Re:Record Numbers of Americans Want to Leave the U.S
by wwweston on Monday January 07, 2019 @12:30PM
(#18847448)
> How we spend that money is just horribly inefficient!
Well, it depends on what your goal is.
If it's to improve population-wide health care outcomes, then yes, we do a worse job than many other first world nations.
If it's to allow for a, ah, "vibrant" set of industries who can benefit from capturing social spending while providing mixed outcomes which we justify by enshrining the fundamental attribution error under the banner of "meritocracy" then perhaps we're being efficient after all.
Re:Record Numbers of Americans Want to Leave the U.S
by skh on Monday January 07, 2019 @12:21PM
(#18847291)
There was no false dichotomy in what I wrote. Our return on taxation is a horrible healthcare system and an extremely effective military. I mentioned nothing about level of spending. I mentioned the returns on said spending. Of corse we could have a powerful military and a good healthcare system but we don’t. We have the former but not the latter.
Re:Record Numbers of Americans Want to Leave the U.S
by kortilla on Monday January 07, 2019 @12:35PM
(#18847513)
It’s an implied false dichotomy. There is no reason to mention the military spending otherwise.
Re:Record Numbers of Americans Want to Leave the U.S
by skh on Monday January 07, 2019 @12:47PM
(#18847702)
I didn’t mention military spending or any other spending. I mentioned returns on taxation. What we get in return for our taxes in the U.S. is an overly expensive healthcare system, overly expensive education system, etc. and the only thing that really shines is the military. Hence, I’m disatisfied with the returns on taxation.
We can have both the most advanced military and a solid social system if we can figure out how to get our social spending return on investment close to other western nation. Universal Health care would be a big step. Other stuff to look at is collapsing the number of social services agencies down to a more reasonable numbers, not removing the benefits. Actually auditing our system to figure out what is and what is not working rather then allocating money based on political appearances.