On Wed, 2008-02-13 at 17:06 -0700, Technomage-hawke wrote:
> On Wednesday 13 February 2008 16:29, Craig White wrote:
> > If you look simply at the 'western' civilizations, our infant mortality
> > rates are indeed substantially higher. Our rate is more than twice as high
> > as that of Japan. I suppose we can quibble over what represents
> > substantially but I consider 2:1 factors substantial.
> problem is, you can't just look at "western civilization". the data points
> become too arbitrary and cease having any relevance. we are a global
> community these days. what affects a place like china can have a significant
> effect here (and vice versa). to a lessor extent do some other places have
> that effect. to get the best understanding possible, you *do* have to account
> for everything.
----
if we limit to "western civilizations'", we can appreciate similarities
in philosophy and technology whereas a country like China shares little
thus far in terms of philosophy, technology or percentage of GDP (and I
haven't looked to verify this).
To include all of the countries will indeed mask the simple conclusion,
that dollar for dollar, we aren't getting our money's worth
----
> >
> > Then if you consider that as a percentage of GDP, we outspend all of those
> > countries on health care and the fact that they have lower infant mortality
> > rates should be a clue that something is wrong here.
>
> true. we outspend, but, we also see a bit better return on that.
> However, there are some "grey" statistics dealing with that here in the US. if
> you are talking strictly native born Americans, the actual cost per GDP is
> substantially lower than if you account for all the people here (including
> illegal aliens and documented aliens). one of the links I posted as a second
> response deals with this specific problem.
----
grey?
We American's have a truly unique philosophy of providing medical
treatment for non-citizens...we don't provide medical treatment except
for life/death or naturally, as a fee for service. Sicko made this
abundantly clear because American's get free or nearly free treatment
when they went to other countries.
Apparently it is only the difference in cost for the delivery of
services that makes it ok to provide libraries for free access to books,
etc., education for our youth but not health care...or is it?
Again, the question Michael Moore asked... "Who Are We?"
Craig
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