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- Jun 28, 2004
DwyaneWadeOG wrote:
[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Canada
England
Japan
Ireland
Germany
South Korea
France
Egypt
Italy
Qatar
Portugal
China
UAE
Sweden
Denmark
Russia
Brazil[/font]
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[font=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I understand what you are saying in that you can find people who have similar lifestyles to Americans in these countries BUT, the chances of you being someone in that country who has a similar lifestyle to that of an american is tiny. What I am saying is that the average American lives an exponentially better life than the average chinese, egyptian, russian, or brazilian. Italy is also one of the most corrupt countries in the developed world.[/font]
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To add to that point, in all of the Africa and Asian countries named (excepting Japan) you would not the ability or the right to say negative things about those countries' governments and/or religions.
Also, the notion of vast European prosperity is overstated. They do get publicly funded Health care and education but bot hare rationed. Health care is rationed with very long wait times and out right denial of care in many cases. You can get a subsidized world class education but very few spots are available so unless you are in the top 10% or so of your class, you do not go to college. The price of food and fuel is even higher there. The elites in Europe promote (some say brow beat) most people onto trains and buses while they ride around in motorcades. European workers have longer vacations and more job security but that makes employers reluctant to hire even during boom times so unemployment is quite high.
There are many great things about Europe and the standard of living is quite high but a lot of people, especially academics and upper middle class young people, go to Europe and see the lifestyle of the well off in the city and see that they work less than their counter parts back home and then conclude that Europeans, writ large, have a vastly superior standard of living compared to their counter parts in the US.