<story><title>Why the U.S. Spends So Much More Than Other Nations on Health Care</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/02/upshot/us-health-care-expensive-country-comparison.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Gustomaximus</author><text>Sweden and Norway, both flagship nanny states are extremely entrepreneurial and not just by volume but success. This goes against the logic you can&amp;#x27;t have social support and people reaching for entrepreneurial success.&lt;p&gt;I think, though know this is anecdotal, US startup success is based largely on its market size of both consumers and venture capital.</text></item><item><author>Joeri</author><text>Counterpoint from a fellow european. I found americans to not be more selfish, but more appreciative of self-reliance. In europe in most countries the philosophy is that of the nanny state, taking care of its citizens no matter what got them into a care-needing situation. In much of the US there’s much more a perception of responsibility for your own success, with negative individual outcomes being considered a necessary evil linked to personal freedom.&lt;p&gt;Looking at the stats clearly the US needs a little more nanny state to generate better outcomes for the bottom half of the country. But equally europe needs more appreciation of self-reliance and entrepreneurship to enable a richer startup culture and let the EU become an economic leader instead of follower.</text></item><item><author>spiderfarmer</author><text>I think the US could easily solve this if they wanted to, but from my (Dutch) point of view:&lt;p&gt;- The US is philosophically much more egotistic than other developed countries&lt;p&gt;- Politically the US is the most divided western country with its two party system&lt;p&gt;- Money in politics means it&amp;#x27;s one of the most corrupt, preventing solutions that could serve its citizens&lt;p&gt;- Conservative media does a very good job at keeping at least 50% of the country comically uninformed&lt;p&gt;- The &amp;quot;American Dream&amp;quot; gives people the impression that working hard solves everything and that their country is the best in the world period&lt;p&gt;- Religion is not focussed on empathy at all anymore, if it ever was&lt;p&gt;The billionare .0001% will probably do their utmost to keep the status quo, as evidently, they are the ones that are profiting from the current situation and they are the ones calling the shots for the next 3 years.&lt;p&gt;The US is doing very good in a lot of areas, but I think collective egotism is preventing it from reaching its true potential.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Jommi</author><text>How on earth is Norway entrepreneurial by volume OR success?</text></comment>
<story><title>Why the U.S. Spends So Much More Than Other Nations on Health Care</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/02/upshot/us-health-care-expensive-country-comparison.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>Gustomaximus</author><text>Sweden and Norway, both flagship nanny states are extremely entrepreneurial and not just by volume but success. This goes against the logic you can&amp;#x27;t have social support and people reaching for entrepreneurial success.&lt;p&gt;I think, though know this is anecdotal, US startup success is based largely on its market size of both consumers and venture capital.</text></item><item><author>Joeri</author><text>Counterpoint from a fellow european. I found americans to not be more selfish, but more appreciative of self-reliance. In europe in most countries the philosophy is that of the nanny state, taking care of its citizens no matter what got them into a care-needing situation. In much of the US there’s much more a perception of responsibility for your own success, with negative individual outcomes being considered a necessary evil linked to personal freedom.&lt;p&gt;Looking at the stats clearly the US needs a little more nanny state to generate better outcomes for the bottom half of the country. But equally europe needs more appreciation of self-reliance and entrepreneurship to enable a richer startup culture and let the EU become an economic leader instead of follower.</text></item><item><author>spiderfarmer</author><text>I think the US could easily solve this if they wanted to, but from my (Dutch) point of view:&lt;p&gt;- The US is philosophically much more egotistic than other developed countries&lt;p&gt;- Politically the US is the most divided western country with its two party system&lt;p&gt;- Money in politics means it&amp;#x27;s one of the most corrupt, preventing solutions that could serve its citizens&lt;p&gt;- Conservative media does a very good job at keeping at least 50% of the country comically uninformed&lt;p&gt;- The &amp;quot;American Dream&amp;quot; gives people the impression that working hard solves everything and that their country is the best in the world period&lt;p&gt;- Religion is not focussed on empathy at all anymore, if it ever was&lt;p&gt;The billionare .0001% will probably do their utmost to keep the status quo, as evidently, they are the ones that are profiting from the current situation and they are the ones calling the shots for the next 3 years.&lt;p&gt;The US is doing very good in a lot of areas, but I think collective egotism is preventing it from reaching its true potential.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>spiderfarmer</author><text>That&amp;#x27;s true, a lot of European startups focus on making it in their local market and from there branch out to other countries, whereas startups in the US are from their inception focussing on their large, single market with no language barriers.&lt;p&gt;I think that&amp;#x27;s slowly changing. Dutch startups are told to think big nowadays and access to venture capital is also improving.</text></comment>