You misunderstand . We don ' t have a dogeatdog mentality as much as we have a severe distrust of our government ' s motivation and capacity to do the right thing . That mistrust is baked right into our Constitution and , until Teddy Roosevelt , was baked into our entire country ' s structure . The other half of it is that we all love our fellow Americans right up until the point our fellow Americans want what ' s in our wallets . It ' s not that we don ' t have a strong sense of community or that we don ' t want to help . It ' s that we don ' t want to be forced to be so or do so . To many of us , government regulations and even services are a form of control . Just look at the UK and Denmark looking to impose various taxes and controls to encourage people to be healthier or , in the case of the UK , force them . While most of us want everyone to be healthy and happy , few of us want to force people to do anything . A government big enough to give you everything you want , is a government big enough to take away everything that you have . Unkown Not only that , but the majority of us DO have extensive benefits and paid leave . I have so much paid leave this year that I didn ' t know what to do with it all . Now I have to burn an extra week before the end of the year or I ' ll lose that leave for the year . Or I could take a bonus check . The overwhelming majority of Americans are welltakencareof by employers .