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Originally Posted by Webby
OK... Will try and condense and get to the point :-)
All over the western world and a good portion of other countries - there is no problem with "barriers". You can form a corp one day and be trading the next. Some countries even offer funding and all types of "help" is available for new corps. Can't actually see where the US is any different from this.
OK.. On better biz environment.. (and this is only one, but based on personal experience) - Where I am now is an excellent biz environment and vastly superior to the US. From here I can choose any other country/continent to operate within. That can be some island in the Caribbean, in the heart of the EU or another Latin American country - all have varying aspects which are beneficial for whatever reason. Each also has their own laws, but not one of these laws are an obstacle course or an inhibitor to doing business - they have their own "porn laws", but these are more common sense and no "record keeping" is involved. Ultimately, all funds generated will end up within a corp where no taxation is payable.
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Don't get me wrong, I'd love not to have to pay tax on everything. But I also enjoy driving on roads, having public services readily available (police/fire/library/schools), and some form of protection when I put my money in the bank. I don't understand how we'd be able to maintain these things without some taxes being paid.
I've also never encountered any problems dealing with other countries. I hire programmers and designers all around the world, make transactions with ease, and have never been stymied by anything the government has done. The 2257 regulations do suck, and I feel they are overboard. I do support a form of 2257 for maintaining someone is 18 and am happy we are not like other countries where child pornography and child sex trafficking is prevelant.
Again, I'm not sure what problems you foresee in businesses in the US having. It's easy to start, taxes are low, and regulations are soft.
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Originally Posted by Webby
I thinks you are trying to defend pocketkangaroo  It ain't about "defending".
OK.. Nobody said there are not some excellent tutors - there are. Tho that can be said of any western country - and a few more. I think you may be surprised how many foreign students enter other western countries. At the moment as far higher education is concerned - some of the leading institutions in the world are in France and Spain (the top two or three were at last check).
For the cost of education within the US - the "value for money" element does not come up to par. It is overpriced and leaves a grad with loans for having this "privilege". That said, higher education in other western countries does cost money, - but not at that level. |
I know there are a lot of great schools in the world. I'm just saying that more people come to the US for education than anywhere else.
As for the value of education for money, it's hard to tell. I believe an average college grad will earn $11,000 more a year than a non-graduate. If you add up the numbers in a lifetime, it makes going to college a solid investment, especially if you study a profession that is in high demand. Despite what some GFYers will say, it is tough to find a well paying job without a college degree.
The price of college is tricky, as there is a big discrepency from public to private universities. If you go to a public state school, you really won't pay a lot at all. Most of your high priced schools are private, and they have to fund themselves and pay for their high priced professors. I don't know how you can tell Harvard that they should charge less seeing as they are privately owned and operated. Not to mention that someone receiving a degree from a high priced, well known school will most likely not have a problem getting a substantially high paid job. I'm not sure what your solution for this is?
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Originally Posted by Webby
The health system has excellent people - that is not the issue, but the "system" is the problem. It's top heavy, overpriced, linked with insurance companies and ya might as well book a cheaper suite at the Hilton.
When it comes to "value for money" - it's a total joke and recognized as such. That results in items like..... I can get an air ambulance insurance policy to fly me direct to Canada or the EU for... can't remember... but around $900. BUT... the moment there is a wish to fly to eg Florida, that insurance policy is.. almost $3000.
Another example... Where I am now there are US medical clinics - basically hotel suites. They provide a service which is around 25% of the cost of the same service in the US. It is the same hospital groups, the same medicine, the same level of medical staffing. Why? Because the US public are being ripped on a very substantial scale.
This then results in US folks flying here for operations.
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There is no doubt that health costs are more expensive in the US. This is because of education, malpractice insurance, and doctors having the most high tech equipment in the field. Insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies have far too much power and fuck over a lot of people while the government turns a blind eye. The system needs a lot of work.
But we also have the most medically advanced technology and doctors in the world. While I'm sure people head to your country for procedures, people all across the world head to the US for advanced procedures and experimental treatments not found anywhere else. The industry is constantly advancing and if you were sick (and money wasn't a factor), I couldn't fathom you not wanting to be treated in this country. The financial factor is a problem, but it is also what drives pharmaceutical companies and doctors to become better.
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Originally Posted by Webby
The issue is not about cheap labor (tho kinda agree) - Whatever a country needs to do to improve it's standard of living - it will do. China produces more product than any country on the planet. It also consumes a high amount of that products internally - while exporting the rest. This in turn, raises the standard of living for folks in China. You may be surprised, but China does not necessarily live on .20 cents/day. There are more cellphones in China than anywhere else - and these are more sophisticated than what we normally know of.
China has an economy which is growing far faster than any western country - that surpasses both the US and EU together.
The Chinese govt is sitting on many billions of US currency and various volumes of currency from other nations. The volume of this currency allows them to issued loans to the US at a rate of around $2 - $4 billion/day. They also have extensive trading partners worldwide and actively seeking to doing more business with these partners - but also doing "cooperative deals" and, in full or in part, - funding a wide variety of construction projects from bridges to whatever.
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I'm not sure you'd prefer the standard of living to the average Chinese person to the average American. While Americans bitch a lot about crap, they do have an extremely high standard of living. A poor kid is considered one whose parents can't buy him an iPod. The cell phone argument is fairly moot considering they have many more people than any other country, and the percent of people in China owning a cell phone is still signifigantly lower than the US and especially Europe.
While they are growing rapidly, they also rely heavily on exporting goods and thus heavily on other countries to remain strong and continue buying. I'd still prefer my US or European traffic to Chinese traffic any day of the week.