| Rath said: If you actually look on that site at the Netherlands individual rankings you will see that they get marked down heavily for 'Government Spending', they also have approximately ~40% of GDP as tax revenue. They also tax and spend like Denmark, Norway, Finland etc. Also not all of Europe is volatile - Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway are all solid as rocks. Also I find it somewhat odd that you (and Happy) assume the failures in the US system are entirely due to errors in the fundamental ideas, but the successes with the same sorts of systems in European countries have absolutely nothing to do with the fundamental ideas and are entirely circumstantial. @Happy. You see I disagree with the entire 'negative consequences typically associated with these programs' part. That is essentially only looking at the USA, where the programs haven't been a grand success, and ignoring the many countries in the world that have implemented social programs succesfully. |
If you read what I stated, the said European nations ranked high for labor freedoms.....Which was my point.
When it comes to the fundemental issues of a nation like America which has less social welfare than a comparable nation in Europe, the reason that Happy and I argue its circumstanial is that there are significant difference between Americans and Europeans. The European model of care is the only one that has had success implementing massive safety nets that have ever survived - even then, the stated nations rely heavily on a few factors that America doesn't have.
My argument is that socialist successes seem to be generally correlated with the size of a nation - and I can understand you vouching for such systems when you live in a very small nation. But as you can see with the American model, its a harbinger of what will likely happen to the EU if they merge. Even then, we're seeing what is happening with nations like Greece, which have the potential to significantly screw up the system.
Back from the dead, I'm afraid.
