How the U.S. stacks up in some key areas

10. November 2008 by admin.

With all the rhetoric flung around during the recent election, it is instructive (at least to me) to understand some of the key areas in which the United States leads the world and some of the ways that it falls far down on the list.  Only when we are cognizant of where we stand, can we improve our standing in some very critical areas, I believe.   For instance, there is a myth that socialized medicine doesn’t work and yet the statistics in key health categories show that it works far better than our system does. In areas where we are already great, we have the responsibility to continue those trends and preserve them–freedom of expression, innovativeness, and the most productive workers in the world by far. 

Am I saying that the U.S. isn’t a great country? No. Am I saying that people from other countries don’t want to come here even with George Bush as President? No. What I am saying is that just because the U.S. is a great country (freedom of speech still greater than any other country, despite the Patriot Act and wholesale spying on the populace by the government) doesn’t mean it can’t be better, esp. with respect to children’s health and welfare.

So where are there areas for the U.S. to improve its standing in the world?

The U.S. ranks #1 or #2 in: Health care spending (but 44th in life expectancy and 29th in infant mortality), obesity as a percentage of the population, child poverty, prisoners per capita, total crimes, divorce rates, rape, and total military expenditures.

The following statistics/rankings were taken from the site "Nationmaster.com" and, in the case of the infant mortality rates, from the LA Times.

 Life Satisfaction: The U.S. ranked #11, behind most of the Scandinavian countries (damned socialists again), Malta, Switzerland, Iceland, Canada, Luxembourg, etc.  The premise for this ranking can be found here.

Life Expectancy at birth (DEFINITION: The average number of years to be lived by a group of people born in the same year, if mortality at each age remains constant in the future. Life expectancy at birth is also a measure of overall quality of life in a country and summarizes the mortality at all ages. It can also be thought of as indicating the potential return on investment in human capital and is necessary for the calculation of various actuarial measures):

U.S. is #44, at 78 years.  What country is #1?  Of course, the Republicans, who are so terrified of socialized medicine, would say it has to be a country with private health care, right?  Well, it’s Andorra, with an average life expectancy of over 83 years, a full 5 years more on average than the U.S. and a fully socialized health care system.  Some other countries that have higher life expectancy rates at birth than the U.S. does? How about Bosnia and Herzegovina, Jordan, Israel–all peaceful, idyllic spots with no man-made problems at all…

Infant Mortality: the U.S. is #29, as in there are 28 countries with LOWER infant mortality rates,  (as of 2005, the last year for which numbers are available) with 6.86 infant deaths per 1000 live births.  Sweden, Norway, Finland, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore are below 3.2.  Notice that at least 4 of those are countries with socialized health care systems.

Health Care (spending per capita): Want to guess who is #1? That’s right, the U.S.  We are 29th in the world in infant mortality, 44th in the world in life expectancy at birth, but we have the highest spending per capita of any country. 

Obesity as percentage of the Population: Again, guess what country’s #1? That’s right!  The United States, with 30% of the  population, followed by Mexico and the UK.

 Education spending as a % of GDP: This one is stunning–the U.S. is #38, spending only 5.7% of GDP on education.  Which country do you think is #1?  Possibly Japan, or Norway, or Germany?  No, it’s Cuba!

 Percent of adult U.S. population with high literacy level: 19% (U.S. ranked 9th behind a number of European countries), including Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Canada, etc.

Percent of adult U.S. population with low literacy level: 47.6% (U.S. ranked 7th)

United States mathematical literacy, measured at 15 years old: ranked 18th (behind 17 other countries) out of 27. Japan was first.

Total years of school life expectancy: The U.S. is #14 with 15.2 years, the #1 being Norway with 16.9 years.

Child Poverty (measured as share of children living in households with income below 50% of the national median): United States had second HIGHEST rate in this category, only topped by Mexico!  There were 21 countries (including those infamous socialistic European countires where everything is supposedly going to hell in a hand-basket because they don’t practice the obviously superior system of free-market capitalism that has yielded such wondrous results for us here in the U.S.

GDP real growth rate (CIA world factbook): United States had a 3.2% growth rate making us 150th with 149 countries having higher growth rates, including such powerhouses as Burundi, Namibia, Saint Lucia.

Business efficiency: United States was #1.

Financial Satisfaction: United States was #8.  The higher-ranking countries included Switzerland, Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Canada, Italy and Ireland.

 Real exports of goods and services annual growth rate: United States ranked 26th out of 30 with a negative 1.2% growth rate. New Zealand was #1, South Korea was #2 and Hungary was #3 all with export growth rates of above +7%.

 Gross Domestic Product (per capita): United States ranked 8th, with $41,890 per capita.  #1-3 were Luxembourg, Norway and Iceland (again, countries with socialized medicine and many more state-run social services than the U.S.). 

Prisoners per Capita: Probably not a surprise that the U.S. is #1 with 715 per 100K people.  What’s more interesting is that you have to get to #61 to find the first Western European country on the list, Spain. 

 Executions (most recent): The U.S. is #7, with 6 countries that have higher execution rates.  Those 6 distinguished countries, all obvious champions of human rights, are: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Congo and Egypt.  We are obviously in good company.  What’s interesting about this list is that there isn’t a single European (forget Western European) country on the list–because no European Country allows the death penalty…

 Total Crimes: U.S. is #1, with just under 12,000,000 and #8 per with total crimes per capita, 80 per 1000.

 Murders with firearms (per capita): U.S. ranked 8th highest, topped only by South Africa, Colombia, Thailand, Zimbabwe, Mexico, Belarus, and Costa Rica.  Every European country had less murders with firearms.

 Corruption: U.S. is 17th.  There are 16 countries less corrupt than the U.S.  The least corrupt include Iceland, Finland, New Zealand and Denmark.

 Divorce Rate: U.S. is #1, with the highest for all countries at 4.95 per 1000 people, followed by Puerto Rico and Russia.

 Rapes: U.S., again, is #1, with just about double the total number of rapes (~95K) as the next country, South Africa (~52K). The U.S. is #9 in rapes per capita, with #1 being South Africa.

 Armed Forces Personnel: U.S. was #3, only topped by China and Russia. 

 Conventional Arms (weapons) Exports: U.S. is #2 behind only Russia, with $6Billion worth of weapons sold to other countries.

 Total military expenditures: U.S. had the honor of being #1, with MORE THAN 4x the total of #2, China.

 Percentage of Population below the poverty line: U.S. was #122 with 12%.  Countries with lower percentages included Syria, Croatia, Ireland, Tunisia.

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