Please don't take this personally, I got really passionate xD
Comping the USA to Europe is insane. Comparing any country to another is insane. Each country has their own culture, history, ideas all which play a HUGE role in how it affects every aspect of their country including crime rates. Copying their policies here without taking anything I said above into consideration would never work.
How is that insane... ? Would you rather ignore how other countries are doing, even if what they are doing work better, simply based on the fact that people would have different cultures? They are different cultures within a country, should we never compare them?
And speaking of the U.S., Europeans and Americans have a common history (Christianity being one of them) and are countries of similar wealthness. Their culture is close enough to justify a fair comparison. It's perfectly valid to compare them and look at examples where some "ideas" are implemented, instead of automatically denying its feasibility without having to provide argumentation (that's what politics do). In many ways, Europe found some inspiration looking at the U.S. for a large number of things these past decades. Maybe the U.S. could do the same sometimes, especially regarding some current, hot topics (I won't get into that).
By reading international newspapers, you could also make your own opinion on whether something could potentially work or not, and whether the reflection you have or your own society is accurate or biased. Constant demonizing of socialism in the U.S., now THAT is insane, and it relies on nothing more than a wide spread propaganda. Safety nets? lots of them are in place in Europe, even in Canada, and the countries aren't crowded with poor people abusing them (though some individuals are abusing - yes). It offers a peace of mind in life, where you know that should something bad happen to you, where you're not necessarily responsible of (sickness, cancer, whatever) your country is not going to throw a big fuck you at your face, with people around you telling you they give no shit about contributing 1% of their "hard earned money" for a safety net that EVERYONE could need someday.
Sure! It might not work as well in a society filled with individualism, but that doesn't mean you can't try to educate people to its benefits rather than letting fatality win. The all too common "Thoughts and prayers" every time something goes wrong!
That's actually my one big complain since I moved to the US, the absolute ignorance that some people (public figures, politics, and some medias) show everyday regarding their understanding or the world. You can thank biased medias and lobbies funding campaigns for that, there was one guy at least open to give it all a fresh look, and he was beaten by Clinton, not that they ever fought on equal grounds anyway...
On safety nets...so I'm torn on this. It is true that good honest people do indeed fall on hard times (sometimes through no fault of their own) and helping one another would be the moral thing to do. However if you subsidized something you get more of it(agro more poor people) If you tax it you get less of it (people who are willing to put in extra hours of work) You need to find a balance and I think the USA has gone far to far into the subsidized part of it. Look at the single motherhood rate, look at all the poor people who are doing NOTHING to improve their lives and instead leeching off the government and demanding more and more.
For the love of everything that matters, about poor people, this is typically a case where you SHOULD look at how other countries are doing. Yes there's always a risk of people leeching and abusing systems, however in the U.S. such systems barely exist, what exist is that you can be a worker at walmart, working full time, and get completely screwed in life because of one health care bill, BECAUSE there are no safety net. Having safety nets is essential. It is to me so much more important than a few potential leechers ! Those you can always try to rule them out by being smarter and smart about who you help. But priorities, PLEASE!
And being a IT dev, paying a lot of taxes in the US, I would GLADLY spend even more if these people weren't stuck in a hellhole where they kept being blamed by people richer than them, while having next to no security in life, thanks to an extreme idea of capitalism that makes even health care related services an excuse to screw people over for profit.
Also, instead of automatically blaming the poor, maybe try to work around fixing the root cause? I don't know... free education comes in mind, giving everyone a fair change to succeed FIRST and then sure, if they don't give a shit, they won't ever be rich, their bad for being lazy... but at least give them a fair chance. But it's too easy to not look at the inherent problems that living in poor areas bring, and then blame them for leeching off the society, and blame them for all the violence. A successful civilization should ALWAYS work towards reducing inequalities between the top of the society and the bottom. Reducing them, but still allowing people to breath and succeed through meritocracy.
rent over, please don't hate me <3
