3 ways America should be more like Canada

Daily Ticker ^ | 5/14/14 | Rick Newman

[TangledUpInBlue]

So for guidance on how to fix America, why not look north to Canada, where the mood is upbeat and life appears to be getting demonstrably better? The New York Times recently reported the Canadian middle class is now the world’s richest, surpassing the U.S. for the first time. In the 2014 “better life index” recently published by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Canada outscored the United States in 9 of 11 categories, including education, safety and overall life satisfaction

[TangledUpInBlue]

Vermont has maple syrup and so does New Hampshire. You can cross of #1 :)

[null and void]

Tim Hortons....

[dfwgator]

Poutine.

[null and void]

No fair picking Idi Amin or Pol Pot. The trade has to be for someone actually alive.

[dfwgator]

Man, you’re making this real hard, aren’t you?

[Alberta's Child]

This article is off base on a lot of things, but not necessarily the way you think about it.

1. One of the biggest reasons Canada can afford its national health plan is that it doesn't provide very much health care at all (in comparison to the U.S.). It's easier to get a CAT scan for your pet than for yourself, for example. If that's fine by them, that's fine by me.

2. There's a remarkable reason why Canada's military expenditures is so low, and this is something that ought to resonate with conservatives here in the U.S.: Canada's federal government has very little power. Amazing at it may seem, Canada actually functions today a lot like the U.S. probably would have ended up if the Confederacy had won the Civil War. Most of the political power is vested in the provincial governments (the provinces run their own health care systems, for example), and for most Canadians, Ottawa is just a nice city on the banks of the Ottawa River with lots of British architecture.

3. The point about the housing bubble is right on. Canada has strict lending standards and a very heavily regulated banking system. Canada also doesn't have the mortgage interest tax deduction, which means homeowners aren't given a major tax incentive to borrow as much money as possible against their homes.

[goodnesswins]

In Canada as I understand it mortgages must be re done every 5 years!!! I lived in Canada for 3 years...don’t get me started

[dfwgator]

And Canada doesn’t exactly have nearly as many of the “Gibsmedat” crowd as here in the US.

[Alberta's Child]

True, but they have more than you might think. Up there, the “gibsmedat” crowd consists mainly of aboriginal tribes. And the folks in Quebec aren’t full-fledged welfare cases, but they are willing to accept a heavy dose of Marxism to prop up their standard of living.

[Alberta's Child]

That’s another good point. There’s no such thing as a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage in Canada. Between that and the lack of tax deductibility for mortgage interest, Canadian homeowners have a very strong incentive to pay off their mortgages as quickly as possible.

[dfwgator]

Well at least they won’t physically attack you.

[the anti-mahdi]

I would trade Obama for 17 trillion dollars—oops, already been done.

[Alberta's Child]

That’s because most tribal reservations are in areas of Canada where citizens are more likely to own firearms.

[TangledUpInBlue]

Your point 1 is very well taken. When I want to piss off my Canadian friends I tell them of the time I hurt my knee playing hockey.

1) Made appointment at 5PM for the next morning, 8AM.

2) Got examined by an Orthopedist - the Dr. for the NY Jets no less - and also got an X-Ray and MRI done, THAT DAY.

3) Was back at work by 11AM.

That pretty much sends them over the edge. :)

[kabar]

2) Immigration? Last time I checked, there wasn't much problem of illegal immigrants sneaking into Canada from the US. What issues do they have there?

You are confusing illegal immigration with legal immigration. Canada has a far superior system of legal immigration. Unfortunately, the author conflates the US guest worker programs with permanent legal immigration. Here is what he said:

But the whole issue of immigration is far less politicized, and there’s a broad understanding that skilled foreign workers help the economy. Canada actually recruits immigrants, part of a deliberate effort to attract talented foreigners most likely to contribute to economic growth. In the United States, the quota for skilled immigrants is far below the number U.S. firms would hire if they could get them. Despite appeals from many businesses, Congress is paralyzed on reforms that would let more skilled immigrants in, partly because that issue gets conflated with separate reforms aimed at stemming the flow of unskilled illegals.

Canada has a merit based system for permanent legal immigration. We have a kinship system for the 1.1 million legal permanent immigrants who enter annually. An estimated 12% of legal immigrants are merit based--the rest is based on sponsorship from family members, i.e, chain migration. 20% of legal permanent immigrants lack even a high school degree. 87% of them are minorities as classified by the USG.

We bring in 650,000 guest workers a year on temporary work visas. We would not need most guest worker programs if we went to a merit based immigration system.

The vast majority of US legal immigrants come from the Third World. They are changing this country demographically and electorally. Immigrants and minorities vote more than two to one Democrat. In 1970 one in 21 in this country was foreign born; today it is one in 8, the highest in 90 years; and within a decade it will be one in 7, the highest in our history. Since 1990 over 25 million legal immigrants have entered the US during the two highest decades of immigration in US history.

The current breakdown in Canada is

76.7% European

14.2% Asian

4.3% Aboriginal

2.9% Black

1.2% Latin American

0.5% Multiracial

0.3% Other

[Squawk 8888]

This author is clueless. Even his analysis of our banking system is only half-right; the reason we had no financial crisis is the conservative banking culture here.

To all- please ping me to Canadian topics.

Canada Ping!

[Nevadan]

I do enjoy being in Canada when I am there, and it has a lot to commend it. But Canada does not have many of the problems the US has. The ethnic make-up is not as varied. The population is much smaller. On the other hand, the taxes are high (something the lib writer I am sure approves of) and everything - and I mean everything - is more expensive.

[Squawk 8888]

Actually, I’m well south of ND. The latitude here is the same as southern Oregon. Crossing the border into Detroit means going northwest.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Yes and they forgot to mention that Canada only has about a 39 million population so its a little easier to administer a national health program.

They don’t have 20 million illegal unskilled Mexicans sucking off the welfare system and clogging the schools with their kids while they pay no taxes to help support it.

I especially love the part of the article where the guy says the US probably won’t be adopting a Parliamentary style of govt anytime soon. Duh. We have a little thing called the Constitution to abide by.

I have to say though that the guy is right about Canadian debt. They also handle their banking system better.

[Dr. Sivana]

1) One of the biggest reasons Canada can afford it's [expletive deleted] national health plan is because it doesn't have to pay for a national defense.

So much depends on where you are. A growing oil area (Alberta, Sask.) doesn't have nearly enough doctors. And God help you if you don't agree 100% of what the doctor wants you to do.
The worst thing to me about the nationalized health care is the way it warps the thinking of even otherwise conservative citizens (subjects)? Even those who lived and thrived before the socialization are afraid of seeing it go, like the U.S. with Social Security.

2) Immigration? Last time I checked, there wasn't much problem of illegal immigrants sneaking into Canada from the US. What issues do they have there?

It is pretty easy (compared to the U.S.) to buy your way into Canada (landed immigrant). They don't have the RFK designed quota system we have. There are plenty (not, of course, as many as here) who come from Mexico and below. My Canadian wife's family knew one man who feared for his life in El Salvador and made his way all the way up on land. Asians (Indians and Far East) aplenty. They don't really assimilate, but mostly aren't big on crime, either.

3) "With far fewer lending excesses, Canada didn’t really have a housing bust or a credit crisis to recover from."

Yeah, it's hard to find a standard 30 year mortgage in Canada, and rates are generally higher than here, as are housing prices. You have maybe half a dozen real banks. That said, they really DIDN'T have a housing bubble or collapse, and no one was playing funny games with derivatives etc. That may not be a bad thing. No collapse means no taxpayer subsidized bailout. Net plus in my book.