In the UK, there are so many different ways to pronounce a word depending on your region and class - some are wildly different phonetically. I'm sure the States is similar. I'm curious as to how you would work out which particular accent to base your phonetic spelling on?
>>I'm sure the States is similar. I'm curious as to how you would work out which particular accent to base your phonetic spelling on?
Probably whichever one the UN tells him to use.
Some reformers would like to have a different reform for each country -- SoundSpel was once called "American" for this reason. But this is really not necessary, because in general, pronunciations are consistent within a group. If you do not pronounce the h in "house" you don't say it in "hotel" or "horse" either. So you can just write it and most people won't say it if they come from those parts.
Anyway, no reform will ever be perfect. Nothing is. But it can be vastly better than our Traditional Orthography. After all, nobody anywhere pronounces the S in island. And vastly better is good enough.