When America Will Become Europe. Thoughts of Our European Future to Come [Victor Davis Hanson]

In the US the tax consumers are clustered in cities along the coast and the great lakes. The tax producers are in the countryside.

Lovely thought, but unfortunately dead wrong.

It's been known for a good many years that the blue states tend to be net tax payers and the red states tend to be net consumers. Within states you are of course quite correct that central cities are financial black holes.

Here's report from several years back that documents this pattern in great detail.

http://www.taxfoundation.org/files/sr139.pdf

I have no idea how the recent financial meltdown has affected the situation, but I suspect it's hit federal income from blue states harder than it has from red states, reducing or possibly even reversing the traditional gap.

I did not think of doctors talking to him in the disparaging way, but rather the nurses or aides or orderlies. The British system is so controlled by the housekeepers unions, (think: SEIU) that I automatically assumed that it was that caliber of worker who was being so callous. I have great sympathy for doctors in those systems, because they can only practice their art at the whim of the union stewards and union rules.

Oh - again - that's different as well. Thank you for helping me see a layer of reading that a non-native english speaker might miss rather than just assuming I'm an Obamabot or a rube. That happens on here sometimes.

Yeah it’s awsome.

The median income in germany is still much higher then in the US. Ok AVERAGE income is higher in the US but that doesn’t say americans can buy more.

If for example John Paulson moves to nigeria - nigeria will have more average income then switzerland.

It’s also true that cars are much bigger in the US - and louder and slower and will break down more often because tehy still run on 1970ies tech. That’s why Volkswagen invests in building a factory for some billions for small cars in chatanooga.

Also many europeans live in a rented small flat. While in the US a guy named george w campaigned for pres. some 9 years ago with a slogan - namely the ‘society of ownership’.

It’s a society of underwater mortgages now ... but hey it’s certainly a lot of luxury your bank owns today.

I’d buy or build some small flats in the US now - let’s see if they are for rent - now after george is finished with his ‘society of ownership’ program.

Public transport is annoying sometimes over here - that’s true - it still beats sneaking along the road with 55 miles per hour - spending your whole life either in transit or in the jam.

There’s a lot of stereotypes about europe - it’s unlike the states, that’s true - but it’s not that bad and world best standards of live you will find in scandinavia - best health support, lowest infant mortality, educated people everywhere, low crime, low polution, lot’s of individual freedom... you name it.

And by the way - I am going to the Cote d’azur next weekend - that’s in the mediterranian sea - where people like Steve Balmer, Bill Gates, Paul Allen or Lary Elison are spending their time on a yacht - maybe they enjoy their time in an area where they won’t get shot at even if they aren’t inside some fortress - so maybe we should count their income to where they really live :)

I don't want to live in a rented small flat. To hell with that. Give me the society of ownership...it works for me. It wasn't Bush who created the subprime mortgage either. You would have to look to the Dems for that, to groups such as Acorn, full of community organizers, and Barney Frank.

If I someday have to live in a rented small flat, I will survive it somehow, but not today. I have a modest home that I can afford to pay for, with a yard. Ownership is good.

Ownership is good - that’s a fact. Small flats suck - exprecially in a city like London - also true.

Bush didn’t create the Subprime Mortgage ... that is still correct.

But the decission to not increase taxes for the expenses on warfare but to stick it to the dollar - hence increasng the prices for oil and other commodities - THAT was a political decission.

Also it was a political decission - and wolfowitz stands out here as a leading person NOT to interfere with the markets by creating new and appropriate rules for the evaluation of financial products and to increase pressure on the federal reserve to keep the interests low.

Subprime worked like that - give a person without any securities money to buy a house. Take the debt from all these poor guys and repackage it - and sell the most of it as an investment of highest security (suitable for your retirement investment as an example). Repeat until bubble bursts. (The system works with climbing prices - but trees don’t grow into heaven)

Now that was plain fraud and treasury surely knew what went on. They certainly knew that they stuck the costs of warfare to the dollar.

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