Things I adore about the USA and Americans

[PermanentTemporary]

No special reason... and it doesn't have to be things other people all agree with.

We're planning a holiday there in a couple of years to see some family so the wonderfulness of the USA is particularly on my mind. But am just thinking about how much I love it.

I'll bring up Senator George Mitchell, who gave years of his life to somehow bring the best out of every politician in Northern Ireland and made it possible for the Good Friday Agreement to be made.

I'll bring up American health care. Because although I don't want to change our system to theirs, the fact is that if you either have good insurance or nothing at all, you can have the best care in the world.

And the Grand Canyon. Not sure I've ever been speechless the way I was the first time I saw it.

I'm wondering if we can drop in to see some distant cousins of my partner's who live in Ohio. We've met once at a wedding. Of all the countries in the world, we can be pretty sure that they will be welcoming and happy to see us. ❤️

I’ve got such fab American friends. Mainly met through work, a while range of different folks. Just lovely. And they crack me up 🤣😍❤️❤️

Canada=a state? Is that a joke, rage bait, or a failure of the education system?

Canada has a single payer, publicly funded system, but it's not free. It is no-cost to the patient at point of service, but the funding comes from taxation, so the people of Canada are paying, just not at the point of use.

Medicare in the US is similar; the government-funded portion is free at point of use, but we pay specific medicare tax on income in the US to fund it.

No this is false. It might seem paradoxical but it's true. If you have literally nothing (or very little, though just how little depends on state) you get Medicaid, where everything, and I mean everything, is free. Even nursing homes.

It is people in the next bracket up, who aren't eligible for Medicaid but don't have good employer insurance, who have the worst time. Or who have employer insurance that is not very good and have a large deductible. The ACA partly filled this gap by giving access to subsidised insurance to working and middle class people.

The other people who have trouble are people who are on a fairly high income but do not have employer insurance (they are self employed, contractors, etc). They are no longer eligible for subsidies and have to pay the full premium, which is a lot if you are a family. I know someone whose husband made a very nice living, I would guess $200K. But she went to work as a para (teaching assistant) which is poorly paying, because it includes very good insurance that's probably worth more than the salary itself, and frees up more than that from her husband's income since the premiums for individuals are higher than group ones. That's another issue; it warps job choices.

Most people do say "free" to mean "free at point of use". After all everything is funded somewhere.

However the Canadian system excludes a number of things: It does not include many non-hospital providers, such as psychotherapists, psychologists, physiotherapists, optometrists; it does not include dental; and it does not include pharmacare (non-hospital prescriptions), though prices are regulated. Provinces provide some pharmacare support based on income. Many people have extended insurance through work to cover these things.

Medicare for American seniors is most like the French Assurance maladie; it pays a set percentage of bills, and you either pay the rest or get a supplemental plan to cover it.

Can we please not derail this lovely thread with yet another bun fight over American health care? 😄

In-N-Burger

Much friendlier and I love the contrasts in just a relatively small area

This is what I do for a living! 🤣 Sort of, anyway; I have a master's in health economics.

I also know more than I want to know about how health care is paid for in the US. 😂

Canada is literally part of America??

It’s a country in North America. It’s not part of the USA, the topic of this thread; and nor are Canadians American by nationality.

Las Vegas with a 3 year old. The receptionist at the MGM Grand loved him and gave us a room with a great view of the fair ground hotel.
Considering we weren't gambling, we were treated really well and the Americans were so kind to our little boy.
We travelled to Lake Mead and some grandparents with kids gave our boy some fish food so we all fed the fish and chatted like old friends.

I'm so pleased you had this experience. Americans are really open to interacting with strangers if the circumstances allow it. And kids are a great starting point for a conversation.

I was once on a long flight sitting beside a woman about my age. She studiously ignored me, which bothered me a little, so I introduced myself and asked her why she was traveling. She was Norwegian, spoke excellent English, and we had a lovely chat. As the flight was ending, she thanked me. I asked her why, and she said that she really enjoyed talking to me but never would have initiated a conversation with me. It simply wasn't done in her culture.

I don't care they're one and the same in my eyes
Just like British people and Australian people are one and the same, just the latter had a bit more sun (I can say this my DH is Aussie)

Never call a Canadian an American. Canadians may be excruciatingly polite but they have limits! 😂 America may mean a continent but really as an adjective it does mean the USA. The official name of Mexico is the Estados Unidos de México by the way. And they just call us americanos, not estadounidenses.

And yes Americans are chattier as a rule. I was out last week and had some knitting with me (I always do) and someone struck up a conversation about what I was making. I wound up demonstrating Norwegian purl for her.

As an American who moved to Britain, I find this thread charming in many respects, but please don't underestimate the horrors of US healthcare. I grew up in a low income family, but due to the income we weren't eligible for Medicaid. For most of my childhood, we didn't have any medical care, because we couldn't afford it. My mother had a heart condition that forced her to go the ER periodically. One short, life-saving visit to the ER would always result in thousands of pounds of debt, which would take years to pay off. I also have an aunt who died in her 40s of a heart attack. Her dying words to her children were, 'Don't call the ambulance, it's too expensive.' Seriously.

And even if you do have insurance, insurance companies have an unwarranted amount of power over which medications your doctors can prescribe, and how much they will cost.

I have always told my DC that living in the UK is better than living in the US for two main reasons: healthcare and guns.

I'll spare you my stories of the loved ones I know who have died violent deaths by guns.

When it comes to living in the US, so much depends on where you are living and what your income is. Life can be good or it can be absolutely awful. I suppose the same is true of living in the UK. But all in all, if you have a low income, I think life is better in the UK. There is still more of a safety net here in terms of benefits and health care.

I've also given birth in both countries and I much preferred maternity care in the UK.

And the execrable lack of health care I experienced when growing up in the US isn't an intervention in a bunfight; it's just a statement of fact. I think Obamacare has improved things somewhat, but there are still a lot of people falling through the gaps.

I have to give Obama credit for this, medicaid has improved massively since the ACA. And we have S-CHIP too, for kids who are better off but don't have insurance through their parents. Very few children are uninsured now (Texas, as always, is the outlier. 10% of Texas children are uninsured but only 1% in MA.)

I had 1child in the UK, 2 in the USA, and my maternity care in the UK was shambolic. There's a number of variables on this one, though. My area of London was known to be difficult and if I had known how it was going to be I would have asked to go to a different hospital. I was also a higher risk patient, so my births were always going to be much more medical, and I think America is better at that.

That makes sense, knitnerd90. Bloody Texas!

Maybe my own experience of giving birth in the UK was better than average, because I live close to a big hospital with a really excellent maternity ward (challenging cases are transferred there from other hospitals).

And yes, my experience of maternity care in the US (which happened at a time I did have health insurance!) was that it was over-medicalised. So many injections, so many tests. And it seemed like the main underlying concern was that the hospitals/insurance companies wanted to avoid any potential lawsuit. And when I finally did give birth, it was on my back with my feet in stirrups. So old-fashioned! It was a revelation to be in labour in the UK hospital and have the midwife encouraging me to move into any position I liked.

Both my DC were born prematurely and they both had excellent care, but in the US, again, the tests and assessments of my newborn DC were relentless. In the UK it seemed as though the care was just as competent, but slightly lighter touch.

Interestingly I also experienced more anti-breastfeeding discrimination in the US than in the UK. In the US Catholic hospital where my DC was born, I brought him back for one of the endless health checks, and the admin person at the desk told me that if I wanted to breastfeed in the waiting room, I needed to 'cover up'. It still makes me cross to think about it now. In fact, in the US state I was in, women are entitled to breastfeed anywhere (no covering up required!) but I didn't know that at the time. I think the hospital as a Catholic hospital just had a very conservative mindset.

I also think maternity care is notoriously worse in the US for ethnic minorities.

It's hard to know how much of my experience is just anecdotal (based on the US and UK cities I've lived in!) and how much is indicative of a wider pattern.

Out of interest I was just googling maternal mortality rates in different countries:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_maternal_mortality_ratio

Australia: 2.9. The UK: 9.8. The US: 21.1. The US should honestly do better.

And OMG the maternity leave provisions in the US! As a full-time, tenure-track academic at a large US state university, I was entitled to the same maternity leave provision as all the other state employees: six weeks.

I promise to shut up now and stop maligning my country of origin😂

Well, that ship has well and truly sailed.

Statistically the UK's racial gap in maternity care is worse than America's, for Black women anyway. I was absolutely shocked to learn that as I thought having an NHS, independently of anything, would improve gaps by providing a consistent floor level and continuity of care.

I had 3 Caesarean sections and quite honestly, it seems like surgery is surgery the world over! I do have to say having a private room after that was better than being in a bay of 8 with mandatory rooming-in and everyone's husbands round all day. So credit to the US on that, as well as having decent nursing ratios. Being a nurse here is tough but at least they are properly paid and have better working conditions.