‘What’s a very American problem that Americans don’t realise isn’t normal in other countries?’ – 17 uniquely stateside issues
10.
‘America is the only place I’ve been where a lot of people expect special treatment and flex their entitlement. haven’t been everywhere but i don’t see it much elsewhere’
-Mammoth_Ad_1769
11.
‘That you can lose your job without warning. No notice period where you can get paid while looking for something else. Just getting thrown out of a workplace you’ve been at for years, with your belongings.
‘And that this can lead to losing your right to proper health care because of insurance.
‘Basically, no rights and no safety net. Only the rich seem to get severance packages.’
-LovingFitness81
12.
‘Golf courses. Not only do they take a lot of space and water but there is a study that says that people who live around them are more likely to develop Parkinson’s’
-No_Composer5148
13.
‘Being so brainwashed into hyper capitalism that all welfare is considered evil socialism. Taxes? Socialism! Food stamps? Socialism! A kindergarten? Socialism! A shelter for the homeless? Socialism!’
-RingAccomplished8464
14.
‘Drug tests at entry level jobs.’
-Hapalion22
15.
‘Healthcare system is embarrassingly bad. In normal developed countries, you go to a building or building complex built as a hospital and get everything you need done there. Here in the US, your PCP refers you to another location usually. Then you need a new appointment, which means you need to take off from work again.
‘I needed to look for a dermatologist the other week. I found one with good reviews and went. You would expect it to be part of a hospital complex but nope. It’s inside a shopping plaza and the building looks like it could have been a bagel shop or something.
‘Eye clinics are also weird. Back in my home country, there are public hospitals dedicated just for eye health. Here, you have eye clinics inside Walmart or Lenscrafters. Eye clinics inside Lenscrafters feel as if they are a front for luring people to shop from Lenscrafters. I get my eye exam done and next thing I see is a sales person approaching me to sell a frame.
‘Makes sense within the boundaries of capitalism because healthcare is one of the services that absolutely everyone would need eventually, so it is designed as service rather than basic human right.’
-sikisabishii
16.
‘Maternity leave. I work for a global company. The team I’m in charge of has people from Hungry, Turkey, UK, US, and Japan. My US team members have maternity leave for 8 weeks and anything else after falls under FMLA. That’s what the company gives, and there is no govt mandated maternity leave.
‘My Japanese associate had a year off mandated by the government. We have a member on our EU team (my sister team) who has a 3 year maternity leave. She might only take two, though, as she doesn’t want to be gone too long. My wife would have killed to have a year off when she gave birth to our kids.’
-Hooligan8403
17.
‘Pretty much the entire American experience would be a dystopia anywhere else. No universal healthcare, mass shootings as background noise, toddlers dying from unsecured guns, and people going bankrupt because they got sick.
‘A former president led an insurrection – and received felonies for serious crimes and instead of facing justice, he was re-elected. Now he’s pardoning the rioters, calling them “patriots,” and rewriting history in real time.
‘We have entire states banning history, criminalizing teachers, and letting billionaires rewrite policy. Our cops have military gear, our prisons are privatized, our citizens worship oligarchs, and half the country thinks this is “freedom.”
‘The real crisis is that half the country doesn’t even know right from wrong or what’s true anymore – they are so hollowed out by propaganda they can’t recognize democracy dying, even as they proudly help kill it. We are collapsing, and they are cheering it on’
-MackPointed
Yes, but apart from all that, what problems to Americans face that are no bother to anyone else?
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