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Comment by JCattheATM | Hacker News Reader

> Then it’s not easy enough to deal with is it?

I mean, the solutions are easy, getting people to vote for them is a problem, although a problem more specific to the US.

> And capitalism seems to have created this situation so you could are the that this is inherent in the system.

I wouldn't say that, given most countries capitalist systems were able to deal with or avoid that situation altogether. Rather than this problem being inherent to capitalism, it seems it is the result of specific events that unfolded in the US. Really, it can all be traced back to Reagan.

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Just a thought but you could probably argue that the US is the largest and most advanced of the capitalist systems in the world, and that makes it somewhat of a bellwether for the future of other capitalist countries.

I think the US is rather unique from other capitalist countries in having such a large portion of its population being so poorly educated. This simply isn't the case in EU or Commonwealth countries - in the US its led people to vote against their own interests, allowing companies to lobby for things that benefit the companies and hurt people, in an ever increasing trend. I don't think it's to do with the size of the country, but the education level of the population.

Hm, this doesn't seemed to be backed up by, say, PISA scores [1], by which the US looks very similar to its OECD peers.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_St...

Looking at the wiki page, PISA seems to have some criticisms, one being it seems very gameable. I'm not really familiar with it.

It might be interesting to try and find some more objective support of my claim, and I'll try and post anything worth posting, but anecdotally...the difference between the US and other developed countries is night and day. It's so incredibly easy to run into people in the US who genuinely astoundingly lack the basic knowledge that in other countries it is taken for granted that adults hold.

There's a reason other countries talk shows don't have segments like asking random pedestrians to name any country, literally any country on a world map, so they can laugh when they fail.

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