Kay -N- Kay

The 2009 Legatum Prosperity Index was released today.

Yeah, I never heard of it either, but evidently it’s a fairly legit operation.  And by legit, I mean neither the Democrats nor the Republicans hired them to prove how evil the other party is.

The index is based on a definition of prosperity that combines economic growth with the level of personal freedoms and democracy in a country as well as measures of happiness and quality of life.

The 2009 Legatum Prosperity Index, published on Tuesday and compiled by the Legatum Institute, an independent policy, advocacy and advisory organization, ranked 104 countries which are home to 90 percent of the world’s population.

So, obviously USA is #1, right?

No… that’d be Finland.

O.o

Finland?  You mean… the people of Finland are more prosperous than Americans?  Come on.  Really?

Well, maybe Finland is really cool and all.  So cool that they and USA were close enough that some rounding errors pushed them over the USA in a fluke runoff tie breaker or something?  Probably something like that.

Except that #2 is Switzerland, not the USA.  Friends and countrymen, we are not even in the top 5!  I’m afraid, when the next Olympics roll around, we’re all going to have to chant, “We’re number 9!  We’re number 9!”  I don’t even want to think what the giant foam hand things will look like that we’ll need to raise up in the air from the stands.  By the way, if you’ve been disconcerted lately with thoughts that perhaps Canada isn’t such a bad place after all, well chances are that you aren’t alone… they came in ranked #7 overall.

Here are the categories of the index, ordered by where the USA was ranked in each:

#1 – Entrepreneurship and Innovation
#2 – Democratic Institutions
#7 – Education
#7 – Social Capital
#8 – Personal Freedom
#14 – Economic Fundamentals
#16 – Governance
#19 – Safety and Security
#27 – Health

So um… health care.  Yeah… that old thorn in our side.  You suppose we should do something about it?

Let’s take a look at some of the countries that have better health care than the USA.  #1 is Austria.  The rest of the top 5 are Ireland, Switzerland, Singapore, and Belgium.  Hmm… what do all of these places have in common?  If you guessed “public health care”, you win the Kewpie doll!!  It’s not just the top 5, either.  The list is long and rather unvaried in terms of countries ranked higher than the USA and whether or not they provide government run health care as an option to all of their citizens.

Smarten up people.  If you want your country to one day over take such health care juggernauts as Hong Kong (#18), New Zealand (#19), Slovenia (#24), and Taiwan (#26)… maybe even one day measure up to our wacky Canadian (#22) neighbors, eh?  Then call your congressmen and let them know that you support government run, public health care options.

Or else next year, we may slip further down, past Uruguay (#28), United Arab Emirates (#29), and Hungary. (#30)