America: The iPod/iTunes was just a comment on my part. I didnt mean it meant US capitalism was superior. It has changed how I listen to music. It also made our big stereo obsolete.
The Japanese also innovated what we call quality. The globalisation of manufacturing would not have been possible without the Japanese experience in Statistical Process Control. Australia and America didnt catch up with the Japanese in that area until the 1990s.
Japan had been doing it since the 1950s. I recall in the 1980s having a Datsun 180B that refused to die. More recently I have had a Suburu that didnt want to go either.
Interestingly though, it was an American W. Deming that did all the intellectual legwork for SPC to work. It essentially commoditizes the labor and location of the manufacturing line. Which enabled factories to be moved quickly from Alabama, to Mexico to China in the space of a decade.
Health in the US is super-messed up. There is also the requirement for many employers to provide health as an employment benefit too. There is so much money being spent on health. The recent Medicare bill looks like it was design to balloon out of control too. It is in a more fiscally precarious position than social security. American legislators are quite poor.
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