Y/E

[Greg Nowell]

It's hard to look at numbers like this and figure what gives.  Spend a week in
Montreal and then a week in Boston.  I would say the quality of life in
Montreal is not 2/3 that of Boston, as implied by these figures.  And certain
things, like access to medical care, and some civilized gun control, manifestly
make life better in Canada.  Maybe it has to do with getting more for less.
Let's say that owning an SUV nets out (insurance, capital cost, gasoline,
shorter overall vehicle life) at $500 more per month than a Toyota Corolla.
Nominally the SUV owning society is $6k richer to afford such a burden.  But
quality of life would not necessarily be better, and in fact might be worse.
-gn.

Doug Henwood wrote:


> jmage at panix.com wrote:
>
> >What happens if you do GDP per employed person? Is Italy at the top of the
> >list?
>
> Using the BLS figures for employment and the World Bank figures for dollar
> GDP, we get this for GDP per employed person in 1997:
>
> Germany                $77,150
> Japan                   64,564
> France                  63,238
> U.S.                    60,467
> Sweden                  57,297
> Italy                   57,135
> Netherlands             50,530
> UK                      48,111
> Australia               46,686
> Canada                  43,594
>
> Doug

--
Gregory P. Nowell
Associate Professor
Department of Political Science, Milne 100
State University of New York
135 Western Ave.
Albany, New York 12222

Fax 518-442-5298