Today some 46 million turkeys will be devoured in the US. Any turkey is fair game, except for Popcorn (the duly elected National
Thanksgiving Turkey) and Caramel, which were solemnly given a “full reprieve from cranberry sauce” by President Obama. Tomorrow, when they’re done with the turkeys, Americans (who are typically extremely nice on every other day of the year) will turn on each other, trampling anyone who stands in their way to get the best Black Friday deals.
For me, thanksgiving is a yearly reminder of how peculiar the American way can be even after 4+ years in the US. Therefore, as an alternative Thanksgiving celebration, I am happy to present the top five things that never cease to amaze me about the US (in no particular order):
- Credit history: Any long-term contract (renting an apartment, electricity or Internet connection, cellphone, etc.) requires a credit check, which determines whether you qualify as a good person (good credit history), a bad person (bad history), or a turkey (no history). The underlying logic is that you are a reliable person if you get into debt and then repay it. In contrast, if you never got into debt in your life and have lots of money in your savings account then you’re obviously a drug dealer. But here’s the catch 22-esque irony: To build your credit history you need a credit card, but to get a (usable) credit card you need credit history.
- Taxes: A crazy tax system is one where nobody has any idea what the rules are. A crazier tax system is one where the rules are nondeterministic. One of my favorite examples is this line from US tax form W-4: “Enter “1” for your spouse. But, you may choose to enter “-0-” if you are married and have either a working spouse or more than one job.”
- American Football: An average professional football game lasts 3 hours and 12 minutes. Average minutes of play: 11. Average time spent on replays: 17 minutes. Average number of commercials: more than 100. I’m not making this stuff up.
- US Congress: Enough said.
- Healthcare: The American healthcare system has turned inefficiency into an art form. Here’s what a typical visit to the hospital looks like. Upon arrival, you are quickly ushered into a private room. Now, let there be n nurses denoted 1,…,n such that for all i, nurse i+1 is more senior than nurse i (they have different titles like unlicensed assistive personnel, licensed vocational nurse, registered nurse, physician’s assistant, etc.); usually n is 4 or 5, but I’ve also witnessed n=6 at Children’s Hospital Boston. For i=1,…,n, nurse i enters the room and asks you the same questions asked by nurses 1,…,i-1 (nurse 1 usually also measures blood pressure or something). Nurse n is a nurse practitioner, and is essentially equivalent to a doctor; after asking the same questions asked by nurses 1,…,n-1, she writes a prescription, say for 10 pills. Incidentally, the pharmaceutical company distributes the pills in packs of 10. A naive person would think he can go to the pharmacy and procure a pack of 10 pills. But that would be too efficient; instead, a pharmacist must take the pills out of the box and carefully place 10 pills into a bag. It is widely understood that this medically indispensable process takes around an hour.
Turing's Invisible Hand 
Dear brother since you are living in the U.S for several years now, let me remind you the situation in Israel:
1. Family history. You did not have the great pleasure of purchasing an apartment in Israel according to old Ottoman empire laws. The equivalent to credit history in Israel for mortgage is parents (not poor ones). Ours signed on my mortgage which allowed me to get much better rates.
2. Taxes – though more deterministic than the American taxes they are still higher than the mean of the American taxes plus a few standard deviations.
3. Real football (soccer) – lasts for 90 minutes with no goals.
4. Kneset – better not talk about it at all.
5.Healthcare – There is only one nurse for every 20 patients and it takes this nurse three hours to ask you a question, usually rudely.
Israel is uncountably crazy — it wouldn’t even make sense to enumerate the peculiarities…
On the Canadian versions of the last two:
4). Canadian government: No clue about its existence (though perhaps Canadian-born citizens have evidence that it’s there).
5). Health care: Canadians have taken the US health care system one step further. In addition to superb inefficiency, they also implemented incompetence as an art form. Aside from the many terrible stories I’ve heard, I’ve seen two nurses and a doctor diagnose a gallbladder attack as:
1). cold, 2). viral infection, 3). middle ear infection (!)… (Diagnostic 3 came from the doctor 😀 )
It can also take 6-12 months to get an appointment with a specialist… of course by the time one gets to see the specialist, the original problem may long be gone.
Waiting until the problem is gone before seeing a specialist actually sounds rather efficient 🙂
Also add:
A) drunk drug using Mayor who is famous for aggressive behavior and harassment.
B) One of the worst voting systems where the federal government is in power for almost a decade with no majority.
C) Freezing weather starting around October — weather in Canada has nothing to do with Equinox ! it’s either cold or freezing cold with the exception of 7-10 days extreme heat and humidity(100%) some time between Spring and Fall Equinox.
Two more:
1. 4-way stop. Why should vehicles from all directions come to a full stop? At least one can drive safely through.
2. Different drink sizes with free refills in fast-food restaurants. Some American do pay more for larger cups (even when dining in).
Degrees Fahrenheit. Letter-size paper. Dates in the month-day-year format.