Fareed Zakaria brought up something I’ve thought about a lot. In his recent article, the part where he talks about benchmarking, I was happy to read someone say this. Living in France and Taiwan, I have seen so many little things that, together, could make a big difference if we put more effort in making them known. Two of the first examples that come to mind:
In France (and Europe in general), almost every apartment building I ever went in had hall lights on timers. You pushed a glowing button, and the lights came on, but they would go off after a few minutes. Meanwhile, at my apartment building here in the US, the lights stay on day and night.
In Taiwan, my wife and I went to the DMV. Her purse had been stolen, so she needed a new ID. We were in and out in about fifteen minutes because we never stayed in one place. There were greeters at the door, they told us where to go. We went to one place where my wife’s information was pulled, another for a picture, etc. Maybe three or four different desks total, and after sitting for about five or ten minutes, her new ID was up and we were out of there. My general experiences of government offices in Taiwan have been like this. Yet, when we came back to the US and had a problem with my wifes SS number, we went to a small SS office, and sat with people who had been languishing there for hours.
If you’re an American living abroad, or someone from another country who came to the US and found yourself thinking, “They would do better if they new about X.”
Try to keep it as unpolitical as possible. I’m really talking about bureaucratic procedures and other tools, not necessarily, “I kept thinking it would be great if y’all had single-payer healthcare.”
Similarly, I’ve heard that in European hotels, you put the room key in a slot when you enter the room, which enables the lights and AC. So when you leave the room (taking the key of course), the lights and AC are automatically turned off.
I’ve heard that homes in Sweden have much more insulation than typical American homes, so that even the front door is much more solid and well-insulated.
Good and bad; when we were in France, we stayed in a few different hotels with this setup. They also only give you one key. It got annoying when you wanted both light and a key - for example, I remember wanting to take a shower while Mr. Athena took a stroll to the lobby. I had to take a shower in the dark because he needed the key to get back in the room.
Come to the north part of the US, we have PLENTY of insulation - front doors, windows, etc. Having grown up here, I’ve spent my time away from the North feeling like all the houses are about to fall down. It’s hard to explain, but a well-insulated house feels different than one that’s less insulated. Sound doesn’t carry as far. The house feels solider, if that makes sense. Every house I owned in Colorado felt like it was about to fly away, even though they were never cold or drafty. They just didn’t have the heavy feel that a well-insulated house does.
(and yes, Colorado is in the south, when you grow up on the shores of Lake Superior.)
Oh, and as far as the OP itself - I think we need to streamline our voting system. From what I’ve heard, many other countries do not require you to register to vote, and voting day is a weekend when most people are not working. Why can’t we do that? Why is it on a Tuesday, when most people are at work, and why do we have some sort of antiquated “registration” system as opposed to just showing a current ID?
I like the fact that when I renewed my Mexican work visa, everyone was friendly, courteous, respectful, conversational, and generally in a good mood. When I go to the Detroit immigration office (for my wife’s visa needs), everyone just assumes that anyone who looks Mexican must be trying to somehow game the system.
In order to avoid single payer systems and destroying privatized systems, there’s something called Seguro Popular. It’s government run, charged on a sliding scale (as low as zero), and is available after a socio-economic study in order to try to catch all of those people at the bottom who don’t have private- or company- or government-insurance.
Parking tickets don’t get out of hand. They take your license plate. If you want it back, you have to go pick it up and pay the fine. Actually, they do that (or take your license) for moving violations as well.
The culture of bribery (while sad) of police officers for minor infractions is quite convenient.
They have a national voter registration card, and it’s NOT used (not allowed to be used) as a national ID card. Just for voting. I can get behind this idea really, really easily (it turned the country into a true democracy).
They vote on Sundays.
They have private toll roads. They also have public, free roads (by law). The toll roads were purpose built as toll roads (not paid for by taxes and then sold to a private company).
They essentially have an open border 20 km in. In the west, the border is essentially open for three entire states.
On the other hand, there are so many things that are really, really wrong.
How does this work – where is the glowing button located?
When I lived in an apartment, I took an elevator or stairs up to a small lobby, then down one of two hallways about 150 feet (~50m) to my apartment door. So if the glowing button was located in the lobby, whenever I exited my apartment, I would have to walk down the hallway in darkness. Or if they had multiple buttons near each of the 16 apartments along that hallway in addition to the lobby, the costs would be real high. I think you could buy electricity for the high efficiency hallway light for decades before you recovered the cost of extra wiring for all those buttons. Doesn’t seem very practical.
Did you ask for a spare? I have never had problems getting another key when more people are staying in the same room.
Typically one in the hallway and one on each floor. Since the wiring is already there (for the lights) it can’t be that expensive to just add a switch with a timer.
I’ve seen some apartment buildings with a light switch next to each apartment door (as well as the front door). There are also plenty of buildings where the hallway lights are triggered by motion detectors - anyone enters the hallway, the lights go on for a few minutes.
All movie tickets in Israel are for reserved seats; you can even order specific seats online.
This has two main advantages. First of all, you don’t have to camp out in front of the theater for good seats, but instead can buy your ticket and then hang out at the mall until 5 minutes before the movie starts. Second of all, if there aren’t any good seats left, you can get a ticket for another screening - or another movie - instead.
If the cards are magnetic, they’re programmable. If they’re holey, they can select another one that will work for the same room, testing it with a machine they have at the front desk. In either case, one of the advantages of card keys over the traditional style is that you can give to the occupants as many keys as needed; it used to be that the customer had to ask for them, but the last few times I’ve been in a hotel with other people, we were asked whether we wanted one key or two. Littlebro just spent the weekend in Córdoba with friends, and they all got keys to the two rooms.
Old-style keys still exist, but (and I’m only mentioning this because it surprised several of my American coworkers) you’re supposed to leave them at the front desk when you leave; this signals the cleaners that your room is available for them to go in.
Light switches in apartment buildings and hotels in Spain: one at the lift, maybe another one beside the staircase, one at each door. The timed ones are being replaced with movement and even movement/light sensors. These last ones light up only if they detect movement and low light at the same time.
Voting on Sundays is good. Bureaucratic reduction such as not needing to register to vote is something every country could do, in different ways, but it’s required in many countries under different names. In Spain you register with the census and that defines where you vote, where you pay taxes, which should be your primary medical center, “points” your kids get for going to a school or another (most primary schools give more “points” to kids who live close or whose parents work close), etc. What I know for sure I don’t understand is the line about “register as a Democrat/Republican/independent”, I definitely don’t need to tell anybody who do I vote for, and while I do belong to a party, that doesn’t mean I vote for them, it means I can go yell at them in their own offices (you don’t even need to belong to a party to run for them, here).
There also seems to be way too many levels of Government that can tax the same thing. Depending on where you live and work, someone in the USA may have to pay income taxes at the local, state and federal level. In Spain it’s at the “region” (state) or “national” (federal) level, but one or the other, you can’t get taxed twice for the same concept.
Medical check-ups for driving. I realize this varies by state, but I’ve personally known two people (at least, I’m not familiar with the medical history of all my acquaintances) who had conditions which should have precluded them from driving, but they got the required doctor’s certificate from a doctor who didn’t know, and who didn’t check their eyesight or their reflexes. The medical check-up required to obtain or renew your Spanish license is far from complete, but ladies with cataracts in both eyes would most definitely not be able to pass it.
There are a few itty problems implementing that concept in Spain which don’t crop up by having elections on a day that’s already a holiday, though. Of course, some of them involve concepts which Americans might do well getting more of, such as puentes (lit. “bridges”):
If a Tuesday or Thursday is a holiday, most people will “bridge over” the workday, thus obtaining a four-day weekend, which they will be spending out of town. So, people away from the “voting schools” = “people not voting”. Yeah, they could vote by mail, but that involves thinking ahead, are you kidding me? And what if they change their mind after sending the vote in, hm?
Now, while I don’t know how would American voting %s be affected by having votes on a bridge-leg, you guys could use a few more four-day-weekends.
And, oh God, get rid of the notion of “limited sick days”.
Maybe I’m used to it, what with all our Hebrew-calendar holidays that fall whenever the hell they want, but having a day off in the middle of the week is really no big deal.
Yeah, many of ours are set in a way which avoids Wednesdays, or close enough to another holiday that you’ll be bridging anyway (see “December bridge = Dec 6th/8th” in the whole country, “Foral bridge = Dec 3rd/6th/8th” in Navarra only, “Pamplona aqueduct = Nov 30th + Dec 3rd/6th/8th”); there have been times when a lonely holiday would have fallen on a Wednesday and it got moved forcefully; some fall at such a time that most people will be on vacation anyway (July 25th for example).
Anyway, sorry for the hijack.
Nava, the party registration is done for primary elections. If more than one candidate runs for a party’s nomination, there’s a “primary” between those candidates. The winner of that election goes on to face the candidate of the opposing party in the general election. Most states allow primaries, some states allow party caucuses or conventions instead.
When states require party registration they can prevent republicans from voting for the weaker democratic candidate in the primary, or vice versa. In Maryland for example, if you register for the Green Party you can’t vote in either the republican or democratic primary. Party registration is usually easy to change, and people will often do so to take a shot at the other party’s candidate selection. Or to run for office themselves, or because they’ve changed their mind about the party they previously registered for.
My state, Virginia, has no party registration. Any registered voter can vote in either party’s primary. I don’t “cross party lines” - it doesn’t seem cricket to me - but plenty of people on both sides do cross. Note that Virginia and Maryland are neighboring states, and have different rules.
A friend of mine volunteers for a major political party in Virginia. She and her party have a hard time finding “their” voters from the registration list. Which voters need candidate info, targeted campaigning, info on primaries or conventions, rides to the polls on election day? All hard to determine.
I think the lack of party registration hurts both major parties, but since it costs money Virginia is unlikely to change.
Sorry, but that’s a really big one… Or at least some form of UHC. The fact that Americans even consider this to be a “political” issue is… disturbing IMO.
Another thing from Israel (and other places): Shared Taxis