What Canada Could Teach the United States

I lived in the Toronto area for about 10 1/2 years. It was a great experience for my family. My daughter, Allyson, who is 28-years old, lives in Montreal and has become for all practical purposes totally Canadian. We all hold dual US and Canadian citizenship. My wife and I took dual citizenship while we were there to allow us to vote and to allow our kids, Allyson and Adam, a choice of where to live when they were out of school. Allyson chose Canada. Adam, who came to the US to play baseball in college, stayed in the US. He likely would return to Canada if business permitted it.

When I listen to the news and read stories about Bernie Madoff or AIG or Citi or Merrill Lynch, I think about Canada and what it could teach the US. Sure there have been Canadian scandals. Konrad Black, former CEO of Holllinger, was no saint. He is in jail for using company assets as his personal ones. He was found guilt in US court. Canada doesn't come down as hard on white collar criminals--or any criminals for that matter--as does the US.

That's not what Canada can teach us. What it can teach us is how to live within our means and to demonstrate shared, communal responsibility. As greedy as we have become, Canadians have continued to be responsible. Their banks continue to be profitable. They did not make bad loans. They required lenders to have the collateral to justify the loan--what a concept!! Unlike Americans, Canadians cannot deduct their mortgage interest from their taxes, so there is no incentive to buy a house well above ones means. Canadians buy what they can afford to buy.

But there is something more that motivates Canadians. There is a sense of equity within society that we do not understand. I must honestly admit that I found this concept rather strange. Growing up in the US, we are socialized to accept the fact that there are inequalities in education, healthcare, living conditions, etc. Canadians do not like to accept these things. All colleges are government run in an effort to keep them fairly equal in terms of quality. Certainly there are differences, but they are not the dramatic differences in quality of education we find in the US. Healthcare is universal in Canada. The system there is breaking; people cannot find doctors; there is a need for reform. Yet no politician in Canada, not even conservatives, will argue for private healthcare like that in the US. Why? Because it would bring inequality to the system. It would divide the country up between those who can and cannot afford the best. This concept seems to be contrary to the Canadian conscience, with the possible exception of Alberta, a western Province that is more akin to the western US than it is to the rest of Canada. It is, as someone said: "The Republican Province of Canada". The rest of Canada seems to vacillate between semi-conservative, by US standards, and socialist.

Socialism in the US is the ultimate "boogie man". We thow around the term without understanding the underlying economic or social concept. Socialism is not communism. Rather, it is a system in which there is an attempt to shrink the vast differences between the haves and have-nots. Wealth is taxed at a high level to allow those who have nothing have a life. While this may not be the world loved by the right-wing in the US, it helps to make the society a bit more community oriented, a bit more socially conscious, a bit more caring.

I saw the dramatic difference with my own children when they graduated from high school in Canada. Canadians do not take the SAT or ACT. They go to college based upon their grades. There is not the pressure that students in the US feel that they must go to the "best school" to get the best jobs and have the good life. One usually does not know where a Canadian went to college (they call it university if it is a 4-year institution). They don't find status in their university education because there is a sense of equality in all who went to university. Also, that would be a bit more bragging than Canadians are used to.

When I lived in Canada, I often thought that Canadians were a bit boring. They didn't push for the "gold" in everything like Americans. They wanted to succeed, but didn't think it was the end of the world if they didn't. They worked to live; they didn't live to work.

I miss that spirit of community and shared responsibility. I miss that social consciousness. I wish we would gain some of that in the U.S. I am tired of reading about the Bernie Madoffs and AIGs and thinking that these are the products of my society--these are the people we applauded for many years because they were the smartest and the richest. They were the embodiment of America. Well, America, look what we have wraught. It is not a pretty sight!!