 Top Ten Reasons Why Ukraine is a Better Place to Live than the United States By Dan MINER-NORDSTROM |
Some of the biggest detractors of life in Ukraine are the Ukrainians themselves.
They imagine life in the United States, to be a land of opportunity, pleasure, and high standard of living. But these qualities are a matter of taste and preference, and as many Americans can tell you: It's not all milk and honey.
The American Dream might just be a somewhat nostalgic glance back at a bygone era of peace and prosperity. These days, the U.S. is becoming a place of high unemployment, rising debts, increasing crime, and rampant militarism and fear mongering. It may not be the place where you want to raise your kids, or even to go to work or study. Being my home country, I'm often torn between loving its strengths and being shocked at its weaknesses.
In comparing the U.S. to Ukraine, one must take into account that there are certain different values that each culture takes to heart. Ukrainians tend to enjoy deep family and social ties, while Americans tend to take up long-distance, and sometimes-superficial relationships (even with their families). Americans tend to value laws and rules, while Ukrainians can be a bit more, let's say, flexible. Ukrainians follow traditional male and female divisions of labor (women do the cooking, men fix things), while Americans are more egalitarian in the home and in business. One of my students laughed recently when I explained what a househusband was. "Never," he said, "would this happen in Ukraine."
These are only generalizations of course, and you can find many exceptions without looking very hard. However, cultural gaps remain between Ukraine and the United States that can perhaps be best understood through a good old-fashioned Top Ten List. I'm going to give my reasons why I think living in Ukraine is better than the United States to challenge your reasons why you might think otherwise.
1. Ukraine has a better public transportation system. Socialist countries did a far better job in creating ways for their people to get around than our capitalist ones. The U.S. was tearing up its railways and tramlines to make way for highways and parking lots to usher in the great age of the automobile while the USSR built a network of passenger railways. If you're ever in the states and what to see how ineffectual their transportation system is, try to get from Grand Forks, North Dakota, to Pierre, South Dakota, without renting a car. Never mind that these are both mid-size cities with large universities and one is even a capital city: there is no rail, bus, or any other public transport connection. You'll have to hitchhike, and that's against the law on most interstate highways.
2. Ukraine has a national health care system that guarantees service to all citizens. Ok, ok, I know what you're saying. It still costs money in terms of bribes, and the quality is sometime poor. But millions of working poor people in the U.S. go without the minimum necessary health care. Low-paid workers at Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer with $220 billion in sales, can purchase insurance through the company at approximately 16% of their net wages, or almost $3000 per year! It might be cheaper to get that necessary surgery done by the taxidermist that lives in the trailer-park on the edge of town.
3. Ukraine has less violent crime, and less prisons per capita. The U.S. has 16 children killed by firearms every day, where approximately half of all households have a gun of some kind. More teenagers die from gunshot wounds than from all natural causes combined. The average child watches 45 acts of violence on TV each day, mostly involving handguns. Fourteen thousand people are murdered in the U.S. by handguns alone every year (while 1,100 more are accidents, and 18,000 are suicides). The consequence of all this violence is that we have 2 million prisoners in United States' jails (most are there for nonviolent, drug-related crimes).
4. Ukraine Allows Open Containers. You might think this one is silly to include in the top ten, but to me it represents the larger issue of personal freedoms. It's no secret that the U.S. is by and large a conservative country - there is no tolerance for underage drinking, gambling, playing hooky, plagiarism, copyright infringement, adultery, criminal negligence, vandalism, indecent exposure, etc. But the one thing that would irk any Ukrainian more than anything else, is that in almost every part of the United States - including most parks and camping areas - there is a zero tolerance policy of drinking in public. Say goodbye to your beer and vodka if you want to have a picnic in Central Park. It's not allowed. And neither is a small fire for your shashlik.
5. Ukraine Has a Lower Cost of Living. There aren't many places in the world where you can do a weeks' worth of shopping for $ 50, but Ukraine makes it possible. I don't want to downplay the average monthly income of $ 67 - which is a serious problem for millions of Ukrainians - but the real cost of items we need to live on is very low. A kilowatt-hour is 7 1/2 cents in the U.S., while it is only 2 1/2 cents here, making our electricity quite cheap (although maybe it should cost more). You can buy cable television for 1 dollar a month in Ukraine, while in the states many monopolies charge in excess of 30 dollars a month. Ukrainians should be happy not to be saddled with the $500 billion in credit card debt that Americans have, or the thousands of dollars in debt that most American college graduates shoulder.
6. Ukraine Has Closer Families. Far be it from me to try to quantify love and filial bliss, but many Ukrainians enjoy close friendships, and housing, with their parents and extended families. I'm sure that this makes matters worse for some who might have an alcoholic uncle, or lazy relative - but overall it seems like people have a sense of obligation to help their family members out. This is less the case in the US. My students are sometimes shocked to hear that American parents often kick their children out of the house when they turn eighteen, or that elderly relatives are often confined to large nursing homes where they might receive visits or phone calls only rarely. While divorce is a global trend, I venture to guess that Americans are the leaders at the rate of over 50 percent of new marriages ending in failure. But I must admit that Ukraine is not far behind, at 40 percent.
7. Ukraine is a Non-Nuclear State. Making an historic agreement with the U.S. and Russia, Ukraine became the first country in the world to voluntarily give up its entire nuclear weapons arsenal in 2001. If ever President Kuchma deserved an award for anything, I think it should be for this. The US, meanwhile, has enough nuclear weapons in its stockpile to obliterate the whole world several times over - making it an obvious target for other nuclear weapon possessing states.
8. Ukraine has abolished the Death Penalty. Ukraine has joined the European ideal of human rights over this one, and separated itself from capital punishment pariahs like China, Iran, and Saudi Arabia. The United States kills dozens of its citizens every year, setting a poor example to children everywhere. As the saying goes, "Why do we kill people, to show people that killing is wrong?"
9. Young Ukrainians Are Slimmer, and More Active (Maybe). One of every three adults in the U.S. is obese. That means that their weight exceeds what is healthy. Young Ukrainians, for all their smoking and drinking, live more active lives than their American counterparts - who spend more time watching television (average of 4 hours per day), eating at fast-food restaurants (4 or more times per week), and driving instead of walking. But I must say that doesn't explain why Americans live longer, does it?
10. Ukrainians Are Friendlier. Well, not considering the ladies in my post office, every Ukrainian I've met is pretty darn friendly. Americans are friendly too, but you can't really tell when they're being genuinely nice from when they're just trying to sell you something (i.e. that obsequious "Can I help you?" smile). I bet that I could find several Ukrainians willing to share their dried fish, beer, and cigarettes with me without going further than a few steps from the front door of our apartment building. Ukrainian people will sing with you, invite you to their homes, buy you presents, and make you a part of their family without ever asking for anything in return. Americans are more private, and suspicious. We're wary of stalkers and scam artists, and usually are slow to let our guard down (especially not with wars and terrorism haunting us). And you won't often find Americans singing together, except if it's in Church, or singing the National Anthem at an athletic event.
Having said all that, I'd like to make one big disclaimer: The United States is not a melting pot, nor is it homogenous by any means. Practically every ethnicity and race lives there, and every language is spoken there too. Americans are also the citizens of many other countries (since dual citizenship is allowed there, as it is not in Ukraine). American States are different in their attitudes regarding drinking, sex, marriage, education, health, guns, and so on. There are wide variations. Compare Utah with its dry laws, and neighboring Nevada with its legal prostitution and gambling.
But the next time you hear someone grumble about how they want to get out of Ukraine, and move west, just remember that the grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence. I'm beginning to think it might just be better to live in Ukraine.
Dan Miner-Nordstrom is a world citizen, having lived in China, Botswana, the United States and Ukraine. He is married to a Ukrainian and has a newborn daughter.
Editor's Note:
Are there any other "world citizens" who would like to comment on Mr. Miner-Nordstrom's views as expressed in his article? The UO July issue would welcome responses and comments.
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Read also previous issue' articles:
Are Ukraine's Political Habits Unique?
Is Ukraine's Economic Growth Speculation-led?
Ukraine is Drifting to the West - Slowly but Surely
The Unfinished Orange Revolution?
Vacuums, Reforms and the Need to Regain the Initiative
Pirates of the 21st century
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