Hello and

welcome to the political orphanage, a home for misfits,

problem solvers, and friendly weirdos across the

political spectrum. I'm your host Andrew Heaton. When Americans discuss other

countries we should emulate.

We invariably invoke Britain, Canada, or whichever country we went to on our sophomore study

abroad program, most likely France, Spain, Germany, or Belgium. Which makes

sense Canada and Britain both speak English so it's easier to compare and

contrast and they almost feel like alternate universe

Americas to some extent so they they just feel natural to look to in terms of

programs that work or don't work. And to the greater European area,

upper middle class white people with passports

tend to want to hang out in Europe.

So Europe and accessible Commonwealth countries play into a kind of international availability bias.

Now I spend a lot of time in Britain. I visited Europe a fair amount, but I find the almost

exclusive American fixation on other white people countries. I don't know how to phrase this I find that focus

rather myopic for example I hear a lot about how French health care works or the Scandinavian welfare model, but I rarely, rarely hear people bring up Japan or South Korea or Taiwan, all of which are fellow liberal market-based democracies.

Or seems to me when we're discussing racial issues, South Africa makes more sense to talk about than Sweden.

But I am particularly fascinated by Singapore.

I doggy paddle around think tank literature pretty regularly and Singapore is simultaneously

claimed by conservative think tanks and progressive think tanks as an example of how their preferred system would work well in America.

Conservative and Libertarian types for years have heralded Singapore as a market-based alternative to single-payer health care.

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