In non-North-American distance units, the distance from LA to Vegas is untenably far, like hearing of exotic lands in the far off yonder that you may one day see, one day. The distance from NY to LA, by contrast, is effectively an impossible concept, infinite in range, like saying "The moon", it's just somewhere that will never, ever be reached.
Remember that to the rest of the world, the USA and Canada's states and provinces, individually, are effectively larger than most countries. We're positively massive, and our sense of scale is complete off compared to theirs. What to us is a long-ish daily commute, to them is something they might do once per year. My daily commute at one point was longer than going through two countries in Europe, and I thought nothing of it. I had relatives from Europe come over, who didn't inform me, because where they were visiting was two hours away, and to them that just seemed like an insane, impassible distance to drive over to say hello.
So what they're saying is that to the beaurocrats, the place they're oppressing is effectively another planet, but to this poster, it's more like hearing of something a country or two over, much more imminent, even if still quite divorced from their life.
Driving LA to Vegas when there is no traffic is just a couple of hours. Not the kind of trip I'd like to make often, but you hear of it being done often enough. Meanwhile to NY, we're talking a couple of days. No one does that unless they're on an adventure, or a cross country truck driver.
Two hours away seems like such a joke. A cousin of mine who lived two hours away was getting married, and wanted help preparing stuff, and also threw a number of pre-wedding and post-wedding parties, in addition to the wedding itself, and I drove back and forth for all of them. Seemed like I went there about 10 times over two months. Wasn't a big deal at all. To have relatives who you don't see often staying only two hours away and not wanting to visit? Wow.
Your perspective makes me feel really sorry for Europeans. At one point I was going to see a medical specialist monthly which was ~4 hours away. I'd leave early in the morning, and come back in the afternoon. I cannot say I enjoyed the travel, but it was better than the alternative. So the European would just stay home, or take a chance with a local quack because there was no one else within their tiny country? Wow, just wow.
To your latter point, I think (and somewhat from experience, in Germany), it’s more that everything in Europe is generally concentrated in a smaller space, specifically because the countries are, for the most part, smaller…
So unless you’re way out in a rural area, say, in a larger country such as Ukraine or Poland (or even a village in Spain, for example), you’re just never that far from those services…
There’s also the cultural difference that fast international trains, slower, regional trains, ferries of all sorts, riverboats and buses everywhere else, are almost completely ubiquitous, even in a relatively poorer country such as Turkey (from experience), as is some form of “universal” healthcare, even in somewhere like Russia, so… The situation you describe simply does not usually happen, simply because it does not need to.
This has been my experience in several euro countries, both EU and non-EU. YMMV.
It's not necessarily being far from services. In the US, the large cities are going to have practically every kind of service you're looking for. However most "experts" are little more than parrots who cannot deal with complex scenarios. If you're having a serious issue, and an expert that is actually better than the rest is one state over, then the travel is worth it.
But if your mindset is to only look at something local, and traveling to another state/country is like going to another planet, then you purposely close yourself off of some better options that may exist.
Ok, fine. Sure. All I can say is that just isn’t how healthcare works, in other places. Sometimes you can choose your specialist, but, in the VAST majority of cases, in the public system, which most people will use, so as to avoid paying thousands of dollars out of pocket, you simply can’t usually do that.
It depends where I live. But say, hypothetically, I live in… Brisbane. I decide, for whatever reason, that I want to see a doctor in Sydney, which is a 10+ hour drive away, because I think they are better. In the public system I can’t do that, because it’s not in my “catchment area”…
Hell, in some states, if you live on the north side of the city, you have to go to the PUBLIC hospital on the north side, not the one on the south side. Because again, catchments. Otherwise the perceived “best” hospitals and doctors will be completely overwhelmed. Again, this only applies to the PUBLIC system. It also applies to PUBLIC schools. Though not universities, of course…
The rest of the world does not operate on the American model. That’s the fundamental “disconnect”, here, I think. What you’re used to, simply isn’t how it works, in the vast majority of the rest of the world, including Australia.
The state I live in is the size of Ireland. Or like, New England, maybe, in the US..?
The Territory, where this is happening, is, by comparison, I think legit larger than Texas. So that’s larger than almost any European country. And this happening on one end of that “territory”, while the man announcing it sits, in the lap of luxury, at the other end.
But it’s so far away from me as to be, as you say “another country”. Like how distant Moscow would seem from say, Paris. Or New York and LA, as I said…
In non-North-American distance units, the distance from LA to Vegas is untenably far, like hearing of exotic lands in the far off yonder that you may one day see, one day. The distance from NY to LA, by contrast, is effectively an impossible concept, infinite in range, like saying "The moon", it's just somewhere that will never, ever be reached.
Remember that to the rest of the world, the USA and Canada's states and provinces, individually, are effectively larger than most countries. We're positively massive, and our sense of scale is complete off compared to theirs. What to us is a long-ish daily commute, to them is something they might do once per year. My daily commute at one point was longer than going through two countries in Europe, and I thought nothing of it. I had relatives from Europe come over, who didn't inform me, because where they were visiting was two hours away, and to them that just seemed like an insane, impassible distance to drive over to say hello.
So what they're saying is that to the beaurocrats, the place they're oppressing is effectively another planet, but to this poster, it's more like hearing of something a country or two over, much more imminent, even if still quite divorced from their life.
Thanks for the explanation, I appreciate it.
Driving LA to Vegas when there is no traffic is just a couple of hours. Not the kind of trip I'd like to make often, but you hear of it being done often enough. Meanwhile to NY, we're talking a couple of days. No one does that unless they're on an adventure, or a cross country truck driver.
Two hours away seems like such a joke. A cousin of mine who lived two hours away was getting married, and wanted help preparing stuff, and also threw a number of pre-wedding and post-wedding parties, in addition to the wedding itself, and I drove back and forth for all of them. Seemed like I went there about 10 times over two months. Wasn't a big deal at all. To have relatives who you don't see often staying only two hours away and not wanting to visit? Wow.
Your perspective makes me feel really sorry for Europeans. At one point I was going to see a medical specialist monthly which was ~4 hours away. I'd leave early in the morning, and come back in the afternoon. I cannot say I enjoyed the travel, but it was better than the alternative. So the European would just stay home, or take a chance with a local quack because there was no one else within their tiny country? Wow, just wow.
To your latter point, I think (and somewhat from experience, in Germany), it’s more that everything in Europe is generally concentrated in a smaller space, specifically because the countries are, for the most part, smaller…
So unless you’re way out in a rural area, say, in a larger country such as Ukraine or Poland (or even a village in Spain, for example), you’re just never that far from those services…
There’s also the cultural difference that fast international trains, slower, regional trains, ferries of all sorts, riverboats and buses everywhere else, are almost completely ubiquitous, even in a relatively poorer country such as Turkey (from experience), as is some form of “universal” healthcare, even in somewhere like Russia, so… The situation you describe simply does not usually happen, simply because it does not need to.
This has been my experience in several euro countries, both EU and non-EU. YMMV.
It's not necessarily being far from services. In the US, the large cities are going to have practically every kind of service you're looking for. However most "experts" are little more than parrots who cannot deal with complex scenarios. If you're having a serious issue, and an expert that is actually better than the rest is one state over, then the travel is worth it.
But if your mindset is to only look at something local, and traveling to another state/country is like going to another planet, then you purposely close yourself off of some better options that may exist.
Ok, fine. Sure. All I can say is that just isn’t how healthcare works, in other places. Sometimes you can choose your specialist, but, in the VAST majority of cases, in the public system, which most people will use, so as to avoid paying thousands of dollars out of pocket, you simply can’t usually do that.
It depends where I live. But say, hypothetically, I live in… Brisbane. I decide, for whatever reason, that I want to see a doctor in Sydney, which is a 10+ hour drive away, because I think they are better. In the public system I can’t do that, because it’s not in my “catchment area”…
Hell, in some states, if you live on the north side of the city, you have to go to the PUBLIC hospital on the north side, not the one on the south side. Because again, catchments. Otherwise the perceived “best” hospitals and doctors will be completely overwhelmed. Again, this only applies to the PUBLIC system. It also applies to PUBLIC schools. Though not universities, of course…
The rest of the world does not operate on the American model. That’s the fundamental “disconnect”, here, I think. What you’re used to, simply isn’t how it works, in the vast majority of the rest of the world, including Australia.
Yeah that’s… Sort of what I meant.
The state I live in is the size of Ireland. Or like, New England, maybe, in the US..?
The Territory, where this is happening, is, by comparison, I think legit larger than Texas. So that’s larger than almost any European country. And this happening on one end of that “territory”, while the man announcing it sits, in the lap of luxury, at the other end.
But it’s so far away from me as to be, as you say “another country”. Like how distant Moscow would seem from say, Paris. Or New York and LA, as I said…