As a non-American, what I find mostly surprising are these two things:
1) that a society that mostly believes that a system of private businesses competing in a free market is the be all and end all of optimal resource allocation end up having the most expensive health care, higher education and apparently, prison system in the world; that this fact does not trigger more thought and discussion;
2) that despite incarcerating people being more expensive than sending them to Harvard, you still favor punishment over prevention and rehabilitation, having the highest incarceration ratio in the world.
1) that a society that mostly believes that a system of private businesses competing in a free market is the be all and end all of optimal resource allocation end up having the most expensive health care, higher education and apparently, prison system in the world; that this fact does not trigger more thought and discussion;
2) that despite incarcerating people being more expensive than sending them to Harvard, you still favor punishment over prevention and rehabilitation, having the highest incarceration ratio in the world.