Choices

Choices, decisions. Shall we go to Walmart, Kmart or Target? Should I buy a Honda, Kia, BMW or a Ford? What brand of soap will I buy?

These are all things we have the freedom to do on a daily basis here in the good old USA. These are things we’ve been doing for as long as there have been choices here in the USA.

Choice is a relatively new thing in Russia and not always available. In Soviet times, you basically had to take what you could get. If there was a shortage of a particular item, you got creative and found what you needed or you bought it on the black market. In the early 90’s when the Soviet government collapsed and democracy was engaged, things were much worse for some time, but have improved over the years. Today in Russia, there is a mix of things that you can and still cannot make choices on.

Choices

There are some things that are even easier to do in Russia than for us here in the USA. Take the health care system for instance. Russia’s health care system is much simpler than ours. The US government has so many regulations and thinks it needs to have say in everything that happens in healthcare. They try to make us think we have the best healthcare in the world. Then why are prescription drugs so expensive here in the US? Why is healthcare in general so expensive? Why is health insurance so expensive and so many people can’t afford health insurance? It’s all the government red tape and bureaucracy here in the US.

I am sure there are a few other things I could think of if I thought about it for a while, but I am just making a point.

So next time you are in the supermarket, just remember that those 7 or 8 different brands of canned veggies you are looking at would only be 2 or 3 in Russia.