[indoordin0saur]

> GDP is not a measure of living standards.

An even stronger case is pointing out that Japan has a lower GDP per capita than Mississippi. But walk around Japan and try to claim that it's "poorer" than even a wealthy state in the US.

[ecshafer]

Japan has less trading houses at increasingly high valuations to pump up their GDP.

[Macha]

Tokyo and Kansai, sure. But a lot of rural Japan is pretty clearly in line with rural US states.

[Yizahi]

So the same quality and reach of the public transit in rural Japan and rural USA? The same percentage of net income spent on the similar healthcare procedures in rural Japan and rural USA? The same quality and percentage of net income spent on the education in rural Japan and rural USA? I have doubts.

[_DeadFred_]

I live in a pretty rural, red small town USA and we have a great bus system. Disabled/elderly/sick can even call and be picked up in front of their home. Our library system is expanding in size and scope (they do a heritage seedbank now). Schools are tough to fund because the feds own most of the land and even though the deal was we lost tax revenue because federal land but that was made up for in logging/mining revenue the feds just stopped giving permits and screwed our community out of the jobs/promised revenue. Rural America isn't all the hellscape the internet pretends it is.

[jst1fthsdys]

Where is this? Because I live in an area with what is considered one of the best public transit systems in the US and even then the bus system is iffy at the edges of the metro area. I am curious to see your bus schedule.

[_DeadFred_]

I get your request but I would be doxing myself and by extension people/businesses I have sometimes brought up here (some of the tech scene is kinda small).

The nice things about a small town is our edge cases aren't far from our non-edge cases so we can offer things like pickup/dropoff at home or serve them normally and not add much to routes. It was such a godsend when my mom was dying of cancer. Not sure the schedule would represent that as it is an off schedule/off published route service.

[paytonjjones]

> walk around Japan

Ok and then go into the average person's living quarters.

There are many non-trivial differences that make these comparisons complex; GDP is about as good as you can get.

[inigyou]

GDP is one of the most meaningless ways to compare the standard of living in two countries. It can only compare their financial position and it's questionably good at that.