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Post by kaima on Aug 9, 2007 2:13:02 GMT -7
I like to see what new information I can dig up on the 'old country', in my case Slovakia, and one method is to combine a source with Google images and see what comes up. This takes advantage of the 'one picture is worth a thousand words' principle, and it saves me searching through a thousand sources to find some rich, hidden information. In this case I called up 'world health organization slovak' on Google Images and came up with the interesting graphic below. I tried to post this under Poland topics, but it seems to fit International Geographic best. I agree that measuring infant mortality rates and longetivity (old age) are two universal measures that can be applied to all countries and cultures for an effective measure of overall health / health care. This graphic adds a scale for wealth as well, and it is good to note that the wealth scale is logarithmic and not linear. I can't come up with a 30 second explanation, but it shortens the horizontal scale - in other words, the distance between the poor people to the left and the richer people to the right is far greater than is shown by the scale. I will leave you to your own devices to find Poland or any other country of interest. Kai
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Post by kaima on Aug 9, 2007 2:35:59 GMT -7
OK Folks, it is after the witching hour and you are all in great danger of being exposed to strange and unusual trivia that I encounter. Now we step over to relative wealth of the various United States vs. the Rest of the World. Even though Jaga lives in Idaho, her State of idaho GDP is equal to that of Idaho – Ukraine (GDP #54 at $81 billion). My State of Alaska, with 600,000 people, Alaska – Belarus (GDP #73 at $29 billion). However, of greatest interst to this forum is Missouri – Poland (GDP #26 at $265 billion) strangemaps.wordpress.com/2007/06/10/131-us-states-renamed-for-countries-with-similar-gdps/
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Post by Jaga on Aug 9, 2007 10:19:59 GMT -7
Even though Jaga lives in Idaho, her State of idaho GDP is equal to that of Idaho – Ukraine (GDP #54 at $81 billion). My State of Alaska, with 600,000 people, Alaska – Belarus (GDP #73 at $29 billion). However, of greatest interst to this forum is Missouri – Poland (GDP #26 at $265 billion) Kai, what an interesting map! But how is it that Idaho has more GDP than Alaska? I always thought that Alaska is the most wealthy. I do not like that in Idaho we have now boarders with Israel and Ireland. This may cause some political troubles California and France it is probably a good comparison but Texas and Canada? I do not think so... ;D
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Post by kaima on Aug 9, 2007 18:27:36 GMT -7
Jaga, I think the GDP comparisons are interesting and shocking to see that individual states are comparable to whole nations around the world. As for Alaska, much of our State simply does not fit neatly in standard categories. Our population is too small (600,000) and area too great (1,500,000 sq km compared to about 80,000 for Hungary). Thus we may have the image of being wealthy PER CAPITA, though again, the statistics must be handled carefully. Expenses up here can be horrendous. We even fight that battle internally, the worst example being in the State Legislature where representatives from Anchorage ( a city with half the state population and the economies that go along with scale) insist that it is"fair" to spend $1 on a school child in Anchorage for every $1 spent on a school child in the Bush - where costs can be three and five times as high!
My State of Alaska, with 600,000 people, Alaska – Belarus (GDP #73 at $29 billion). Belarus, almost 10,000,000 people and only 207,600 km², about 1/7 the size of Alaska with 16 times as many people.
Now our GDP may be rated highly because of Oil, but we are a bit like Nigeria - rich in oil with profits that are exported, not leaving much for the people - though we live much better than the average Nigerian!.
Kai
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Post by Jaga on Aug 9, 2007 20:14:23 GMT -7
Jaga, I think the GDP comparisons are interesting and shocking to see that individual states are comparable to whole nations around the world. As for Alaska, much of our State simply does not fit neatly in standard categories. Our population is too small (600,000) and area too great (1,500,000 sq km compared to about 80,000 for Hungary). Kai, you are surely right. I just thought that since the population of Alaska is similar to Idaho - the GDP should be probably higher (like Ukraine is doing better than Belarus) since you - Alaskians are rich people
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