Tony Blankley is wrong in his claim that U.S. growth has been better than that of Europe.

U.S. Productivity Growth Still Trails Europe

Center for Economic and Policy Research (June 12, 2007)

Washington, D.C.: A report by the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) shows that U.S. productivity growth has lagged behind Europe—even during the IT boom from 1995-2005—when adjusted to measure rises in living standards.

The paper, “‘Usable Productivity’ Growth in the United States: An International Comparison, 1980-2005,” by Dean Baker and David Rosnick, also finds that the U.S. economy’s sustainable rate of usable productivity growth over the 1995-2005 period was 0.4 percentage points lower than the average of other OECD countries.

These calculations suggest that even with the 1995 productivity upturn that accompanied the IT boom, the U.S. has not been able to sustain the same rate of increase in living standards as other wealthy countries. The performance of the United States also appeared relatively worse in the 1980 - 1995 period.

“The U.S.’ failure to keep up has been hidden, in part, by the huge increase in the current account deficit and the decline in net investment over the last decade,” Dean Baker, Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, and co-author of the study, explained. “But when the current account deficit stabilizes or shrinks in the coming years, the rate of increase in living standards in the U.S. is likely to be slower than in other wealthy countries.”

Someone needs to educate Tony Blakely in regard to what emergency hospitals can and cannot provide.  While emergency hospitals do treat illnesses and injuries that require immediate medical treatment, they do not provide the continuing care that a patient might need, medications that a patient might need, and/or the long-term treatment that a patient might need. It’s disingenuous for Blakely to make this argument, and someone needs to set him straight.