How can a country within such a short span of less than 250 years be the world leader? How is that all these people from varied cultures come here and settle down and live happy? How are NRIs able to stay away from their close relatives and friends in India? Is it the lure of dollor or something beyond that? All these questions were in our mind when we came first to US. We found the answer after some time.

US CAPITOL(WASHIGTON DC)

It is the Systems prevailing here that make people happy. It is United Systems of America to me and not United States of America. Simple Systems but simply great systems! Every system here is standardized which in my opinion is responsible for the success.

Drivers cannot get the driving license without proving their credentials on the road. There is one magic (SSN) Social Security number and along with your driving license that helps in tracking every financial transaction of all citizens and immigrants. Every income automatically becomes taxable due to this simple system which results in total elimination of corruption at lower and middle levels.


Education: The System of Schooling in Public schools is common across all 50 States. School Buses in Appearance are the Same Yellow in Color and the reason is simple identity. Also when the variety is reduced in products mass volume is possible helping in better quality and higher scale of production. These school buses are fitted with the same blinker system. All the vehicles have to stop while school children are boarding the bus as otherwise the cop will give ticket for traffic violation.  All the Public school students in US have the right to take the school bus. The entire public school system of education is free for K-12 (Kindergarden through high school) .These Public schools have same education standard like the Indian private and convent schools but with better infrastructure. Some of the amazing facilities are like indoor Basketball court, gymnasium, music room, auditorium, and canteen and so on. How is it possible to have free education of this standard all over the country?

Community Funding:

Property Tax is the significant source for public funding which is about 30%. The other income source is Sales tax which makes up about 25% of the state revenues. Local Public schools upto 12^th grade are financed primarily by income from local property taxes. The tax is well defined and is fixed on norms. Property tax is quite high compared to India (About 1% of property market assessed value) for local residents. About 52% of the Property Tax goes to local public schools in that locality. The rest in fixed percentage by system is allocated to local police and fire (15%), park library (3%) roads transportation (8)% Hospital welfare (11%). * The community is funded by the property owners in that area.

*Source; Fairfax County property tax distribution

Some names in US are misnomers and needs clarification. We live in Northern Virginia State which is equivalent to Chennai City. A locality like Besant Nagar is called City here (Our city is Mclean ).Besant Nagar is part of Adyar(This is called County here- we are part of Fairfax County).When this Fairfax County is well developed, then the property value goes up and so also the rental value. This is same with Adyar in Chennai. That is all the similarity .

Now Newton’s Second Law takeover. More is the Property value more is the Property Tax .The more the property tax the residents pay, the more their City school gets and better will be their children education .Similarly more the tax better will be the roads, parks and library in that community as these are all funded from property tax. Since the public school depends on the local resident’s tax money the residents have the Right of Admission in their city Public schools anytime during the year for any class. All that they had to do to get admission in the best school district is to become a resident in that area. Take the sale deed or house lease agreement to the school. Then their child automatically gets enrolled in the best school of their area the very next day without any test or interview of the child or parents and most important without a single dime!

The Children in US go to the Best Public School funded 100% by them indirectly through taxes without their knowledge and get the best education. So all the residents had to do when choosing the house is in choosing the good school district. If the people get fired in job which is quite common, and due to this are forced to change job in another state within US, no problem. They had to choose the appropriate school district again, and the child can join the next day in the best school again.

There is also a simple system to reduce the burden of children carrying school bag .The locker facility in all the public schools helps the students to keep most of the books at school itself. All the Books at the beginning of the curriculum are provided free by the school to be returned back in good condition at the end of the year. If the student can’t afford to buy the graphic calculator the teacher has a few to spare!

Library: Again the Library is free for the residents. There is no limit on number of books the residents can take home. There is a basket in the library provided to carry books like grocery items. When we were in Detroit in Farmington Hills, the community Library had the most modern café within the libruary! Farmington Hills being a hub of local Indian community, the library management opened an Indian section. We used to take home and refresh all the old classics of Tamil Authors like Kalki (Ponniyin Selvan )Chandilyan and Sujatha,Sivashankari novels. There was separate Hindi, Telugu, Gujarathi section too!

US Model - Learn from mistakes

Let us see what happens when such well thought of systems are not followed in US. First the stock market crisis in 2000 .The greedy investors in US bypassed established norms of stock evaluation and hyped click and mortar companies with no revenue model over brick and mortar companies existing for decades. The bubble bust in 2000.

Again the established systems of lending were broken  5 years back in  US by greedy bankers. People were offered mortgages beyond their capacity and to make it appear affordable new types of interest only sub prime loans for first years were offered. People fell into the trap to get into lifelong debt .This created artificial boom for housing and this worked as long as market price kept increasing. When the reality sets in, the country has plunged into sub prime mortgage crisisas of now leading to foreclosure of homes. As USA is the world’s biggest consumer the vibrations are felt all over the stock markets around the world. The old system of prime loan system is  put back in practice. Also the initiatives by the Federal Government  and stimulus packages offered at times of crisis are worth emulating.  The  established systems are like Bible and cannot be broken.

Indian Scenario

Amazing Systems of India

Let us see the Positive side of India for instance in Transportation.

India should be proud of  Railways, which connect every nook and corner of the country. Wow it is Amazing!

Most of the major cities in US  like Detroit have no alternative to cars for transportation.  This is because there is no infrastructure  developed over the these years for public transportation (other than Amtrak for Train and Greyhound for Buses.

Public Transportation in India by buses connect urban and rural villages at such low cost to the traveller. This is simply great Indian public transportation inspite of subsidies are profitable.Railways not only caters to such huge passenger movement but also leads in Freight Movement.

Also the Healthcare System in India is amazing .The quality of the drugs at very nominal cost as well as the availability of Indian doctors at nook and corner is truly amazing.US healthcare system is very expensive and needs reform.

India has better  systems in public transportation and in healthcare system and US can potentially learn  from India on this.

Education Systems in India

India has same public school system like in US but the focus on these schools have shifted away from education to add on like mid day meals and are controlled by politicians. Due to the fall in education standard, everyone poor or middle class have the dream to educate their children in private schools or convent.

In order to get admission in the best private schools in areas like Adyar one has to wait for a long time or be prepared to pay hefty donations. The recommendation of the influential persons is also required besides donation. It is a very competitive environment and the kids had to succeed in the tests too and the interview .If in spite of all this the child did not get admission, they are forced to study in other neighboring localities say Mylapore. The kids have to travel long distance by public transport and had to criss cross between areas adding to children and parent’s discomfort as well as adding to pollution. I really feel sorry for the Indian kids when we see the good systems here.

When the parents switch the job in the middle of the year they had to maintain dual setup till the completion of the annual exams. We had experienced this couple of times when we changed from one Indian city to another. This is because the system is not there to get the admission in the middle of the year. The lack of the system is helping the middle man, bureaucrats and politicians breeding corruption.

Due to lack of systems individual charisma and  power is required sometimes to  get things done in India.
" I can do" in India  is replaced by  "All can do" in USA to some extent  due to  the systems. Aren’t our spiritual Gurus asking us to shed the same ego ?

Swaraj

Swaraj as told by Gandhiji lays stress on governance not by a hierarchical government, but self governance through individuals and community building. The spirit of Swaraj is followed 10000 miles away in a country like USA .

Thus, basically a nation is said to have achieved its Swaraj, when its people govern themselves directly, are entirely self sufficient not only as a whole but as individuals as well, and have an innate sense of nationhood that is identified by themselves and not their government.

In order to change systems require change in mindset. This is tough because the politicians and middle man will not allow the  present systems to change which is to their advantage now. So there lies the challenge for the future

I have given the positive and negative side of both USA and India  based on my observations .


Independence begins at the bottom. Life will not be a pyramid with the apex sustained by the bottom. But it will be an oceanic circle whose center will be the individual. Therefore the outermost circumference will not wield power to crush the inner circle but will give strength to all within and derive its own strength from it.

Gandhiji on Swaraj

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