One problem Americans have is most don't seem to know any different

Why do so many Americans believe that people everywhere else in the world has it worse than they do?

There are numerous reasons, but it all starts with the fact that at least two-thirds of us never travel anywhere outside the United States. Only 30 percent of Americans had passports as recently as 2011, a number that was much lower until passports became necessary to travel to Canada and Mexico.

Of my five closest friends over my lifetime, only two have traveled outside North America. Both of them have graduate degrees, and one traveled as a youth because his father was in the Navy.

Two of the other three have traveled very little. They're just sort of typical Americans, seeing the grass is greener right where they are. Their vacations tend to be to the mountains, to the beach or to Disney, -land if they live out west and World if they're in the east.

Those of us who grew up in the '50s and '60s heard time and again from our parents about how badly people were suffering in postwar Europe. We were told to eat our vegetables because there were children starving in Europe for at least a decade after any actual starvation was happening.

We were told time and again how much better we lived than people in other countries, and for a while it was true. But somewhere along the line, things started to change. In the 1970s, we looked up and realized that folks in Europe were driving better cars than we were. They may have been smaller, but they were more dependable and got better mileage.

They also had better television sets with sharper pictures, and most of the electronic stuff -- stereos, cassette decks, the new video recorders -- were coming to America from Japan and Europe.

It was around that time that we made a mistake that should have been obvious. When the laws against multinational corporations started going away, those corporations decided they could make a lot more money by getting rid of high-priced American labor and using Third World workers to make the products that would be sold in the United States.

It came as no surprise to most people when at some point in the early '80s we realized there were no longer any televisions being manufactured in the U.S.

We went from a company that made things to one that waited on people. We have reached a point now where nearly 70 percent of all jobs in America are in the service sector.

"Welcome to Walmart."

"Would you like fries with that?"

"How may I help you?"

Meanwhile, folks in other countries find that their lives are improving. All the benefits we don't have, they do. In the countries considered to have the happiest people -- how's that for a survey? -- people have much lower levels of stress. They don't have to worry about medical bankruptcy. They don't have to worry that they won't be prepared for retirement and will have to work till they die.

And surprise of surprises, they actually take the point of view that making sure everyone has at least four weeks a year of vacation, and making sure they take it, actually makes them more productive when they return from their time off.

Imagine that. When you look at our employers by comparison, it seems that the biggest motivation our workers are expected to have is fear of losing their jobs.

It's truly a shame more Americans don't get the chance to see how people in other so-called free societies live. Call them socialist if you want, but if you're honest, you'll accept the fact that these are societies that are run for the greater good. Not just for the people at the top of the pyramid.

It's a shame we can't seem to learn from them.