1. The United States health care

1. The United States
> Annual Health Care Costs Per Capita: 16% (the most)
> Active Doctors Per 1,000 People: 2.43 (eighth fewest)
> Average Length of Hospital Stay: 5.5 days (ninth shortest)
> Debt as % of GDP (2010): 68.9%
> Average Life Expectancy:77.9 years (14th shortest)

The United States has far and away the least effective health care system in the OECD. Each year, the country spends $7,538 per person on health care, the equivalent of 16% of our entire GDP. This is nearly triple what Japan spends per person. Life expectancy in the United States, however, is 77.9 years, which is the eighth worst among the 34 OECD countries. Japan has the highest, at 82.7 years. Relative to the other ranked nations, the U.S. government spends the least as a percentage of total costs on health care, while American citizens pay the second most out of pocket, an average of $912 per year. Pharmaceuticals cost the U.S. an average of $897 per capita, the most spent in any country in the OECD. Unlike nations like Belgium and Germany, these massive costs per person do not yield appropriately high levels of care. The U.S. has the third-fewest hospital beds per person, behind only Turkey and Mexico. Americans also have the fifth-fewest doctor consultations per year. One likely candidate for the country’s terrible life expectancy despite massive costs is obesity, which is well known to be linked to a variety of health complications. While we only have data for 11 OECD countries, the United States has by far the highest recorded rate: nearly 34% of adults are considered unhealthily overweight. This is exactly ten times the rate in Japan – just 3.4%. And, this obesity and the problems it brings probably raise the cost to care for unhealthy people in the last year or two of their lives when they are troubled by the diseases related to their lifestyles.

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Read more: Who Lives the Longest – Countries With the Most and Least Effective Healthcare - 24/7 Wall St. http://247wallst.com/2011/04/19/who-lives-the-longest-countries-with-the-most-and-least-effective-healthcare/#ixzz1JyspMKVd

Fair Housing Month

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has announced the launch of a national media campaign to kick off Fair Housing Month, celebrated across the country each April to commemorate the passage of the Fair Housing Act. The "Live Free" campaign will educate the public and housing providers about their fair housing rights and responsibilities.