So is the alternative, the defined-contribution model.

You get less overall performance and casino-like odds on returns.

Presuming conventional admissions cases to secondary level institutions, yes.

At the secondary level(or what goes on after the 9th/8th year), people are streamed into rigid tracks that discourage and delay upward movement.

So you're fine with having someone's life be divined on the scoring of a few track-determining tests? The US system doesn't have that flaw.
One can improve your academic performance at any time, get a recommendation, and then move up to Honors/AP. Try that in compulsory streaming and you end up going through an entire lower track before your performance is recognized.

I guess you went to a van der Snoot Academy, since you have a high disdain for public schools. Good public schools (yes, the ones run by governments) do exist and they do send people to very good places (even Ivies!).

FTFY.

Any conclusions so far about tests can safely be considered as flawed since they do not take admission type into account. That is, an educational system that takes everybody is penalized while more selective systems (Asia, Europe) do not.

Controlling for access methods (US all-access versus Asian compulsory streaming for example) would show something a bit less favorable to Asia. Never mind that the test score in Asia leaves no room for improvement - it simply forces you on one track.

There seems to be a general "throw everything and the kitchen sink" response by employers against US citizens, while bending over backwards for foreign/guest workers. The only worry an employer has in this respect is that someone calls them out on the fraud.

Schneier's allegations require that you believe a known non-trustworthy person (Edward Snowden)'s own allegation for that to be true.

When all of that can be brought to bear in a US court with Snowden et al in custody, then you can start talking about it as truth when it is proven to be truth.

A lot of that departure was driven by the political climate in the 1980s, which was to exact vengance on those industries and their supporters. The finishing blow came when the opposition encouraged non-assimilating immigrants to flood in. To a limited extent, that's playing out in current-day United States, except through various actions.

What Thatcher (and the financial interests she enabled) couldn't kill, the opposition managed to finish off through importation of non-assimilating individuals from the Third World.

Only if you don't like the benefits coming from economies of scale. Those disappear even in the ACA.

You can enjoy your second-tier care with an small employer while I'll enjoy less sacrifice with a direct-hire/non-contractor employer that can use economies of scale to provide more benefits per dollar.

Never mind that you are operating in a high-failure part of the private sector with people that cannot really afford to fail. That, and you have no scale to offset purchase costs, especially those relating to benefits.

That's part of the "Check a few boxes and ship a translated owner's manual" treatment of the Western markets. Second to that is the over-regulation by environmental groups that operate by the "small cars for thee, but not for me" philosophy.

Making corner-cutting, granola-eating-environmentalist pleasing 4-cylinder-based cars is not the primary specialty of General Motors - especially when you see that most of them are captive imports(Spark/Aveo, Cruze, about anything Buick). The only saving grace is that GM doesn't opt to make cylinders appear through thin air (a la Ford's EcoBoost). Let GM make the larger vehicles for less, which is their specialty, and they will do well.

Personally, I'd not mind if GM decided to make Buick solely a Chinese brand, and then bring in Oldsmobile in their traditional positioning to cover the void in the US. Then find a creative way to (effectively) offer more car than what EPA's CAFE regulations would allow - perhaps by allowing US-spec imports of 4-cylinder cars to be placed on order but not generally stocked. If one were to go beyond that, lobby to have the EPA's regulations removed or curtailed.

It also indicates the further wish to be out of touch with Western markets and continue to decline in overall quality. Checking a few boxes and translating the manual makes for a bad execution on implementing a product in other markets - as opposed to integrating the expectations made by the target market.

Besides, having it in Los Angeles doesn't diminish the value of Eastern contributions, but serves as a barrier to entry for the unqualified.

China and their fellow freedom-reducing brethren operate on the idea of stealing from nations that innovate. A proven secondary use for that is for them to use it against their own citizens.

The US and the rest of the civilized world operate on the idea of creating something new or advancing existing technology in a new way. Unlike China, there has been no solid evidence to prove use against citizens - just the allegations of a spurned traitor(who in turn gave what he had to China and Russia, of all irony).