Sure, it's easy to claim a higher quality of life when you live in a place like France, where you get 30 days of paid vacation every year. Never mind that their productivity numbers nearly equal ours. Where's the index for rugged individualism and personal responsibility? How good do ya think them Frenchies would do on that, huh?

They just don't have the stuff to accept a shorter life expectancy and crappy health care. (The lifespan for African-Americans in the former French city of New Orleans is about the same as that of people living in North Korea.)

But, hey, they're not who we mean when we talk about Americans, anyway. I don't want your damn pinko health care. And keep your hands off my gun. Oh, and, U.S. outta the U.N., dammit!

LOL

Quality of Life Index contains in my opinion, that nobody in the country stay hungry or without shelter!
Tends I don't see as shelter and public feeding for starving people means not, that everybody has enough food!
There are much more than 13 countries, that meet these criteria! How can reach USA 13th place?

The fact that 19% of children in the US live in poverty, the number of people living in poverty is 37.3 million and the number of people living in extreme poverty, those with incomes below half the poverty line, is 15.6 million (and growing) might have something to do with it?
(Stats : National Centre for Children in Poverty. NCCP)