ABSTRACT
As was hinted at in the Introduction, and as our data will show in this chapter and in the remainder of this book, there is significant divergence between the US and Canada in the levels of public support for the health care system. Americans are less satisfied with their system despite similar assessments of the quality of medical care they personally receive. This general puzzle drives our empirical study of health care opinion in these two neighboring countries. It brings us to investigate a number of questions that our survey data analysis will aim at answering. First, what are the salient differences in the sources of public attitudes toward the health care system in these two countries, and in the determinants of public support for health care reform as well? Second, do Americans and Canadians hold different opinions about their neighbor’s health care system, and do these opinions in turn affect the extent to which they would want their own system be reformed in one way or another? These are the core research questions that underpin this book.
