162 Things I Think America Should Improve or Change

 On the Fourth of July this year, I wrote a blog listing 250 reasons I’m still proud to be an American. I felt like that post needed a follow-up about the things I think America should improve or change. 

It turns out, I couldn’t list 250 things! Maybe that’s a good sign for the country. Some of these things are no-brainers. Some of them are VERY spicy takes. Some might not make sense to you. I’d love to answer questions about any of them.

Federal Government

1. Executive Orders should be significantly limited.

2. Less legislation, especially proposed budgets, should be initiated with the executive branch (like The Affordable Care Act, Inflation Reduction Act, and Big Beautiful Bill). 

3. Supreme Court Justices should be greater in number, partisan, elected, and term-limited.

4. Ranked-choice voting should be tested at the national level, I suggest starting with elections for the senate. 

5. The role of vice president should be replaced with a prime minister role that functions as an executive of the legislative branch. This person should be appointed by majority vote in congress. 

6. Government shutdown should be avoided by giving the federal reserve authority to fund approved government programs indefinitely in times of political gridlock. 

7. The federal government should guarantee employment, providing good-paying jobs to every citizen who needs one. These jobs should include an element of professional development training and guided career searching. 

8. Non-citizens should be given the right to vote in all elections. Residency, not citizenship should be the requirement for voting. 

9. Voting should be done online, likely using blockchain technology to maintain security and avoid duplicates. 

10. Stop minting nickels

11. Stop minting coins at all, and create 25 and 50 cent notes instead.

12. People with expertise in guns should be more involved in writing gun control legislation. We’ll never make good policy with only people who don’t like guns writing the proposals. This will require concessions from both sides, but possibly the hardest one will be the concession from gun rights advocates that a bigger portion of gun violence problems in America are a result of access to guns. 

13. People with expertise in women’s healthcare should be more involved in writing abortion restrictions. As with above, this will require concessions from both sides, but some abortion restrictions will inevitably be put in place, and we need the right people making the carve outs for exceptions. 

14. Congress should get rid of PAYGO rules that require them to increase taxes or debt to fund every spending increase. 

15. Funding cuts made by DOGE should be restored. 

16. Federal support for the arts should be a bigger priority. 

17. ICE should be abolished. 

State and Local Government

18. There shouldn’t be “non-partisan” elections. Candidates should be required to declare an association with a political party with their election filings. 

19. Uncontested elections shouldn’t appear on ballots. 

20. The Wisconsin state Senate should be elected in statewide elections. 

21. We need to figure out how to make fair election maps. I don’t think this is as easy as some democrats think, but still very important. 

22. Local police forces should be supplemented by unarmed expert personnel for handling things like domestic conflict remediation, social work, mental health-related incidents, and neighborly disputes. 

23. Get rid of toll roads.

Political Discourse

24. A new conservative political party should be formed emphasizing moral leadership, free trade, and fiscal discipline. It should compete for votes with the Republican party, and could be led by someone like Mitt Romney or Jeb Bush

25. A new liberal political party should be formed emphasizing income equality, workers rights, and ethical foreign policy. It should complete for votes with the Democratic party, and could be led by someone like Zorhan Mamdani or Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

26. People should think of taxes less as a means to fund the government and more as a means to control inflation. 

27. Americans need to be more welcoming to immigrants, and make the legal immigration pathways significantly easier (as easy as inter-state moves). 

28. Trump supporters need to stop pretending he’s so great. 

29. Trump critics need to stop dehumanizing Trump and his supporters (honestly, they need to stop talking so much about him in general). 

30. Americans should compartmentalize partisan politics better. 

31. Governments should make policy under the assumption that it’s not possible for people to overcome their circumstances without help. 

32. Individuals should act as if it’s always possible for people to overcome their circumstances without help. 

33. Americans should stop confusing limitations on speech by public opinion or by private business with illegal repression of free speech by governments. 

34. Americans should acknowledge that large corporations are little governments and should be held accountable to their actions in similar ways. 

35. Americans should still feel national pride, despite America’s flaws. 

36. Americans shouldn’t be over-patriotic. 

Economics and Business

37. There should be more privately held and employee owned companies. Not everything needs to be traded on the stock market. 

38. Homes should be primarily for living, not for investing. 

39. All businesses should have publicly accessible restrooms. 

40. Restaurants should just pay their workers enough, even if it leads to higher prices, and we should end tipping. 

41. Billionaires should not be allowed to get loans from banks. 

42. A lot of businesses should be open earlier and later and be closed in the middle of the day. 

43. Professionals need to do a better job balancing artificial and organic intelligence. 

44. Companies should pump the brakes on AI, making sure the tools we currently have are being deployed most effectively and are improving in sustainability. 

45. Antitrust law should be a secondary consideration only after prioritizing what’s best for consumers. 

46. The raising of children should be financially compensated. 

47. Childcare costs should be covered in almost all benefits packages like healthcare. 

Arguments to Retire

Another way to phrase these is “dogmas to loosen from grip.” Some of these arguments I agree with, but they have come to have almost universally a negative impact on civil discussion, and they prevent the kind of openness that can lead to positive change. Think of these as the “box” that we need to start thinking outside of. 

48. Guns don’t kill people

49. Abortion is murder

50. There is no ethical consumption under capitalism 

51. There are no ethical billionaires 

52. But what about <other political leader>? 

53. Both sides are bad.

54. One side is incomparably worse.

55. Individuals “owe” some portion of the U.S. debt. 

56. Taxation is theft

57. Immigration is great as long as it’s legal

58. There’s no such thing as a free lunch

59. If you don’t like it here, you should just leave

60. America first

61. It’s <insert shadowy group on the other side> causing all the violence

62. The corrupt media shouldn’t be trusted on this issue.

63. Jesus was a liberal

64. We can’t support anyone who supports the genocide in gaza

65. The Bible says so

66. Meat is murder

Education

67. Federal education funding should be increased.

68. Common core standards should be few, specific, and strict.

69. National standards for education should emphasize and protect instructor choice.  

70. All restrictions on school library catalogs should be eliminated, but state and local governments should be allowed/encouraged to establish rating and content warning systems for literature  available in schools. 

71. STEAM should become STREAM and include religion. 

72. Courses in the secular study of religion and engagement with diverse spiritual practices (prayer, meditation, rituals) should be offered in schools nationwide, and should address religion from a secular point of view. 

73. More trust should be garnered in real expertise, and less trust should be given to personal, untrained research. 

74. Technology education should take place in computer labs, not individual devices in classrooms. 

75. Most education should not take place on a computer or tablet. 

76. School days should be shorter (start later, end earlier) and should be more numerous (not as many days off).

77. Teachers should make starting salaries closer to software developers than retail employees. 

78. School sports should be significantly less about competition and significantly more about exercise, life skills, and fun. They should be inclusive and inexpensive for kids of all ability levels. 

79. Colleges and universities should not have competitive sports teams. 

80. Americans should read more poetry. 

Media

81. Religious people should get more comfortable with profane language in movies. 

82. Movie makers should get less comfortable with nudity and sex on screen. 

83. Movie makers should get less comfortable with graphic violence on screen. 

84. Americans should improve their media literacy, especially their ability to evaluate the quality of a source. 

85. Streaming services should not block account sharing. 

86. Movie trailers should have a narrator with a cool voice in them. 

87. There should be more live action family movies

88. CGI peaked in the 90s. No new movie should have more advanced graphics than Jumanji did in 1995. 

89. Movie budgets should be capped at something like $50 million. 

90. People should stop arguing about what box office numbers mean for a movie’s quality. 

91. Casting of movie remakes should focus on actor talent first. All things being equal, they should try to have a diverse cast. 

92. Collections of short films should show in theaters, kind of like how short story collections appear in bookstores. 

93. They should make a new set of Star Wars movies with Rey as the protagonist. 

94. People should stop complaining about remakes and sequels. 

95. They should make 10 more Toy Story movies, accompanied by dozens of new Toy Story shorts. 

96. We should have more PG-13 horror movies

97. More TV shows should come out one episode at a time, with time between episodes. 

98. There should be more, better sources of public debate in the media, where actually balanced debates occur between experts with different opinions. 

99. “Balanced” media should not mean that two sides are equally represented when they are not actually balanced when it comes to available evidence or majority opinions of experts. 

100. News media organizations should admit and lean into their bias, rather than try to pretend objectivity. 

Travel

101. There should be more public transportation options, especially trains

102. Airlines should board back to front, outside seats to in. 

103. City names should be de-duplicated. If two cities have the same name, they should have to fight over who gets to keep it. 

Food

104. Bring Haggis to America

105. Bring Black and white pudding to America

106. There should be more fiber enriched food products than protein enriched food products. 

107. Fast food should actually be fast. If you can’t afford to hire enough staff for quick service, you can’t afford to run a franchise. 

108. There should be more (any?) simple, healthy fast food restaurants. Like, I should be able to go through a drive-through and get a cup of washed grapes and a protein shake as easily as I can get a double cheeseburger. 

109. The lack of fry sauce in burger joints is religious discrimination. 

110. American cheese deserves more respect. 

111. Let whole grain snacks be whole grain snacks and let cheese-its remain unhealthy

112. More fresh, crusty bread

113. We need fewer bulk shopping deals. I don’t want to buy 5 bags of chips to get 2 free. 

114. In general, Americans need to be less elitist about food. 

115. Fearmongering about microplastics, seed oils, artificial dies, and artificial sweeteners should be reduced. 

116. Cabbage should replace lettuce as a standard burger topping and salad base.

117. The definition of “organic” should be reassessed, and largely retired in agricultural product marketing. 

Healthcare

118. Healthcare should be considered a human right. 

119. The U.S. should establish a national healthcare system with a value-based care reimbursement model. 

120. People should trust their doctors more. 

121. Patients should treat PAs and NPs and residents with the same level of respect they give physicians. 

122. Leaders should do more to reduce vaccine hesitancy in America. 

123. Vaccine developers should develop more vaccines that can be administered without shots. 

124. Labor and Delivery costs should be paid for by public funds. 

Religion/Spirituality

125. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints should formally “bless” same sex unions in a manner similar to the church of England. 

126. The terms “cult” and “high-demand religion” should be retired from the vocabulary of religion. 

127. People who leave religions should focus more on owning their truth than playing the victim. 

128. More (doesn't have to be all) religious people should consider their scriptures flawed and human without diminishing their importance. 

129. Non church-going Americans should re-evaluate whether joining a church community could provide them with a useful “third space” 

130. Church-going Americans should be more inclusive of people who don’t believe or believe differently from them. 

131. American Christians should stop gatekeeping Christianity. 

132. Religious Americans should stop turning to political leadership more often than God for help solving the world’s problems. 

133. The wall between church and state should be maintained and strengthened. 

134. I don’t think Christians should pledge allegiance to the flag or the republic for which it stands.

135. Modern prophets should be more dramatic, doing sign acts, performances, public testimony seals, etc. 

Identity/Character

136. Identity as an “American” should be considered less important than identity as a human being. 

137. We should give up the word “partner” to describe spouses, girlfriends, boyfriends, etc. 

138. American individualism should be decreased a bit and American collectivism should be increased. 

139. More currently gendered things should be considered “non-binary” and fewer people should feel the need to identify themselves this way. 

140. Areas with discrete cultural influences (like chinatowns or areas where hispanic culture is paramount) should be projected economically with decision makers being the people who live there. 

141. We should hold some historical events as more sacred and deserving of reverence. It’s always “too soon” for some jokes about events like 9/11. 

142. Americans should not over-sell the positive effects of unity after tragedy, and should acknowledge the terrible things that a traumatically unified America has done. 

143. I think we need to more frequently participate in rituals that bring us together: flag raisings, parades, stuff like that, and they should be given a sense of formality and reverence without overdoing patriotism. 

144. I think the flag should be put at half mast less often, basically only for when a former president dies. 

145. Americans should give up purity tests for identity. There aren’t individual positions that make you a “real” liberal, christian, american, or whatever. 

146. America should learn to acknowledge and heal from the mistakes of the past without erasing the good.  

Nature/Environment

147. People with beachfront/lakefront property should allow public visitors more freely, considering themselves more stewards than owners of nature. 

148. Heat pumps should replace AC in more homes. 

149. The U.S. should rejoin the Paris agreement. 

150. More Americans should believe the experts on climate change. 

People I Know

151. My parents should move to Madison

152. Jeremy should come back to the church 

153. Kate should move out of Rexburg

154. Amy and Ben should have a baby

155. Callie should write/illustrate  a children’s book

156. Justin should get into drone piloting

157. Jeremy and Justin should get jobs at Epic

158. Daniela should write a book

159. In general, friends who have left organized religion should re-evaluate what elements of their experience of religion were not actually antagonistic but were instead humans trying to figure out the right thing to do. And they need to realize that some religious standards were and continue to be good ideas. 

Miscellaneous 

160. Homes should be built with central, overhead light in every room. 

161. Normal sized rolls of toilet paper should exist (just look at the TP aisle and you’ll realize that every brand claims bigger rolls than normal). 

162. People shouldn't be allowed to save seats with their belongings for public events. Normalize just moving people's stuff and sitting in their seats.