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US upward social mobility is among the worst in the world. US workers are stuck in a rat race that simply doesn't exist to the same extent in Europe.
by tovej 5y ago
US upward social mobility is among the worst in the world. US workers are stuck in a rat race that simply doesn't exist to the same extent in Europe.
- ChuckNorris89 5y agoI beg to differ. The fact is hard working immigrants in the US have a much higher chance of becoming successful than in Europe. Pretty much all the US tech companies are now run by immigrants of minority backgrounds while, for example, Eastern European and Turkish immigrants in Germany are still regarded as cleaners and kebab salesmen, with the only notable exception they can name being the Turkish CEO of BionTech.
- varjag 5y agoEven the top tier of decision making political class in the USA has many immigrants. In Europe it's still largely token presence faces in auxiliary positions.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoYeah the Trump government was really really diverse, and so are the boards of the large companies.
- varjag 5y agoSebastian Gorka is an immigrant, from the EU no less. So are the many notorious alt-right figures that are baked in your consciousness as ur-American.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoOk yeah the Nazis building your moon rockets were also immigrants, true ;-)
- varjag 5y agoI'm an Eastern European immigrant in Norway, stuff your attitude where it makes you warm.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoI don't follow ... what does that have to do with Nazis being a part of or employed by the US government? And I stand by my point that the big companies that the article is about don't have too much diversity on the higher levels.
- varjag 5y agoOf course you don't follow, because what you wrote was a non sequitur.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoYeah I also sometimes have those bad days where I just wanna insult people without even telling them exactly why ...
- varjag 5y agoIt was you who brought Trump and then to top it off bloody Nazis with a personal slant. Here is a brilliant idea for you, don't try to jab complete strangers you know nothing about, keep the debate to subject matter. Then you'll skip the whole hoopla of trying to arguing yourself out from uncomfortable corner you paint yourself into.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoYou talked about decision makers, didn't you? Was Trump not a decision maker? So I'm still not following, you really gotta give more context.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoI'd argue if you say "the fact is", you should provide a source for that. So low-paying jobs in the service sector are not an immigrant thing in the US? Did you talk to enough Europeans to know we can only name the BionTech guy as an example of a successful immigrant?
- ChuckNorris89 5y ago>Did you talk to enough Europeans to know we can only name the BionTech guy as an example of a successful immigrant? Please name some for me. Especially in Germany.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoI am one European. You would have to talk to a lot of Europeans to make the claim you made.
- ChuckNorris89 5y agoThe fact that you can't name any just proves my point. Thank you.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoYour logic is flawed. That happens when following some ideology.
- ChuckNorris89 5y agoIt may be flawed but at least I provide arguments for my logic while you just spam this thread with "Europe good because social system, USA bad because corporations"
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y agoYeah, however, what you should provide is evidence, not arguments. With "logic", anything can explained, if your logic is just skewed enough. My evidence? Reality.
- Applejinx 5y agoIf the 'higher chance' we're talking about is the chance of becoming CEO of a tech unicorn, established by the fact that there are CEOs of tech unicorns, is this not entirely a moot and meaningless point? Effectively the difference between a chance of 0.0000001% and 0.0% is not important…
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> US upward social mobility is among the worst in the world This is incorrect. American social mobility is low. But not widely so, and certainly not consistently lowest among rich countries. (It is consistently among the lowest.) If one takes "the extent to which son’s [sic] earnings levels reflect those of their fathers," Britain and Italy are worse than America while France is quite close [1]. Similarly, "after adjusting for the country-specific distribution of socio-economic status, the United States, France and Belgium are countries where parental background has the greatest influence on student achievement." [1] http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.411.8463&rep=rep1&type=pdf http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.411... Figure 2, page 9
- tovej 5y agoSo US social mobility is only slightly better (insignificantly) than the two worst countries in Europe. I think that article rather supports my claim. Italy is also rather a troublesome example, because northern and southern Italy are vastly different. Regional differences account for much of the inequality and the persistence of it there. Looking at the mean in Europe vs the US there is no contest. Other metrics in the same paper indicate that for factors that impact long term social stability, like schooling, the US is the worst. It's possible that, since the US is such a big territory, regional differences are distorted. But I couldn't find a better source myself, with a quick search.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> US social mobility is only slightly better (insignificantly) than the two worst countries in Europe. I think that article rather supports my claim. Compared with the cohort of European countries, America fairs poorly (though not excessively so). The original claim, however, was that it fares "among the worst in the world." This is incorrect; it's roughly middle of the pack [1][2]. On the measure of the "number of generations it would take...those born to...the bottom 10% of the income distribution...to approach the mean in their society," America ties with Ireland, Portugal, Italy, the U.K., Italy, Austria and Switzerland. It is ahead of France, Germany and Hungary. In summary, America is good at allowing the poor to become middle class. It is less good at letting the middle class become exorbitantly rich, though not terribly so. [1] https://www.oecd.org/social/broken-elevator-how-to-promote-social-mobility-9789264301085-en.htm https://www.oecd.org/social/broken-elevator-how-to-promote-s... [2] https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/1-5%20generations.png https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/1-5%20generations.png