5 ms·

Denmark legally discriminates agwinst "non-western" immigrants and officially aims at not taking any refugees at all. France is ruled by a rather right-wing gov

by oytis 5y ago

Denmark legally discriminates agwinst "non-western" immigrants and officially aims at not taking any refugees at all. France is ruled by a rather right-wing government and has a chance to have a far-right one next. Germany hasn't seen a left-wing government for 16 years, will likely not see it for 4 more years (if ever). The rest can be easily compromised by economic stagnation, to have good social security you need a lot of wealth, and a lot of immigration from poorer countries

j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
I don't get your point. I mean, I agree with the danger of a far-right president in France in '22, and I'd like to see another party in power in Germany, but what does that have to do with the current quality of life? Right now, the social security system works, does it not? Just from the perspective of a citizen ... I have health and unemployment insurance, good public transportation, I won't get shot in public, the police will less likely kill me, etc. I really don't get your point. Because there's stuff that could go wrong, the good things we have are irrelevant?
- oytis 5y ago
  The first part was about quality of democracy. Europe has problems with the far-right too, and American democracy at least makes it possible that it's being interchangeably ruled by different parties with pretty distinct policies. The second part is, well, like asking why should we sit in the lockdown and wear masks when not a lot of people are dying of covid right now. It's not something that may happen, it will happen if evething goes as it goes and no one makes anything about it
  - j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
    So you're saying parties in Europe are interchangeable? We know what happens with Covid due to science, modeling and stuff. But a virus spread is oretty easy to model compared to a society and its economy. So until now it worked really nice, haven't seen a lot of studies saying it won't in the future, rather the opposite. Edit: or do you mean because we're getting older and hace fewer kids? Yeah that'll be a challange. Bit eventually every country will experience that, so lets figure out how to deal with this! And yeah, also let immigrants in ;)
    - oytis 5y ago
      > So you're saying parties in Europe are interchangeable? No, not at all. But you don't have the same party ruling in U.S. for several decades. That would be legally possible, but that just doesn't happen due to how the system works. > So until now it worked really nice I'm not very well versed with the statistics here. But my impression is that social security is on decline. Welfare benefits sum grows much slower than inflation, and there have been studies that it's already not enough to even get the necessary nutrients. So it is a tendency that we see right now, not a prediction about some possible catastrophic event in future. > And yeah, also let immigrants in ;) There will be no immigrants if economy is weak, that's the thing.
      - Rexxar 5y ago
        > No, not at all. But you don't have the same party ruling in U.S. for several decades. Look at state/city level and you will have a different picture of United States. And for Europe, let's take France as example. Here are the ruling party changes in the last forty years : 81,86,88,93,97,02,12,17 Do you know the average tenure of the current American senators ?
      - viceroyalbean 5y ago
        >But you don't have the same party ruling in U.S. for several decades It depends on what country you're talking about, but looking at which party is the biggest/who the prime minister is and summing it up as the "ruling party" is a gross oversimplification of the power dynamics in a parliamentary democracy. The power balance shifting between smaller parties can bring about huge effects on the government and the policies that are passed.
      - j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
        I agree that for example in Germany, it would be very helpful to limit the chancellor(...ship?) to two terms. But again, just because social security does not deliver all it promises - throw it out completely? I don't get that point. Tendencies that exist right now can be corrected. And that wouldn't even be more expensive, but at least in Germany, the money would just have to be distributed more fairly. For example, you get the same amount of child benefits no matter what you earn. That doesn't make sense. So change that a little and lots of people won't notice while lots of people will do way better.
gjhh244 5y ago
Mass migration from developing world is mostly a burden to European welfare systems these days, since a lot of it is humanitarian and most humanitarian migrants lack skills to do well in our job markets.
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
  Source? Wrong for Germany, those immigrants from 2015 integrated well into the workforce.
  - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
    > Wrong for Germany, those immigrants from 2015 integrated well into the workforce I have no horse in this race, but I'm curious about a source for this, mostly for how it's been measured.
    - oytis 5y ago
      First one that I could find.https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/arbeitsmarkt-fluechtlinge-103.html https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/arbeitsmarkt-fluechtlin... It says that by 2020 half of them has found a job, which is way higher unemployment rate than is average in Germany though. But even if they don't find jobs themselves, at the very least they have children which is critical for sustainability of a country with inverted population pyramid.
      - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
        > by 2020 half of them has found a job, which is way higher unemployment rate than is average in Germany though Half of immigrants being unemployed after half a decade is bad, especially compared with America, where immigrants are more likely to find themselves employed than the native born [1]. > if they don't find jobs themselves, at the very least they have children Sure. But I'd hate to do the math on how much each of those children cost the German taxpayer. [1] https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=LZTRCwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR1&dq=immigrants+economic+integration+america&ots=9BiQj6PLb5&sig=e0_PCXY313ITHZ51TbFAoWOMDbM#v=onepage&q=immigrants%20economic%20integration%20america&f=false https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=LZTRCwAAQBAJ&oi=...

by oytis 5y ago

j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago

I don't get your point. I mean, I agree with the danger of a far-right president in France in '22, and I'd like to see another party in power in Germany, but what does that have to do with the current quality of life? Right now, the social security system works, does it not? Just from the perspective of a citizen ... I have health and unemployment insurance, good public transportation, I won't get shot in public, the police will less likely kill me, etc. I really don't get your point. Because there's stuff that could go wrong, the good things we have are irrelevant?

oytis 5y ago
The first part was about quality of democracy. Europe has problems with the far-right too, and American democracy at least makes it possible that it's being interchangeably ruled by different parties with pretty distinct policies. The second part is, well, like asking why should we sit in the lockdown and wear masks when not a lot of people are dying of covid right now. It's not something that may happen, it will happen if evething goes as it goes and no one makes anything about it
- j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
  So you're saying parties in Europe are interchangeable? We know what happens with Covid due to science, modeling and stuff. But a virus spread is oretty easy to model compared to a society and its economy. So until now it worked really nice, haven't seen a lot of studies saying it won't in the future, rather the opposite. Edit: or do you mean because we're getting older and hace fewer kids? Yeah that'll be a challange. Bit eventually every country will experience that, so lets figure out how to deal with this! And yeah, also let immigrants in ;)
  - oytis 5y ago
    > So you're saying parties in Europe are interchangeable? No, not at all. But you don't have the same party ruling in U.S. for several decades. That would be legally possible, but that just doesn't happen due to how the system works. > So until now it worked really nice I'm not very well versed with the statistics here. But my impression is that social security is on decline. Welfare benefits sum grows much slower than inflation, and there have been studies that it's already not enough to even get the necessary nutrients. So it is a tendency that we see right now, not a prediction about some possible catastrophic event in future. > And yeah, also let immigrants in ;) There will be no immigrants if economy is weak, that's the thing.
    - Rexxar 5y ago
      > No, not at all. But you don't have the same party ruling in U.S. for several decades. Look at state/city level and you will have a different picture of United States. And for Europe, let's take France as example. Here are the ruling party changes in the last forty years : 81,86,88,93,97,02,12,17 Do you know the average tenure of the current American senators ?
    - viceroyalbean 5y ago
      >But you don't have the same party ruling in U.S. for several decades It depends on what country you're talking about, but looking at which party is the biggest/who the prime minister is and summing it up as the "ruling party" is a gross oversimplification of the power dynamics in a parliamentary democracy. The power balance shifting between smaller parties can bring about huge effects on the government and the policies that are passed.
    - j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
      I agree that for example in Germany, it would be very helpful to limit the chancellor(...ship?) to two terms. But again, just because social security does not deliver all it promises - throw it out completely? I don't get that point. Tendencies that exist right now can be corrected. And that wouldn't even be more expensive, but at least in Germany, the money would just have to be distributed more fairly. For example, you get the same amount of child benefits no matter what you earn. That doesn't make sense. So change that a little and lots of people won't notice while lots of people will do way better.

gjhh244 5y ago

Mass migration from developing world is mostly a burden to European welfare systems these days, since a lot of it is humanitarian and most humanitarian migrants lack skills to do well in our job markets.

j_wtf_all_taken 5y ago
Source? Wrong for Germany, those immigrants from 2015 integrated well into the workforce.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  > Wrong for Germany, those immigrants from 2015 integrated well into the workforce I have no horse in this race, but I'm curious about a source for this, mostly for how it's been measured.
  - oytis 5y ago
    First one that I could find.https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/arbeitsmarkt-fluechtlinge-103.html https://www.tagesschau.de/wirtschaft/arbeitsmarkt-fluechtlin... It says that by 2020 half of them has found a job, which is way higher unemployment rate than is average in Germany though. But even if they don't find jobs themselves, at the very least they have children which is critical for sustainability of a country with inverted population pyramid.
    - JumpCrisscross 5y ago
      > by 2020 half of them has found a job, which is way higher unemployment rate than is average in Germany though Half of immigrants being unemployed after half a decade is bad, especially compared with America, where immigrants are more likely to find themselves employed than the native born [1]. > if they don't find jobs themselves, at the very least they have children Sure. But I'd hate to do the math on how much each of those children cost the German taxpayer. [1] https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=LZTRCwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR1&dq=immigrants+economic+integration+america&ots=9BiQj6PLb5&sig=e0_PCXY313ITHZ51TbFAoWOMDbM#v=onepage&q=immigrants%20economic%20integration%20america&f=false https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=LZTRCwAAQBAJ&oi=...