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> maybe it is my European arrogance It could be. Social cohesion is a lot easier in monoethnic countries, for better or for worse; and in countries where the m

> maybe it is my European arrogance It could be. Social cohesion is a lot easier in monoethnic countries, for better or for worse; and in countries where the monoethnicity is changing like Sweden (where a full quarter of the population is not ethnically Swedish), voters are putting political parties in power that promise to restore it by some combination of reducing immigration or enforcing integration. In the meantime, the dystopia of the United States is such that the state of Mississippi, often panned both within the US and without as a "literal third-world country", has a higher per capita disposable income than Germany. The image that you have of half the population either struggling to stay alive or basically dead is not true to reality.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago
I feel you're just repeating randomly cherry-picked stats. The data is fairly consistent that the USA as a whole has slowly lost it's advantages over Europe that it had after WWII and the New Deal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_Unit... > In the United Nations Human Development Index, which measures health, education, and per capita income levels, the United States is relatively high, currently ranking 8th. However, the Human Development Index is not considered a measure of living standards, but a measure of potential living standards were there no inequality: rather, the inequality-adjusted Human Development Index is considered the actual level of human development, taking inequality into account. On the inequality-adjusted HDI, the United States ranked 27th in 2014, tied with Poland Wikipedia has newer stats too, but the USA is still basically tied with Poland in the mid 20s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequality-adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequalit... So, if the USA as a whole is Poland then presumably Mississipi, despite all the money they get from other states, is likely not doing that great compared with Germany. Also intersesting, and new to me, they do one that takes into account how wasteful the country is with resources to achieve that standard of living, on that the USA slips way down, below Ukraine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary_pressures%E2%80%93adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary...
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  I think they made a compatible point that you are glossing over. The US can have all of the following: less social cohesion, more money, more inequality, and less human development. I agree that social cohesion is at the crux of most of it. Many Americans hate most other Americans at any given time. Most are concerned in exerting political control over each other to force them to behave how they want.
  - prottog 4y ago
    I don't know about "hate", but one of the foundational ideas of the US, at least from what I can make of it, is that more control should be relegated to the lower levels of government (to the states or the people), and the highest levels (the federal government) should necessarily be sort of the least common denominator of what everyone agrees on -- which, of course, is going to be few things. So you have a situation where one side wants to "help people" by throwing money at them and yelling at the other side for being heartless greedy bastards, and the other side wants to "help people" by imposing state-sanctioned morality on them and yelling at the other side for being immoral hedonists, and the federal government being simultaneous trying to be used by everyone for their own purposes and yelled at by everyone for being "obstructionist" (hint: that's it working as intended).
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      I think it goes a bit further than you described. both sides aren't just judging calling the other side heartless or hedonists. They are actively using the state and police to force them to comply with their own morality via mandatory taxation and laws. (e.g. mandatory taxation for social welfare, or prohibition of private behavior such as buying alcohol on Sunday) Social diversity = differences in morality differences in morality + State enforced morality = low social cohesion/animosity.
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago
  > The data is fairly consistent that the USA as a whole has slowly lost it's advantages over Europe It is September now, let's talk about USA standards of living vs European in say 6 months. This will give some time to account for the winter with natural gas shortages.
atoav 4y ago
The fractions mentioned were of course hyperbole. My point was that giving away more of your income to your peers will create a more livable environment. For example as we talk about Mississipi and Germany: - Infant mortality — Germany: 2.67 deaths per 1000 live births, Mississippi: 8.8 infant deaths per 1000 live births - Life expectancy — Germany: 80.1 years, Mississippi: 71.9 years - Homicides per 100.000 population — Germany: 0.933, Mississippi: 20.5 So the superiour disposable income in Mississippi surely does not help to keep their infants (or rather themselves) from dying more often. But okay: you pay less taxes and therefore have more disposable income as people living in Germany. But it comes at a cost. And while well educated upper class people might not be as much affected by this (if they are lucky and don't fall victim to the resulting violence), this will shape the whole environment you are living in. Nothing else was my point. If I had to choose between more money and a less livable environment, or less money and a more livable environment I'd choose the later one. Money can buy you a lot of nice things, but unless you never leave your home living in a nice environment is worth more for a live well spent. And if you never leave your home, you should maybe wonder why. By the way I live in Hamburg, Germany, where 34% of the population has a migration background, many turkish, arabian and african minorities. I never heard a single gunshot in a decade of living here. I have never seen a single person publicly using hard drugs (excluding Marihuana, Alcohol and similar things). I have once seen a used syringe and I live in one of the dirtier parts of the city. Just like living in a noisy flat will wear you down in ways you don't even notice until you finally spend a few calm nights in another place, the environment you live in affects you as well.
- nradov 4y ago
  There is a huge diversity between US states in our federal structure, just like there is a huge diversity between EU member countries. For better or worse, US states are sovereign entities with the right to govern their own internal affairs. It would be more sensible to compare Mississippi to Romania. (Although Mississippi does still come out worse on certain metrics.)
- prottog 4y ago
  You're absolutely right about everything you said, but for me the crux of it comes down to: > If I had to choose between more money and a less livable environment, or less money and a more livable environment I'd choose the later one. Some people might choose differently, and moreover, the less taxation there is, the more people are able to choose between the two at all. After all, you can freely give to charity what isn't taxed from you, should you choose to trade your money to better outcomes of those around you. I have never been to your fair city (though I always have wanted to!), but a 34% foreign-born rate is comparable to many large cities in the US, some in states with more egalitarian policies (California, New Jersey) and some in states with less egalitarian policies (Florida, Texas); so clearly that is not a big driver, at least in the US, of where immigrants choose to go. San Francisco, famously egalitarian in its local politics, is right in line with Hamburg at 34.1% foreign-born; yet it is full of people using hard drugs in public, leaving syringes and human waste behind.

ZeroGravitas 4y ago

I feel you're just repeating randomly cherry-picked stats. The data is fairly consistent that the USA as a whole has slowly lost it's advantages over Europe that it had after WWII and the New Deal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_Unit... > In the United Nations Human Development Index, which measures health, education, and per capita income levels, the United States is relatively high, currently ranking 8th. However, the Human Development Index is not considered a measure of living standards, but a measure of potential living standards were there no inequality: rather, the inequality-adjusted Human Development Index is considered the actual level of human development, taking inequality into account. On the inequality-adjusted HDI, the United States ranked 27th in 2014, tied with Poland Wikipedia has newer stats too, but the USA is still basically tied with Poland in the mid 20s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequality-adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequalit... So, if the USA as a whole is Poland then presumably Mississipi, despite all the money they get from other states, is likely not doing that great compared with Germany. Also intersesting, and new to me, they do one that takes into account how wasteful the country is with resources to achieve that standard of living, on that the USA slips way down, below Ukraine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary_pressures%E2%80%93adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary...

s1artibartfast 4y ago
I think they made a compatible point that you are glossing over. The US can have all of the following: less social cohesion, more money, more inequality, and less human development. I agree that social cohesion is at the crux of most of it. Many Americans hate most other Americans at any given time. Most are concerned in exerting political control over each other to force them to behave how they want.
- prottog 4y ago
  I don't know about "hate", but one of the foundational ideas of the US, at least from what I can make of it, is that more control should be relegated to the lower levels of government (to the states or the people), and the highest levels (the federal government) should necessarily be sort of the least common denominator of what everyone agrees on -- which, of course, is going to be few things. So you have a situation where one side wants to "help people" by throwing money at them and yelling at the other side for being heartless greedy bastards, and the other side wants to "help people" by imposing state-sanctioned morality on them and yelling at the other side for being immoral hedonists, and the federal government being simultaneous trying to be used by everyone for their own purposes and yelled at by everyone for being "obstructionist" (hint: that's it working as intended).
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    I think it goes a bit further than you described. both sides aren't just judging calling the other side heartless or hedonists. They are actively using the state and police to force them to comply with their own morality via mandatory taxation and laws. (e.g. mandatory taxation for social welfare, or prohibition of private behavior such as buying alcohol on Sunday) Social diversity = differences in morality differences in morality + State enforced morality = low social cohesion/animosity.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago
> The data is fairly consistent that the USA as a whole has slowly lost it's advantages over Europe It is September now, let's talk about USA standards of living vs European in say 6 months. This will give some time to account for the winter with natural gas shortages.

atoav 4y ago

The fractions mentioned were of course hyperbole. My point was that giving away more of your income to your peers will create a more livable environment. For example as we talk about Mississipi and Germany: - Infant mortality — Germany: 2.67 deaths per 1000 live births, Mississippi: 8.8 infant deaths per 1000 live births - Life expectancy — Germany: 80.1 years, Mississippi: 71.9 years - Homicides per 100.000 population — Germany: 0.933, Mississippi: 20.5 So the superiour disposable income in Mississippi surely does not help to keep their infants (or rather themselves) from dying more often. But okay: you pay less taxes and therefore have more disposable income as people living in Germany. But it comes at a cost. And while well educated upper class people might not be as much affected by this (if they are lucky and don't fall victim to the resulting violence), this will shape the whole environment you are living in. Nothing else was my point. If I had to choose between more money and a less livable environment, or less money and a more livable environment I'd choose the later one. Money can buy you a lot of nice things, but unless you never leave your home living in a nice environment is worth more for a live well spent. And if you never leave your home, you should maybe wonder why. By the way I live in Hamburg, Germany, where 34% of the population has a migration background, many turkish, arabian and african minorities. I never heard a single gunshot in a decade of living here. I have never seen a single person publicly using hard drugs (excluding Marihuana, Alcohol and similar things). I have once seen a used syringe and I live in one of the dirtier parts of the city. Just like living in a noisy flat will wear you down in ways you don't even notice until you finally spend a few calm nights in another place, the environment you live in affects you as well.

nradov 4y ago
There is a huge diversity between US states in our federal structure, just like there is a huge diversity between EU member countries. For better or worse, US states are sovereign entities with the right to govern their own internal affairs. It would be more sensible to compare Mississippi to Romania. (Although Mississippi does still come out worse on certain metrics.)
prottog 4y ago
You're absolutely right about everything you said, but for me the crux of it comes down to: > If I had to choose between more money and a less livable environment, or less money and a more livable environment I'd choose the later one. Some people might choose differently, and moreover, the less taxation there is, the more people are able to choose between the two at all. After all, you can freely give to charity what isn't taxed from you, should you choose to trade your money to better outcomes of those around you. I have never been to your fair city (though I always have wanted to!), but a 34% foreign-born rate is comparable to many large cities in the US, some in states with more egalitarian policies (California, New Jersey) and some in states with less egalitarian policies (Florida, Texas); so clearly that is not a big driver, at least in the US, of where immigrants choose to go. San Francisco, famously egalitarian in its local politics, is right in line with Hamburg at 34.1% foreign-born; yet it is full of people using hard drugs in public, leaving syringes and human waste behind.