Agreed, Finland is a very homogeneous country, but you just have to look across the Baltic to find a very similar country with similar immigration levels to the

Agreed, Finland is a very homogeneous country, but you just have to look across the Baltic to find a very similar country with similar immigration levels to the US (Sweden), which I happen to be from. Now the difference is what kind of immigrants the US gets versus European countries. The US has a much higher ratio of skilled immigrant workers. It's very difficult to get in to this country without a STEM master's degree, I'd know. Almost nobody moves to Sweden for the reason to work. They move to Sweden because they might be killed in their home country if they don't leave, and it's one of the few countries that can't turn away immigrants who face threats to their lives. Now look at Portland, which I also happen to live in. It might have a lot of immigrants, but come ON! Are you really using Portland as an example of a dysfunctional place? Portland? Personally, I think this is one of the best places in this country. If I'd go by the correlation then I'd say more diverse populations result in better communities, but I wouldn't go that far. I'll admit that diverse populations do create problems, but I think it's a cop out for people to blame that for any little problem you might be facing. Man up and take some responsibility. And this is the point where people start using size as an argument, and how states within the country differ sooo much. I've had long discussions with several people saying that New York and Texas are as different as France and Germany. Which is just ludicrous and shows how little they know about the world. Btw, Russians and Finns are not closely related in any sense. If you said that to a Finn they'd probably kill you, just giving a heads up. Swedes and Finns are more intertwined by history and culture than related in the genetic or language sense. If you told a Finn that they're related to Swedes they might kill you slightly for that too.