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The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

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Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#81

Post by Turing_Machine »

Retric wrote: post #75
Turing_Machine wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the contrary, both the UK and Canada produce vast quantities of oil. Also, I'm not sure what numbers you're looking at. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)... shows all those countries well below the United States. The only ones above it are, again, oil and financial services countries.

List of IMF ranked countries by GDP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_IMF_ranked_countries_b... Has different numbers. Though, several other places don't seem to agree with those numbers. So, they may be off.

Sort the GDP (PPP) per capita column in descending order. It's Qatar, Luxembourg, Singapore, Brunei, Kuwait, Norway, United Arab Emirates, San Marino, Switzerland, United States.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#82

Post by sanoli »

lumberjack wrote: post #78
jandrewrogers wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social mobility measures based on income (PPP) percentiles are misleading because they don't account for the hugely different income variances between countries. In countries with low income variances like Denmark, a small change in your absolute income will be deemed "socially mobile" whereas a much larger increase absolute income in countries with high income variances like the US will be deemed as not "socially mo…

>Individuals don't care about their ability to change their percentile, they care about their ability to change their total income. I think most individuals would prefer a "non-mobile" $60k increase in income versus a "mobile" $40k increase in income. You can't spend percentiles. I highly dispute this. Take it as a completely different world view but I think if people were given a choice: 1 >a nominal income of $100k…

Depends. Can I opt for the $100k income and then move to the $60k neighborhood?

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#83

Post by dharma1 »

Finn here (though lived the past 12 years in the UK).

In my experience, the one thing that by far works best to enable social mobility, and that I think Nordic and some central European countries have done quite well, is free, high quality education - from primary school to university.

Especially as we move further and further to knowledge based economic growth, this is crucial, not just for social mobility, but well being and success of whole countries.

Market forces are great at optimising some things, some not so great. Things that require long term focus - basic research, education, environmental issues - are best handled, and paid for by governments.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#84

Post by vanilla-almond »

DasIch wrote: post #40
douche wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Social issues are easy when you have a 99% ethnically homogeneous population without any serious religious divisions either.

The problem isn't that the US is heterogenous, the problem is that the US has a massive problem with racism, freedom of and from religion. Maybe even worse than that though are people like you, who can't even openly admit that obvious problem and only mention it in some euphemistic indirect way.

"the problem is that the US has a massive problem with racism"

I think this is too simplistic. The US is a country of some 320 million people and the experience of racism undoubtedly varies enormously across cities and states. A blanket statement like this can't convey the complexity of the situation.

I live in the UK, where we've seen a horrible rise in racism after the EU referendum. But what country in the EU can honestly say they don't have serious problems with racism in their society?

Across EU nations, there are many racist political parties, not at the fringes, but actively shaping and influencing political discourse.

I really don't think we in Europe are in a superior position when it comes to issues of racism. In fact, I'd argue we're probably less likely to acknowledge or consider it a problem.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#85

Post by fleitz »

gr3yh47 wrote: post #51
chris_va wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't conflate political rhetoric with quality of life. Quality of life has never been higher for any social class, even with unfortunate income inequality.

>Quality of life has never been higher for any social class even if this were true (source?) it doesnt matter when there is a steady move toward lower social class on average for the overwhelming majority of Americans

Yes, the middle class IS shrinking, but the amazing thing is people are leaving to the upper classes at a 2:1 ratio.

> The study shows that as the number of middle-class Americans fell (from 61 percent of the population to 51 percent of the population), the percentage of Americans who are upper income surged from 14 percent of the population to 20 percent of the population.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/48754974

71% of Americans are middle class or better, amazing. Most of those in the lower classes are those who decided not to get any skills.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#86

Post by bunnymancer »

sremani wrote: post #71
cplanas wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> homogeneous society [...] Scandinavian fetish Foreign-born population of Sweden: 16% Foreign-born population of Norway: 13.9% Foreign-born population of USA: 13.1% https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

how convenient, to pick and make it native vs foreign born? you know better than that! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_State...

Convenient in the sense of that most countries don't collect race demographics and there isn't any other data,

or convenient in the sense of you having little to offer as a retort?

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#87

Post by nostrebored »

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #39
cplanas wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that you are putting Spain, Greece and Italy as example of poor EU countries already shows you have an alarming lack of knowledge about the EU at least. Spain and Italy are average countries in the EU, GDP per capita-wise. Greece is lower than average, but far away from the poorest ones ( http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/images/3/3... ) In Europe anyone can go to a top school. In my case, my…

> if you are good enough for that university, you go there. As someone who grew up in EU but now I live in the US, this is something that seriously bugs me. What lesson should I teach my kids when they go to college? "Son, no matter how hard you study, or you don't study, all that matters is daddy's money to get you into college."

If you are good enough (prepared enough is a better term, probably) for a university in the U.S., odds are that you go there. Is there a disparity in admissions based on wealth? Absolutely, but I believe a very significant portion of that is due to the attitudes of the wealthy towards education.

You see a large number of transfers from community colleges in the U.S. to top tier schools as well. CCSF feeds into Berkeley, Georgia Perimeter College feeds into Georgia Tech, etc., etc.

The truth is, unless you're hyper-wealthy, your money gets your kid into college through the things that you purchase to further that goal, and the attitudes of children in the same social class.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#88

Post by cplanas »

sremani wrote: post #71
cplanas wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> homogeneous society [...] Scandinavian fetish Foreign-born population of Sweden: 16% Foreign-born population of Norway: 13.9% Foreign-born population of USA: 13.1% https://data.oecd.org/migration/foreign-born-population.htm

how convenient, to pick and make it native vs foreign born? you know better than that! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_State...

Diversity, as understood as a possible problem for social cohesion, is not about race: it's about culture. And the vast majority of Americans in the US have only one culture: the American one. The exception for this is first (and sometimes second) generation immigrants. That's why I use the native vs foreign born statistic.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#89

Post by clarry »

ptaipale wrote: post #22
jomamaxx wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

32% national, 22% municipal and 8% social security = 62%. 20% payroll tax. 24% VAT. That it is 'common' does not mean it is fair. If a company has $100K allocated to pay you, $20K goes to payroll tax. Of $80K remaining, you take home 40% of that, which is $32K. Suppose 2/3 of your take home goes towards consumer goods meaning that you're paying an additional $5K on VAT ~= $25K direct take home. So for $100K salary, y…

The national tax percentage is 32 % (actually 31.75 %) only for the amount that exceeds the "high earner" threshold, i.e. you pay it for the part that you earn in excess of 72,300 € per year. (That income puts you in top 4 % of earners in Finland.) The municipal tax varies between 16.50 % (Kauniainen) and 22.50 % (Savonlinna). The church tax varies between 1 and 2 %.

And you don't have to be in church.

Re: The American Dream Is Alive in Finland

#90

Post by jacquesm »

IanDrake wrote: post #49
jacquesm wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My friends are from all over Europe, and America, India and China. > Obviously, that's not a pragmatic statement, as poor kids from the ghetto often have no appreciation of this and simply don't work towards great outcomes - but this is the reality. Ah, it's their fault. > impossible for poor Spaniards/Greeks/Sicilians to rise to higher than the European upper middle class. I'm sure you'd argue they don't work toward…

>> Obviously, that's not a pragmatic statement, as poor kids from the ghetto often have no appreciation of this and simply don't work towards great outcomes - but this is the reality. >Ah, it's their fault. That's not what he said. There are many reasons for this, mostly parenting and culture.

That's exactly what he said: that they don't work towards great outcomes.
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