5 ms·

What an absolute joke. The United States has terrible class mobility compared to the Netherlands or Germany for example. You don’t have anything to support what

What an absolute joke. The United States has terrible class mobility compared to the Netherlands or Germany for example. You don’t have anything to support what you said other than a skewed perspective created by American centric media. Edit: I guess the down voters here hate facts. The US scores lower on social mobility than the majority of European countries https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Social_Mobility_Index https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Social_Mobility_Index

thesimon 5y ago
Using a different metric the Netherlands are slightly better than the US, but Germany is slightly worse. https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/1-5%20generations.png https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/1-5%20generations.png
- dsomers 5y ago
  And the majority of Europe is still ahead of the US, so what’s your point?
  - thegypsyking 5y ago
    I moved from Europe to the US, and so have a lot of other people who aim to become rich. In europe most rich people inherit everything, mobility to upper class is basically non existent. Here it’s Very much possible
- dan-robertson 5y ago
  I’m kinda surprised by these numbers. My impression of the us is that many immigrants will be unskilled and have low incomes, but that their children will be much better off in comparison. So a few reasons these numbers could be this way: 1. My intuition is wrong 2. There are lots of people in low income groups where there is little i regeneration along mobility for structural reasons, or maybe immigrants children who often see the biggest improvements are excluded for some reason. 3. The chart talks about reaching mean income. Particularly in the US, mean income is higher than median income so even if achieving the latter is easier, achieving the former could be harder. To some extent the metric may disadvantage countries where the highest-earning few percent of the population earn a lot more than the median person.
- lpv 5y ago
  That graph, and "social mobility" analysis in general, shows the movement from low income to average. This is good for a country overall, but it's irrelevant to the discussion that people are having in this thread. Most people here are more interested in the median to rich movement. Unfortunately this movement is practically impossible in countries like Sweden and NL (for an employee). Let's take a typical profile that HN users would be interested in, a top10% engineer working for a big company. This person would never become rich in NL, but almost always become rich in the US.
  - thesimon 5y ago
    >Most people here are more interested in the median to rich movement. Unfortunately this movement is practically impossible in countries like Sweden and NL (for an employee). Same in Germany why I assumed the diagram would be appropriate. But you are 100% correct and I agree with > This person would never become rich in NL, but almost always become rich in the US.
bjornsing 5y ago
I don’t think that measurement of social mobility makes much sense in this context. Sure, moving from lower working class to upper middle class is probably easier in Sweden than in many other countries. But the thing is: it doesn’t make much of a difference. I have a sneaking suspicion that the Nordic welfare state kind of games the social mobility score in this way, by having such a compressed income distribution. If you go from $20k after taxes to $35k after taxes you’ve moved through more or less the whole income distribution, but your life is pretty much the same.
- yunohn 5y ago
  > If you go from $20k after taxes to $35k after taxes you’ve moved through more or less the whole income distribution, but your life is pretty much the same. 100% agreed - my sibling comment about NL also implies the same.
- oblio 5y ago
  The thing is, there's only 1 situation where being a part of a certain socioeconomic group sucks. Being poor. So any country that optimizes for improving that, kind of by definition, improves the average happiness of its citizens.
- ethbr0 5y ago
  The report itself [0] notes many of the contradictions in the US: > "Despite scoring high on the Work Opportunities (83.0) pillar—because of its low unemployment rate—as well as on the Technology Access pillar (90.2), it has the lowest score in the region on the Fair Wages pillar (43.8 against an average of 64.6 for the region). With an incidence of low pay (less than two-thirds of median wages) at 24.9, it has one of the shares of low-paid workers among OECD countries. The lack of effective social protection in the United States also translates into a low score on the Social Protection pillar (61.7). The minimum guaranteed income benefits for a family with two children (where one partner is out of work) is only 20% of median income. The United States could also improve on the Health pillar, where it performs quite poorly compared to peers in its region (75.8) due to a low healthy life expectancy at birth (66.6 years)." When you average things down to a single number, you lose a lot of nuance. For the US, the data the report collected generally supports something like 'You have the opportunity to succeed greatly, and be rewarded extremely well, but this requires financial resources at birth.' While also being true that 'If you are less successful, there are few and poor support nets for you, and serious pitfalls to avoid (f.ex. health care costs).' [0] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/Global_Social_Mobility_Report.pdf https://www3.weforum.org/docs/Global_Social_Mobility_Report....
yunohn 5y ago
Given my experience in NL, I would disagree. I see a very clear class divide here, which is just mostly ignored by the middle/upper classes and government. Most of the population spend the majority of their income on rent, commuting, and essentials. Students also have lots of debt over the past decade (15k on average). Owning a car is expensive, but so is public transport (esp. for a family). Renting is expensive, but so is buying a house. Income tax brackets range from ~40-50%, while corporate and dividend taxes are minimal - 15-20%. VAT is regressive and applies on almost all goods incl. groceries, ranging from 5-21%. There is no capital gains taxes, so this obviously benefits the economically active upper/elite classes who have assets/savings to invest - while middle class families do not own much at all. Since the Mobility Index rankings focus on lower -> middle class mobility, it shows the Netherlands in a positive light. However, the income divide between the two classes is actually not as pronounced as the USA, while the gap between middle to upper is incredibly massive (like most of the world). I guess what I'm trying to say is that despite the expected policy differences and rankings, NL is quite strongly divided economically. In my experience, the average Dutch don't mix with the poor, nor show off their riches, nor think too deeply about the elite classes. This mindset is essentially ignorance - neglecting poorness, brushing off government corruption, and assisting the funneling of taxes & wealth.
- garmaine 5y ago
  > Students also have lots of debt over the past decade (15k on average) Those are amateur numbers. -USA
  - yunohn 5y ago
    I know loads of students with more debt, but indeed, it’s less than the USA. Not an acceptable amount regardless.
    - garmaine 5y ago
      Really? That seems something that could be paid off pretty easily. Not like US student debt which is the size of house in value.
RickJWagner 5y ago
My own experiences disagree. I have friends who started out in middle-class families and sunk lower. I also have friends who started out middle-class and rose. IMHO, the biggest factors seem to be raw intellingence, willingness to move & chase money, and some 'luck' factors. But I can't imagine a world where nobody could change fortunes given reasonably common circumstances.

thesimon 5y ago

Using a different metric the Netherlands are slightly better than the US, but Germany is slightly worse. https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/1-5%20generations.png https://www.oecd.org/els/soc/1-5%20generations.png

dsomers 5y ago
And the majority of Europe is still ahead of the US, so what’s your point?
- thegypsyking 5y ago
  I moved from Europe to the US, and so have a lot of other people who aim to become rich. In europe most rich people inherit everything, mobility to upper class is basically non existent. Here it’s Very much possible
dan-robertson 5y ago
I’m kinda surprised by these numbers. My impression of the us is that many immigrants will be unskilled and have low incomes, but that their children will be much better off in comparison. So a few reasons these numbers could be this way: 1. My intuition is wrong 2. There are lots of people in low income groups where there is little i regeneration along mobility for structural reasons, or maybe immigrants children who often see the biggest improvements are excluded for some reason. 3. The chart talks about reaching mean income. Particularly in the US, mean income is higher than median income so even if achieving the latter is easier, achieving the former could be harder. To some extent the metric may disadvantage countries where the highest-earning few percent of the population earn a lot more than the median person.
lpv 5y ago
That graph, and "social mobility" analysis in general, shows the movement from low income to average. This is good for a country overall, but it's irrelevant to the discussion that people are having in this thread. Most people here are more interested in the median to rich movement. Unfortunately this movement is practically impossible in countries like Sweden and NL (for an employee). Let's take a typical profile that HN users would be interested in, a top10% engineer working for a big company. This person would never become rich in NL, but almost always become rich in the US.
- thesimon 5y ago
  >Most people here are more interested in the median to rich movement. Unfortunately this movement is practically impossible in countries like Sweden and NL (for an employee). Same in Germany why I assumed the diagram would be appropriate. But you are 100% correct and I agree with > This person would never become rich in NL, but almost always become rich in the US.

bjornsing 5y ago

I don’t think that measurement of social mobility makes much sense in this context. Sure, moving from lower working class to upper middle class is probably easier in Sweden than in many other countries. But the thing is: it doesn’t make much of a difference. I have a sneaking suspicion that the Nordic welfare state kind of games the social mobility score in this way, by having such a compressed income distribution. If you go from $20k after taxes to $35k after taxes you’ve moved through more or less the whole income distribution, but your life is pretty much the same.

yunohn 5y ago
> If you go from $20k after taxes to $35k after taxes you’ve moved through more or less the whole income distribution, but your life is pretty much the same. 100% agreed - my sibling comment about NL also implies the same.
oblio 5y ago
The thing is, there's only 1 situation where being a part of a certain socioeconomic group sucks. Being poor. So any country that optimizes for improving that, kind of by definition, improves the average happiness of its citizens.
ethbr0 5y ago
The report itself [0] notes many of the contradictions in the US: > "Despite scoring high on the Work Opportunities (83.0) pillar—because of its low unemployment rate—as well as on the Technology Access pillar (90.2), it has the lowest score in the region on the Fair Wages pillar (43.8 against an average of 64.6 for the region). With an incidence of low pay (less than two-thirds of median wages) at 24.9, it has one of the shares of low-paid workers among OECD countries. The lack of effective social protection in the United States also translates into a low score on the Social Protection pillar (61.7). The minimum guaranteed income benefits for a family with two children (where one partner is out of work) is only 20% of median income. The United States could also improve on the Health pillar, where it performs quite poorly compared to peers in its region (75.8) due to a low healthy life expectancy at birth (66.6 years)." When you average things down to a single number, you lose a lot of nuance. For the US, the data the report collected generally supports something like 'You have the opportunity to succeed greatly, and be rewarded extremely well, but this requires financial resources at birth.' While also being true that 'If you are less successful, there are few and poor support nets for you, and serious pitfalls to avoid (f.ex. health care costs).' [0] https://www3.weforum.org/docs/Global_Social_Mobility_Report.pdf https://www3.weforum.org/docs/Global_Social_Mobility_Report....

yunohn 5y ago

Given my experience in NL, I would disagree. I see a very clear class divide here, which is just mostly ignored by the middle/upper classes and government. Most of the population spend the majority of their income on rent, commuting, and essentials. Students also have lots of debt over the past decade (15k on average). Owning a car is expensive, but so is public transport (esp. for a family). Renting is expensive, but so is buying a house. Income tax brackets range from ~40-50%, while corporate and dividend taxes are minimal - 15-20%. VAT is regressive and applies on almost all goods incl. groceries, ranging from 5-21%. There is no capital gains taxes, so this obviously benefits the economically active upper/elite classes who have assets/savings to invest - while middle class families do not own much at all. Since the Mobility Index rankings focus on lower -> middle class mobility, it shows the Netherlands in a positive light. However, the income divide between the two classes is actually not as pronounced as the USA, while the gap between middle to upper is incredibly massive (like most of the world). I guess what I'm trying to say is that despite the expected policy differences and rankings, NL is quite strongly divided economically. In my experience, the average Dutch don't mix with the poor, nor show off their riches, nor think too deeply about the elite classes. This mindset is essentially ignorance - neglecting poorness, brushing off government corruption, and assisting the funneling of taxes & wealth.

garmaine 5y ago
> Students also have lots of debt over the past decade (15k on average) Those are amateur numbers. -USA
- yunohn 5y ago
  I know loads of students with more debt, but indeed, it’s less than the USA. Not an acceptable amount regardless.
  - garmaine 5y ago
    Really? That seems something that could be paid off pretty easily. Not like US student debt which is the size of house in value.

RickJWagner 5y ago

My own experiences disagree. I have friends who started out in middle-class families and sunk lower. I also have friends who started out middle-class and rose. IMHO, the biggest factors seem to be raw intellingence, willingness to move & chase money, and some 'luck' factors. But I can't imagine a world where nobody could change fortunes given reasonably common circumstances.