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Actually, we do. In fact, immigrant households use nearly twice the benefits as citizens.

That's pretty misleading. They use it twice as often. It doesn't mean they're using twice as much. They also don't qualify for federal benefits until they're almost able to get citizenship, so it's not relevant to this discussion.

Cost of living is much higher in Finland than most of the US.

Actually, the costs are really quite similar.

You need to compare different states. CoL in Mississippi is a lot lower than California. Since we're talking about federal UBI, nothing prevents those who find it too difficult to live on $500 / mo. in San Francisco from moving to Jackson.

Not to mention you completely excluded state welfare spending, which if converted to UBI as well would significantly reduce the need to spend it at the federal level.

So we're going to spend more at the State levels? Or is UBI to replace all existing welfare plans?

We already spend on welfare at the state level. That spending can be used by each individual to supplement UBI from the federal level to reach a livable income. E.g. if states already provides $200 / month in food assistance, then the federal government only needs to spend $300 for a combined total of $500.

There are about 217 million people between the ages of 18 and 65 - UBI recipients.

We're not giving anything to illegal immigrants and visa holders. Maybe not even to permanent residents (though some might naturalize anyways to get the benefit, which is not a bad thing).

Actually, we do. In fact, immigrant households use nearly twice the benefits as citizens.

Cost of living is much higher in Finland than most of the US.

Actually, the costs are really quite similar.

Not to mention you completely excluded state welfare spending, which if converted to UBI as well would significantly reduce the need to spend it at the federal level.

So we're going to spend more at the State levels? Or is UBI to replace all existing welfare plans?

I was talking about the poorly educated population in Nigeria. You're the one who brought race into it.

I've been in Africa, I've been involved in a couple of projects there. There are some really great people, but also a pile of problems. Yet, anytime someone tries to discuss those problems, people like you shut down the discussion with cries of "racism".

Who is the real racist, here?

... When do we start referring to Irag as the 20 Year war? Even that is optimistic.

And let's not forget the our remarkable success in Afghanistan. A real garden of paradise and it only cost a trillion (as of 2017). That's about $4 million per square mile or $6640 per acre. ($1.07T / (251,773 * 640)). A real bargain. Not counting American lives lost or ruined, medical and other expenses for the killed and wounded, opportunities lost due to funds diverted to defense and interest to be paid on the whole pile.

... When do we start referring to Irag as the 20 Year war? Even that is optimistic.

And let's not forget the our remarkable success in Afghanistan. A real garden of paradise and it only cost a trillion (as of 2017). That's about $4 million per square mile or $6640 per acre. ($1.07T / (251,773 * 640)). A real bargain. Not counting American lives lost or ruined, medical and other expenses for the killed and wounded, opportunities lost due to funds diverted to defense and interest to be paid on the whole pile.

In 1950, Venezuela had the 4th highest per-capita income on Earth.

Venezuela has the largest known oil reserves on the planet.

It takes a special kind of stupid to fuck that up.

I give you socialism.

Let's talk about that.

Tell yourself whatever you need to in order to get through the day.

Ironic.
But it's not me saying it, it's called metrics They come in handy for comparing things.

No need to take free speech... They don't have that now.. https://www.lifehacker.com.au/...

Holy shit, they must have it really bad then... oh wait http://www.nationmaster.com/co...
If the US put as much effort into improving quality of life as pursuing this misconstrued perception of freedom, then maybe you'd actually have a higher quality of life.

Venezuela has done that, and has crime being 1/1000 what it was
Ha ha ha ha. You are so funny.

So what's the point here? The point is that
1. It's a parenting thing. First and foremost. Parents shouldn't let their children bake in front of screens as a substitute for imparting social and civic values or as a substitute for education.
2. It's also a commercial thing. We do have laws about marketing at and entering into contracts with children on the grounds that children aren't fully-formed adults capable of making their own decisions. Laws at all levels of government treat that sort of commercial activity as predatory in many cases and no one bats an eye on 1A grounds because even though it doesn't say it in the Constitution, we all have a notion that children aren't fully capable of being rational actors. Actually it comes close to saying it because we have a Constitutional upper limit (but no lower limit) on federal voting age.

So what's it all add up to? Maybe there is a role for government in helping parents rein in potentially harmful influences on children. What role exactly? I don't know off the top of my head. As you say...there's a need for objective information to make an informed decision, but like all research, it'll be motivated by an anecdotal observation...namely that children are impressionable.

Many countries that have dramatically lower crime rates have very similar TV viewing habits: https://www.statista.com/stati...
Japan consumes essentially the same amount of TV. Yet our murder rate is 26 times higher: http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

There is no real evidence to suggest that TV is the problem, although plenty of studies have been done. It's also disappointing to me that you would rather have the government control parenting techniques than discuss restrictions on firearms. I would have more respect for conservatives if they weren't so eager to sacrifice freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of religion (all of which are threatened by your suggestions) for the sake of keeping gun purchases convenient.

theft etc is more of a problem.

Citation?

In 2002, theft in America was about the same as in the EU. In America, 10% were victims, vs 9.57% for the G7 average. That is an insignificant difference. Do you have more recent statistics that say otherwise?

LOL is that what you think? Here's a quick overview of Thailand's gun laws:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Also Switzerland isn't much wealthier than the US:

http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

There's no relationship between monocultural and monoracial places and lower gun crime. Look at Somalia or any other war-torn African hellhole. Or on the other end of the spectrum, look at France, England, or eastern Canada. Those places are also not far from the US in wealth and have much lower gun crime. Or look at Australia or NZ - mostly white, monocultural or damn near close to it, incomes in the same ballpark as the US, and much lower gun crime.

On that note, you're right that the US' gun violence is due to a cultural difference. The US has a cultural problem called gun culture, and it keeps them from having sensible gun laws. Australia used to suffer with it, but they got over it.

Curiosity? For all the bad things you hear about the country it doesn't seem to be the worst for tourists, I hear more bad things about Mexico.

That's because A) there is more news about Mexico and some of it is bound to be bad, B) you obviously haven't been to Mexico and C) people who have a great experience in Mexico (most of them) don't complain about it. I've worked in Mexico and spent quite a lot of time there. Mexico is great for the most part. Honestly the US is roughly just as dangerous to visit as Mexico and neither place is really especially dangerous. There is no reason to be afraid of visiting either country as a general proposition.

There are lots of things I'm curious about but I don't do the ones that carry a non trivial chance of me ending up in a labor camp. If you want to stick your head in the lions mouth knock yourself out but personally I'll just visit pleasant places. There are worse places to go (like Syria) but not a lot of them.

Overall, US crime rate is about twice that of Switzerland..

OK, but as of 2015 only 42% of US crime was committed by whites, while whites are 72% of the US population:

.42/.72 = .58

.58 x (about twice) is "about the same".

strong unions already took care of that and with nearly 100% membership

Union membership by country:

Sweden - 82%
Denmark - 76%
Norway - 57%
Switzerland - 22%

Businesses where low wages are common, such as retail and fast-food, are the least likely to be unionized.

After more research it seems you're half right; the initial scale was 0 as the temperature of a brine solution at it's phase change point and 96, not 100, was selected as body temperature. Those seem like perfectly useful reference points really, for daily use.

As for crime rates: http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

People that currently work to afford drug and alcohol addictions would now have no need to work, so society as a whole gains a dependent class at the expense of those who want to produce.

The thing is, people whop work just to get money to fund an addiction are most likely working jobs that are going to be gone anyway in the next couople of decades. That is, someone working a warehousing or a fast food job just to be able to afford booze is not going to be able to find work in the future regardless because automation is already making such jobs obsolete and is only going to keep going.

Those that want to produce will simply stop producing when they can't receive the fruits of their labor because it's going to a massive welfare state.

Bullshit. The very poiint of this story for example is to point out that the people who can work will not work any less under UBI because you still get more money if you work rather than just being on the UBI. The incentive to work if you can and those raise your standard of living is still there,

If Socialist utopias worked, Venezuela would be a paradise right now instead of the hellhole it is. Massive amounts of people would be fighting to get into Cuba, China, Russia, the DPRK, and all of the other "Socialist (also known as communism without so many government guns)" countries.

Ah, this argument again. I live in Finland, you know, one of those 'socialist' that offers free healthcare and education with tax money. We have an extensive welfare system already and are also trialing UBI to replace/modernize the wellfare system to make it more flexible. Other countries that have similar systems include but are not limited to: sweden, norway, denmark, Germany, France, etc And last I checked, the US has a social security system also funded by taxes.

There's some sort of weird american myopia, in which the only alternatives seem to be an massive oligarchy á la Russia or modern day US where the top 0,1 % is doing insanely well, the next 9,9 % are doing alright and then the middle and low-income classes are going down, or a 3rd world hellhole. This is just one giant strawman and the age old 'no social policies can ever work because the soviet union' -argument which is utter BS. The advanced European economies have been working as de facto socialist states for the better part of half a century, yet somehow conveniently we are always ignored in these conversations even though we've been far more successful in the implementation of these policies than the 3rd world countries that you just listed. We outperform the US in basic education and health, people are happier, there's less violent crime, less corruption etc. Quoting the study on happiness:

The USA is a story of reduced happiness. In 2007 the USA ranked 3rd among the OECD countries; in 2016 it came 19th. The reasons are declining social support and increased corruption (chapter 7) and it is these same factors that explain why the Nordic countries do so much better.

But sure, keep looking at Venezuela if it makes you feel good.

They are not doing so, they are all trying to get to the most free countries in the world with Capitalist economies (closest representations at least) and representative democratic Governments.

We have both a capitalistic system (a capitalistic economy does not prevent strong social policies) and a multi-party representational democracy. And if I had to choose, I'd much rather stay here (on in any other

Comparable educational levels in less time: http://www.nationmaster.com/co... [nationmaster.com]

Yes, and the highest private education spending in OECD

Get free healthcare. Giving better life expectancy (and lower teenage pregnacy rates): http://www.nationmaster.com/co... [nationmaster.com]

Yes, for the simple reason that healthcare spending has little to do with either life expectancy or teenage pregnancy rates. So why are you dragging it into this discussion?

Whatever you think of "other countries" that were "stupid enough to allow taxes to get so high" applies to the US, not to the UK.

Actually, the UK has about average taxes among OECD countries at around 35% of GDP; the US is on the low side at about 26%. Of course, given that US per capita GDP is about 35% higher than that of the UK, the US actually collects more in taxes per capita than the UK, and it spends even more because it runs a deficit.

Comparable educational levels in less time: http://www.nationmaster.com/co... [nationmaster.com]

Yes, and the highest private education spending in OECD

Get free healthcare. Giving better life expectancy (and lower teenage pregnacy rates): http://www.nationmaster.com/co... [nationmaster.com]

Yes, for the simple reason that healthcare spending has little to do with either life expectancy or teenage pregnancy rates. So why are you dragging it into this discussion?

Whatever you think of "other countries" that were "stupid enough to allow taxes to get so high" applies to the US, not to the UK.

Actually, the UK has about average taxes among OECD countries at around 35% of GDP; the US is on the low side at about 26%. Of course, given that US per capita GDP is about 35% higher than that of the UK, the US actually collects more in taxes per capita than the UK, and it spends even more because it runs a deficit.

UK pays less tax.

Get free healthcare. Giving better life expectancy (and lower teenage pregnacy rates):
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Lower crime rates:
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Comparable educational levels in less time:
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Whatever you think of "other countries" that were "stupid enough to allow taxes to get so high" applies to the US, not to the UK.

You pay more. Get less back.

UK pays less tax.

Get free healthcare. Giving better life expectancy (and lower teenage pregnacy rates):
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Lower crime rates:
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Comparable educational levels in less time:
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Whatever you think of "other countries" that were "stupid enough to allow taxes to get so high" applies to the US, not to the UK.

You pay more. Get less back.

UK pays less tax.

Get free healthcare. Giving better life expectancy (and lower teenage pregnacy rates):
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Lower crime rates:
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Comparable educational levels in less time:
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Whatever you think of "other countries" that were "stupid enough to allow taxes to get so high" applies to the US, not to the UK.

You pay more. Get less back.

Completely free means you are perfectly oblivious about who is paying for it.

I'll give you a hint: there's a reason why the US far out paces Sweden's economy in every per capita metric:

http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Americans don't think their paychecks will get mooched from so people can have freebie health insurance to the same extent the Swedish do.

Cuba supposedly has free health care (although no one can access it). Pay for public health care is the reason why the nation is so poor. Same thing in Fiji where the unemployment rate is twice as high as the US.

The UK is actually more obese than America, thank you very much. Also, the proportion of people living in poverty is only slightly higher in the US than in the UK. Prisons, sure, that's something America really needs to work on. And yes, the gun homicide rate is much higher in the US than it is in the UK. But the total *murder* rate is only 4x higher in the US, and more than half of that is gangs killing other gangs, which isn't representative of what the average citizen faces.

Good links, thanks.

But why does the USA let babies die?

http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Health/Infant-mortality-rate

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/howard-steven-friedman/infant-mortality-rate-united-states_b_1620664.html

http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr63/nvsr63_05.pdf

http://www.nber.org/papers/w20525.pdf

Indeed. It's especially wonderful when you see them comparing countries by gun murder rate. No shit Britain has a gun murder rate that's like...5% of ours, but their plain old murder rate is a lot closer, what does THAT tell you?

WTF are you smoking and can I have some?
http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

UK murder rate per million: 11.68. USA 42.01.
That's a 4X per capita difference. In numerical terms, the cost of the 4X higher murder rate in the USA costs many more lives. UK: 722, USA, 12,996.
So we might infer that if the 4X difference in murder rate is due to the greater gun control in the UK, that same gun control in the US would yield 9747 fewer murder victims.

You might want to consider what your motivations are for making those lies.

It's simple, we lock every American in their own jail cell 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Gun deaths will plummet.

Alternately, shut down Detroit, New Orleans, Oakland, and Baltimore, and the U.S. drops from #10 out of 44 countries for which there are statistics, to #41.

Which would put it lower than Germany, Sweden, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, and Spain, but still higher than Japan or the UK (just like all those other countries are higher than Japan and the UK).

http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

In Developed countries, no. Companies like to bitch and moan that it is the profitable markets like we are doing most of the pirating, but that is just plain false. Claiming that it is the US and Europe is just ways to get stockholder and government sympathy. The piracy rates of developed countries is the lowest in the world [1].

The problem areas are the rest of the world where this stuff is openly sold on the streets and people just don't care. So when people bring up things like Steam Sales and cheap games they are right, stuff is too cheap for the majority of us to pirate, but elsewhere in the world, it is not.

[1] http://www.nationmaster.com/co... info/stats/Crime/Software-piracy-rate

In Developed countries, no. Companies like to bitch and moan that it is the profitable markets like we are doing most of the pirating, but that is just plain false. Claiming that it is the US and Europe is just ways to get stockholder and government sympathy. The piracy rates of developed countries is the lowest in the world [1].

The problem areas are the rest of the world where this stuff is openly sold on the streets and people just don't care. So when people bring up things like Steam Sales and cheap games they are right, stuff is too cheap for the majority of us to pirate, but elsewhere in the world, it is not.

[1] http://www.nationmaster.com/co... info/stats/Crime/Software-piracy-rate

In Developed countries, no. Companies like to bitch and moan that it is the profitable markets like we are doing most of the pirating, but that is just plain false. Claiming that it is the US and Europe is just ways to get stockholder and government sympathy. The piracy rates of developed countries is the lowest in the world [1].

The problem areas are the rest of the world where this stuff is openly sold on the streets and people just don't care. So when people bring up things like Steam Sales and cheap games they are right, stuff is too cheap for the majority of us to pirate, but elsewhere in the world, it is not.

[1] http://www.nationmaster.com/co... info/stats/Crime/Software-piracy-rate

Here, now you know how to fish.

Australia's robbery rate is about half (55%) that of the US, overall murder rate is about 1/4.

        http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

And I'll just throw this out there, last night in my town, someone not only managed to shoot himself in the foot, but the same bullet seriously injured a 9 year old neighbor:

        http://abc7news.com/news/san-j...

the French who couldn't manage that. Then again, profitability is hard when you're on strike for 6 out of 7 days and rioting fot the 7th.

Well, statistics says french workers strikes days are below average EU level. The point is that french workers tend to strike against the government instead of their employer, which produce fewer but bigger and more visible strikes.

Well, yeah, it is kind of shocking to compare crime between the US and Finland: http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

The molecules which make up all objects, including criminals, move substantially slower when it's cold as hell.

Well, yeah, it is kind of shocking to compare crime between the US and Finland: http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

did the person who voted the lying moron up hover over his links?

the first is an unrelated bing advertisement come on and the second is an xls that no one security aware is going to click on

here are the real facts:

http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

great time to be a kiwi

then there is this assertion:

"They are no longer richer then most of Europe primarily because most of the region periodically insists on throwing the foreign corporations out."

any serious economist or historian would assert a couple dozen reasons for latin america's problems, nevermind the fact that the temper tantrums of venezuela over the past few decades is not germaine to 1900 nor can it be extrapolated to a dozen other countries, which is where this "fact" about "throwing foreign corporations out" seems to come from, some propaganda addled mind

this guy comes across as an alex jones HURR DURR blowhard spouting low iq "facts" and he gets modded up?

this guy is a moron, a liar, and a troll. and someone modded him up because he provided "links"

i can do the same

here is my link proving that fusion power has been blocked by the illuminati in the year 1970

fact!

pfffft

Even the German cars may not be made in Germany, BMW or example only makes half its cars there and Spartanburg SC is poised to overtake Dingolfing as the highest volume plant.

But that hair splits at both ends, as many "Detroit" cars are made in Mexico or Canada.

True. Between manufacturing costs and various laws such as fuel economy standards mean cars only relationship to the home country is the name.

Actually, Germany produces about half as many cars as the US.

Only if the goalpost is moved from cars to "all automobiles" a la the AC below. But I didn't say automobiles, I said cars.

Fair enough, although it is only about 1/4 higher in 2014 for cars.

2014 Production

Although if you would add in light trucks in the US, which often are bought instead of a car as a primary vehicle, the stats would change.

US automobile production was 11 million in 2013, while Germany produced 5.7 million.

Too bad I was talking about cars, then. Why is it that every time this factoid is mentioned, people try to move the subject to automobiles, total?

It's like someone saying GM produces more cars and trucks than Honda, and then someone saying Honda is the largest engine maker in the world because in addition to cars, they make ATV's, riding lawnmowers, and personal watercraft. The later is a true statement....but a non sequitur in response to the first.

Even the German cars may not be made in Germany, BMW or example only makes half its cars there and Spartanburg SC is poised to overtake Dingolfing as the highest volume plant.

But that hair splits at both ends, as many "Detroit" cars are made in Mexico or Canada.

Actually, Germany produces about half as many cars as the US.

Only if the goalpost is moved from cars to "all automobiles" a la the AC below. But I didn't say automobiles, I said cars.

I don't necessarily think any victim-blaming was going on.

Whenever something the victim has said or done is used to excuse — or even merely explain — an attack on him, it is victim-blaming. When his actions/words were perfectly legal — whether it is the revealing clothing, or following a suspicious character on public street, or mocking somebody's religion, or even "not caring" for somebody's dire economic situation — such victim-blaming becomes abhorrent.

Poverty breeds violent crime.

Yeah, a famous excuse by Illiberals. Only it is not quite true. Congo, for example, may be the world's poorest country, but Iceland is at the top of the number of crimes per capita.

Poor people with no future and therefore nothing to lose do bad things.

Citation needed. While we do not (yet) know the background of these criminals, the Tsarnaev brothers were reasonably comfortable. Palestinians in Gaza are much wealthier than Egyptians behind the border. 9/11-attackers were from Saudi Arabia — and although not all residents of that country are rich, all citizens are very well off. Bin Laden was a bona-fide billionaire...

Poverty may or may not increase the number of property crimes, but it does not make one a terrorist, from what I see.

If you can do something to fix that problem, you will decrease the number of desperate people doing desperate thing.

The assholes responsible for the attack being discussed were not desperate. Nor did they do a "desperate thing". Off-topic much?

Yes, and Americans have more freedom to make those choices for themselves than Europeans.

No, most of them do not. Social mobility is provably higher in most EU member states with high taxes. It's pretty simple: wealth/income redistribution provides a lot of people in the lower part of society with freedom. Many (less affluent) Americans have little choice but to take on any job they can get and then work as many hours as they can get, crawling for their superiors for fear of getting fired. That's not freedom.

You can choose which company you work for, and you can found your own company. Both of those are a lot easier in the US than in Europe.

Wait a minute. You actually believe that Europeans can't choose at which company they get a job? Really?
Also, wrong: http://www.nationmaster.com/co...
Or perhaps founding a company is easier in the US, just less of an option to most people.

Nothing, except higher taxation, less wealth, and more regulation

Bullshit. Private investments are hardly regulated and not taxed at all.
But don't let reality spoil your preconceived notions. Just keep waving that banner, man.

If you're discounting what you claim the major cause of American gun deaths (illegally owned guns used by criminals) to be, you've got to do the same in Canada. In nearly every category Canada is better off, per capita, than the US in terms of crime.

Also, citation needed for the not counting gangland violence showing low murder rate. The closest thing I can find is a mis-cited report about Chicago that a US conservative site trotted out, sourcing a CDC report that shows nothing of the sort, via Reddit. Here's a well cited refutation of the idea that 80% of gun deaths are caused by gangs, not even after ruling out suicide is it close to true..

Once you start crossing borders, 'nations' become less worrisome. I'd like to know how many of the 'willing expats' have travelled out-of-nation prior to the survey. I'd bet that the majority have. I'd assume that there are fewer of the Americans surveyed who have travelled abroad, but this is just my gut feel. I've heard 'stories' mind you, of people who've never left their counties *shudder*.

Once you leave and explore the world a little, you'll find that many places are quite nice to visit / live for a while. Some will be learning experiences, some will just be for material gain, and others will receive opportunities that their own country can't offer. Why the specific people thought what they did was another topic.

Although one big reason is that there's still the prevailing belief that moving to America will increase your chance at happiness, security, or financial success. I'd still consider that debatable, but the circumstances are very relevant.

http://www.nationmaster.com/co...
Tells me there's a large shift in immigration for people moving into OIL rich nations which makes sense since there's probably a great financial incentive to move (10 year old data alas). The US is 30th, so still pretty strong on the immigration front, but seems to be slowwing per capita over time, which may indicate tighter immigration policies or less incentive from 2005-2008. Of course post-housing meltdown numbers would be more interesting, but oh well.

Here is a proper citiation: http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/stats/Industry/Manufacturing-output

The issue with US manufacturing isn't the absolute dollar values/volume of goods produced, it is the trend line. US manufacturing isn't growing, its largely flat, that is the problem. We are naturally producing more humans constantly, but you can't hire those new humans in to an industry that isn't growing at the same rate as the population.

It's not meant as a deterrent, you're right, it doesn't work as one. it's meant to simply eliminate remorseless, hopelessly evil people from the world.
The US has a high population than many other countries, thus a higher crime rate than those countries, but also an open news media, so nearly every crime is tracked and reported, and even sometimes makes national news if it serves an agenda.
If you look at http://www.nationmaster.com/co... there's even a disclaimer that states, "DEFINITION: Note: Crime statistics are often better indicators of prevalence of law enforcement and willingness to report crime, than actual prevalence.." There is also a difference between a murder and an execution: a murder of an innocent is unprovoked; killing a murderer is not unprovoked and he/she is not innocent. (Granted, they should be DAMN SURE they guy they're executing is indeed the guilty party, in this particular case, it was no contest). Frankly it's akin to killing cancer cells. Rehabilitation where violent criminals are concerned is an extreme rarity, practically a myth. And I'm fairly sure that more than half the vocal anti-death penalty crowd here would suddenly drop their lofty principles if the man strapped in the gurney was Dick Cheney.

3,500 prisoners serving a life sentence... that's rougly about 1 in 100,000. 80,000 is about 1 in 4,000. In the random western country where I live, only 1 in 500,000 are serving a life sentence. I cannot find numbers for the number of those in solitary confinement but with a total of 1 in 2,000 people in jail, about half would have to be in solitary confinement to match the US numbers.

So, no, I don't think those staggering numbers take the edge out of the argument, they
confirm it. The US has been leading the ranks of prisoners per capita for ages and is one of only a handful of western countries in the top 100.

http://www.nationmaster.com/co...

Certainly I was not playing games. This is the first time I've been accused of using a straw man argument, but I suspect you may be correct about it. I always thought that logical fallacies were more of a debating tactic, but now I guess they are usually just made in error. Oops. :-)

Anyway, I think my reasoning and arguments have so far been rather poor, perhaps mostly because I've been flailing around in the fog of my own opinions: something that I'm sure is more likely if you don't put enough effort into listening (or in this case reading) what is actually being said. Again, my bad.

I'll give it another try. In your first reply to me you were very clear and there was no need for me to search for analogies: "Compare parts of the US to parts of the US if you want to talk about the US statistics. You cannot compare states across national lines with any credibility." That was your apples and oranges argument all along and and I should have recognized it immediately. My apologies for the lengthy and unnecessary digression.

Instead, I should have immediately pointed out to you that I see nothing scientifically wrong with making numerical comparisons like that between countries; something that is in fact done all the time. Here are more than a dozen examples:

• List of countries by HIV/AIDS adult prevalence rate
• List of countries by traffic-related death rate
• The 15 Countries With the Highest Smartphone Penetration
• List of countries by electricity production from renewable sources
• Countries with the Highest / Lowest Average IQ
• Obesity country comparison
• Cancer rates: see how countries compare worldwide
• Paid Vacation Around the World
• Average temperature in the countries of the world
• List of countries by rail transport network size
• Highways > Total (per capita) (most recent) by country
• Total Water Use per capita by Country
• List of countries by suicide rate
• List of countries by incarceration rate
• Drug Use Death Rate Per 100,000
• Teenage pregnancy (most recent) by country
• Snakebite in The Americas

Why would it be unscientific to make comparisons like these? As long as the numbers are always collected in the same way, then they are just numbers and don't attempt to explain anything about differences that may be cultural, legal, socioeconomic, etc. In all cases it's left up to the reader to explain the differences ("it's a police state", "it's probably a poor country", "perhaps they

Certainly I was not playing games. This is the first time I've been accused of using a straw man argument, but I suspect you may be correct about it. I always thought that logical fallacies were more of a debating tactic, but now I guess they are usually just made in error. Oops. :-)

Anyway, I think my reasoning and arguments have so far been rather poor, perhaps mostly because I've been flailing around in the fog of my own opinions: something that I'm sure is more likely if you don't put enough effort into listening (or in this case reading) what is actually being said. Again, my bad.

I'll give it another try. In your first reply to me you were very clear and there was no need for me to search for analogies: "Compare parts of the US to parts of the US if you want to talk about the US statistics. You cannot compare states across national lines with any credibility." That was your apples and oranges argument all along and and I should have recognized it immediately. My apologies for the lengthy and unnecessary digression.

Instead, I should have immediately pointed out to you that I see nothing scientifically wrong with making numerical comparisons like that between countries; something that is in fact done all the time. Here are more than a dozen examples:

• List of countries by HIV/AIDS adult prevalence rate
• List of countries by traffic-related death rate
• The 15 Countries With the Highest Smartphone Penetration
• List of countries by electricity production from renewable sources
• Countries with the Highest / Lowest Average IQ
• Obesity country comparison
• Cancer rates: see how countries compare worldwide
• Paid Vacation Around the World
• Average temperature in the countries of the world
• List of countries by rail transport network size
• Highways > Total (per capita) (most recent) by country
• Total Water Use per capita by Country
• List of countries by suicide rate
• List of countries by incarceration rate
• Drug Use Death Rate Per 100,000
• Teenage pregnancy (most recent) by country
• Snakebite in The Americas

Why would it be unscientific to make comparisons like these? As long as the numbers are always collected in the same way, then they are just numbers and don't attempt to explain anything about differences that may be cultural, legal, socioeconomic, etc. In all cases it's left up to the reader to explain the differences ("it's a police state", "it's probably a poor country", "perhaps they

Is it zero? Can we be legitimately concerned about indefinite human unemployment and the long-term phasing out of capitalism yet?

The last few will probably be stubborn; but today's technology has decimated agricultural-sector employment throughout the developed world already.

In the case of Australia, farmers represent a whopping 1.7% of the population, so even their total extirpation as an employment class would be relatively minor shift. Probably one with substantial cultural resonance; but just not that big in absolute or relative terms.

Not just due to harsher sentences but also due to harsher crimes. The US murder rate is four times as high as the UK murder rate and almost 6 times as high as the German one.

The number of drug offences is way higher in Germany, that skews the statictics, as you can see in this comparison