[HN Gopher] Britain and the US are poor societies with some rich...
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Britain and the US are poor societies with some rich people
Author : yodsanklai
Score : 33 points
Date : 2022-09-16 20:04 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.ft.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.ft.com)
| SamReidHughes wrote:
| Actual graphs show US median income beating almost all the other
| countries (but not Norway or Switzerland).
| TheCoelacanth wrote:
| I think they made a better case for this being true for the UK
| than for the US.
|
| The UK is approximately equal to Slovenia all the way up to the
| median.
|
| The US is approximately equal to Slovenia at the 10th
| percentile, but much higher at the median.
| ZoomerCretin wrote:
| There's more to income distribution than the median.
| haunter wrote:
| Couldn't find now but years ago (~10) there was a long
| article/essay here about China pretty much lamenting about the
| same question that China is a poor country with a lot of rich
| people or a rich country with a lot of poor people.
| Kukumber wrote:
| China just exited the status of 3rd world country not too long
| ago, so your statement is not fair
| [deleted]
| chinabot wrote:
| Rich is always rich, but poor is relative in many cases. Having a
| poorly paid job in a cheap place to live can be as good as a
| well-paid job in a big city when you are spending 90% of your
| income just to exist.
|
| No way I earn as much as I used to in the city but I'm a 1000%
| happier.
| dybeubxhsjs wrote:
| Which is why we use PPP metrics (parity purchasing power). It
| aims to answer: "with the amount of local currency I make, how
| many goods and services can I get?"
|
| It's not perfect, but it's definitely something present in
| considerations of whether a country is rich or poor (country X
| can be poorer than Z in nominal terms, but is richer in real
| terms -i.e. PPP terms- than country X)
| csense wrote:
| OTOH, having a poorly paid job in a rich country can be better
| than being rich in a poor country..
|
| Read one of the Reddit threads about "What did you notice most
| when you moved from a poor country to a rich country?" It's
| pretty eye opening. Some stuff that I remember:
|
| - Stuff that breaks (vending machines, bathrooms, etc.) usually
| gets repaired instead of just being broken from then on
|
| - Government officials don't demand bribes everywhere you go
|
| - You have rights, you can't just be jailed or worse for no
| reason, even if you criticize the government
|
| - Buildings are well constructed and aren't in danger of
| collapse / burning down due to electrical faults / gas
| explosions
|
| - Police, fire and ambulance come reasonably quickly and do
| their jobs reasonably well
|
| - No matter how poor you are, you're not just left to fend for
| yourself, there are some safety nets
|
| The best life hack is to live in places off the beaten path in
| a rich country, e.g. the Rust Belt in the US. Bonus points if
| you can work remotely for a company that pays big-city wages.
| jmrm wrote:
| Article without paywall: https://archive.ph/MTVay
| rospaya wrote:
| > On present trends, the average Slovenian household will be
| better off than its British counterpart by 2024, and the average
| Polish family will move ahead before the end of the decade.
|
| FT is using "better off" and "richer" as synonyms, and yes they
| have overlaps but you still use the same roads, government
| services and yeah, breath the same air like poor people. The US
| is good at diving them.
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