Surprisingly, there are some recent, more sophisticated studies indicating that our social mobility is a lot better than earlier thought, relative to the countries that are usually lauded for social mobility.
For example, Scandinavian countries are famous as exemplars for how to be a developed country with high income mobility. But a recent paper focused on Denmark (the most income-mobile country in the group) in order to study the effectiveness of the Scandinavian model. It found that pre-tax, pre-transfer income mobility was the same as the US! Needless to say, this is a pretty shocking find, as it belies years of assumptions about equality of opportunity and its effect on achievement (as measured by income). Even the addition of Denmark's much heavier investment in all levels of schooling does nothing to budge the level of educational attainment among the poor, relative to the US.
From the Atlantic article linked in my footnotes:
> Low-income Danish kids are not much more likely to earn a middle-class wage than their American counterparts. What’s more, the children of non-college graduates in Denmark are about as unlikely to attend college as their American counterparts.
IMO, Denmark's generous redistribution is worth the impact on outcomes, but it's fascinating to see redistribution have almost ZERO impact on one of its most positive-sum, universally appealing benefits (moving more towards equality of opportunity).
Coming from Denmark I can totally agree. Of course can't speak on behalf of US conditions, but NO we sure as hell haven't solved the redistribution problem here in Denmark. Haven't read the article you linked, but judging by the quotations I totally agree. There are big obstacles if you are born out of the "wrong" family, in the "wrong" part of the country. Of course you can overcome them, but you start at an disadvantage.
What could make a difference though is the relative difference between poverty in US and poverty in DK. I am pretty sure that you are better of as poor in Denmark than you are as poor in the US. We probably have a better safety-net. And in the other end of the spectrum I'm pretty sure that there is a smaller percentage of mega-rich in Danish terms even. So while I agree that there is still a problem in Denmark I don't think our problem is as big as the US.
My main point being that you can't just look at Denmark through this lens and say - Hey! They haven't solved it. And you also can't say that we have. As I see it, it is as always; a lot more complicated.
I wouldn't be on it, being poor in America still means you have more money than everyone in the world, including more than the middle class in most EU nations.
Social mobility in Europe is also really not great especially once you adjust for the immigration, you also need to account for the fact that social mobility studies in Europe are based on the income level of parents and grandparents, both WW2/Eastern Block and immigration from Africa, Asia and the Middle east inflate the social mobility figures considerably.
Actually being poor in America is worse than being poor in most other OECD nations; most first world countries have unemployment benefits that don't have time limits (they may have performance limits, i.e. you need to apply for X amount of jobs per week, etc). A number of them have free health care (and even some 2nd world countries have this). A non trivial number have free university education, or a university education that is paid out of your taxes (after an earning threshold) and the outstanding balance forgiven after 25 year or so. The USA can at times be a brutal place to be poor; even still this can be better than a large number of 2nd world countries, and almost all 3rd world countries.
That is not indicative of social mobility, the tax liability on the poor and the middle class in the US is considerably lower than in Europe.
Wages are on the other hand considerably higher.
This holds true even for low income jobs, McDonalds pays nearly 10$ an hour in the US vs 4.35 GBP in the UK, or 6.50 EUR in Germany (there are comming minimum wage changes in Germany so it will increase to about 8 EUR in 2017) and US those workers are taxed at considerably lower rates.
The current minimum wage in the UK is £7.20, and what's more if you are on the minimum wage in the UK the government will frequently top that up with tax credits (money paid directly to the claimant either weekly or monthly) and possibly housing benefit (money paid to either the claimant or landlord, and in some cases help to pay your mortgage) as well, although these typically only apply to people who are earning less than an equivalent to a full time minimum wage job and/or have children.
Despite your claims about socialization of higher education - which is perfectly true - America actually graduates a lot more people out of college than European countries. A lot more.
There is a better 'safety net' in most European countries, but there is a lot more opportunity in America. It's 100% true that 'anyone can make it' - as long as 'making it' means having a job, owning a home, in a regular place like Cleveland or Pittsburg or whatever.
Europe has a much, much stronger class system than the US.
American companies have tons of workers and professionals who came from poor situations. Europe is not like that at all.
> Despite your claims about socialization of higher education - which is perfectly true - America actually graduates a lot more people out of college than European countries. A lot more.
A lot of what would be a college degree in the US is done though trade schools in Europe. I also think there are much stricter requirements on what the degree is in most countries, as in the won't fund a lot of arts degrees.
> I wouldn't be on it, being poor in America still means you have more money than everyone in the world, including more than the middle class in most EU nations.
The US poverty line household income is $22,541, this is more than the median income in Poland, and not that far from the median household income in developed countries like Belgium.
Stop reading libertarian / right wing / whatever propaganda, open your eyes to the real world. I've lived on both sides of the Atlantic. Being poor in America is a lot worse than being poor in Europe. Dress up your statistics all you like, the fact is America is a trap for anyone below middle class.
That's not saying there are rivers of milk and honey flowing in the EU either. But over there, at least you still have access to decent health care even if you're at the rock bottom, and at least your kids could get decent education so they achieve escape velocity.
But here? Once you're below a certain level, society just throws you on the dung heap. Leaves you to your own proverbial "bootstraps", however stupid that meme may sound when you see how things could be handled differently in a civilized world.
I wonder if you ever actually bothered to go through any of the actual poor regions in Europe and tell me how well they are having it.
I live in the UK, I'm not a libertarian, I'm not a right winger, and I don't read propaganda.
"America is doing quite poorly in terms of social mobility, compared to other top-tier countries."
I think this is a myth.
Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland all do pretty well on the 'gini coefficient' - but they are tiny, relatively homogeneous societies. They are ethnic groups - and they are each smaller than Los Angeles.
What would the gini coefficient look like for 'The entire EU' for example - which would be a better direct comparison to America.
It would be terrible.
Why? Because Greeks grow up mostly to live in Greece, and much poorer than Swedes, who grow up to be Swedes, generally much richer than Greeks.
Poor Greeks, Sardinians, and Bulgarians kids mostly do not grow up to reach the level of wealth of middle class Scandinavians - not even close.
From Slovenia to London ... the gap is really quite huge.
America is doing quite poorly in terms of social mobility, compared to other top-tier countries.