We're Number 28 (and dropping).

[kallend 2,026]

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/09/opinion/united-states-social-progress.html

This should be a wake-up call: New data suggest that the United States is one of just a few countries worldwide that is slipping backward.

The newest Social Progress Index, shared with me before its official release Thursday morning, finds that out of 163 countries assessed worldwide, the United States, Brazil and Hungary are the only ones in which people are worse off than when the index began in 2011. And the declines in Brazil and Hungary were smaller than America’s.

“The data paint an alarming picture of the state of our nation, and we hope it will be a call to action,” Michael Porter, a Harvard Business School professor and the chair of the advisory panel for the Social Progress Index, told me. “It’s like we’re a developing country.”

The index, inspired by research of Nobel-winning economists, collects 50 metrics of well-being — nutrition, safety, freedom, the environment, health, education and more — to measure quality of life. Norway comes out on top in the 2020 edition, followed by Denmark, Finland and New Zealand. South Sudan is at the bottom, with Chad, Central African Republic and Eritrea just behind.

[gowlerk 2,190]

8 minutes ago, kallend said:

“It’s like we’re a developing country.”

Or more correctly, an "undeveloping" country? Seriously though, with all the resources and advantages the US has, this is hard to justify. It can only be the direct result of policies that are encouraging the concentration of wealth. It is my belief that those policies are the result of money being allowed to flow into the political system unimpeded. Classical socialism is not the answer, we all know that it doesn't work. But giving the power to banks and corporations while doing everything possible to damage and discourage unions is not helping society in general.

[Phil1111 1,149]

11 hours ago, gowlerk said:

Or more correctly, an "undeveloping" country? Seriously though, with all the resources and advantages the US has, this is hard to justify. It can only be the direct result of policies that are encouraging the concentration of wealth. It is my belief that those policies are the result of money being allowed to flow into the political system unimpeded. Classical socialism is not the answer, we all know that it doesn't work. But giving the power to banks and corporations while doing everything possible to damage and discourage unions is not helping society in general.

As long as the political discourse is controlled by the military-industrial complex, tribes, lobbyists and the trump/GOP the slip into a dystopian America will continue.

As brenthutch represented in another thread about such concepts. They don't matter to some Americans.