Alright, how about: 87% of residents of Finland are ethnically Finnish and speak Finnish and have Finnish heritage.
Conversely, the most common USA racial group is non-Hispanic white (which groups many common languages/cultures, the most frequent of which are German/English/Polish/French). This group which is composed of all those different cultures comprises 60% of the US population.
> Compare this with USA where there is 1 language.
Nearly a quarter of American households speak a language besides English at home.
It's fine to say "there are things we can learn even though we are not as culturally homogeneous". It's fine to argue "cultural homogeneity isn't as big a deal for these things". But it's simply inconsistent with reality to claim that the USA is less ethnically and culturally diverse than Finland.
Even after controlling for ethnicity and income there are quite big geographical variations. White people in the upper mid-west are a lot healthier and long lived than whites elsewhere, for example.
Comparing an extremely heterogeneous country like America to ethnically monolithic countries like Finland or Japan is always an error.
Indian Americans are on the top. Russian Americans are 12th in the list. Dutch Americans are 54th.
Do you think that this is a proof of Indian supremacy and Dutch mediocrity? Or is there a policy that systematically oppresses whites of Dutch ancestry and elevates whites of Russian ancestry?
Finland is made up of one population with similiar genes.
Primary white or black is not the same at all. The black population has very different genes within that subgroup representing 50+ countries with different histories some with salary others not. The white population is similiar but more diverse.
In Finland, ethnicity is fairly homogenous, and so is culture and language. The only exceptions are the Sami people (10,000 in Finland) and Finns of historically Swedish ethnicity. So in that sense, the white people of Finland are very homogenous.
I strongly believe that US-based categories of ethnicity do not work well in European contexts. We also try to avoide the term "race", that has a bit of historical baggage over here.
The correct comparison is European ancestry to European ancestry, excluding first and second generation, not "American whites" vs. Finns.
True. But since the number of European immigrants to the US and non-white native Finns is very low, the correct comparison is unlikely to differ significantly from the numbers given. So technically you are right, but I don't think there will be much difference in practice. Do you disagree?
It's also the best comparison currently possible, since I don't know of any data set that provides more granular data than what Sanandaji used. Do you?
You're comparing a country with a 30%+ black/Mestizo component to a list of countries that are 90%+ white or East-Asian. The same kids who score highly in Finland or Korea, also score highly in the US. But because they comprise a lower % of the population, our average as a whole is lower than Finland/Korea.
There’s a lot of confusion caused by thinking that “white people” are a coherent group. For example, we talk about racial income gaps as if incomes among white ethnic groups are uniform. But there’s a huge gap between those who report themselves on the census as “American” Americans (usually Scots Irish folks who came here long ago) rank near the bottom of the income distribution, lower than recent immigrant groups like Bangladeshis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_the_U...
You're right, I interpolated "finns" for "Western Europeans," which is what was said in the first paragraph of the link you chastised me for not reading:
"American students outperform Western Europe by significant margins and tie with Asian students."
The article you linked goes on to clarify: "The mean score of Americans with European ancestry is 524, compared to 506 in Europe, when first and second generation immigrants are excluded." The correct comparison is European ancestry to European ancestry, excluding first and second generation, not "American whites" vs. Finns.
In any case, I've seen this study pop up for a while now, and more recently on facebook a lot of my friends have been linking The Atlantic's piece.
It's called World Factbook, not worldbook, "white vs. non-white" has nothing do with it as far as I'm concerned (skin color is related to sunlight, not culture), and last, but surely not least.
As of 2010 however, 1.33 million people or 14.3% of the inhabitants in Sweden were foreign-born. Of these, 859,000 (9.2%) were born outside the European Union and 477,000 (5.1%) were born in another EU member state.
At the beginning of 1992, immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents totalled 183,000 persons, or 4.3 per cent of Norway’s population. Twenty years later, at the beginning of 2012, these groups had risen to 655,000 persons or 13.1 per cent of the population.
So, my bad; at least these two nordic countries are even MORE diverse than the US. Which is hilarious because I was totally gambling with my initial post, thanks for making me look for confirmation. Of course you might say the real problem is that many US-born citizens have dark skin, while many immigrants to nordic countries have white skin, but that's the point where I leave the discussion.
At any rate, there are differences between the US and those countries, but immigration does not seem to be especially prominent. So no, that can't be it.
Yup, you must be right, there are only rich white people in America. I was commenting that although the vast majority of European countries and also Canada tend to have single-digit percentages of visible minorities compared to 34% of the United States, they are often quick to accuse the U.S. of racism, or fail to understand the implications of a truly multicultural society. Germany has 6% of its population with ancestry outside of Europe, yet there is this "Integrationsfrage" that gets a more lip service than you can imagine. Basically, it is encouraging a lot of countries quite literally to look in a mirror before judging. The U.S. education system has failings, but its populace is fundamentally different what the above commenter was trying to compare it to.
And white people in the U.S. are also not homogeneous. So what?
The U.S. has multiple metropolitan areas that each has a larger population and more ethnic diversity than the smaller European countries. And that's before you even consider the country as a whole.
I'm just assuming that for a population that makes up 10% of the total population to make 100% of the community, race is probably an active differentiator, although of course that's not necessarily the case.
For countries where economic standing/language/culture are very highly associated with race, then it's entirely possible for populations to sort themselves along racial lines without race actually being an active factor...I think it's just the "100% white" part that is making me assume that it's likely a factor.
Maybe, just maybe, the differentiating factor is poverty, not race?
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