# How does the USA's social safety net compare with those of the European welfare states? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 14, 2013, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841 "2013-09-14T13:03:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 9:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/101 "2013-09-23T09:21:20Z")
> [@Doggo](#): > > I assume you are being sarcastic. > However, it is a fact that countries with a generous welfare system cannot get people on welfare to move to other parts of the country where work is available, even if it is unskilled, and it is necessary to bring in people from other countries to do that work, while also paying welfare to able bodied people fully capable of working. > Just look at the “surfer dude” that had his 15 minutes of fame recently. > If someone can travel all the way from the other side of the world to get a job in the States or the UK, why can’t someone in those countries travel a few hundred miles to get work? > > However it could also be something to do with the fact that people with a degree in “media studies” ( for example ) aren’t educated to do job that is actually in demand like engineering or plumbing or electrical or farming, or welding etc etc etc. Businesses that deal with trades just can’t get enough workers that can do the job. Part of the lack of geographical mobility is that the cost of living is so much higher in places where there actually is work. Rents are far, far higher in London than in places like Hull, and the working tax credits system, income tax, etc, doesn’t offset that. To get started paying that high rent you’d also need a deposit of at least a month’s rent plus a month in advance, plus agency fees. If you moved to a cheap part of London and lived in a shared house (rent of 500 quid a month - lower than average) you’d still need about 1,300 quid just to move in. That’s a lot of money to save up when you’re on benefits or minimum wage. And that’s without even taking into account the other costs of moving to another city and looking for work there. Even housing benefit, which is now called Local Housing Allowance for private accommodation, doesn’t really take local prices into account; 50% of a 200 quid rent is far easier to find than 50% of a 500 quid rent. (LHA pays 50% of what it considers the average local rent for a home of the size it deems you need). Wages are also higher in London on average, but that’s because of some jobs that pay huge amounts - a minimum wage job is a minimum wage job wherever you live. Many companies in London give “London weighting” even for minimum wage jobs, but it’s a tiny increase compared to increased rents. It’s not necessary to “bring in people from other countries to do work.” Those people have come here of their own volition and apply for work just like anyone else. They tend to be young, healthy, educated and skilled (because those that aren’t tend not to move countries), making them more likely to be hired than some segments of the local populace. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 10:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/102 "2013-09-23T10:45:05Z")
The U.K. has a very useful thing called the ‘Travel to Interview’ scheme which pays for the cost of being interviewed. Without it, I would not have got my last job. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 11:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/103 "2013-09-23T11:40:14Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > The U.K. has a very useful thing called the ‘Travel to Interview’ scheme which pays for the cost of being interviewed. Without it, I would not have got my last job. Just to clarify for others on the thread: that’s only for people on unemployment benefits. It does help with the interview, but if it’s for a minimum wage job (doggo was talking about low-skilled work) then they’re not going to hold the job open until you have the money saved for the actual moving part. They’re going to expect you to start work immediately (within a few days), which, even if you have money saved, is unlikely to be possible unless you have friends to stay with and no kids or partner to move with you. ---
**Author:** ![keving](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a587f6/32.png) [@keving](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/keving)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/104 "2013-09-23T12:56:57Z")
I think there is a balance to be struck, though, between helping out people who live in economically declining areas, and helping them to move to prospering areas where their skills and labour are needed. Such economic change is inevitable. It does no good in the long run to merely pay people to stay where they are if there are no jobs there. And I don’t think its politically sustainable in the long term to have the prosperous parts of the country paying the poorer parts’ benefits bill. It must be managed carefully, because of course you can’t expect communities and families to just up sticks and move. But it has to happen in the end, or else those areas must find new ways of making money. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/105 "2013-09-23T13:35:25Z")
Merely offering a “moving allowance” of some sort will induce some of the people in declining areas to move. You might want them to jump through some hoops to get it, and you need to manage it so families can relocate and not just individuals, but a lot of people aren’t moving not because they’re so in love with where they are but due to lack of resources to make that move. Reducing the labor pool in those areas will make things better for those that remain (up to a point - you can get to point where the population is so low the town is doomed). In the past, some companies gave “moving allowances” to encourage highly desirable employees to relocate, either as new hires or as long term employees they wanted to move to another company location. If this works in the private sector why is there such resistance to it in the public? If I could get a middle-class income by moving to a new place I would _but I don’t have the resources to move on my own_. Something as simple as assisting people with a new security deposit can make these things so much easier. Of course, you don’t want to hand out money carelessly, but in the US there is so often NO help for those who are down on their luck and struggling to climb back up the social ladder. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/106 "2013-09-23T14:15:15Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I’ve always heard that it was the habitually homeless in America who typically have drug/alcohol or mental problems. Most people who wind up homeless in the United States are only that way temporarily. They’re able to get back up on their feet with either state assistance or the help of friends and family. Cite? ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/107 "2013-09-23T14:19:08Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > Well, not all the citizens are meant to flourish in the USA. We still have a constituency for what is in some ways a slavery economy. The insistence on not paying a living wage, the insistence on decades-long prison terms for a variety of crimes, the sheer raving hatred for anything that could be called “welfare” or “socialism”–these come from a powerful vocal constituency that demands cheap labor and cheap goods. Exactly. When you combine militarized police, the school-to-jail pipeline, for-profit prisons selling dirt-cheap prison labor to corporations, you have the formula for a modern form of slavery that just isn’t CALLED slavery. It’s the economic system that dare not speak its name, and it is making some coporations and their owners very, very rich. ---
**Author:** ![hildea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ebca7d/32.png) [@hildea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hildea)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/108 "2013-09-23T19:17:00Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The problem with those studies though is that they measure in quintiles. The wealthier a country is, the most it gets penalized in such studies, since you have farther to go to go from one quintile to another. > > A better way to measure income mobility would be to simply measure income growth or decline over generations. If an American is raised in a household that makes $30,000/yr and at 30 he’s making $60,000/yr, that’s great, right? No, it just puts him up one quintile. But in Sweden, that would probably be worth two quintiles, so it makes Sweden appear more socially mobile. You’re mixing up “wealthy” and “uneaqual distribution of wealth”. Sweden and US are pretty close in wealth (measured in GDP per capita, [nomial values](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29_per_capita) and [purchasing power](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita)), but Sweden has a far more equal distribution of wealth ([cite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality)). If a child of unskilled laborers goes to university and becomes a doctor, she’ll cross a smaller gap in absolute wages in Sweden than in US, but the distance she travels measured in income quintiles will be pretty similar (not necessarily identical) in the two nations. This way of comparing social mobility makes sense even if we’re comparing countries with very different distribution of wealth. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [September 23, 2013, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/109 "2013-09-23T21:00:19Z")
But that’s part of the problem with the measurement. The argument for wealth inequality is that people can move up and down depending on their skills and work ethic. But because we have such big wealth inequality, it takes a lot more to get into the top quintile because the spread is larger. That’s why I think social mobility should be measured by total income gain over a period of time for an individual, not movement between quintiles. ---
**Author:** ![Doggo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/87869e/32.png) [@Doggo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doggo)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2013, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841/110 "2013-09-25T07:36:32Z")
> [@hildea](#): > > You’re mixing up “wealthy” and “uneaqual distribution of wealth”. Sweden and US are pretty close in wealth (measured in GDP per capita, [nomial values](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29_per_capita) and [purchasing power](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita)), but Sweden has a far more equal distribution of wealth ([cite](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_income_equality)). > > If a child of unskilled laborers goes to university and becomes a doctor, she’ll cross a smaller gap in absolute wages in Sweden than in US, but the distance she travels measured in income quintiles will be pretty similar (not necessarily identical) in the two nations. This way of comparing social mobility makes sense even if we’re comparing countries with very different distribution of wealth. Regardless of the equality of income, as long as Capital can export jobs to cheaper labour countries to make a few people far far richer than the vast majority, there will never be equality of opportunity. Car workers in the US used to be relatively wealthy, but look at Detroit now. Unfortunately, Socialism as is actually practiced in the world seems to be a licence for corruption, so that’s not the answer. As for the answer, my solutions of reducing populations and high tarrifs on imported goods have as much chance of being accepted as I have of flying to the moon. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-does-the-usas-social-safety-net-compare-with-those-of-the-european-welfare-states/668841.md?page=5)