The example of the United States: the social factor

The United States are still regarded by many as an example of how to organize society. Here we are especially interested in those in Europe who think so, since it implicitly contains the judgement that the American society is better than the European. This judgment is partly based on gut feelings, intuitions, on America’s conceived as champion of liberty, democracy, etc., and partly on specific arguments. Here we will concentrate on the latter, specifically on America’s internal social organization

The major specific argument for the proponents to prefer the American society over the European is the argument of wealth: Americans are richer then Europeans. This overly repeated argument is only partially correct. What one means is that the total income of all Americans together is higher than of all Europeans together, taking the relative population into account, so the American average is higher. This however, does not necessarily mean that the average American earns more than the average European. If a single American citizen earns all of the American income, and the rest nothing, the average American earns nothing .

So in order to judge income, one has to look, besides at its total, also at its distribution. One of the standard ways to do this is not to look at the average (or mean) income, but at the so-called modal income. The modal income is the amount for which the number of people that earn more is the same as the number that earns less. For our extreme distribution above, the modal income gives indeed zero.

At present, there are no numbers available for the modal incomes. However, there are numbers that make it possible to make an estimate of their relative position in Europe and America. Firstly, there is the minimum wage, that in Europe is based on yearly income, and varies between numbers around 400 and 800 euro per month. In America, the minimum income is based on pay per hour, so effectively there is no minimum income; the hourly amount is below two dollars per hour, a number that in Europe (when based on the minimum wage) is much higher. Secondly, there is the social income for those who cannot work; in Europe this typically around 80% of the minimum wage, in America it is nothing (they have food stamps and similar schemes, but this is no real comparison). Thirdly, there is the number of people that cannot afford health insurance, i.e. health care; in Europe this is largely zero, because in most countries there is a national health insurance; in America this is about half the population (latest: 48%). Fourthly, there is the number of children living in poverty. In America this is has been given by Americans as 39%; for Europe, no precise numbers are available, but estimates put it below 20%, where one also has to take into account that the American definition of poverty is probably considerable lower than the European, since the overall opinion on social sustainable income, as in the minimum wage, is a lot lower.

So without knowing the modal incomes, from the above mentioned numbers one can estimate that in America it is not too far away from what in Europe is considered to be the socially acceptable minimum income. In Europe, the modal income is about twice the minimum income. So the modal income in Europe is much higher than in America. This is of course because the top incomes in America earn much more than in Europe, as illustrated by our extreme example of a single person who gets all. This should be no surprise, because one of the main features of American culture is the attitude of “Winner takes all!”

These being the facts, there is also the matter how to judge them. Here we can use the American opinion as a reference. Not the direct opinion on the given numbers about income, of course. When it is specifically about this subject, almost all Americans will maintain their way is the way it should be, because it would be inconceivable not to do so: to criticize something fundamental like the distribution of wealth or income would be considered un-American (or socialist, or similar negative terms). To get the real opinion on these issues, one has to look for areas where the judgement is indirect. The example given here is the opinion on what the Soviet Union did or China does when it comes to spending on national projects. Of both the Soviet Union when it still existed, and China right now, it is mentioned that it is unacceptable that they spend large amounts of money on defence and space, when there are still so many of their citizens who are poor  .

In fact, the statement that this kind of spending is unacceptable, is a moral or ethical statement, that is part of the moral idea that a nation should take care of all of its citizens, providing a minimum standard for living for all of them before it should spend money on what outsiders conceive as prestige projects

This example clearly shows that the Americans know the argument of having a social acceptable level of living for all, since they freely apply it to other countries. So firstly one can say that the fact that they do not apply it to their own country, while they do apply it to others, is hypocritical.

But the main conclusion must be that, where the Americans apparently know perfectly well the concept of dividing wealth honestly over all citizens in a society, they refuse to give their own weaker citizens the corresponding rights. That can be judged no less than as morally degraded.

As the argument of the wholeness of things learns, such internal deficiencies also lead to faults in external behaviour, i.e. the way the United States treats the outside world. Some examples of this behaviour are given here.


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