According to this report by Unicef "Child poverty in perspective: an overview of child well-being in rich countries", the Netherlands is the best country in the west to raise your children, while the United States and Great Britain are the bottom end (out of 21 countries). I thought it was quite surprising. Spain is 5th (not bad), and ranks high in subjective well-being, which means they feel happy but maybe lack things. The authors of this report evaluated 6 dimensions:
1-material well-being
2-health and safety
3-educational well-being
4-family and peer relationships
5-behaviours and risks
6-subjective well-being
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6 comments:
I have little confidence in UN reports; much of what they claim as objective is politically biased ranting. Any organization that would place Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Pakistan and Russia on a Human Rights Council leaves great doubt in my mind as to their intent.
The 1986 UNESCO, Seville Statement was a complete fraud.
WM
WM, Well, who knows! Did you actually read it (even partly?)
I agree with WM: the UN is a highly biased organization, frequently skewing evaluation criteria to produce pre-determined results.
One reason the US has so many poor people is because of how the US defines who is poor. You can be considered poor here and have more money and material things than in any country on Earth. So it is misleading to read that there are 35 million poor in America.
Look behind the numbers. You find that forty-six percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. Seventy-six percent of poor households have air conditioning. Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe.
I did glance at the report, but it is 52 pages, and it doesn't make it easy to quickly find how the data was obtained. If the UN used our criteria for who is poor, their data would falsely show the US as being worse than it should be.
I suppose it would be interesting to see a similar report done by a different organisation... I thought it was quite interesting. Now, why would the UK and the US fare so low in all areas? Even subjective well-being??
You're right about the poverty issue, James, and they also take it in consideration in this report: "It shows, for example, that the child
poverty rate in the United States is higher than in Hungary, but fails to show that 50% of median income (for a couple with two children) is approximately $7,000 in Hungary and $24,000 in the United States" (page 8)
Sorry, I forgot to add, when they say material well-being, they don't mean just how much money or cars the family has, they take into account cultural and educational resources, and other indicators. Anyway, that's just one of the six dimensions.
Nuri,
I have little faith in the UN. Most of their so-called reports are merely political documents, imbued with political correctness, created to obfuscate reality.
WM
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