Steve CoxKonto zweryfikowane

Ok. This will take a few posts. I’ll let you know when I’m done. First, France/England: They’re very similar countries whose histories are intertwined. Consider, for example, that Brits don’t flip people off, but rather hold up two fingers...

When the French would capture a British archer, they’d cut off his index and middle fingers then send him home. He couldn’t fire arrows anymore. They hold up two fingers to show they’re still a threat. Nothing to do with this. Just an interesting story.

England and France both have about the same level of poverty (approx 14%). The poverty line is set at 60% of the median income in both countries. Here, for example, it’s set at about 40%. So their poor are less poor, and there are less *of* them.

Both countries have universal healthcare. Both countries have strong welfare programs to help those who are underprivileged. Both countries lack things like heavy drug sentencing for possession. They both have a much smaller wealth/wage gap than we do, too. (It's getting worse.)

Simply put, they don't have gun homicides like we do because they have much better socioeconomic equality than we do. The poor aren't too poor, and the rich aren't too rich.

As things continue to divide there in terms of wealth inequality, my bet is gun crime/homicide rises regardless of gun-ownership levels. It may have already started. I haven't looked. My numbers are from The Guardian in 2012. But that's the answer to that one. Socioeconomics.

Here, in the US, in this regard, I already touched on our poverty level (20%, with threshold set much lower than in those countries), but add in the war on drugs and resulting social imbalance, lack of universal healthcare, and Reagan defunding our mental-health infrastructure...

And then you can look at the inequality of school funding for inner cities (because it's often based on local property taxes), which is meant to be offset by federal spending, which *both* parties have been cutting and diverting to charter schools...