Is the USA a Developed Country?

[Infected Mushroom]

In light of... general widespread ownership of guns in the hands of civilians...

So you want the government... to be the only people... to own guns... okay then...

Am I the only one who remembers the 100 or so people who died by guns in Paris in 2015?

Is that why Sweden is the "rape capital of the west?"

This is one of the smartest political commentators I've ever listened to. I think he can describe it pretty well.

The USA's crime rate, especially with guns, is overall much higher though. Paris was an isolated incident. For instance, take a look at this from wikipedia:

"Compared to 22 other high-income nations, the U.S. gun-related murder rate is 25 times higher.[13] Although it has half the population of the other 22 nations combined, the U.S. had 82 percent of all gun deaths, 90 percent of all women killed by guns, 91 percent of children under 14 and 92 percent of young people between ages 15 and 24 killed by guns.[13]"

[Pope Joan]

Because of the huge income gaps, the poor outcomes for such things as infant mortality, the overall poor ranking on physical well being, and the fact that we no longer get much revenue from exported manufactures (other than jets) but rather export our agricultural products, minerals and timber, we look an awful lot like any other third world country,

[Plzen]

well I was thinking healthcare, education, infrastructure (like public transport) as other issues...

So, healthcare, education, and infrastructure, was it? Very well. Let's look at those.

Healthcare?
Life expectancy - 79 years, compared with the world average of 72.
Infant mortality rate - 0.56% compared with the world average of 3.17%

Education?
Secondary school enrollment ratio - 98% compared to world average of 76%.

Infrastructure?
Access to improved sanitation - 100% compared to world average of 68%
Prevalence of motorised transportation - by far the highest in the world, at 820 vehicles per 1,000 population ten years ago

Safety?
Intentional homicide rate - 4.9/100,000 compared to world average of 5.3/100,000

In what way, exactly, is the United States a developing country? Even by your metrics life is pretty good in the US.

but the most pressing is that the citizens have, overall, the mindset of a less developed society where large numbers of individuals need to own guns to protect themselves from each other and corrupt government officials... its just something that shouldn't exist as a large-scale phenomenon in a more advanced society that has accumulated and earned enough social capital

Care to explain, then, why gun ownership is positively correlated with democratic governance?

---

Because of the huge income gaps, the poor outcomes for such things as infant mortality, the overall poor ranking on physical well being, and the fact that we no longer get much revenue from exported manufactures (other than jets) but rather export our agricultural products, minerals and timber, we look an awful lot like any other third world country,

This dramatically underestimates how much variance there is in lifestyles around the world.

I can assure you, as a person with access to free online statistics, that life in the United States is pretty good.

[Gibet]

By the same token, the US sees fewer gun-related MURDERS than a good deal of countries--in fact, most firearm relate deaths in the United States are attributed to self-infliction, or improper gun safety. According to The Small Arms Survey, the honor of most gun-related murders annually (excluding active war zones) belongs to El Salvador, with Honduras having previously held that title for five years (avg. 67 per 100,000); whereas the United States currently has approx. 10.6 per 100,000.

At current, almost 2/3 gun related deaths in the US are suicide, that's around 21,000 annually. With only 11,000+- attributed to homicide--and as of the most current data, almost 9,000 of those are gang-related. Then, you should take into account that there are nearly as many guns as people in the US--statistically speaking, gun-related deaths are bound to be more common, as a result.

It is interesting that you have constantly compared the US to what you consider developed nations, such as Germany, Japan, or Canada. Taking the two figures above, and putting them into perspective, Germany has a suicide rate comparable to the United States (approx. 10 per 100,000). At the same time, Japan enjoys a much higher 18 per 100,000. Does that suggest that either Germany or Japan are not sufficiently developed socially to be considered truly developed?

What you are driving at is that a country cannot be considered developed if it struggles with social of political issues, as countries are apt to do. Therefore, your entire argument is subjective, and cannot be quantified.

[Ranoria]

Yeah, sorry, but that sentence is the stupidest thing I've ever read, It might even beat an earlier sentence of yours.

So the country with the strongest military, largest economy, most innovative tech sector, strongest defense sector (which provides the defensive capabilities of pretty much all of the noneuropean developed world) (unless you want to count China as developed which would be stupid if gun culture is a disqualifier in your count), the country which won WWII (Idgaf what you say, lend-lease alone won WWII for the allies. Without the US, it would not have turned out well.), and that is the absolute center of world pop culture is somehow not a developed country...



... because we don't trust our government to honor our constitution and don't let the government walk over us like Europe allows their governments to walk over them.

fucking. hell.

The government walks all over your rights in Europe?

I thought it was the opposite. See in Europe people can trust the government to protect the people. This is why there is high social capital and trust and the government has taken on the functions of defense and policing so that the people can specialise in other trades.

Whereas in the USA, there is a lot of duplication of functions with the people not trusting the government and each other. A side effect of this is the relatively high incidence of gun violence incidents like Las Vegas, gun ownership, and street gun crimes. As a result, it is less safe and stable.

Having a big military doesn't count for much. At one point the USSR had the largest military in the world but it was never really Developed.

The gun violence thing is a non factor. Looking at total violence, crime, and murder, rates in Europe are actually higher than those in the USA by a small margin, believe it or not. And the way you say this makes it sound like Europe is some sort of utopia, I promise, it's not, and it really doesn't take a lot of digging to figure out why. Besides that, no, European people don't all trust each other. That isn't a thing, it never has been, and it never will. Some people in all countries trust the government, others do not. It's really that simple. Your statements are overgeneralizing to the extreme of saying that entire countries have a certain mindset.

[Ranoria]

Yes.

i think that takes away from the true meaning of development, which ought to include social and political metrics too

if your country is not safe then how can it be truly developed?

Think before you say something like that. Seriously.

Go to Somalia, go to Iraq, Afghanistan, and tell me that those countries are safer than the U.S. The United States has lower murder rates than most European countries. GUN crime rates are higher, but total crime is lower. America's society is developed, and just because there are people, just as there are in any other country, who mar that does not make it an non-advanced society.

[Infected Mushroom]

i think that takes away from the true meaning of development, which ought to include social and political metrics too

if your country is not safe then how can it be truly developed?

Think before you say something like that. Seriously.

Go to Somalia, go to Iraq, Afghanistan, and tell me that those countries are safer than the U.S. The United States has lower murder rates than most European countries. GUN crime rates are higher, but total crime is lower. America's society is developed, and just because there are people, just as there are in any other country, who mar that does not make it an non-advanced society.

well the USA will be somewhere in the upper percentiles for sure, but the issue is... is it sufficiently behind most other developed countries in some key aspects (such as gun control) that its not very useful to consider the USA as just "A Developed Country" and better to think of it as either a separate third category or as a leader of the Developing world

[The East Marches II]

Think before you say something like that. Seriously.

Go to Somalia, go to Iraq, Afghanistan, and tell me that those countries are safer than the U.S. The United States has lower murder rates than most European countries. GUN crime rates are higher, but total crime is lower. America's society is developed, and just because there are people, just as there are in any other country, who mar that does not make it an non-advanced society.

well the USA will be somewhere in the upper percentiles for sure, but the issue is... is it sufficiently behind most other developed countries in some key aspects (such as gun control) that its not very useful to consider the USA as just "A Developed Country" and better to think of it as either a separate third category or as a leader of the Developing world

We should have a new method of measurement

Developed Countries: Put a man on the Moon

Undeveloped Countries: Never put a man on the Moon

[Valgora]

Think before you say something like that. Seriously.

Go to Somalia, go to Iraq, Afghanistan, and tell me that those countries are safer than the U.S. The United States has lower murder rates than most European countries. GUN crime rates are higher, but total crime is lower. America's society is developed, and just because there are people, just as there are in any other country, who mar that does not make it an non-advanced society.

well the USA will be somewhere in the upper percentiles for sure, but the issue is... is it sufficiently behind most other developed countries in some key aspects (such as gun control) that its not very useful to consider the USA as just "A Developed Country" and better to think of it as either a separate third category or as a leader of the Developing world

If you want gun violence to be stopped, you need to fuck off about banning guns and this gun control bullshit.
Why? Because it keeps us (society, etc.) from searching for the origins to the problem.
Guns are not the problem nor are they the cause of it.
Sure it may be easy to just say that guns are the problem and/or the cause, that's still an idiotic thing to do.

[Infected Mushroom]

well the USA will be somewhere in the upper percentiles for sure, but the issue is... is it sufficiently behind most other developed countries in some key aspects (such as gun control) that its not very useful to consider the USA as just "A Developed Country" and better to think of it as either a separate third category or as a leader of the Developing world

If you want gun violence to be stopped, you need to fuck off about banning guns and this gun control bullshit.
Why? Because it keeps us (society, etc.) from searching for the origins to the problem.
Guns are not the problem nor are they the cause of it.
Sure it may be easy to just say that guns are the problem and/or the cause, that's still an idiotic thing to do.

well without guns we wouldn't have Las Vegas or the school shootings

[Plzen]

well without guns we wouldn't have Las Vegas or the school shootings

Without airplanes we wouldn't have plane crashes, either.

In a free nation we accept that the people as a society should take certain risks in order to preserve individual freedoms. Whether you consider the right to be armed to be an individual freedom worth protecting is ultimately a cultural difference, and minor cultural differences do not distinguish developed countries from underdeveloped countries.

[Valgora]

If you want gun violence to be stopped, you need to fuck off about banning guns and this gun control bullshit.
Why? Because it keeps us (society, etc.) from searching for the origins to the problem.
Guns are not the problem nor are they the cause of it.
Sure it may be easy to just say that guns are the problem and/or the cause, that's still an idiotic thing to do.

well without guns we wouldn't have Las Vegas or the school shootings

Jesus Fucking Christ!
Did you not read what I fuckin' said?!

The Las Vegas and school shooting wouldn't fucking happen if we fucking fix the goddamn cause.
And since the cause ain't guns, we shouldn't ban them.

Gun violence doesn't happen in a vacuum where the only factor involved is the availability of guns and the number of them.

[Infected Mushroom]

well without guns we wouldn't have Las Vegas or the school shootings

Jesus Fucking Christ!
Did you not read what I fuckin' said?!

The Las Vegas and school shooting wouldn't fucking happen if we fucking fix the goddamn cause.
And since the cause ain't guns, we shouldn't ban them.

Gun violence doesn't happen in a vacuum where the only factor involved is the availability of guns and the number of them.

if there are no guns, how can there be gun violence?

[Infected Mushroom]

well without guns we wouldn't have Las Vegas or the school shootings

Without airplanes we wouldn't have plane crashes, either.

In a free nation we accept that the people as a society should take certain risks in order to preserve individual freedoms. Whether you consider the right to be armed to be an individual freedom worth protecting is ultimately a cultural difference, and minor cultural differences do not distinguish developed countries from underdeveloped countries.

incidence of gun violence is more than just a cultural difference, its an actual difference in safety

[Gibet]

Jesus Fucking Christ!
Did you not read what I fuckin' said?!

The Las Vegas and school shooting wouldn't fucking happen if we fucking fix the goddamn cause.
And since the cause ain't guns, we shouldn't ban them.

Gun violence doesn't happen in a vacuum where the only factor involved is the availability of guns and the number of them.

if there are no guns, how can there be gun violence?

I think we can all agree here that you cannot truly regulate the things. After all, just because marijuana is illegal in most US states doesn't mean you can't find suppliers in those same states. The same applies for drinking and driving, or criminal gangs, or illegal immigration. Saying its bad doesn't suddenly fix the problems. That seems to be the gist of your argument here.

Simply illegalizing guns won't solve the problem. If anything, it creates a whole other spectrum of new one's. How do you regulate them? Will this legislation also do away with shooting clubs, or what about folks who genuinely use them to provide food? Not saying its a majority, but it's still there. For Christ's sake, even Denmark hasn't completely banned guns.

[Gibet]

Without airplanes we wouldn't have plane crashes, either.

In a free nation we accept that the people as a society should take certain risks in order to preserve individual freedoms. Whether you consider the right to be armed to be an individual freedom worth protecting is ultimately a cultural difference, and minor cultural differences do not distinguish developed countries from underdeveloped countries.

incidence of gun violence is more than just a cultural difference, its an actual difference in safety

Of course, if you're truly concerned about your safety, then at least look at the big picture.

In the United States, the odds of you being shot are currently 1/300; compared to accidental poisoning (1 in 139) and accidental falls (1 in 184). Or, even driving (1/272). One out of every six people will die of Heart Disease, 1/7 of cancer.

[New Dumnezeu]

Yes, USA is a developed country. It may not be good for some people (including me) because all of that gun ownership thing and just way too much civil rights.

[Plzen]

incidence of gun violence is more than just a cultural difference, its an actual difference in safety

Because you're clearly not grasping my point, let me repeat it:

In a free nation we accept that the people as a society should take certain risks in order to preserve individual freedoms.

On average, 34,000 people were killed via firearms each year in the United States in the 2010-2015 period, of which only about one-third is illegal homicide. You're saying that the United States needs to reduce civilian-owned firearms, and leave firearms matters to the experts (police, military, etc.).

But 42,000 people are killed each year in the United States in accidental poisoning incidents. Should we then restrict civilian cooking and require that all private citizens leave nutritional matters to expert government cooks?

No. That is plainly ridiculous. The risk of death by accidental poisoning is too low to justify restrictions on private cooking, and by the same logic the risk of death by gun violence is too low to justify restrictions of private firearms ownership.

[Cedoria]

Economically yep.

Socially depends on where you live. It has weird levels of batshit religious fundamentalism for so scientifically advanced a society.

[Twinkies And Napalm]

"Developed" is an economic classification used by the UN and it's subsidiaries like World Bank.

Of course the USA is a developed country.

[Galloism]

Yeah but that's not the definition of development. Development is actually associated with more guns, not less. That doesn't mean more guns = more development, but more development is generally associated with more guns. This is for a very obvious reason.

We have the money in the developed world to buy them.

And no, you don't get to randomly redefine development to get a special case for the United States - which more closely relates to the developed world in gun ownership than the undeveloped world - just because we have somewhat more guns than average.

why would people living in a highly developed society (politically, socially, economically) need to have lots of guns in the hands of private citizens with a side effect being that there is a high gun crime rates and gun related killing sprees?

it doesn't seem very highly developed

Because we have the money for it.

You don't see these things in undeveloped countries hardly at all - because they don't have the money to buy guns.

That's why, of the 20 least gun toting countries, all but a few are undeveloped countries.

[Infected Mushroom]

why would people living in a highly developed society (politically, socially, economically) need to have lots of guns in the hands of private citizens with a side effect being that there is a high gun crime rates and gun related killing sprees?

it doesn't seem very highly developed

Because we have the money for it.

You don't see these things in undeveloped countries hardly at all - because they don't have the money to buy guns.

That's why, of the 20 least gun toting countries, all but a few are undeveloped countries.

have you ever heard of the phrase:

"Money isn't everything"

[Galloism]

Because we have the money for it.

You don't see these things in undeveloped countries hardly at all - because they don't have the money to buy guns.

That's why, of the 20 least gun toting countries, all but a few are undeveloped countries.

have you ever heard of the phrase:

"Money isn't everything"

Sure, but I'm not saying money is a virtue in of itself. I'm saying countries with more guns tend to be developed countries because the citizens of developed countries tend to have the money to buy guns.

You're got your correlation the wrong way 'round, not to mention causation. Development is associated with more guns - not less.

[Great Minarchistan]

Using your definition, places armed to the teeth like Switzerland shouldn't be considered a developed country. Yet they're one of the most. Just focusing on crime ignores the high purchasing power of the median household, one of the most advanced healthcare services in the world (if not the, but I think Singapore ranks 1st?), good educational opportunities and the decreasing poverty rates.

[Valgora]

Jesus Fucking Christ!
Did you not read what I fuckin' said?!

The Las Vegas and school shooting wouldn't fucking happen if we fucking fix the goddamn cause.
And since the cause ain't guns, we shouldn't ban them.

Gun violence doesn't happen in a vacuum where the only factor involved is the availability of guns and the number of them.

if there are no guns, how can there be gun violence?

So you're telling me, that you would rather there be no guns than fix the problem and have the guns in violent crime be replace with something else (like a truck for example).

Good God that is stupid.

One can make homemade guns, one can buy illegal guns, and/or one can just use something else.
There's explosives, knives, trucks, poison, etc.
It sees like that if you were killed in a violent crime and guns were banned, your last words would be "At least he couldn't buy a gun to shoot me."

Again, guns' ain't the problem; you're impeding progress.