There’s something important missing from Paul Krugman’s paean to Denmark in his latest New York Times column. Nowhere in his catalog of social benefits that Danes have chosen to convey on themselves does he mention that every one of those social programs was put in place when Denmark was comprised of 98% ethnic Danes and 98% at least cultural Lutherans. Those are not insignificant. That means that when they were put in place the Danes were less predisposed to avail themselves of the benefits than Americans would have been and there was a general understanding that they were helping themselves rather than being called on to help non-Danes. Us rather than them.
He also fails to mention that Denmark, like the other Scandinavian countries, is backing away from its expansive social programs, has just banned the burqa, and is a country of under 6 million people.
Other than that it’s a fine column.
Krugman’s main sin is that he is always willing to lie to promote his political agenda. He is one of the most corrupt people in public life.
If the success of social programs in Denmark is dependent upon ethnic and religious uniformity, what religions and ethnicities would be the identifiable problem with such programs in the U.S.?
All of them, Ben. Every diverse population can be sliced and diced, then offered a benefit at the expense of another. And if they don’t inherently feel deserving, there are plenty of advocates who realize there is money and power to be had by informing a group of the injustice inflicted upon them.
It’s not merely uniformity, Ben. A cultural disinclination towards asking for help is a powerful force in controlling costs and anybody who’s ever listened to “A Prairie Home Companion” has a pretty good idea of Lutheran culture.
The tininess of Denmark’s programs is an issue as well. There are ten times as many people on Medicaid, using SNAP, or SSDI as there are people in Denmark and programs like these do not scale linearly. They scale worse than linearly.
Finally, a lot of white folk aren’t particularly interested in giving handouts to blacks or Hispanics. I’m not in agreement with them but I’m convinced it’s a fact.
Basically, I wish more people would compare us with countries we resemble more closely (like Mexico, Brazil, or even India) than with tiny ethnically homogeneous, culturally cohesive countries like Denmark.
Let’s think about a specific program, like universal pre-k similar to the French ecole maternelle.
What might we reasonably expect would result in this program being a net negative? How might it result in worse outcomes than no universal pre-k?
The results of Head Start have been disappointing. Billions have been spent over a period of a half century to achieve results that are indistinguishable from no Head Start after a very few years. Since money is fungible that is itself a net negative.
The reasons for this are known. Head Start was not devised empirically based on what works but politically, a chronic problem with educational programs in the U. S. In other words a hypothetical system could provide net benefits but the actual system hasn’t.
For decades I supported extension and full funding of Head Start. I find all of this very discouraging.
Forget Head Start. Perry Preschool has, over the last fifty years, shown a much better return and can serve as a model for the U.S. pre-k system of the future. Why can’t Americans handle this? Why would it be bad?
To expound on Dave’s point, the Danish Social Democratic Party (SD) has moved in a more restrictive position on immigration for a few reasons:
(1) “SD believes itself to be the prime sponsor of the Danish welfare state. As various scholars have pointed out, there is a fundamental contradiction between a very liberal immigration policy and the survival of the welfare state.”
(2) Historically, it was the case that the “genuine Social Democrat grass-roots favor a tight and restrictive immigration policy, which, . . . was departed from in the period from the early 1980s until today . . . when it was seduced by academic proselytes.”
(3) Political necessity due to the fact that “traditional working class voters have gradually left social democratic parties for more anti-immigration parties in Denmark as well as in other European countries.” Also the piece notes SD insults directed at anti-immigration parties were taken as insults to working class voters.
https://samf.ku.dk/presse/kronikker-og-debat/the-danish-social-democratic-case/
I don’t think you can really help people with programs. First, you have to meet them, then find something to really like about them, then care about them, then humbly offer to share with them what works for you, and hope it works for them.
I know, Amen.
I’ll delegate my response to Brookings:
I would also add a question. How do you expect to get there politically? To the best of my knowledge there are no present Congressional sponsors for adoption of the Perry Preschool program nationwide. Historically, it has been easier to expand existing programs than it has been to adopt new ones. In other words it will be politically easier for a new universal pre-school program to be grafted on to Head Start than it would be to abolish Head Start in favor of a completely new system.
BTW, you’re engaging in a fallacy called “reversing the burden”. It is the responsibility of the advocate to demonstrate the feasibility and benefits of a program. In other words “Why would it be bad?” is the wrong question.
“To assert that these same outcomes can be achieved at scale by pre-K programs that cost less and don’t look the same is unsupported by any available.”
Its kind of like citing some hippie commune of 50 people who share vegetables raised in the garden, clothes sewn by the women, water delivered from the mountain stream and chickens running around the yard. It might work – sort of – there, but not a real town, state or country. Its a pipe dream………..which they probably share as well.
No offense, but there is some less-than-good-faith argumentation going on here. When I ask why a specific program would be bad or harmful, it’s because I want to hear the objections. The reasons for pre-k education are obvious. Also, objections to scandinavian programs have been framed not as being failures, but as something we just can’t do in the U.S. due to lack of religious and ethnic homogeneity, promting my question: why is universal pre-k something Europe can do but not the U.S.? France has enormous religious and ethnic diversity and makes universal pre-k work.
Furthermore, whether there is current political support doesn’t present any particular obstacle. If there is, great. If not, you create it.
That anything potentially helpful to non-employers isn’t realistic isn’t even an argument.
France’s heterogeneity is relatively recent. No older than the 1960s. France’s pre-school system predates the heterogeneity by a century. The question you should be asking is if France did not have a system would it adopt its present system now and why? That Denmark and Sweden are retrenching from their prior welfare states suggests the answer.
There are other factors that make France drastically different from the U. S. Laicism for one. By U. S. standards it’s radical.
The same is true of health care and social insurance. France, Germany, and the UK adopted their systems when they were much more homogeneous than today. And they are all much, much smaller and more compact than the U. S.
Basically, I am responding with the political realities. The pragmatic worth of the programs is practically irrelevant.
In reviewing that last comment I wasn’t sure I ever got around to making my point. Let me take another whack at it.
The notion of “Frenchness” is the foundation of the modern French state. The educational system is seen as one means for inculcating Frenchness. Ironically, that’s analogous to how the public education system was sold in the U. S.
IMO universal preschool could be sold in the U. S. as a means for inculating Americanness in the children of immigrants, separating them from the baleful influence of their foreign-born parents. Can you imagine the uproar? It would be attacked as fascist, bigoted, white supremacy, etc. If you don’t think that’s very much how the public school system was promoted a century ago, you haven’t read John Dewey.
Aaron Carroll has been doing a series on this. There are actually a lot of studies showing god outcomes. One of the problems is that you have to know the difference between programs and outcomes. You also need to know when the studies were done and how difficult something is to change.
https://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/healthcare-triage-do-early-childhood-interventions-work/
https://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/healthcare-triage-what-should-future-childhood-programs-look-like/
He is drawing mostly from the big Rand report and using the Community Guide for confirmation.
Steve