Society Life has got better over the last 50 years in many countries, but not in the Americas

An interesting posting on the crime rates. I live about 25 miles north of St. Louis, but in Illinois, and travel to STL frequently alone. I have never felt afraid, so I guess that it includes the entire St. Louis City and St. Louis County, which is quite a large area. I also was a substitute teacher in north county which had a much higher crime rate than the city.

I am curious why Chicago isn't included on the list. I also travel to Chicago frequently (5 hour drive north), and hear gunshots all night long when I stay with my son or my brother (which are in two different areas). So I am much more afraid to travel there alone and Chicago isn't listed. Must be the differences in how crime is reported.

Here is an op view of American cities.

https://www.forbes.com/pictures/mlj45jggj/1-detroit/#5743183a69d9
 
This is a screen shot of the highest number of crimes per city in the U.S. with population numbers

View attachment 9532
 
Wheal said:
An interesting posting on the crime rates. I live about 25 miles north of St. Louis, but in Illinois, and travel to STL frequently alone. I have never felt afraid, so I guess that it includes the entire St. Louis City and St. Louis County, which is quite a large area. I also was a substitute teacher in north county which had a much higher crime rate than the city.

I am curious why Chicago isn't included on the list. I also travel to Chicago frequently (5 hour drive north), and hear gunshots all night long when I stay with my son or my brother (which are in two different areas). So I am much more afraid to travel there alone and Chicago isn't listed. Must be the differences in how crime is reported.

Here is an op view of American cities.

https://www.forbes.com/pictures/mlj45jggj/1-detroit/#5743183a69d9
Click to expand...

One may just be homicides, one the broader category of violent crimes, which would also include serious assaults, rapes, etc.

You'd think Chicago would be way up there on both.

Venezuela has become such a mess.

I had so many arguments with a Cuban friend about Chavez. You'd think a Cuban of all people would know better.
 
Maciamo said:
Chile, Argentina and Uruguay are overwhelmingly European and not just on the paternal side, because there was a lot of recent immigration from countries like Italy and Germany (notably after WWII), but also France, Spain and others.
Click to expand...

I don't agree entirely with this statement about Chile. I've been to Chile for several days, and what I noticed was a heavily seggregated society (not formally so, of course): in the downtown and poorer neighborhoods, as many as 70% of the faces I saw had clearly Amerindian features (mixed or, in some cases, virtually unmixed); but in the richest neighborhoods, like the amazing Las Condes and Providencia (in Santiago), the white Caucasian faces were as much as 70% or 80%. Relatives and friends of mine have noticed the same pattern there.

In general, my impression was that the vast majority of the Chilean population is mestizo with a lot of Amerindian admixture. Only in rich neighborhoods and some pockets of colonial towns especially in the cold South of Chile will you see a clear majority of whites as you see in Buenos Aires. But strangely in most polls (the government data only distinguish "indigenous" from "non-indigenous" - a bit suspect if you ask me) between 50% and 60% of Chileans claim they are white.

So, why the contradiction? A hint may be in the fact that one genetic study on Chilean populations revealed that 38% identified as white, but those who self-identified as white were in average only 54% European. That's even less than the average Brazilian citizen (apart from the north/Amazon, all regions have 55% to 75% of European DNA), and most Brazilians aren't exactly unadmixed whites. All in all, my impression is that, unlike Brazil or Mexico, Chileans aren't still totally comfortable with their mestizo history and identity.
 
Ygorcs said:
I don't agree entirely with this statement about Chile. I've been to Chile for several days, and what I noticed was a heavily seggregated society (not formally so, of course): in the downtown and poorer neighborhoods, as many as 70% of the faces I saw had clearly Amerindian features (mixed or, in some cases, virtually unmixed); but in the richest neighborhoods, like the amazing Las Condes and Providencia (in Santiago), the white Caucasian faces were as much as 70% or 80%. Relatives and friends of mine have noticed the same pattern there.

In general, my impression was that the vast majority of the Chilean population is mestizo with a lot of Amerindian admixture. Only in rich neighborhoods and some pockets of colonial towns especially in the cold South of Chile will you see a clear majority of whites as you see in Buenos Aires. But strangely in most polls (the government data only distinguish "indigenous" from "non-indigenous" - a bit suspect if you ask me) between 50% and 60% of Chileans claim they are white.

So, why the contradiction? A hint may be in the fact that one genetic study on Chilean populations revealed that 38% identified as white, but those who self-identified as white were in average only 54% European. That's even less than the average Brazilian citizen (apart from the north/Amazon, all regions have 55% to 75% of European DNA), and most Brazilians aren't exactly unadmixed whites. All in all, my impression is that, unlike Brazil or Mexico, Chileans aren't still totally comfortable with their mestizo history and identity.
Click to expand...

Most Mexicans may acknowledge that they're a mestizo people, but their society still looks very color stratified to me. I've only been there three times, though, so my perception may be off.
 
Ygorcs said:
I don't agree entirely with this statement about Chile. I've been to Chile for several days, and what I noticed was a heavily seggregated society (not formally so, of course): in the downtown and poorer neighborhoods, as many as 70% of the faces I saw had clearly Amerindian features (mixed or, in some cases, virtually unmixed); but in the richest neighborhoods, like the amazing Las Condes and Providencia (in Santiago), the white Caucasian faces were as much as 70% or 80%. Relatives and friends of mine have noticed the same pattern there.

In general, my impression was that the vast majority of the Chilean population is mestizo with a lot of Amerindian admixture. Only in rich neighborhoods and some pockets of colonial towns especially in the cold South of Chile will you see a clear majority of whites as you see in Buenos Aires. But strangely in most polls (the government data only distinguish "indigenous" from "non-indigenous" - a bit suspect if you ask me) between 50% and 60% of Chileans claim they are white.

So, why the contradiction? A hint may be in the fact that one genetic study on Chilean populations revealed that 38% identified as white, but those who self-identified as white were in average only 54% European. That's even less than the average Brazilian citizen (apart from the north/Amazon, all regions have 55% to 75% of European DNA), and most Brazilians aren't exactly unadmixed whites. All in all, my impression is that, unlike Brazil or Mexico, Chileans aren't still totally comfortable with their mestizo history and identity.
Click to expand...

Thanks for clarifying this. I haven't been to Chile, so I have to rely on statistics and the few Chilean people I have met (who were mostly unadmixed Europeans).
 
I think I have found some clues as to what makes Latin Americans so gloomy.

According to those OECD stats on pro- and anti-social behaviour, the Latin American countries surveyed (Mexico, Chile and Brazil) displayed the highest scores of anti-social behaviour in the list after South Africa. Their pro-social score was lower than average.

The highest scorers for pro-social behaviour were all English-speaking countries, with the USA on top. There is a correlation between pro-social behaviour and GDP per capita, although in South European countries, Korea and Japan scored more poorly than they should, while Anglophone countries consistently score high on pro-social behaviour regardless of GDP per capita (New Zealand is almost as high as the USA). So cultural factors play a role too.

Depression rates are much high on the American continent as a whole, except in Mexico.The USA has the world's highest age-standardised disability-adjusted life year (DALY) depression rate! Brazil is the 2nd highest outside of South Asia. So good weather and a fun-loving lifestyle does not necessarily lower depression - although Greece and Spain have the lowest depression rates in the world after Japan.

The extremely high murder rates in Latin America (and the USA) have already been mentioned as a probably cause for seeing life negatively. What is more worrying is that so many Latin American countries also have crazy high youth murder rates, with Colombia on top of the list with 327 murders committed by youths per million, 11x more than in the USA and about 100x to 300x more than in Europe!! (except Albania and former USSR countries) Even the safest Latin American countries (Chile and Uruguay) have a youth murder rate 3x to 10x higher than in Europe. Jamaica is the only exception in the Americas, with one of the very lowest youth murder rates on earth, but it is English-speaking and has a noticeable different culture.
 
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