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Notes -
How do you square this theory with the fact that many European countries have gone further with their progressive reforms along all of these dimensions (at least, that is my general impression - I'm not willing to claim expertise in every single EU member state's social policies and what it's like to live there, but I am willing to claim that most Americans perceive that European countries are both more progressive and less disordered than the US).
So, do European countries not have no-fault divorce? Do they not have lax drug policies or housing projects? Are the cops in London going around cracking rough sleepers over the head with their billy clubs and shipping them off to institutions? (I mention London specifically because the UK is the only European (kind of?) country I have any experience traveling in, and it's generally amazing to me how few "street people" you see in the cities. Most people I've talked to about this cite the stronger social safety net as being the reason.
As much as I instinctively would like more aggressive policing of vagrancy, vandalism, and property crime in American cities, I'm not sure it will solve the fundamental problem of too many people without jobs or other economic support. Given what it costs to actually arrest, jail, bring to trial, convict, and imprison somebody, it's simply not worth prosecuting most low-level property crime, even if it makes living in cities hell. Low-crime times and places seem more correlated with "enough jobs and housing to go around" than with "enough cops, courts and jails".
European countries are more or less racially homogeneous in comparison. That's how, I'd say.
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