Today, UNICEF (the United Nations body which champions children's rights worldwide, and is often regarded even by UN critics as one of the more useful parts of the UN) released a report on the state of children's welfare in 21 "advanced nations". They miss out Japan, so the list is actually most of the countries of the EU, plus the USA.

Here's a link to the UNICEF press release, which itself carries a link to the PDF file containing the detailed report itself, entitled "Child Poverty in Perspective: An Overview of child well-being in rich countries".

The survey used a mix of hard statistics (mortality and health measures, teen pregnancy rates etc.) together with more subjective assessments that fall under six dimensions:

1. material well-being,
2. health and safety,
3. education,
4. peer and
5. family relationships,
6. behaviours and risks, and
7. young people’s own subjective sense of well-being

In order, the ranking of nations in which it's good to be a kid is as follows (with the best place to grow up first, and the worst last):

1. Netherlands
2. Sweden
3. Denmark
4. Finland
5. Spain
6. Switzerland
7. Norway
8. Italy
9. Republic of Ireland
10. Belgium
11. Germany
12. Canada
13. Greece
14. Poland
15. Czech Republic
16. France
17. Portugal
18. Austria
19. Hungary
20. United States
21. United Kingdom

Reaction here in the UK has been predictable, with the more patriotic (and those more hostile to international institutions) attempting to rubbish the report, and more left-leaning sources doing a lot of hand-wringing and "where did we go wrong?".

The BBC has been quite balanced, doing a little of both. Here are some links to BBC reaction - Why are the Dutch so happy?, UK is accused of failing children, and Do UK youngsters get a raw deal?

It's worth noting that the top-rated countries all have high taxation rates and more socialist-leaning state systems, and that rates of divorce and single parenthood are broadly comparable to the UK & USA. Whatever else is causing the disparity, it doesn't seem to be family breakdown.

It's also worth noting that this is not a survey that UNICEF has regularly produced, so there's no real sense that things have got better or worse for any of the nations surveyed beyond anecdotes. Please try to avoid anecdotes about your own childhood, instead concentrating on how life is for children and teenagers today.

Questions for debate:
How has this report been covered in the US media?

Do you agree or disagree with the findings?

If you agree, what are the UK and USA doing wrong that is letting down their children?

If you disagree, and think that US and UK kids are doing just fine, where did the authors of the report go wrong?

Questions for debate:
How has this report been covered in the US media?
Not to my knowledge, this is the first I've seen of it.

Do you agree or disagree with the findings?
hmmm, wihtout knowing much of their methodologies, I can't really say. I'm not even sure that they're asking the right questions. UNICEF is, understandably, a "nanny" mentality organization, and hence nanny matters are the criteria it will evaluate. The single most important question should be "how are they doing at preparing the children for the adult world." A childhood could easily score A+ on every one of then study's factors, and the child be utterly unprepared for adulthood. A similar question, and one that considers a longer timeframe, is "relative to their parents, how successful a life do these children have?"

If you agree, what are the UK and USA doing wrong that is letting down their children?
If you disagree, and think that US and UK kids are doing just fine, where did the authors of the report go wrong?

Kinda answered both those in one sense, because I'm not sure they're asking the right question. What I do find somewhat interesting, if we set aside the former Warsaw Pact countries, is that at first glance there is a remarkable correlation between cultural homogeniety and high ranking on that list. Austria and Portugal are the only outliers in that sense.

The ANZAC crowd may be somewhat annoyed that they aren't considered "advanced", eh. It is a bit of a surprise to see Spain ranked as high as it is, especially in comparison to Portugal. Is there really that much of a disparity between them?

Okay, I've gone and started looking at the methodologies and right off the bat, it smells of agenda, nanny agenda.

From the report, Section 1:6 (page 8 of 52) this is an unusual definition of poverty, at least by the way it is used:



As a result, this is the standard they used to evaluate poverty:


That's national median, not OECD median. Not surprisingly, the US comes out dead last in that category. Why? Because we have the greatest income disparities of the countries in question. The only way we can "improve" in this ranking is to reduce our income disparity.

Nonetheless, its an interesting read.

As noted, there are six dimensions evaluated. The US ranks in the bottom third of all five. FIVE? But I just said "six". Yup, due to "insufficient data" the US has no score for "subjective well being."

I think that the behavioural elements are the most important, and given that, I can see why folks have gotten riled up in the UK. It looks like you're being overrun by sex crazed, smoking, drinking, fightin' hooligans. And then there's the soccer fans.

Definitely an interesting read...

Have you ever lived in the UK?

I have and I have to laugh. I really do. I read this BBC article and my lips just started curling back of their own accord. I mean, seriously, its like some one suddenly turned round and asked, "Hey! Where'd that elephant in the middle of the room come from?"


Do you agree or disagree with the findings?

Yes I most certainly do. Having spent my life divided between living in the UK and Denmark I can honestly testify that I saw more violence per year in the UK than I have in the entire time I've been in Denmark.

If you agree, what are the UK and USA doing wrong that is letting down their children?

Ramble on, sing my song....

I cannot speak for the USA as I've never been there so my views are too subjective to carry any weight, but I have looked long and hard at my old homeland and noted its squallor and poverty. The problem with the UK is simple enough. Its a question of culture. The UK is way too over crowded and people are crammed in and they don't thrive well in these conditions. Quite why this should be such a problem for the British and not the Dutch is an interesting conundrum to me, but I find that the British, generally, are very ignorant where as the Dutch are (usually) not.

The British have so many problems its difficult to know where to start. I think one of their biggest problems is their insular nature which means they have a poor grasp of the reality beyond their own country. This can clearly be seen in the British media which is ridiculously anti American, anti European and 'anti anything' which contradicts the home grown British perception of the outside world. Perhaps the problem is the British, like the Americans to some degree, are prisoners of their own languange, always looking out, never able to communicate with any one else except on the other persons terms. One of the oft repeated complaints I met from British friends was the lament that they knew only one language and I think this monolingusitic perspective is significant for it prevents Anglo Saxons from ever straying outside their own culture.

What they've strained for instead is multi-culture which, to me, appears to be more like wishful thinking than an actual state of existance in the UK. Rather than be isolated in their own culture, but unable to share the benefits of another (non English language culture) the British choose instead to make a big noise about their 'cultural diversity'. They use buzz words like 'vibrant' to keep the myth alive but the truth is, British multi-culture is exactly what it says it is, lots of different cultures with limited interaction. When we went back to the UK in the late 90's my GF and I were foreigners. My years away from the UK and my growth into adulthood had polished me into a Dane so I saw the UK from a new identity. I had my memory of the place and all I saw corroborated it, but now I also saw it from the outside and things became much clearer as a result.

The British are very xenophobic. As a foreigner in the UK I mingled with many other foreigners, from all over the world and the conversation would often revolve around what we all thought of Britain. Some loved it, others hated it, but all agreed that the British were totally wrapped up in themselves and had no taste for outsiders at all. Interaction with Brits was possible, but 90% of the time it only happened on their terms.

For all the talk of multi-culture, I never saw any sign that the British believed in this idea as anything but as a means to promote a political agenda. I certainly never encountered British people who would intermingle with non British people. At university, classes were often divided into three cliques, The ethnic British, the British of foreign ethnic groups (usually Jamacians and Pakistani's) and the foreign students. It was always the case that the ethnic British 'ran' the class rooms, that is to say, they made the most noise and were apt to dictate the social environment, even when they were the distinct minority. The Black and Asian Brits were more subdued, but even harder to talk to than the ethnic British. I certainly never managed to penetrate their walls of silence though I tried many times. Engaging a Pakistani Brit in conversation was simply impossible. They seemed to believe foreigners were lower down on the food chain than they were so they acted accordingly.

Usually the foreign students hung out together and helped each other out. It was striking that the smallest group were often the representatives of the whole of the rest of the world and they were relegated to the fringes. Even by the tutors, who were all British. I only ever saw one class room which defied this set up and that class was dominated by a large Norwegian presence. For reasons of economy the Kent Institute of Art and Design had brought in a large number of Norwgeians and whilst I studied there, these Scandinavians ruled the place since they out numbered even the ethnic British in many classes. What was notable in these instances was the high absentee rate of both the ethnic and non ethnic Brits from these classes.

The really strange thing about being a foreign student in the UK was, that the British themselves believed the north of England to be more inhospitable than the south, but this was not the case. Though Liverpool was a dump (run down with gangs of near feral children destroying everything they could) the people I met in Liverpool, no matter what their ethnicity, were almost all friendly. Liverpool didn't attract many foreign students, but it had its fair share. I think perhaps there was an honesty in Liverpool though. They couldn't hide the depradation so they didn't bother. They were far more honest in their approach to life than any other Britis I have met. They seemed happier also, depsite the poverty which is obvious in Liverpool (I as frequently propositioned on my way home from school by prostitues who'se prices averaged at £10. If thats not a sign of poverty in a region then I don't know what is.)

The children of Liverpool were wild. Utterly ungovernable. They really did roam in gangs, even the youngest, looking for trouble. More than once my GF and I were stunned to see a gang of kids completely destroying some artifact of public property, a bus stop perhaps or a park bench, and adults would just walk by unconcerned. No one intervened because it was understood that to do so was to invite disaster. Even if one survived the initial ordeal, the repercussions could be very dangerous or expensive. Since people knew where you lived, the most common form of retribution was a brick through one's window at night, but it was not unknown for the police to come by after the childrens parents had reported any incident where their children had been told off. Many adults I spoke to in Liverpool were scared of the children because they had no power over them at all so when they passed a group of ten year olds destroying a sign post, they just kept on walking.

I intevened once only, when a group of local kids were harrassing an Eastern European woman with a baby girl outside my house. Seeing she was in trouble, I strode out and told the kids to leave her alone. Being some what vain in those days I used to wear leather trousers (or pants to you Americans) and the sight of these caused the children to instantly forget their victim and gather around me to examine my amazing legs. I think the novelty of my appearance (no one in Liverpool wore such trousers in '96) saved me any greater hassle, but from that day on, we were a known feature of Toxteth (the area of Liverpool in which we lived).

On another occaision my GF was sitting on the front door step sculpting for a school project when she was discovered by some local children. Within ten minutes there was a literal crowd of children, all puchinga nd vying to see what was going on. It was painfully obvious that these children had nothing to do. That any novelty, no matter how small and paltry, would generate a lot of excitement and interest. Having seen the place where these children were growing up, I was not surprised by their reactions. At heart they were all friendly, and really really bored.

Toxteth was meant to be a 'black part' of the city of Liverpool, but I never intereacted with the black people much. My land lady had a long string of black boy friends and the single mother next door was also black, but these literally said as little as possible to us. The girl next door, never once invited us in though she was happy to say hello and how're you? when we passed each other on the door step. There was a line in the sand that she would simply not cross. Outside of Toxteth, black people were open and fairly friendly again, but within they were always cautious to the point of paranoia. On one occaision I was coming home late from uni and I passed two black tinted mercs. As I passed a window whirred down and a large black man, in 'gangsta' attire leaned out of the window. I paused, and he asked me for a light. I did not smoke but I had a box of cookies from which I was eating and I offered him a cookie instead. Immedietely seven other black men all jumped out of their cars and also wanted cookies... Thankfully I had a whole box so there were plenty to go around. From this, some what surreal experience I lost my fear of the 'black gangsta's' who had such a poor reputation in Liverpool. I'm sure under other circumstances they were dangerous, but at heart, they were just the same kids who've grown up bored in an over crowded city which afforded them scant prospect of an interesting life. Like their white compatriots they were, are, prisoners in their English speaking monoculture and had no way of sharing any other perspective.

For me, being half Danish has meant I am freed of that prison. Perhaps I am still trapped in another one, but at least I can shift from one cultural perspective to another. The British cannot do this. Every foreigner who comes to their country has the advantage of being able to look into the British culture, but the British cannot look out. When Brits travel abroad they do so at a distinct disadvantage for even if they learn some of the local lingo, they are still just tourists and upon their return they cannot share any deeper cultural insights with their fellow Brits.

Denmark is full of British ex-pats (Americans too) and several of my friends are ex-pats. As a consequence we often talk about the differences between Denmark and Britian and one of the most common observations is that Denmark is far and away the better place to live. Often these conversations will be a litany of complaints against Denmark and Danes, and valid complaints too they often are, but at no point do these complaints ever lead to the conclusion that Britain is a better place to live. Its understood that Britain has greater opportuntities for a well educated Dane, has better shopping, better night life and is an all around more interesting place, but I do not know a single Brit who came to Denmark and then decided to return to Britain to have children and I only know one other Dane who grew up in the UK as I did, but like mine his family moved back to Denmark.

Like basically ALL UNICEF studies, it's never published how this information is gathered, but Western Europeans hold to it as if the Lord himself made these claims. I'm not sure why.

The issue I will almost always have with these studies is that they don't publish their findings and how they came to the information. They MIGHT be correct about the US, but I'm very apprehensive.

Where did they poll? The US in terms of size and population is as large as 4-5 Western European nations, and I'm confident that they pollsters didn't come to my neighborhood. Results can be skewed in the US easily, by using what might be deemed an acceptable 'sample size', using geography and demographics to find the results they need. It's ALOT like gallop polling in the US nowadays. If you hit NY, Pennslyvania, Maryland, and New Jersey, you'll never get the same results as if you included New Mexico, Louisiana, NY, and Michigan. Understand?

The issue always arises in the US that there is a significant gap between wealth and poverty, gap in crime dependant upon locale, differences in cultural values dependant upon varying factors (race, geography, etc), difference in material wealth and education based upon location, etc, etc, etc. For instance, you could poll someone in rural Arkansas, someone in Plano Texas, someone in Manhattan, and someone in Seattle and literally get 100% different results. The US is a far less homogenous society in general than most nations on the list.

SURPRISE, however, UNICEF doesn't publish their method of research. I'm not sure why. Well, YES I AM! Because it probably doesn't fit the need. It probably wouldn't bode well for people to evaluate. I'm not really surprised to be frank. I'd love to see their research methodology, then there MIGHT be some creedence to their findings.... but seeing that this information isn't public, I sincerely doubt it.

Did you look over the actual report, Aevans? What methodology are you wondering about? At the beginning of each chapter they clearly state what exactly they derive their scores from. The statistics themselves were, I imagine, taken from the Census reports and governments statistics. Now one might address the validity of some of those factors as measuring posts, but they are certainly there in black and white to be discussed and debated. You're claiming some sort of secretive methodology, which doesn't play out in the actual report. At all.

I love reading the complaints of the anti-UN crowd - they seem to change the nature of the complaint depending on what's being discussed. The UN is biased towards third world countries! The UN is biased towards western Europe! Well which is it? Never mind that the US is still the most powerful nation in the UN, and that we have veto power in the Security Council - not to mention a permanent seat.

Here's an example of what I'm talking about, from the report:



Seems to address your concerns, no? They even explain why they use so many different factors in their study:



Since they seem to have covered the kinds of questions you are raising, perhaps you'd care to read the report and then debate specifics? A generalized rant about the UN or your assumed conclusions about methodology and 'agendas' are hardly helpful.

edited to add: If you are interested in the exact methodology, go straight to page 48, where it discusses openly and as transparently as possible the methodology of the report.

Reports like this are of marginal utility.

Intrisnic to this report is the communistic assumption that all people should have access to equal resoruces and live in an equal environment. Reality is people are responsible for their condition, and as a result, some will live in much better conditions than others. As such, absent living in a Marxist novel, all nations will have lots of poor and lots of vertical variation in living condition unless the govt at the point of a gun steals from the rich and heavily redistributes income and wealth.

Since I do not believe in governmental confiscation, a report like this means little to me. If anything, it shows that the nations with the biggest socialist/communist agenda score well.

It's biased toward countries with more socialist/communists structures as Bikerdad has allready pointed out if you read in between the lines.



This type of testing would test a country to be a Nirvana if they had a perfect communist country, which is a paradox in itself due to human nature. In other words, the more equal the "substance" of the lives of children the better the score. A nation could have people sampled living with $100k - $5 billion/yr salaries and score lower than a nation with a sampling between $100 - $300/yr salaries. The higher the discrepancy in incomes the lower the nation scores.

Sir, while I applaud the notion that you believe this to be true, you're not correct.

Page 48 doesn't tell us where information came from, who they polled, etc. No where does it state these facts in the report. it's not that I said it WAS inaccurate, but I do find it interesting that I can't find who they polled or how.

For instance, in the US, how did they find "reported deprivation"? How do they know which kids don't have books, for instance?

You'll notice some interesting things while you look, for instance, relative income poverty. Relative to who? Of course- people in the same nation. Look then at the unemployment rate chart, and the US is near the best of countries where kids live in homes with parents unemployed (meaning fewest).

What I'm saying is without knowing that they polled all 50 states, all geographic areas and income brackets, the US is far and above different from all nations listed.

QH, I'm not arguing that the information isn't pertinent, but that it's interesting that we can't find a link to the raw data. The US IS NOT Norway or Portugal, in that our society is far less homogenous. You should understand this, not to mention the statistical difficulty of finding information of this type in the US. Something else you'll notice by reading their "notes" is that much of this material was taken from texts written by someone else.

I do understand how they could get things like immunization records, birth weight stats, etc. I do find many of these measurements understandable, however very difficult to not have statistical error-laden information unless the study was expansive.

[quote name='moif' date='Feb 15 2007, 12:40 PM' post='207620']


Do you agree or disagree with the findings?

Yes I most certainly do. Having spent my life divided between living in the UK and Denmark I can honestly testify that I saw more violence per year in the UK than I have in the entire time I've been in Denmark.

Moif, I was born and raised in England. I now live in San Francisco. I will always live here. While my mom lives, I will visit England once a year. I loved your post. You see England as I do. Therefore, using me as an example, some English have the ability to objectively see their country for what it is. Not all go on two week vacations to a seaside resort overseas. Some travel the world and learn from the cultures that they meet. Yet, they are a small minority. However, I guess that most people believe that "their country" is the best. Toxteth in Liverpool is one of the very toughest places in England. I grew up in a similar environment. I am surprised that America is considered violent by the English, when I, or anybody I know, has never been assaulted on the streets here. I still have gaps in my teeth from walking home from the pub in England.

I disagree on a couple of your comments. The England that I left matched your view, but it has improved over time. On recent visits, I notice an abundance of non-English people who are accepted. In the town of my birth (Wolverhampton), there are now people from many countries. The food has gotten better as a result. The insular attitude that you speak of was correct when I left (1993). The English referred to Europe as "the continent", and would never describe themselves as Europeans. Today, the young and the middle-aged have embraced Europe. England is going through a transfornation, for the better. It is still violent though. I don't understand that, or what is needed to reverse that culture. I can leave a bar in San Francisco at 2.am, walk through bad neighborhoods, and arrive home with nothing more than a hangover. In Wolverhampton, I may get beaten by a bunch of youths who I never met before.
I hope that, over time, the English youths will learn from the greater exposure to foreign cultures that they experience through immigration or travel.