The problem is that the Scandy systems actually try (and in the large part succeed) in avoiding having a significant underclass and in achieving good inter-generational social mobility.

The US system clearly doesn't and year on year the inequality and education gap gets worse and worse.

Your attittude to the underclass seems to be:

'They can sink or swim. The ones with moral backbone will get out and those that don't get out don't deserve to have my tax $$$'.

This has two flaws.

Firstly it may just be simple bad economics - the cost of the crime/bad health/justice system may well work out to be far higher than the cost of the welfare payments you save (but at least it keeps more prison officers, policeman and lawyers in deserving jobs, right?).

Secondly it assumes that someone's 'moral backbone' is somehow entirely independent of both genes and upbringing and is therefore a fair (and sole) arbiter of their worth as a human being.

The UK has a bad underclass problem as well (though not as bad as the US) and it did try to solve it by the welfare state route. You are quite correct in that it didn't work very well and people can end up trapped in a hand-out culture from cradle to grave.
But those people have kids and you have to do something to try to break the cycle.

It may be that the Scandies are just lucky to have a small enough underclass that they have been able to keep on top of the problem, but clearly an argument that very generous welfare benefits CAUSE an underclass problem (and therefore that removing or restricting welfare will solve the problem) is overly simplistic and proved wrong by the fact that most of the top ten best quality of life countries in the world having generous welfare systems.

Underclasses arise through segregation, racism, a culture of a lack of respect for education, and exploitation. It isn't because they are all lazy and stupid - and even if more of them are lazy and stupid than I am I still don't want to see them pushed further into abject poverty. We got rid of the workhouses some time ago..

Beavis is correct:
http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/200 ... lat_1.html

Yes its a good post, but its also very obvious to me that you guys have never spent any serious time deep in the inner city. I mean, in the houses, schools and lives of the very poor.

Youre perspective its totally different from mine because I have been there and Im there every day. I respect your points of view but when I read this stuff, it reminds me of alot of other situations where people who have lost touch with reality because they are too far removed, are making decisions for those of us affected by those decisions.

Example: A couple years ago our brilliant police chief decided that we needed more officers in patrol. WOW...a big revelation. Well, his idea was to have all detectives work one week in patrol each 6 months. Sounds like a good idea if you are sitting in a nice comfy chair behind a big desk. Except for a million reasons it wont work and didnt work.

The detectives dont want to do it because they think its beneath them.
The patrol officers dont want help from people they dont know and trust and are afraid to do any real work because they are afraid of what the detective might do, not do, or say later.

So nothing gets done and they drive around all evening trying to not do anything. Meanwhile, the cases stack up back at the office because there are less detectives to investigate the crimes committed. Oh, well it sounded good on paper right?

Just like your utopean (sp?) idea sound good on paper. And just to set the record straight....like it or not, most of the ultra poor ARE in fact very stupid. Whos fault that is... Gods? Their own? Societys? Thats open to debate, but its a fact.

If they didnt pay their rent, they are on the wrong end obviously. Move back to 1954 Russia if you want everyone to be equal and have the government do everything for you.

Yes its a good post, but its also very obvious to me that you guys have never spent any serious time deep in the inner city. I mean, in the houses, schools and lives of the very poor.

I've just spent 15 years living 800 yards from Longsight - once of the worst (and most notorious) of Manchester's inner city gang suburbs. I only moved (last year) because my house got too small when my second child came along.

Mostly when you are talking about inner city poor in the US you are talking about black people.

The thing that you have in the US worse than anywhere else (except maybe Israel) is de facto racial segregation. I went to visit frinds in the US a few years ago and was in DC for a week or so. One afternoon I decided to go and see a movie (mainstream blockbuster - Independence Day). I found a movie theatre in a mall just two subway stops from the main drag (the one with the Smithsonian stiff on). I went to the 7pm show I think. The movie theatre was full.
I WAS THE ONLY WHITE GUY IN THE PLACE.

That level of racial segregation is simply unthinkable outside the US and I'm afraid it and its obvious consequences understandably color your view of black people generally. Those of us outside don't see the urban poor in the same way, however much welfare they are on.