The battle over the assumed success of European socialism continues.
Many European countries like Sweden have gained a reputation as being very wealthy in spite of their highly regulated and taxed economies.
From there, many assume that the rest of Europe is more or less similar, even if slightly poorer.
But if we look more closely at the data, a very different picture emerges, and we find that the median household in the US is better off (income-wise) than the median household in all but three European countries.
Worse than Mississippi?
Last year, a debate erupted over how Britain would compare to individual US states.
In the UK Spectator, Fraser Nelson explained "Why Britain is poorer than any US state, other than Mississippi."
A week later, TIME shot back with an article titled "No, Britain Is Not Poorer than Alabama."
The author of the TIME article, Dan Stewart, explained that, yes, Britain is poorer than many US states, but certainly not all of them. (See below to confirm that the UK is, in fact, poorer than every state.)
...The nationwide median income for the US is in red. To the left of the red column are other OECD countries, and to the right of the red bar are individual US states.
These national-level comparisons take into account taxes, and include social benefits (e.g., "welfare" and state-subsidized health care) as income.
Purchasing power is adjusted to take differences in the cost of living in different countries into account.
Since Sweden is held up as a sort of promised land by American socialists, let's compare it first.
We find that, if it were to join the US as a state, Sweden would be poorer than all but 12 states, with a median income of $27,167.
Median residents in states like Colorado ($35,830), Massachusetts ($37,626), Virginia ($39,291), Washington ($36,343), and Utah ($36,036) have considerably higher incomes than Sweden..."
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