Yes, there is such a thing as a formerly developed country
bostonglobe.com
bostonglobe.com
The parallels cited in the article are hand picked to fit their “omg fascism in the US is totally real you guys” narrative.
But back to Argentina. In reality, their fall is much more complicated and spread over a long period. But, if you had to simplify it could be described as a terrible cycle of unchecked power and corruption.
If you think the US is bad try starting a business, securing licensure, or navigating the judicial system in literally any other country.
But how is that any different than many of the things we do in the USA too, like for example in Austin, TX right now there is a ~4 month wait to take a driving test, but you can pay a 3rd party who will help you along in the process and "test" you, and then tell the DMV they have tested you, so you can get your license in a week or so. Or Clear at the airport.
It all pay to play, the difference in the US is that we call them "public private partnerships" or other nonsense which ends up being a bribe to someone in the know who can accelerate the process. We pretend that clear is somehow more secure/etc than the interview and fingerprint global entry process (wait time ~9 months). Or that the 1+ year waiting periods to get a site plan approval, sped up if you know a council man, isn't just corruption.
And in many cases these wait times are directly the result of funding cuts/etc to each and every organization, by a party that insists that government is inefficient, despite frequently being patently false. If I paid even half of the $500 fee I payed to the private driving instructor to the DMV they would be swimming in money to test people.
My argument is that we seem to have significantly less corruption overall in the US.
Stop laughing and hear me out: when you apply for a residence permit, you have an initial consultation appointment at an office in your town or county where, after reviewing your form, you are then given a checklist of documents and the expected application fee to bring to your next appointment, based on your particular circumstances. Outside of Covid times, and even during the massive wave of refugees from Syria, that was typically within a few weeks.
Show up with the requested documents and photos and pay the fee (into a machine, get a printed receipt, no human touches your money), get a receipt for your application and an estimated pickup date for your shiny residence permit (and ID).
When I went to renew my residence permit around year 4, the clerk helpfully asked if what I really wanted was an application for a permanent residence permit. Hadn’t occurred to me - I thought it was 5 years of residency, but it’s only 3 if you’re married to a German citizen.
No lawyers involved, no anxious weeks without my passport, all at a cost that was less than 300 EUR a pop. Far less drama and expense than I’ve heard from acquaintances who have tried getting a German or other EU citizen spouse through the US Green Card process.
Bureaucracy is good when it’s clear in its demands.
Argentina doesn’t really seem like the most salient example though because it’s a pretty unique country. On the other hand, Hungary’s backsliding into autocracy (and the reverence of certain western political groups towards its government) is a real cautionary tale for other countries.
Going left solves some issues and creates others. Going right same thing. A country needs to shift back and forth to evolve properly. Going too far left or right brings a correction next cycle.
...other than New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Denmark, or South Korea, as of the 2020 Ease of Doing Business Report, as all these countries were ranked higher than the US :)
It is also a country with deep structural racism and a police force that's infiltrated with literal fascists.
All that can be true and completely unrelated with the bad premises of the article.
Sorry, I’m not sure which law you’re referring to here. Can you elaborate?
I agree such surveys are problematic from a first amendment standpoint. But what’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
Do you think we should tolerate teachers who attempt to indoctrinate vulnerable students?
Meanwhile, I find it ironic that the same state enacting this "intellectual diversity" law has specifically banned teaching critical race theory in public schools.
A voluntary survey invites participation bias; respondents will likely skew heavily toward the "I feel I am being indoctrinated/I feel uncomfortable voicing my beliefs". The spirit of the law aside, this law looks like a lever to pull funding from universities where the median Floridian, who votes Republican, would feel like their views are being challenged.
Words have no meaning I guess.
I'm sure you're just as concerned about those surveys which could be far more harmful than voluntary surveys about ideology.
The statistics of the past don't account for the fact that Argentina -still is- but used to be a deeply, deeply unequal country with a small cadre of families owning the vast majority of land, and then pretty much everyone else.
That oligarchy engaged in multiple decades of election fraud, propped-up military dictators, and many other shady practices to remain in power. That doesn't matter much when looking at the general economic indicators for a country that exported huge amounts of food in a global context to two world wars and a destroyed Europe.
Perón came from the military, he was a demagogue, and was a fascist sympathizer. He was also the among the first governments to actually develop institutions for a strong middle class, including hospitals, schools, universal policies that benefited the working poor as well as myriad other highly progressive laws.
As with a lot of populist programs it came at cost far beyond what even the relatively wealthy state could afford, which combined with the opposition to Perón (both in the shape of the military, conservatives, and also liberals who opposed Perón's repressive personality cult) turned into his downfall.
What followed Perón was another series of military governments and "democratic" governments with very limited power. The development of institutions that guaranteed middle-class wealth gradually slowed down, and the country has never been able to transition away from primary exports as its basic means of foreign currency.
The substantial difference from its neighboring countries is that decades of failed monetary policy have resulted in some of the highest inflation in the world, and a great degree of that failure is no doubt due to the tension between conservative and Peronist policy goals.
But make no mistake, it is also true that Argentina has a substantial, educated middle class when compared to its neighbors and I'm not really sure that would have been possible without a measure of populism being introduced to break from decades of oligarchs who cared little beyond getting grain from their fields to the ports.
Perón is a polarizing figure because many can simultaneously attribute the rise of an industrial middle class to him as well as the subsequent degeneration of monetary policy and demagogue populist entitlement programs of dubious effectiveness.
But I doubt its lessons translate much to current times.