This reminds me of a famous Tocqueville quote:

There is in fact a manly and legitimate passion for equality that spurs all men to wish to be strong and esteemed. This passion tends to elevate the lesser to the rank of the greater.

But one also finds in the human heart a depraved taste for equality which impels the weak to want to bring the strong down to their level and which reduces men to preferring equality in servitude to inequality in freedom.

> How do you propose to raise up a culture that doesn't value diligent hard work

Which culture? Don't be abstract. Name what culture you think doesn't value hard work and I will and we'll see if I can't find a counterexample.

This is a commonly held hypothesis but the question of "why are the Jews successful despite being outsiders" is complicated and not in any way settled. What I know of it comes from reading some of "the origins of totalitarianism" Hannah Arendt. "The Jews are really hardworking" is a lazy and easy explanation for the question of how some Jews have flourished despite persecution.

It is not simply the case that culture is the proximal cause of (some) Jewish wealth than the particular material conditions of certain Jews throughout history that has lead to the affluence of and importance of some, mostly European Jews. For example, many Jews came to have a privileged position in European courts because of the rise of protestantism (a hardworking culture that doesn't value credit, something that Wax would probably say is "bad"). You're ignoring politics and history when you just chalk everything up to culture. It's survivorship bias at it's finest.

Edit: I butchered a sentence in the middle of my comment. Added a line break.

"If the Jews are okay, then how come you couldn't figure it out? HMMMMMM? That's what I thought." is heard often when bringing up the American Jewish within the context of this discussion. While I don't agree with down-voting a comment that smells similar to something toxic (I doubt the grand-parent intended this interpretation). The highly negative reaction is likely due to the frequency with which this argument is brought up, and its lack of any validity.

Comparing the American Jewish to African-Americans is an apples-to-oranges comparison. The time spans for the comparison are horribly different - When were Jews recently generationally slaved for centuries?

The thing that really annoys me about this comparison between Jews and African Americans is "because of their strong values of hard work, family, and creativity". In my opinion these values of Jewish Americans are obtained through the tightly ingrained religious and familial structures. Unlike the Jewish, however, African-Americans' culture was systematically annihilated when they were enslaved. There are few traces of African religions and customs that remained after slavery. Any shared values were destroyed by such an event. You can similarly say that the massive amounts of black males that have since been imprisoned for minor drug crimes in the U.S. has had a similar effect on the familial unit.

The plights of Jewish and Black Americans in the U.S. have been very different. This is likely why people reacted poorly to the subject being brought up.

Yes, Black Americans have suffered a truly horrible history of oppression that has caused cultural problems. If anything, you're agreeing with Wax that culture matters.

What we choose to do about that is up for debate. The fact of the situation, however, is not.

I don't follow. The quote strongly applies that freedom is preferable to slavery even if some would want otherwise.

* Life expectancy: this assumes longer is better

* Rate of suicide: happy secure people generally don't commit suicide

* Rate of preventable deceases: says something about health

* Rate of violent crime: secure people don't have to deal with crime

"Raising up" the culture of people who are unsurprised that people at the peak of their fertility tend to get pregnant even in an environment where marriage is increasingly unattainable to that population is more about not going out of our way to kick people while they're down than hobbling the excellent.

How do you mean marriage is increasingly unattainable ? A marriage license costs $55. Are you alluding to something else here?

Single mothers are one of the last bastions of subsidies and welfare, especially considering how everything else has been scaled down in the recent years.

> our society takes every possible opportunity to treat young unwed mothers like absolute shit.

I have plenty of anecdata to the contrary. I'd like to hear why you think this, there must be a somewhat personal reason.

TANF (the last vestige of single-mother welfare) is ~$30bn/yr for the whole US, state & federal contribution.

SSDI (a mix of people with severe medical problems and the work-shy) is $150bn/yr.

OASI (I'm old - gimmie money) is $813bn/yr

Medicare (I'm old - gimmie healthcare) is $709bn/yr

Single mother welfare is a rounding error in the budget compared to other subsidies and welfare, which is mostly diverted towards older and wealthier people.

I'm not just talking about cash welfare -- try holding down a job while raising a kid by your own and see how much our society will bend over backwards to accommodate any lifestyle choice other than single child-rearing.

I don't have a dog in this fight - I'm a middle-aged, childless single guy. But I have eyes to see and it doesn't take much research to figure out who's getting the short end of the stick in our social order.

> But I have eyes to see and it doesn't take much research to figure out who's getting the short end of the stick in our social order.

Part of the plight of single mothers is rising inequality and inability of the fathers to find decent jobs. Whenever arguments about children are made, I strongly believe at looking at a broader picture - how can we make sure the child grows up in a nuclear family for at least 16-18 years? I think that has to be looked at in the context of both sexes.

Thanks for the numbers as well, although I believe medical care is also subsidized for single mothers (at their median income level). It's hard to argue against expanding TANF (One of my college Economics courses examined effectiveness of welfare programs, and found that TANF was the most beneficial as far as how far each dollar goes).

Welfare is structured so that single moms get more money if they stay single. It is bad for the kids to grow up without a father and it is bad for society to encourage it.

Source: Wife worked in a homeless shelter.

Poor policies that leave people in poverty traps (e.g. having a single mom find a job that pays barely above her welfare benefits shouldn't be stripping her of benefits, but a much more gradual sliding scale instead) should constantly be brought to light and fixed.

> It is bad for the kids to grow up without a father and it is bad for society to encourage it.

Absolutely, but to fix that we also have to look at why the fathers aren't sticking around, not only why single mothers aren't remarrying and/or getting out of poverty quicker.

I think there are a lot of reasons fathers aren't sticking around. I think a lot of those can be helped if there was less drug use and gang violence and more enfranchise on education, family planning, and marriage.

I think there are both structural (welfare, education, ect) and cultural changes that need to be made before all of those areas can be improved.

Lots of welfare, which gets back to the original point about marriage vs. single parents.

Given that this includes people who value a society where particular values aren't successful, it is probably not possible to have a society like that.