IMO, The US has crumbling infrastructure, corrupt government, dangerous cities, and a lot of homelessness, among so many other problems. Hell, millions of people in the US don’t even have power right now.

What’s the difference?

  • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works
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    4 months ago

    Because the original concept of “ordinal world country” came out of the Cold War:

    • “first world” was US/Western affiliated/allied
    • “second world” was USSR affiliated/allied
    • ”third world” just meant “none of the above” for a very long time

    However, since then, understanding of the term in popular discourse has somewhat shifted from geopolitical affiliation to a vague amalgam of socioeconomic status/GDP/“are you a pariah state”/etc.

    On a less serious note: the US is really just several dozen 3rd world countries in a trenchcoat essentially relying on (but also politically backstabbing) the economic product of like 5 or 6 states that could be first world economies in their own right