zlacker

>>vmoore+(OP)
I'm strongly in favor of expanding the US social safety net, but I don't want to neglect other obvious factors here. Dutch children are able to walk or bike outside unsupervised. In the US they'd risk either being killed by a driver, or stopped by an overzealous neighbor or police officer. I think this kind of freedom of movement has a big effect on happiness, it certainly did for me.

ETA relevant links: https://youtube.com/@NotJustBikes https://letgrow.org/

ETA again: I glibly mentioned "being killed by a driver" but of course navigating the typical US built environment if you're under 16 or otherwise unable to drive is a miserable experience in a number of ways even if you survive it. Highways make pedestrian paths unnecessarily roundabout. Parking lots make everything further from everything else. Crossing major roads requires getting drivers to notice and stop for you (harder when you're short!), or waiting through interminable signal cycles, etc.

>>MBlume+yj
I read a blog post a while back that had the idea that the reason so many American's remember their college years so fondly is because for many of them it was the only time in their lives where they lived somewhere walkable.

>>dopame+5l
This was my experience. There's this narrative that you move away from your parents and you have the freedom and independence they were previously denying you, and I'm sure that's very much the case for many people but it's not as though my parents were ever trying to keep me from going places and seeing people, the built environment where I grew up (suburb of Los Angeles) did that.