I recently wrote a post at Bloomberg Opinion arguing that "bad behavior" - drug use, violence, single parenthood, and idleness - is not the main cause of poverty in advanced nations. As evidence, I cited the country of Japan, which has extremely low rates of drug use, violence, single parenthood, and idleness, and yet which has a poverty rate almost as high as that of the U.S., and significantly higher than those of wealthy European countries. Since Japan has so little bad behavior and still ...
