Comparison of the United States to Italy

Italy and the United States are similar in certain ways and complete opposites in other ways. They are both fairly rich countries with a strong emphasis on individual liberties. Their people have similar expectations of stands are living and freedom and everything else. Where they are different comes down to a matter of size. The United States is the richest country in the world with over 300,000,000 citizens. It has taken a leadership in world affairs and has people from all over the world calling it their home. Italy, on the hand, is happy being a team player inside of the European Union. It is fairly rich, but not nearly as big and surrounded by potential rivals, the fact of which makes it a much easier and smarter decision to be extremely cooperative and friendly. Also, Italy is a much, much, much less diverse country with over 90% of its citizens being of Italian descent.

      Italy and the United are almost exact opposites when it comes to diversity. In Italy there is only one main ethnic group, Italian, and 90% of the country practices the same religion, Catholicism. As a result, the culture is basically the same throughout the entire country. The only differences seen are in between the north, where the mountains are and is similar to the countries it borders, and the south which borders the Mediterranean Sea and shares certain things in common with other countries that border the sea. These differences, however, are not very large or important, as a general rule the culture of Italy is pretty similar throughout. (The World Fact Book: Italy) With most of the country being Catholic, plus the center of that religion being based in Italy, it has a lot of influence on the countries culture. For example, almost all of the country's famous artists, such as Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were known for making the paintings and sculptures used to decorate Italy's thousands of churches.

This is remarkable when you compare it with the United States. The...