Can you think of any countries in the world that are more culturally similar to each other than the U.S is to Canada?

29 comments

1. This will be really hard to gauge without first living in those countries.

2. Argentina and Uruguay.

3. Czech Republic and Slovakia?

4. I don’t know that I could possibly judge. Like, I can tell you that Bulgaria and Macedonia are extremely similar. The languages are basically the same. The food is basically the same. There are definitely some interesting differences (ie, Bulgaria has a large Turkish minority, Macedonia has a large Albanian minority) so they aren’t identical, but if you’re from one you won’t find the other very foreign.

   But I couldn’t compare that to say, Moldova and Romania or Panama and Colombia or Germany and Austria because I don’t know enough about those places.

5. I’m sure I’ll be violently corrected on this but Germany/Austria always felt like a good comparison to the US and Canada. They even have the same thing we have where people are surprised to find out a famous person is actually Austrian/Canadian instead of German/American.

   …of course, in Austria’s case that famous person is Hitler and not, say, Seth Rogan.

6. Vatican City and Italy seem pretty similar

7. The three Scandinavian nations

8. Croatia vs Serbia.

9. Russia and Belarus. Russia and Ukraine at a close second. Makes the war all the more ridiculous to me.

10. I don’t know that the US and Canada are even similar to themselves

    I mean if you were inventing imaginary countries, I doubt if you would invent one that contained San Francisco, Miami, dallas , and the Amish.

    It would be just too weird.

    Nova Scotia, Quebec and Vancouver, probably not much better

11. Guatemala and El Salvador seem very similar. I know multiple people from both countries, and even they have acknowledged the similarities, comparing it to living in different states here.

12. I don’t really know enough about New Zealand and Australia to make that call. But even their flags are almost exactly the same.

13. Sweden/Norway/Denmark. Between the three, each one was at one time the same country with each of the others. Each has at least three different regions with a different feel. The differences here are also similar to those between the 50 states. Alaska, Montana, Minnesota, California, Florida, New York, Ohio. Each of these states has a feel, just like I found in the different areas of those three countries.

    And I have lived in most of the places listed here, or spend more than 3 months at a time in them.

14. Italy and San Marino?

15. Sweden and Åland, which is an autonomous, Swedish speaking, region of Finland

16. Not really. I have both citizenships and Canada and the US are very close to being the same place.

17. Algeria and Morocco

18. Moldova and Romania. 

    Here’s an interesting article that discusses some of their similarities and differences: https://origins.osu.edu/read/moldova-and-romania-long-and-complicated-relationship

19. There’s a great website that tracks this, the Country Similarity Index. According to them, the most similar countries in the world are Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Burundi and Rwanda are No. 2, and the Czech Republic and Slovakia are No. 3.

20. Norway / Sweden / Denmark
    Australia / New Zealand

21. Jersey and Guernsey, next question

22. As an American that has spent a bit of time (4 days) in Canada and a few weeks in Australia, I think Australia is closer to the US culturally.

    I was in Vancouver, so maybe that skewed my perception.

23. France and Belgium

24. I woudl say Quebec and Canada are pretty similar

25. I think parts of every country has cultural similarities with neighboring countries like parts of Pakistan (like Karachi and Punjab) and Northern India because of the two sided migration during Partition. Heck, I’m from Karachi and still have extended family that lives in India. Also, Northwest Pakistan and Afghanistan because of shared ethnicity and I’m guessing West Bengal in India has a lot of similarities with Bangladesh for the same reasons.

26. England and Wales?

27. All of these are maybes

    * Germany and Austria
    * Uruguay and Argentina
    * Lots of Caribbean Countries

28. New Zealand and Australia.

29. Us and the Brits are more similar than I think most people realize. When looking at it globally we have become like cousins or something. There’s about as much difference between America and Britain as there is between the west and East coasts of America IMO.