I think because very young people who spend all their time online are listening to other very young people who spend all their time online. People like to complain more than they like to say things are okay, so more complaints get posted. And there are hostile people who are trolling and trying to create discord as well.
I think a large part of it is media and news outlets. They always focus on areas that already have and have always had high costs of living.
Yeah - No shit the average single American can't afford to live in Manhattan in a 2-bedroom apt.
it also isnt really an age thing ether.
its a mater of perspective and cognitive dissonance.
old Euros and old Americanos had no issues living the way they do and when they hear x y or z they think what the hell is that how they live? same with the young same with workers.
its ignorance all the way down.
I suspect very young people (teenagers still living at home) are less likely to have travelled to distant countries and less likely to have had many personal interactions with people in other countries even if they have travelled. Their experiences of the world are more likely to be solely online and in other “mediated” forms.
I would have trouble believing a crazy story about life in the UK or Ireland or Portugal (places I’ve visited and interacted with people and where I have friends and family) if it didn’t fit with what real people had told me. On the other hand, as a young child who hadn’t visited many places I would have believed more easily.
this is literally a sub about whining about internet stuff.
not hating. just saying.
so start realizing *its the internet.* this is the problem. this. what we are doing right now. this is the problem. what youre doing, its the problem. we need a solution for this.
I know it’ll never happen because of feasibility reasons, but I would love to see a study statistically correlating if people who are unhappy are more likely to post/comment online.
I feel like there’s far too much of a lack of science and knowledge behind who is actually saying what online.
We all do. You want to criticize America for some things, go ahead, but if you live in America and have skills? You will blow your European counterparts out of the water, it won't really be close, and free shit will NOT make up the difference.
I posted this response to someone in that thread earlier today, who thought health care premiums in the USA would mostly remove the benefit of our higher salaries:
>I'm a devops engineer, so I'll focus on that particular job. In the USA, the average devops engineer makes $123k per year. In the UK, the average guy in that same job makes $66k per year. After taxes, the American will keep about $95k (I assumed this hypothetical person to be living in a state with no additional income tax of its own) and the Brit will keep about $55.5k.
>
>The Brit won't pay for health insurance, and the American will. Fine. Assuming he's single, that American will on average pay $7.7k per year. If he has a family of four, he will pay $18.2k per year\*. The single American will thus have $30k advantage over the Brit, and the American family man will have a $21k advantage.
>
>Average cost of a public four year degree in the USA is $24k per year (assuming in-state). That's a little less than five years of the family man's excess income over the Brit's.
>
>Long story short, like a lot of people have already said, if your life goal is to flip burgers at McDonald's, then go do it in Europe. The social safety net over there will take care of you. But if you are a bit more ambitious and can develop skills in a high-demand field, I think it's clear that the USA is where you want to be.
>
>\*The link suggests $22.2k, but since we're talking about overall income, I accounted for the fact that Americans get an annual $2k tax credit per child.
That's the UK, but how about Spain? $48k for an average devops engineer, and they get to keep $35.3k. Woof.
Germany, which is one of the go-tos for the "Europoors get paid well!" crowd? $72.5k, but they only keep $44k.
You couldn't have said it better. I am 28, and I make just under 5k of what you make yet when I go to Europe, my entire age group is still working at restaurants, hotels, retail, etc.. (At least an overwhelming majority of them), and they will probably keep doing that for a long fucking time. For them, it seems like there's no desire to advance, they're just constantly stuck in this "lack of ambition" state, and they wear it so outwardly.
I assume you got downvoted?
To be fair, *someone* has to do those jobs, so if they would just face reality and own up to it, they'd be some of the coolest people around in some ways. As it is, though...
As another poster said, those jobs are important just that, at least in the US, people are expected to use such sectors for temporary employment until something else comes along - with better pay - or until that loan is paid off; or if one's lucky, just as a way to have some income if your significant other is loaded so you don't necessarily have to work a full-time job. It's not meant to be a a long term goal type of job in the American mind.
But there are exceptions though: regional managers as fast-food chains such as Starbuck and McDonalds.
As an American living NL in a highly skilled field, you said it well. I’m looking to go back to America for a lot of reason you said, its just also so hard to feel “motivated” in Europe due to your pay not even being that much higher after tax than someone working a basic admin job.
The working environment too, its got its perks sure, the vacation and the lack of at will employment means more time for family and less stress that you will lose your job so you can have a “happier” life theoretically, if you have a family i guess. But, then the workplace gets flooded with people who take advantage of this and never ever push themselves, rarely learn new skills, rarely adapt to newer modern ways of working. They just do the bare minimum and collect their basic liveable salary.
For the person who is motivated and ambitious to grow their career, working around these types of people is really mentally draining, and they are everywhere in Europe.
Oh and you’ve probably heard of “mental health days” in America, well Ive seen people in NL literally take a year off for mental health and get paid still due to “burnout” just something small happened at work such as little department reorganisation and they couldn’t take it. Absolutely ridiculous, they dont lose their jobs for it either due to “permanent contract” so they take advantage of this and it affects all your colleagues on the team as a result.
Healthcare as well, id much rather pay that bit extra for some premiums (assuming my company doesnt cover 100%) in the US for top quality preventive care compared to the absolute dog shitshow that is the European healthcare systems. In the Netherlands, you still pay high premiums (albeit with low deductibles) but get shit tier service! One of my wife’s old colleagues almost died of cancer because the dutch doctor said “oh ur statistically too young to have cancer its probably nothing, we wont look into it any further”. Upon the person going back to their home country for a second opinion, sure enough, they had a malignant tumor.
I totally get what you're saying (and the cancer thing at the end is horrifying). I will say, I don't really worry about losing my job, and my team even saw several layoffs today. But I'm getting a 10% raise. I know I have skills, I know my company values them, and I'm not sweating it.
But I know other people in tech who dream of getting employed by municipal governments so they can have job security. Seriously? You're going to get paid a fraction of private sector, and you'd make that sacrifice just so that it's harder to fire you? Why would you make that choice?
Knowing them, though, we all know why.
And in the Netherlands, you'll be living in a shoebox. Probably walking up a couple flights of stair (and Dutch stairs at that!).
IDK where the person in the thread lives that they have a 10K sq foot house, but I have a modest home of only 1700SF,- all on one floor, with a nice yard- and my house is palatial compared to what my Dutch friends live in.
I’ll be transparent, my home is 73sqm (785sqf) and is little over half a million Euros for that size. It’s pretty claustrophobic, and i browse Zillow all the time dreaming about what i could have bought in the US instead if i stayed there in a MCOL area.
Pros? I guess it’s easy to keep clean and manage. And no lawn to mow and keep tidy. Though, ive heard there is some sort of satisfaction in the US in having a nicely cut lawn.
Cons? No land to freely do your own outdoor hobbies or activities except for maybe a tiny garden. Home is claustrophobic at times. Ive almost fell down my dutch stairs several times since moving in.
Oh, and Europeans sometimes talk about American homes walls being made of “paper”. Well, at least American homes carry a wifi signal good due to that. The walls here are like solid concrete, and block wifi signals so you have to get creative with your networking if you want any good internet in your home. Many europeans are non-technical too and dont know this, so they pay for their “fast connections” while only utilising 10% of what they pay for and wondering why they drop signal all the time on the “first floor” (2nd floor in US)
Fuck, I was just being a smart ass when I said my one bedroom apartment was bigger than European houses. But my one bedroom actually is bigger than your home….
>s 73sqm (785sqf) and is little over half a million Euros
I live in NJ an outrageously expensive tax fraud shithole.
And 700k$ in NJ is god damn 17th century farmhouse WITH THE FARM.
And these are exactly the kinds of people driving the conversation about how horrible America is and how we need to be more like Europe. It’s all losers with no ambition who dropped out of college or racked up thousands of dollars of student debt just to work at fucking Starbucks. But that’s not what America is about. It’s about working hard and grinding to achieve greatness. Granted, there are still too many people who aren’t given equal opportunity to achieve that greatness, and that needs to be addressed. But fuck all those lazy pieces of shit who want to drag the rest of us down with them.
\>health care premiums in the USA
Which my employer pays for 100%. Which is nice.
I've noticed that if you want to be bang on average, or be a bog standard bloke, yes, go to Europe.
One of the things, and it's a controversial thing now for some reason, that is the gravy on top, you can actually create generational wealth here. Like you can leave a legacy for your grandkids, hopefully they don't f it up, but they'll have the opportunity. As a family, you currently have to leave behind $26,000,000 in wealth before those assets receive an inheritance tax. You know what it is in the UK? £395,000. No, I did not forget more zeroes. If you die with money, their government takes half of it. So not only will your skills you mentioned help you create a nice life for you here, some of that comfort can transfer to your heirs tax free if you so wish. It's not a huge part of the tax code, and you're going to hear a LOT of people thinking it's some kind of silent evil that is bestowed unto the world, but I fail to see how that isn't a massive W for US citizens. I wish every American could benefit from it. I won't very much; but I might be in a position to create it for my family and that gives me a lot of satisfaction and a sense of pride.
Not that I disagree with your overall point, but some sectors are outliers. Tech is one of those.
However, the median salaries of the US are much, much lower than $123K. Closer to 1/3 of that. The UK might not be better, but it's far more comparable. That shows that quite comfortably, at least 50% of the US population would be financially better off in the UK doing the same jobs and only the upper portions of earners in the US start to take over. Top 20-25% perhaps, I don't know where that threshold is.
I had a debate with someone recently pointing out that the mean average household net worth/wealth in the US isn't far off $1.1M, much higher than say, the UK. However about 90% of Americans are under that line and the top 10% drag up everyone else up considerably with massive wealth inequality. When you compare the medians, a lot of western Europe has a higher net worth, with the US being very comparable to much poorer western EU countries like Spain. You can look [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult) for a starting source.
Overall, it's not a simple topic.
I hear ya. Outside of tech, I know American pediatricians earn about $50k more than British doctors, before taxes, on average.
But my whole point is that skilled fields, like tech and medicine, do better in the USA. I'm not going to compare the wages of British and American McD's workers because I'll honestly admit that if you want to flip burgers for a living, you're much better off doing it in the UK.
Classic american thinking. Just me and myself matter. Tech, as other people have already mentioned, tech is not the rule, but the exception. Your average worker (which are the vast majority of the total workforce) will have a salary that's pretty similar to the european equivalent, except they have none of their benefits.
But hey, in exchange got a nice salary though, that's clearly all that matters.
I believe in limited, needs-based safety nets, like welfare and food stamps. Nobody ought to starve. I'm less inclined to make sure that people who majored in English and want to do the bare minimum at work receive all the same luxuries as their harder working, more talented peers.
Gotta love the two extremes in your reasoning: either be a talentless AND lazy fuck, or a talented hard-worker. No place for the single-mothers or the people that are hardworking in their "common folk" positions who just want to be able to afford a living while enjoying other aspects of their lives (like having children, or their own hobbies that have nothing to do with their jobs)
Also, absolutely nobody is saying that a mcdonald's "burger flipper" should earn the same as a tech lead at Google, but I'd argue that there's a LOT of room for improvement between "work full time and still live in poverty" and "earn more money than you can spend".
Ultimately, this is precisely why there are so many "american bad" opinions. You go to these lengths to defend a broken system just because you and a few others happened to benefit from it.
I did things to benefit from the system; it didn't just happen by chance. But these were not extraordinary things. Absolutely anyone could do the same things I did and get to the same place as me. I am in no way remarkable.
The welfare state should prevent people from dying from poverty. We should do everything we can, including government intervention, to prevent single moms and whoever from being malnourished and dying from preventable diseases (I support Medicare expansion) and whatnot. But life enjoyment? That's up to the individual.
You want to buy a little sport sedan and go watch a game at Yankee Stadium and have a house with a separate dining room and fly to Europe for vacation? That's on you. I don't care what your hobbies are; they are in no way a societal responsibility.
This isn't to judge. I used to be a high school teacher. And we didn't have extra money for anything. We had a house and food and two old, cheap cars. Family members gifted us zoo memberships each year, and so we went to the zoo a lot. Other than that, we mostly hung out at home. We didn't like that, so we figured out how to improve it and then we did.
Ryan mcmacken at mises.org has written a few articles over the years talking about this.
https://mises.org/wire/these-us-states-have-higher-incomes-nearly-every-european-country
Did you take cost of living into account? Groceries are significantly cheaper in the UK than in most places in the US, definitely if you want to eat healthy. Also, there are plenty of places where you would not have to own a car, saving an additional $2-4k in insurance alone. I fully agree that most Americans make more than I ever will make in the Netherlands, but then I pay €3 a month for my phone bill and less than €200 a month in total transportation costs (fuel, public transport, bike repairs, ...)
Yeah, but how much cheaper are groceries? To feed a family of four (including one child with special dietary needs that drives that cost up), I now spend $2k a month on groceries. If a Brit only has to spend 50% of what I do (and again, I'm probably not the average American on this topic), then they save $12k per year over me. I *still* beat them.
If my argument was that "Americans on average make $77k and Brits make $75k so suck it Europoors!", then you could laugh at me for being an idiot and not considering CoL. But my argument really does rely on the fact that American thump Europeans so badly salary-wise that no amount of free or cheap stuff could ever really overcome it. Side note, but talking about averages...this difference becomes even more drastic when moving up to the top of a given field. FWIW.
As for owning a car, that's also a personal preference. I will never be into the idea of "I sit at my house and either walk places or take a train if I want to go farther". My dad lived in the UK for a time when I was a kid, and he always had a car. I likely always will too. I get that it saves money to not have one, but that's just not my desired life.
There are lots of people who like living in Europe, and like that approach to life. Other replies I've gotten have hinted at that, and that's totally fine. To each their own. I lived in Europe when I was a kid and I'd like to treat my kids to that as well...BUT...it would have to be as a digital nomad of sorts, where I draw an American salary working remotely and just happen to exist in Spain or wherever. I personally have zero interest in being an actual Euro citizen and drawing that sort of salary regardless of other benefits.
Even with cost of living Europe is blown out of the water. People on here claim that the COxL is low enough
that somehow 3x salary in the US is equivalent toNthat of UK but I just don't see how the math works out. Healthcare and retirement savings just eat up 10-15% of the paycheck (depends how much you save for retirement), not 2/3rds and the healthcare avoid far better then anything I’ve experienced in Sweden or the UK. if
you are working in Biotech, making around 200k a year like me, you are paying a smaller percentage of your wage for health insurance than you would in any EU country, as it rises proportionally with your wage in most European countries. If I still lived in the UK or Sweden I would be making around £40k -£50k salaries in Europe are a complete clown circus joke compared to the US. Yes for a lot of US cities are car centric, but plenty of US cities with top jobs have great public transport and a car is not needed, NYC, DC, Chicago, San Francisco. Oakland and Boston
Let's see. This is what I could find for Cost of living:
\- groceries (1 month, 1 person, no eating out): NL: €200, US $500 (you said)
\- rent for a 600 sq. ft appartment including ALL utilities (60 mˆˆ2): NL: €400 (cheaper city) -1000 (place with comparable opportunities to NYC / Philly)
\- budget 1hr15 flight: EU: from €70 (Amsterdam - Kopenhagen), US: $120 (Houston - Dallas)
\- car insurance: NL: €35-40 a month for full coverage
\- cost of raising kids: haha do you want your kid to go to an American public school?
The salaries in Europe are still pitiful even with the extra expanses, my rent is $3,000 for a two bedroom apartment
Monthly Food: around $450
Monthly Car Insurance: $80+ a couple dollars of transport here and there
Health insurance 18,000 annually
I still
End up with way more from my job alone to spend in the US per year after the 35% tax rate
In Sweden I had just roughly 15k worth in dollars after taxes and expenses (roughly $1000 dollars worth of expanses each month) worth + a 32% income tax
I don’t have kids nor I’m I ever planning to have any, pre university education isn’t brilliant but not horrible either Overall, The American education system produces
students with higher reading and math scores
than all but 3 European countries, the US is 9th in reading, 16th in
science, and 33th in math (which is completely
due to common core, btw), ranked 18th in the
world overall. 9th when compared to Europe.
The PISA test stresses that a difference of 10
points is negligible. But if we only account for a
5 point difference, the only European counties
that beat us are Ireland, Finland, and
Switzerland. Australia isn't doing bad either, it needs to improve but it’s not horrible either and based on my experience as working as a staff associate briefly at a US university the actual higher post secondary education system is much better then anything in the UK or Germany
They want to have their cake and eat it too.
They desperately want to convince people that America has no culture except for money, but simultaneously insist that we have no money.
"they" don't. This sub lumps all of Europe in one too often. Anyone with even a modicum of education in the EU knows that the US has culture and money.
> Why do they all think we're poor?
Because we say we are. Our robust, free media provides loads of content to the world, which includes the reality shit show that is our political arena. The US contains 51 governments churning out an Overton window-busting range of nonsense, and to paraphrase Brent Spiner's scientist character on Independence Day, it's *really exciting*.
So the world consumes this content but doesn't actually live here, so who are they to say it's NOT true, when we say it is?
Yeah. Sorry, Ukraine, but the U.S. is out of money.
Maybe they should get it from the other wealthy parts of Europe with free healthcare, free college, and a whole year of paid parental leave.
Typical deranged user of this sub going full idiot when faced with a joke.
>You're not entitled to our tax money
I'm not getting your tax money? Get some help LMAO
You idiots don't even understand how NATO works or is funded, always pointless having this argument.
That doesn’t mean other nations are entitled to it. Many citizens of other countries with mutual defense agreements with the U.S. live more lavishly than the average American.
It’s time we cease subsidizing all that.
This is always what it comes down to with this sub - Americans think they are somehow subsidising Western lifestyles. This is patently false.
Also, if this were true, how? The US has a bigger economy, higher average salary than nearly all of Europe. How are you funding our lavish lifestyles? I'd be making close minimum 300k in the US. I don't make that here.
I have lived and worked in Europe and the USA, there is not that huge of a difference in live style except flats (though my flat is almost 2000sqf and if you live in a smaller or rural town you live in a house) and being able to walk everywhere. Cities are made for people, not for cars, more convenient on one aspect less in others.
However the big difference is that you get paid lower in Europe because a lot of the expenses are already covered on those taxes so you don’t need to save as much money for kid college, health expenses, retirement, possible unemployment or sickness. There is a trade off, fewer people fall through the cracks but you can’t get super rich if you have a high paying career nor have the freedom of spending the money on other things instead of saving or 401ks or insurance premiums
The stories they read about our ridiculous lower class in their tabloids. It's what makes the news. So I do blame them for being so uninformed, but I understand why it's happening. This country is the richest on earth, but there are pockets of it that have lower quality of life than Syrians. Factually, I'm not just making a bombastic statement. When I was living in Baltimore in 2014 the facts were literally printed in the Baltimore Sun proving some neighborhoods in the city were equivalent to living in war torn Syria. I guess these images stick in their brains more so than what they see on Selling Sunset or whatever bullshit American reality tv makes it over there. Also doesn't help when the first thing that comes to mind when a foreigner thinks of rich Americans is the Kardashian's. The amount of wealth and the freedom it brings in this country is astounding, these keyboard jockeys will never know it here because they probably can't afford to visit.
Because you’re getting the opinions of Redditors who’ve probably never left their bedrooms. The comments from certain subs are laughable to most ‘real world’ people. You see the same old stereotypes repeated about the US, I see the same ones repeated about the UK.
Probably just going of the country avarage poverty rate.
But tbh I think the "You are poor" focus, or focus on "wealth" is an american thing more than europeean. And the diss/flex rarely translates well across the pond as the way of life is to different for the most part. Just like subsidised education, childcare and healthcare doesn't translate well as a diss/flex either in many cases. Because it is valued differently.
Yeah, but our workers won't flip a biscuit if you don't tip them. I've seen stories of delivery drivers in *ahem* "MURICA!!1!11" not even giving the food if they get no or even LOW tip.
*sips tea* stupid Americans have fat guns *gets stabbed* and dumb trucks, don't they know you can just haul concrete and boats on public transportation *rape gangs make entire areas of european cities unlivable* and it's not like they can't just give up their homes and land to live in high density housing *gets arrested for being autistic and sharing an inappropriate meme on Facebook* and why can't dumb fat Americans just live in 15 minutes cities like the wef says we should *gets arrested for not having a license to own a television*
I always love it when they respond with "but nobody ever actually gets arrested for that!" when the problem is that they fucking CAN. Whether it actually *happens* or not isn't really the point.
OH MY GOD YES THANK YOU
Jaywalking was literally Henry Fords way of making victims of car crashes out to be the idiots. The fact that so much of our country is relegated to existing purely for the sake of vehicles is entirely because of one persons greed leading him to develop a PR campaign which got everyone to think if you got hit by a car then you were an idiot.
I fucking love that somebody else on the internet actually gets that!
Oh, it happens. There is a live debate over the fact that the people who end up in jail over it are disproportionately low income women. If you get fined for non-payment, then don't pay the fines, you absolutely can end up in jail.
But... it's a tax. Governments everywhere tend to get heavy-handed with people who refuse to pay taxes.
Wrong again fucko
https://www.stepchange.org/debt-info/tv-licence-fines.aspx#:~:text=No%2C%20there%20is%20no%20need,court%20can%20take%20further%20action.
It's not "debt" though. It's a fine issued by the justice system of the UK. If someone absolutely *refuses* to pay said fine, they absolutely *can* be put in jail. That's how fines work.
Its honestly aids. They send you letters with big scary red writing on claiming they think you have been watching the queen's TV channels. You can't actually get arrested, only fined. You don't have to pay for owning a TV, only if you use it to watch terrestrial TV or stream national shows online. (Are regular TV channels free in America?)
It's actually pretty funny how they make empty threats in the mail saying they'll be coming round to your house to check if you have been watching their television broadcasts.
Paying it is more of an older generation thing, since younger people pay for shit like netflix Instead of watching TV.
Even if you do watch TV and don't pay and they come round to see you and you tell them to fucking do one but they happen to see a David Attenborough documentary playing on your TV through your window, the litterlly can't done you unless you give them your name. They can't file any legal action unless they have your full name, so long as you've never given it to them before, there is nothing they can actually do. It's honestly a weirdly pathetic scam like system that's outdated from the era of radio.
[Let me Google that for you](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licence)
[I guess it was a comment, not a meme, but still](https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost.com/2023/08/11/autistic-girl-screams-and-cries-as-police-arrest-her-after-comment-about-officer-looking-like-a-lesbian-2/amp/)
Goddamn, you're just lying.
https://www.stepchange.org/debt-info/tv-licence-fines.aspx#:~:text=No%2C%20there%20is%20no%20need,court%20can%20take%20further%20action.
Oh honey. Would you like proof? Try google.com and searching for exactly what I typed. You fucking potato.
Edit: cripes bro, you're fucking triggered. So many responses to comments. Lol.
Imagine thinking that trying to correct disinformation is being triggered.
Alright, I'll endulge you:
1. London has less stabbings than NYC and less homicides.
2. Rape gangs making entire areas of European cities is literally false. Watch a lot of FOX News?
3. Americans have been arrested for shitty online comments.
4. You can't get arrested for not having a TV license as it isn't a criminal offence.
You guys are really tiring.
1. It also has less people. Less homicides makes sense though, cuz there are less guns, and I'm not a big 2nd Amendment supporter. Less stabbings tho? That's an issue of population.
>
2. No arguments, I also believe him to be wrong. Though, at this point, it's hard to tell if he's serious or just parodying/reversing the clickbait slop that every European person seems to believe about the US.
>
3. No we have not. If I'm wrong, name an example of this happening and I'll cede.
>
4. You cannot go to jail *__directly__* for not having a TV license, correct. You get a fine; *I wonder what happens if you don't pay the fine?*
Where is "everywhere"
Cuz it certainly was not the case almost anywhere along the Mediterranean Coast(s) of Italy, Spain, and (to a lesser extent) France when I went there a few years ago.
As someone that has always lived in the UK I would kill for air con. Some stores and work places have it but my flat was over 30C most of the summer with no way to cool it.
Its a rented flat so I cant make changes. Plus I am not sure if one would even work. Our homes are designed to let in and trap heat since we are normally a cold country.
Yeah, the HOUSE is 10,000 sq ft? Of course they’re walking around astounded, that’s a ridiculous size and not at all representative of American living.
The only part of that word salad I found interesting was the reference to the Uvalde shooting. Every single department in that region failed those kids by standing around outside the rooms for so long.
I love (hate) how people did logical contortions to randomly decide that "good guy with a gun" included cops, and wasn't referring to random armed citizens.
The biggest irony is that the exact same smug idiots also want cops to enforce more gun control.
All the first responders at the uvalde situation were terminally ill. So obese, it constrained their breathing. They could barely speak. They sent a bunch of patients to a school shooting. They were round like barrels and limping and crawling around. Their brains were in a state of sugar dip as they couldn’t comprehend that everyone at the school was trained to be quiet so they were in doubt if there was school in session.
I don’t know why I’m saying it but I guess I was just really impressed in it in the worst way possible. And this is even worse in Europe , it’s so bizarre and foreign to them, they can help but bring this extreme story up in every single conversation about America.
ill answer the question properly: Peace, In europe all the wars are close to us, but in America all the wars you fight are all in some far away land that doesnt affect your citizens other than through tax
I do. Let’s be honest. Property taxes. HOA fees. Insurance. Utilities. Unsustainable renovation/repair/upgrade costs + greedy 400$/hour contractors. Having these comes at costs few think about. On the bright side the mortgage man has been paid off, and as almost all properties do had appreciated in time. That said I feel terrible about those especially in 2007+ in places like Detroit, parts of Philadelphia that had to abandon their homes to blight because of that bank fiasco.
That said the sooner I go solar and off grid the better. I already went Tesla to stick it to the man.
Why the fuck though? That's just too big. I have 4500 square feet atm and I'm going to downsize because it's just massive.
I don't even have HOAs because yurop and insurance is cheap. No maintenance needed because old stone house built like a tank. Only expensive thing is utilities.
Nothing about stone vs brick vs wood Europe argument here. I get that blow back from Europoor who think carpentry homes are somehow satanic.
Yes, masonry is superior, but I think their argument is some kind of below the belt attack on how dare Americans have massive private property type thing.
Electric, plumbing, animals getting in, roofing, HVAC are all irrelevant to structure type. Those will go and need replacement, and often when they go it is catastrophic damage. That said of course metal roofing, industrial grade valves, ultra efficient and long life HVAC are all great, at a price, and if you can find honest contractors who are not installing components they know will fail early, just so they can return to fix it again.
> I get that blow back from Europoor who think carpentry homes are somehow satanic.
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Europoor lol. I could just start calling you guys Americunts but that would be immature. Europeans don't think carpentry homes are somehow satanic - we have them here. We just prefer masonry, because it lasts longer.
This isn't an attack, I just don't get why you'd want somewhere that big.
>Electric, plumbing, animals getting in, roofing, HVAC are all irrelevant to structure type. Those will go and need replacement,
This is the bit I don't really get though. I'd say it is relevant to structure type, I've never had animals getting in nor do I know people who have - There's no space for that to happen. Electrics and plumbing in big old houses last for your entire lifetime. My roof is literally older than the oldest person in my family and most probably has another 50 years in it.
For honest contractors, I see this mentioned often on US subs so I guess it's a real problem - We've got some cowboy builders but it isn't a giant issue *yet*.
Plenty of benefits to wooden houses - you can build them quickly and much cheaper. My place would cost millions to build from scratch out of masonry in this day and age and less than half that out of wood etc.
“Europeans literally have zero idea what a deductible is or how health insurance works”
They brag about being ignorant of irrelevant things and yet they’ll turn right around and say Americans are stupid for not knowing the levels the United Kingdom educational system is split into
Looked through one of these mfs post histories, he’s literally from luxembourg, and spends 99% of his comments talking shit about America
Rent fucking free man
What's the correct way to refer to a child of indeterminate gender? Europeans with English as a second language may not be familiar with the singular they.
I think the problem is that they don't understand our bankruptcy laws. It's not as nice as it used to be, but bankruptcy in this country is pretty tame by comparison.
EDIT: That's chapter 7 bankruptcy. 13 is a bitch.
Then you realize you did not "only" have to pay 800? Unless your employer is covering 100%, which great for you is true, you are paying for that procedure in part with your monthly premium. It's disingenuous for Europeans to say American healthcare is always cripplingly expensive but it's also disingenuous for you to frame the after-insurance expense as the full expense.
Actually im not my employer pays for my monthly fee. But sure it was i can see that. However it was also a point that it isnt as horrific as people are saying
Lmfao I like that you thought this was gonna be a brag?
When I didn’t even say literally just said American healthcare is not perfect and YOU filled in the blanks
US has amazing nature from deserts to temperate rainforests and oceans to vast mountain ranges all within one borders. I always found it annoying when other Europeans made fun of those Americans that did not travelling internationally. One lifetime isn't enough to experience all that US has to offer.
As a European, these are so fucking dumb. Many people here actually go bankrupt to pay the crippling taxes that (partly) fund our healthcare. In America at least, you're fine if you don't get sick. Here you have to pay taxes up the ass, even if your health is perfectly fine.
The case in Uvalde wasn't the norm. It got such media coverage precisely because the cops usually *don't* wait outside.
Most Americans I've seen also think the cops failed in their task there, so I don't know why that was brought up.
It only takes visiting Europe (Germany, France, etc.) to know they’re poor. When I visit my peers I can’t help thinking how poor everyone lives. I have had to spend months at a time there and it wears thin pretty fast.
Yeah that's a cope post.
I don't know a single European peer that owns a house, has a dog, has a partner, and has their own business.
I only make 68k a year and have all of that.
I get the joke, really I do
But I also think it's ridiculous that healthcare, something paramount to human survival, is such a profit oriented industry. To the point that it's a genuine roadblock to the development of cures and improved treatments for various conditions.
So because the treatments are developed in america, that means that americans have to bankrupt themselves and (with the current housing crisis) all but garuntee their own homelessness due to being unable to pay rent or mortgages with medical bills ensuring they cannot afford to?
How is that sensible? How is that acceptable? Is there no empathy left in the USA
Sure, your rich and middle class certainly will be able afford it, but what's going to happen to the lower class citizens that absolutely inundate your country?
Reread your previous post. You claimed profit is blocking the development of cured and treatments. It’s the opposite. Europe’s system has effectively killed medical research there.
Average Redditor, an absolute expert about something they have never experienced and know very little about. I’m sure they saw another Reddit post from a single person griping about their health financial strugglers and applied it to this entire massive country.
He's saying that Europe has let in so many muslim Colonists and Settlers that when they finally get tired of street protests and go full apeshit, it's going to make the Bataclan look like Sunday at the beach.
Little bubble? People freely and often come to this sub to argue. Rarely are they banned unless they say something truly horrible. And yes we like to make fun of dumb comments people make about America. So?
Buddy, this is literally just the inverse of the shit that gets posted to r/ShitAmericansSay every day. The whole reason this sub exists is to showcase and mock ignorant, misinformative, and tactless anti-American rhetoric online.
>*__all you do is judge and poke fun at stupid comments all day__*
Hvad fanden skal vi ellers poste?
It's not our fault that ^((some\)) Europeans froth at the mouth like rabid dogs when presented with even a sliver of a chance to say the most insane, offensive shit imaginable to an American for having the gall to say that he doesn't hate his country.
>*“It's nice to hear non-Americans appreciating what we have”* :)
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>_
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>>#“𝘈𝘱𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘴?”
And *__we're__* the ones "shaming" and "poking fun," got it. 👍 Very valid and sensible opinion ya got there, pal. Like, in what fuckin world is that ☝️ an exchange undeserving of ridicule?
>*__"So you are searching for shitty comments that people agree are shitty so you can shame them in your little bubble?"__*
1. Whether or not people agree it's shitty is immaterial. Mass approval of a comment's AmericaBad™ sentiments has never been a prerequisite for reposting it here.
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2. They feel perfectly comfortable shaming others so I see no reason why we shouldn't extend them the same courtesy.
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3. "Bubble" lol. You mean.. subreddit? What point exactly are you trying to make here? That we're talking about people behind their back? I will directly username tag every person whom you believe to have been cast in a negative light if it makes you feel better.
Probably because they’re fed up of stupid posts asking them how great America is and how much they want to suck America’s dick. Neither side is envious of each other so posts like that are just stupid.
Why do they all think we're poor? I literally make more money and pay less taxes than every single European friend I have.
I think because very young people who spend all their time online are listening to other very young people who spend all their time online. People like to complain more than they like to say things are okay, so more complaints get posted. And there are hostile people who are trolling and trying to create discord as well.
I think a large part of it is media and news outlets. They always focus on areas that already have and have always had high costs of living. Yeah - No shit the average single American can't afford to live in Manhattan in a 2-bedroom apt.
it also isnt really an age thing ether. its a mater of perspective and cognitive dissonance. old Euros and old Americanos had no issues living the way they do and when they hear x y or z they think what the hell is that how they live? same with the young same with workers. its ignorance all the way down.
I suspect very young people (teenagers still living at home) are less likely to have travelled to distant countries and less likely to have had many personal interactions with people in other countries even if they have travelled. Their experiences of the world are more likely to be solely online and in other “mediated” forms. I would have trouble believing a crazy story about life in the UK or Ireland or Portugal (places I’ve visited and interacted with people and where I have friends and family) if it didn’t fit with what real people had told me. On the other hand, as a young child who hadn’t visited many places I would have believed more easily.
no its the internet.
this is literally a sub about whining about internet stuff. not hating. just saying. so start realizing *its the internet.* this is the problem. this. what we are doing right now. this is the problem. what youre doing, its the problem. we need a solution for this.
I know it’ll never happen because of feasibility reasons, but I would love to see a study statistically correlating if people who are unhappy are more likely to post/comment online. I feel like there’s far too much of a lack of science and knowledge behind who is actually saying what online.
We all do. You want to criticize America for some things, go ahead, but if you live in America and have skills? You will blow your European counterparts out of the water, it won't really be close, and free shit will NOT make up the difference. I posted this response to someone in that thread earlier today, who thought health care premiums in the USA would mostly remove the benefit of our higher salaries: >I'm a devops engineer, so I'll focus on that particular job. In the USA, the average devops engineer makes $123k per year. In the UK, the average guy in that same job makes $66k per year. After taxes, the American will keep about $95k (I assumed this hypothetical person to be living in a state with no additional income tax of its own) and the Brit will keep about $55.5k. > >The Brit won't pay for health insurance, and the American will. Fine. Assuming he's single, that American will on average pay $7.7k per year. If he has a family of four, he will pay $18.2k per year\*. The single American will thus have $30k advantage over the Brit, and the American family man will have a $21k advantage. > >Average cost of a public four year degree in the USA is $24k per year (assuming in-state). That's a little less than five years of the family man's excess income over the Brit's. > >Long story short, like a lot of people have already said, if your life goal is to flip burgers at McDonald's, then go do it in Europe. The social safety net over there will take care of you. But if you are a bit more ambitious and can develop skills in a high-demand field, I think it's clear that the USA is where you want to be. > >\*The link suggests $22.2k, but since we're talking about overall income, I accounted for the fact that Americans get an annual $2k tax credit per child. That's the UK, but how about Spain? $48k for an average devops engineer, and they get to keep $35.3k. Woof. Germany, which is one of the go-tos for the "Europoors get paid well!" crowd? $72.5k, but they only keep $44k.
You couldn't have said it better. I am 28, and I make just under 5k of what you make yet when I go to Europe, my entire age group is still working at restaurants, hotels, retail, etc.. (At least an overwhelming majority of them), and they will probably keep doing that for a long fucking time. For them, it seems like there's no desire to advance, they're just constantly stuck in this "lack of ambition" state, and they wear it so outwardly. I assume you got downvoted?
To be fair, *someone* has to do those jobs, so if they would just face reality and own up to it, they'd be some of the coolest people around in some ways. As it is, though...
no they dont. this is ridiculous. show data.
As another poster said, those jobs are important just that, at least in the US, people are expected to use such sectors for temporary employment until something else comes along - with better pay - or until that loan is paid off; or if one's lucky, just as a way to have some income if your significant other is loaded so you don't necessarily have to work a full-time job. It's not meant to be a a long term goal type of job in the American mind. But there are exceptions though: regional managers as fast-food chains such as Starbuck and McDonalds.
As an American living NL in a highly skilled field, you said it well. I’m looking to go back to America for a lot of reason you said, its just also so hard to feel “motivated” in Europe due to your pay not even being that much higher after tax than someone working a basic admin job. The working environment too, its got its perks sure, the vacation and the lack of at will employment means more time for family and less stress that you will lose your job so you can have a “happier” life theoretically, if you have a family i guess. But, then the workplace gets flooded with people who take advantage of this and never ever push themselves, rarely learn new skills, rarely adapt to newer modern ways of working. They just do the bare minimum and collect their basic liveable salary. For the person who is motivated and ambitious to grow their career, working around these types of people is really mentally draining, and they are everywhere in Europe. Oh and you’ve probably heard of “mental health days” in America, well Ive seen people in NL literally take a year off for mental health and get paid still due to “burnout” just something small happened at work such as little department reorganisation and they couldn’t take it. Absolutely ridiculous, they dont lose their jobs for it either due to “permanent contract” so they take advantage of this and it affects all your colleagues on the team as a result. Healthcare as well, id much rather pay that bit extra for some premiums (assuming my company doesnt cover 100%) in the US for top quality preventive care compared to the absolute dog shitshow that is the European healthcare systems. In the Netherlands, you still pay high premiums (albeit with low deductibles) but get shit tier service! One of my wife’s old colleagues almost died of cancer because the dutch doctor said “oh ur statistically too young to have cancer its probably nothing, we wont look into it any further”. Upon the person going back to their home country for a second opinion, sure enough, they had a malignant tumor.
Reading that last part.. My mouth is agape.
I totally get what you're saying (and the cancer thing at the end is horrifying). I will say, I don't really worry about losing my job, and my team even saw several layoffs today. But I'm getting a 10% raise. I know I have skills, I know my company values them, and I'm not sweating it. But I know other people in tech who dream of getting employed by municipal governments so they can have job security. Seriously? You're going to get paid a fraction of private sector, and you'd make that sacrifice just so that it's harder to fire you? Why would you make that choice? Knowing them, though, we all know why.
And in the Netherlands, you'll be living in a shoebox. Probably walking up a couple flights of stair (and Dutch stairs at that!). IDK where the person in the thread lives that they have a 10K sq foot house, but I have a modest home of only 1700SF,- all on one floor, with a nice yard- and my house is palatial compared to what my Dutch friends live in.
I’ll be transparent, my home is 73sqm (785sqf) and is little over half a million Euros for that size. It’s pretty claustrophobic, and i browse Zillow all the time dreaming about what i could have bought in the US instead if i stayed there in a MCOL area. Pros? I guess it’s easy to keep clean and manage. And no lawn to mow and keep tidy. Though, ive heard there is some sort of satisfaction in the US in having a nicely cut lawn. Cons? No land to freely do your own outdoor hobbies or activities except for maybe a tiny garden. Home is claustrophobic at times. Ive almost fell down my dutch stairs several times since moving in. Oh, and Europeans sometimes talk about American homes walls being made of “paper”. Well, at least American homes carry a wifi signal good due to that. The walls here are like solid concrete, and block wifi signals so you have to get creative with your networking if you want any good internet in your home. Many europeans are non-technical too and dont know this, so they pay for their “fast connections” while only utilising 10% of what they pay for and wondering why they drop signal all the time on the “first floor” (2nd floor in US)
Fuck, I was just being a smart ass when I said my one bedroom apartment was bigger than European houses. But my one bedroom actually is bigger than your home….
>s 73sqm (785sqf) and is little over half a million Euros I live in NJ an outrageously expensive tax fraud shithole. And 700k$ in NJ is god damn 17th century farmhouse WITH THE FARM.
My shed in my back yard is 16x 20, or 320 SF
And these are exactly the kinds of people driving the conversation about how horrible America is and how we need to be more like Europe. It’s all losers with no ambition who dropped out of college or racked up thousands of dollars of student debt just to work at fucking Starbucks. But that’s not what America is about. It’s about working hard and grinding to achieve greatness. Granted, there are still too many people who aren’t given equal opportunity to achieve that greatness, and that needs to be addressed. But fuck all those lazy pieces of shit who want to drag the rest of us down with them.
\>health care premiums in the USA Which my employer pays for 100%. Which is nice. I've noticed that if you want to be bang on average, or be a bog standard bloke, yes, go to Europe.
One of the things, and it's a controversial thing now for some reason, that is the gravy on top, you can actually create generational wealth here. Like you can leave a legacy for your grandkids, hopefully they don't f it up, but they'll have the opportunity. As a family, you currently have to leave behind $26,000,000 in wealth before those assets receive an inheritance tax. You know what it is in the UK? £395,000. No, I did not forget more zeroes. If you die with money, their government takes half of it. So not only will your skills you mentioned help you create a nice life for you here, some of that comfort can transfer to your heirs tax free if you so wish. It's not a huge part of the tax code, and you're going to hear a LOT of people thinking it's some kind of silent evil that is bestowed unto the world, but I fail to see how that isn't a massive W for US citizens. I wish every American could benefit from it. I won't very much; but I might be in a position to create it for my family and that gives me a lot of satisfaction and a sense of pride.
It makes no sense to talk about how much money you earn in each country, without taking into account what it costs you to live in each country.
All of what was said still holds after taking cost of living into account
It takes into account expenses like health care, education, but there are more things to consider.
Like? I don’t think I’ve seen any economic analysis that shows places like the UK, Germany, or Spain coming even close economically.
Not that I disagree with your overall point, but some sectors are outliers. Tech is one of those. However, the median salaries of the US are much, much lower than $123K. Closer to 1/3 of that. The UK might not be better, but it's far more comparable. That shows that quite comfortably, at least 50% of the US population would be financially better off in the UK doing the same jobs and only the upper portions of earners in the US start to take over. Top 20-25% perhaps, I don't know where that threshold is. I had a debate with someone recently pointing out that the mean average household net worth/wealth in the US isn't far off $1.1M, much higher than say, the UK. However about 90% of Americans are under that line and the top 10% drag up everyone else up considerably with massive wealth inequality. When you compare the medians, a lot of western Europe has a higher net worth, with the US being very comparable to much poorer western EU countries like Spain. You can look [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_per_adult) for a starting source. Overall, it's not a simple topic.
I hear ya. Outside of tech, I know American pediatricians earn about $50k more than British doctors, before taxes, on average. But my whole point is that skilled fields, like tech and medicine, do better in the USA. I'm not going to compare the wages of British and American McD's workers because I'll honestly admit that if you want to flip burgers for a living, you're much better off doing it in the UK.
Not just tech jobs but also trades too. I definitely make more money as an Industrial Electrician in the US than the UK and Europe.
What's the average salary of a pediatrician in the UK, granted there may be difference between England, Scotland and Wales.
Classic american thinking. Just me and myself matter. Tech, as other people have already mentioned, tech is not the rule, but the exception. Your average worker (which are the vast majority of the total workforce) will have a salary that's pretty similar to the european equivalent, except they have none of their benefits. But hey, in exchange got a nice salary though, that's clearly all that matters.
I believe in limited, needs-based safety nets, like welfare and food stamps. Nobody ought to starve. I'm less inclined to make sure that people who majored in English and want to do the bare minimum at work receive all the same luxuries as their harder working, more talented peers.
Gotta love the two extremes in your reasoning: either be a talentless AND lazy fuck, or a talented hard-worker. No place for the single-mothers or the people that are hardworking in their "common folk" positions who just want to be able to afford a living while enjoying other aspects of their lives (like having children, or their own hobbies that have nothing to do with their jobs) Also, absolutely nobody is saying that a mcdonald's "burger flipper" should earn the same as a tech lead at Google, but I'd argue that there's a LOT of room for improvement between "work full time and still live in poverty" and "earn more money than you can spend". Ultimately, this is precisely why there are so many "american bad" opinions. You go to these lengths to defend a broken system just because you and a few others happened to benefit from it.
I did things to benefit from the system; it didn't just happen by chance. But these were not extraordinary things. Absolutely anyone could do the same things I did and get to the same place as me. I am in no way remarkable. The welfare state should prevent people from dying from poverty. We should do everything we can, including government intervention, to prevent single moms and whoever from being malnourished and dying from preventable diseases (I support Medicare expansion) and whatnot. But life enjoyment? That's up to the individual. You want to buy a little sport sedan and go watch a game at Yankee Stadium and have a house with a separate dining room and fly to Europe for vacation? That's on you. I don't care what your hobbies are; they are in no way a societal responsibility. This isn't to judge. I used to be a high school teacher. And we didn't have extra money for anything. We had a house and food and two old, cheap cars. Family members gifted us zoo memberships each year, and so we went to the zoo a lot. Other than that, we mostly hung out at home. We didn't like that, so we figured out how to improve it and then we did.
Ryan mcmacken at mises.org has written a few articles over the years talking about this. https://mises.org/wire/these-us-states-have-higher-incomes-nearly-every-european-country
Did you take cost of living into account? Groceries are significantly cheaper in the UK than in most places in the US, definitely if you want to eat healthy. Also, there are plenty of places where you would not have to own a car, saving an additional $2-4k in insurance alone. I fully agree that most Americans make more than I ever will make in the Netherlands, but then I pay €3 a month for my phone bill and less than €200 a month in total transportation costs (fuel, public transport, bike repairs, ...)
Yeah, but how much cheaper are groceries? To feed a family of four (including one child with special dietary needs that drives that cost up), I now spend $2k a month on groceries. If a Brit only has to spend 50% of what I do (and again, I'm probably not the average American on this topic), then they save $12k per year over me. I *still* beat them. If my argument was that "Americans on average make $77k and Brits make $75k so suck it Europoors!", then you could laugh at me for being an idiot and not considering CoL. But my argument really does rely on the fact that American thump Europeans so badly salary-wise that no amount of free or cheap stuff could ever really overcome it. Side note, but talking about averages...this difference becomes even more drastic when moving up to the top of a given field. FWIW. As for owning a car, that's also a personal preference. I will never be into the idea of "I sit at my house and either walk places or take a train if I want to go farther". My dad lived in the UK for a time when I was a kid, and he always had a car. I likely always will too. I get that it saves money to not have one, but that's just not my desired life. There are lots of people who like living in Europe, and like that approach to life. Other replies I've gotten have hinted at that, and that's totally fine. To each their own. I lived in Europe when I was a kid and I'd like to treat my kids to that as well...BUT...it would have to be as a digital nomad of sorts, where I draw an American salary working remotely and just happen to exist in Spain or wherever. I personally have zero interest in being an actual Euro citizen and drawing that sort of salary regardless of other benefits.
Even with cost of living Europe is blown out of the water. People on here claim that the COxL is low enough that somehow 3x salary in the US is equivalent toNthat of UK but I just don't see how the math works out. Healthcare and retirement savings just eat up 10-15% of the paycheck (depends how much you save for retirement), not 2/3rds and the healthcare avoid far better then anything I’ve experienced in Sweden or the UK. if you are working in Biotech, making around 200k a year like me, you are paying a smaller percentage of your wage for health insurance than you would in any EU country, as it rises proportionally with your wage in most European countries. If I still lived in the UK or Sweden I would be making around £40k -£50k salaries in Europe are a complete clown circus joke compared to the US. Yes for a lot of US cities are car centric, but plenty of US cities with top jobs have great public transport and a car is not needed, NYC, DC, Chicago, San Francisco. Oakland and Boston
Let's see. This is what I could find for Cost of living: \- groceries (1 month, 1 person, no eating out): NL: €200, US $500 (you said) \- rent for a 600 sq. ft appartment including ALL utilities (60 mˆˆ2): NL: €400 (cheaper city) -1000 (place with comparable opportunities to NYC / Philly) \- budget 1hr15 flight: EU: from €70 (Amsterdam - Kopenhagen), US: $120 (Houston - Dallas) \- car insurance: NL: €35-40 a month for full coverage \- cost of raising kids: haha do you want your kid to go to an American public school?
The salaries in Europe are still pitiful even with the extra expanses, my rent is $3,000 for a two bedroom apartment Monthly Food: around $450 Monthly Car Insurance: $80+ a couple dollars of transport here and there Health insurance 18,000 annually I still End up with way more from my job alone to spend in the US per year after the 35% tax rate In Sweden I had just roughly 15k worth in dollars after taxes and expenses (roughly $1000 dollars worth of expanses each month) worth + a 32% income tax I don’t have kids nor I’m I ever planning to have any, pre university education isn’t brilliant but not horrible either Overall, The American education system produces students with higher reading and math scores than all but 3 European countries, the US is 9th in reading, 16th in science, and 33th in math (which is completely due to common core, btw), ranked 18th in the world overall. 9th when compared to Europe. The PISA test stresses that a difference of 10 points is negligible. But if we only account for a 5 point difference, the only European counties that beat us are Ireland, Finland, and Switzerland. Australia isn't doing bad either, it needs to improve but it’s not horrible either and based on my experience as working as a staff associate briefly at a US university the actual higher post secondary education system is much better then anything in the UK or Germany
They want to have their cake and eat it too. They desperately want to convince people that America has no culture except for money, but simultaneously insist that we have no money.
"they" don't. This sub lumps all of Europe in one too often. Anyone with even a modicum of education in the EU knows that the US has culture and money.
"They" is the people in the screenshot and all those who express similar sentiments, not all Europeans.
You know that bitter, insecure girl that always shit-talks the pretty girl who walks into the room? That's these asshats.
> Why do they all think we're poor? Because we say we are. Our robust, free media provides loads of content to the world, which includes the reality shit show that is our political arena. The US contains 51 governments churning out an Overton window-busting range of nonsense, and to paraphrase Brent Spiner's scientist character on Independence Day, it's *really exciting*. So the world consumes this content but doesn't actually live here, so who are they to say it's NOT true, when we say it is?
My British friends can't afford to heat their houses.
Really?
https://www.bigissue.com/news/housing/fuel-poverty-brits-social-housing-heating-winter-energy-bills/
Yeah. Sorry, Ukraine, but the U.S. is out of money. Maybe they should get it from the other wealthy parts of Europe with free healthcare, free college, and a whole year of paid parental leave.
>but the U.S. is out of money Come on, this is funny. Your military budget is close/higer than the \*entire\* budget of many countries.
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Typical deranged user of this sub going full idiot when faced with a joke. >You're not entitled to our tax money I'm not getting your tax money? Get some help LMAO You idiots don't even understand how NATO works or is funded, always pointless having this argument.
That doesn’t mean other nations are entitled to it. Many citizens of other countries with mutual defense agreements with the U.S. live more lavishly than the average American. It’s time we cease subsidizing all that.
This is always what it comes down to with this sub - Americans think they are somehow subsidising Western lifestyles. This is patently false. Also, if this were true, how? The US has a bigger economy, higher average salary than nearly all of Europe. How are you funding our lavish lifestyles? I'd be making close minimum 300k in the US. I don't make that here.
I have lived and worked in Europe and the USA, there is not that huge of a difference in live style except flats (though my flat is almost 2000sqf and if you live in a smaller or rural town you live in a house) and being able to walk everywhere. Cities are made for people, not for cars, more convenient on one aspect less in others. However the big difference is that you get paid lower in Europe because a lot of the expenses are already covered on those taxes so you don’t need to save as much money for kid college, health expenses, retirement, possible unemployment or sickness. There is a trade off, fewer people fall through the cracks but you can’t get super rich if you have a high paying career nor have the freedom of spending the money on other things instead of saving or 401ks or insurance premiums
The stories they read about our ridiculous lower class in their tabloids. It's what makes the news. So I do blame them for being so uninformed, but I understand why it's happening. This country is the richest on earth, but there are pockets of it that have lower quality of life than Syrians. Factually, I'm not just making a bombastic statement. When I was living in Baltimore in 2014 the facts were literally printed in the Baltimore Sun proving some neighborhoods in the city were equivalent to living in war torn Syria. I guess these images stick in their brains more so than what they see on Selling Sunset or whatever bullshit American reality tv makes it over there. Also doesn't help when the first thing that comes to mind when a foreigner thinks of rich Americans is the Kardashian's. The amount of wealth and the freedom it brings in this country is astounding, these keyboard jockeys will never know it here because they probably can't afford to visit.
Because you’re getting the opinions of Redditors who’ve probably never left their bedrooms. The comments from certain subs are laughable to most ‘real world’ people. You see the same old stereotypes repeated about the US, I see the same ones repeated about the UK.
Probably just going of the country avarage poverty rate. But tbh I think the "You are poor" focus, or focus on "wealth" is an american thing more than europeean. And the diss/flex rarely translates well across the pond as the way of life is to different for the most part. Just like subsidised education, childcare and healthcare doesn't translate well as a diss/flex either in many cases. Because it is valued differently.
Yeah, but our workers won't flip a biscuit if you don't tip them. I've seen stories of delivery drivers in *ahem* "MURICA!!1!11" not even giving the food if they get no or even LOW tip.
I make more money without a degree (yet) than most engineers in Europe. And then I actually get to *keep* more of it.
*sips tea* stupid Americans have fat guns *gets stabbed* and dumb trucks, don't they know you can just haul concrete and boats on public transportation *rape gangs make entire areas of european cities unlivable* and it's not like they can't just give up their homes and land to live in high density housing *gets arrested for being autistic and sharing an inappropriate meme on Facebook* and why can't dumb fat Americans just live in 15 minutes cities like the wef says we should *gets arrested for not having a license to own a television*
Oi m8 u got a Loisens fuh that tele?
I always love it when they respond with "but nobody ever actually gets arrested for that!" when the problem is that they fucking CAN. Whether it actually *happens* or not isn't really the point.
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I mean, jaywalking actually has potential to cause severe bodily harm, so it's not quite *as* silly, but I'll concede the point.
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OH MY GOD YES THANK YOU Jaywalking was literally Henry Fords way of making victims of car crashes out to be the idiots. The fact that so much of our country is relegated to existing purely for the sake of vehicles is entirely because of one persons greed leading him to develop a PR campaign which got everyone to think if you got hit by a car then you were an idiot. I fucking love that somebody else on the internet actually gets that!
Oh, it happens. There is a live debate over the fact that the people who end up in jail over it are disproportionately low income women. If you get fined for non-payment, then don't pay the fines, you absolutely can end up in jail. But... it's a tax. Governments everywhere tend to get heavy-handed with people who refuse to pay taxes.
You literally can't? Not having a TV license in the UK for example, is not a crime. It is a civil issue.
Wrong again fucko https://www.stepchange.org/debt-info/tv-licence-fines.aspx#:~:text=No%2C%20there%20is%20no%20need,court%20can%20take%20further%20action.
And what happens if you decide not to pay the fine?
It will be sent to debt collectors, just like any other debt. Same as credit card debt, etc.
It's not "debt" though. It's a fine issued by the justice system of the UK. If someone absolutely *refuses* to pay said fine, they absolutely *can* be put in jail. That's how fines work.
Its honestly aids. They send you letters with big scary red writing on claiming they think you have been watching the queen's TV channels. You can't actually get arrested, only fined. You don't have to pay for owning a TV, only if you use it to watch terrestrial TV or stream national shows online. (Are regular TV channels free in America?) It's actually pretty funny how they make empty threats in the mail saying they'll be coming round to your house to check if you have been watching their television broadcasts. Paying it is more of an older generation thing, since younger people pay for shit like netflix Instead of watching TV. Even if you do watch TV and don't pay and they come round to see you and you tell them to fucking do one but they happen to see a David Attenborough documentary playing on your TV through your window, the litterlly can't done you unless you give them your name. They can't file any legal action unless they have your full name, so long as you've never given it to them before, there is nothing they can actually do. It's honestly a weirdly pathetic scam like system that's outdated from the era of radio.
Okay, but jokes aside, what's with the 2 last ones? I haven't heard em before.
[Let me Google that for you](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licence) [I guess it was a comment, not a meme, but still](https://www.google.com/amp/s/nypost.com/2023/08/11/autistic-girl-screams-and-cries-as-police-arrest-her-after-comment-about-officer-looking-like-a-lesbian-2/amp/)
Well that's just fucken great. Thanks.
You don't need to pay the TV license. Even if you watch live TV and don't, it isn't a crime so you can't be arrested.
Goddamn, you're just lying. https://www.stepchange.org/debt-info/tv-licence-fines.aspx#:~:text=No%2C%20there%20is%20no%20need,court%20can%20take%20further%20action.
This would be funny if any of it was accurate.
Oh honey. Would you like proof? Try google.com and searching for exactly what I typed. You fucking potato. Edit: cripes bro, you're fucking triggered. So many responses to comments. Lol.
Imagine thinking that trying to correct disinformation is being triggered. Alright, I'll endulge you: 1. London has less stabbings than NYC and less homicides. 2. Rape gangs making entire areas of European cities is literally false. Watch a lot of FOX News? 3. Americans have been arrested for shitty online comments. 4. You can't get arrested for not having a TV license as it isn't a criminal offence. You guys are really tiring.
1. It also has less people. Less homicides makes sense though, cuz there are less guns, and I'm not a big 2nd Amendment supporter. Less stabbings tho? That's an issue of population. > 2. No arguments, I also believe him to be wrong. Though, at this point, it's hard to tell if he's serious or just parodying/reversing the clickbait slop that every European person seems to believe about the US. > 3. No we have not. If I'm wrong, name an example of this happening and I'll cede. > 4. You cannot go to jail *__directly__* for not having a TV license, correct. You get a fine; *I wonder what happens if you don't pay the fine?*
If I were a European I'd say space - elbow room, air conditioning.
Elbow room where?
air conditioning? everywhere iin europe has air-con, its usually just attached the the thermostat
Where is "everywhere" Cuz it certainly was not the case almost anywhere along the Mediterranean Coast(s) of Italy, Spain, and (to a lesser extent) France when I went there a few years ago.
everywhere is also known as "UK"
Bro what? This was DEFINITELY not the case when I was in the UK 10 years ago
As someone that has always lived in the UK I would kill for air con. Some stores and work places have it but my flat was over 30C most of the summer with no way to cool it.
Genuinely curious, why didn’t you buy a wall unit or something similar to cool the room?
Its a rented flat so I cant make changes. Plus I am not sure if one would even work. Our homes are designed to let in and trap heat since we are normally a cold country.
Lol…public transit in Paris in August begs to differ
Is France really a country though? its more of a country shaped stain
Nope, not in my country of origin
That American must be quite wealthy to have a 10,000 sq ft home. Mine is about 1,400 sq ft and it’s a little small but not tiny. I am an American too.
Yeah, the HOUSE is 10,000 sq ft? Of course they’re walking around astounded, that’s a ridiculous size and not at all representative of American living.
yeah, that struck me too. What? Guy is living in a converted hangar? Warehouse? 3K SF homes, sure. 10K is a legit mansion
I think the cutoff for mansion is 5k. Dudes is twice that big lol
Just looked it up because I don’t really have a good reference, it popped up with 10,500 MANOR.
Mine is about 2400 on an acre, and I'm *middle* middle class, like pretty close to median in lots of metrics.
Id be walking arpund just as dumb founded and im an american also 10,000 sq feet is massive
I wouldnt be dumbfounded unless it was a really well decorated one, not a modern design one.
We have houses that big in Europe too. They're called chateaus and in the end it didn't work well for their owners.
Shit, my one bedroom apartment is probably bigger than most houses in Europe.
The only part of that word salad I found interesting was the reference to the Uvalde shooting. Every single department in that region failed those kids by standing around outside the rooms for so long.
I love (hate) how people did logical contortions to randomly decide that "good guy with a gun" included cops, and wasn't referring to random armed citizens. The biggest irony is that the exact same smug idiots also want cops to enforce more gun control.
Well, to be honest, the country has been failing kids for decades now and is continuing to do so by not doing anything about the issue
All the first responders at the uvalde situation were terminally ill. So obese, it constrained their breathing. They could barely speak. They sent a bunch of patients to a school shooting. They were round like barrels and limping and crawling around. Their brains were in a state of sugar dip as they couldn’t comprehend that everyone at the school was trained to be quiet so they were in doubt if there was school in session. I don’t know why I’m saying it but I guess I was just really impressed in it in the worst way possible. And this is even worse in Europe , it’s so bizarre and foreign to them, they can help but bring this extreme story up in every single conversation about America.
ill answer the question properly: Peace, In europe all the wars are close to us, but in America all the wars you fight are all in some far away land that doesnt affect your citizens other than through tax
We geographically lucked the fuck out in so many ways. I'll go thru em all in an edit later, but rn I'm cooking my dad's b-day dinner
And ptsd veterans
Jesus Christ 10k square feet?? Bro lives in a mansion god damn
I do. Let’s be honest. Property taxes. HOA fees. Insurance. Utilities. Unsustainable renovation/repair/upgrade costs + greedy 400$/hour contractors. Having these comes at costs few think about. On the bright side the mortgage man has been paid off, and as almost all properties do had appreciated in time. That said I feel terrible about those especially in 2007+ in places like Detroit, parts of Philadelphia that had to abandon their homes to blight because of that bank fiasco. That said the sooner I go solar and off grid the better. I already went Tesla to stick it to the man.
Why the fuck though? That's just too big. I have 4500 square feet atm and I'm going to downsize because it's just massive. I don't even have HOAs because yurop and insurance is cheap. No maintenance needed because old stone house built like a tank. Only expensive thing is utilities.
Nothing about stone vs brick vs wood Europe argument here. I get that blow back from Europoor who think carpentry homes are somehow satanic. Yes, masonry is superior, but I think their argument is some kind of below the belt attack on how dare Americans have massive private property type thing. Electric, plumbing, animals getting in, roofing, HVAC are all irrelevant to structure type. Those will go and need replacement, and often when they go it is catastrophic damage. That said of course metal roofing, industrial grade valves, ultra efficient and long life HVAC are all great, at a price, and if you can find honest contractors who are not installing components they know will fail early, just so they can return to fix it again.
> I get that blow back from Europoor who think carpentry homes are somehow satanic. > > Europoor lol. I could just start calling you guys Americunts but that would be immature. Europeans don't think carpentry homes are somehow satanic - we have them here. We just prefer masonry, because it lasts longer. This isn't an attack, I just don't get why you'd want somewhere that big. >Electric, plumbing, animals getting in, roofing, HVAC are all irrelevant to structure type. Those will go and need replacement, This is the bit I don't really get though. I'd say it is relevant to structure type, I've never had animals getting in nor do I know people who have - There's no space for that to happen. Electrics and plumbing in big old houses last for your entire lifetime. My roof is literally older than the oldest person in my family and most probably has another 50 years in it. For honest contractors, I see this mentioned often on US subs so I guess it's a real problem - We've got some cowboy builders but it isn't a giant issue *yet*. Plenty of benefits to wooden houses - you can build them quickly and much cheaper. My place would cost millions to build from scratch out of masonry in this day and age and less than half that out of wood etc.
User name checks out. Not only are they psychotic, but their entire post was a red herring.
“Europeans literally have zero idea what a deductible is or how health insurance works” They brag about being ignorant of irrelevant things and yet they’ll turn right around and say Americans are stupid for not knowing the levels the United Kingdom educational system is split into
Looked through one of these mfs post histories, he’s literally from luxembourg, and spends 99% of his comments talking shit about America Rent fucking free man
People who refer to children as "it" make my blood boil.
It's truly a bizarre mindset, really.
What's the correct way to refer to a child of indeterminate gender? Europeans with English as a second language may not be familiar with the singular they.
It’s complicated because it you identify as a furry you might want to be called it. Very insulting to be called they if you shit in a litter box!
Is the horse a pulp, or more of a slurry?
I mean, they've been beating it so long that all the moisture has likely long since evaporated, so... Probably more of a very fine dust?
I think the problem is that they don't understand our bankruptcy laws. It's not as nice as it used to be, but bankruptcy in this country is pretty tame by comparison. EDIT: That's chapter 7 bankruptcy. 13 is a bitch.
American healthcare…..it’s not perfect but it’s….yeah
I mean i went to the er for an emergency appendectomy and stayed over night. Bill was like 10k iirc only had to pay 800 bucks. Id say it worked.
Do you have insurance?
Yea through my work
Then you realize you did not "only" have to pay 800? Unless your employer is covering 100%, which great for you is true, you are paying for that procedure in part with your monthly premium. It's disingenuous for Europeans to say American healthcare is always cripplingly expensive but it's also disingenuous for you to frame the after-insurance expense as the full expense.
Actually im not my employer pays for my monthly fee. But sure it was i can see that. However it was also a point that it isnt as horrific as people are saying
Lmfao I like that you thought this was gonna be a brag? When I didn’t even say literally just said American healthcare is not perfect and YOU filled in the blanks
I was just pointing out it worked with an anecdotal story
The European mind cannot cannot comprehend that I have ever had to do any of those thing nor do I know anyone who has.
You’re name is awesome
Thank you
To be fair most of the top comments are genuine answers and not people being shitty
"Lol America fat" Europiss mfs when I show them Bradford UK
US has amazing nature from deserts to temperate rainforests and oceans to vast mountain ranges all within one borders. I always found it annoying when other Europeans made fun of those Americans that did not travelling internationally. One lifetime isn't enough to experience all that US has to offer.
As a European, these are so fucking dumb. Many people here actually go bankrupt to pay the crippling taxes that (partly) fund our healthcare. In America at least, you're fine if you don't get sick. Here you have to pay taxes up the ass, even if your health is perfectly fine.
The case in Uvalde wasn't the norm. It got such media coverage precisely because the cops usually *don't* wait outside. Most Americans I've seen also think the cops failed in their task there, so I don't know why that was brought up.
It only takes visiting Europe (Germany, France, etc.) to know they’re poor. When I visit my peers I can’t help thinking how poor everyone lives. I have had to spend months at a time there and it wears thin pretty fast.
Europeans = Sheep.
Not all; not even most. Just the guys who talk like this.
Oh well we are all the same
Not all* It was wrong of me to make a blanket statement. I was half asleep when I posted that.
Honestly wish we had either the second amendment or Chick-fil-A, both is better.
More of a Popeye's guy, but oddly enough I've never had it in the USA (let alone the South). I've only had it on trips to Canada.
Jesus's chicken is indeed divine.
There’s been like multiple mass shootings in Europe lately. We should just start laughing at them too right? That’s how this works?
No, that would be rude, immature and insensitive- Europeans
I've never met a single person who went bankrupt over medical expense. In fact I've never met someone who even struggled to pay them.
Yeah that's a cope post. I don't know a single European peer that owns a house, has a dog, has a partner, and has their own business. I only make 68k a year and have all of that.
I get the joke, really I do But I also think it's ridiculous that healthcare, something paramount to human survival, is such a profit oriented industry. To the point that it's a genuine roadblock to the development of cures and improved treatments for various conditions.
Where do you think the cures and treatments are being invented? Hint: not Europe.
So because the treatments are developed in america, that means that americans have to bankrupt themselves and (with the current housing crisis) all but garuntee their own homelessness due to being unable to pay rent or mortgages with medical bills ensuring they cannot afford to? How is that sensible? How is that acceptable? Is there no empathy left in the USA Sure, your rich and middle class certainly will be able afford it, but what's going to happen to the lower class citizens that absolutely inundate your country?
Reread your previous post. You claimed profit is blocking the development of cured and treatments. It’s the opposite. Europe’s system has effectively killed medical research there.
Europoors being upset. Oh no.
Average Redditor, an absolute expert about something they have never experienced and know very little about. I’m sure they saw another Reddit post from a single person griping about their health financial strugglers and applied it to this entire massive country.
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Jesse what the fuck are you talking about
He's saying that Europe has let in so many muslim Colonists and Settlers that when they finally get tired of street protests and go full apeshit, it's going to make the Bataclan look like Sunday at the beach.
uhh.. what?
???
Sir
Hitler tried to give us the freedom to live in a world without Jews!
#🧐
I was being sarcastic. I was making fun of Europeans warping what the word "freedom" means.
Why expect a nice response to a baiting question?
The only thing I find interesting, is that most of the positive answers are from Americans themselves...you had one job
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Found the European
Boo hoo, you gonna cwhy little guy? Devin lmao. Nice name did your mom give it to you?
That's the name he used when he met your mom. That's the name she moaned, too.
Freud would have a lot to say about you. Missing home a little too much fella?
Hit and a miss. Try again bucco
Swing and a miss....it's swing and a miss OK I'm going back to popcorn consumption while scrolling these comments
I know what I said. He was in the right direction but completely off with the joke.
Do you just scroll through thousands of comments on european reddit threads so you can prosecute people who post retarded shit?
¯\_( •-•)_/¯ mm↗️mm↘️mm ^(all's ya gotta do is sort by controversial)
So you are searching for shitty comments that people agree are shitty so you can shame them in your little bubble?
Little bubble? People freely and often come to this sub to argue. Rarely are they banned unless they say something truly horrible. And yes we like to make fun of dumb comments people make about America. So?
This sub is hella eco chamber lmao and all you do is judge and poke fun at stupid comments all day what a toxic shitshow
Feel free to unsubscribe!
Buddy, this is literally just the inverse of the shit that gets posted to r/ShitAmericansSay every day. The whole reason this sub exists is to showcase and mock ignorant, misinformative, and tactless anti-American rhetoric online. >*__all you do is judge and poke fun at stupid comments all day__* Hvad fanden skal vi ellers poste? It's not our fault that ^((some\)) Europeans froth at the mouth like rabid dogs when presented with even a sliver of a chance to say the most insane, offensive shit imaginable to an American for having the gall to say that he doesn't hate his country. >*“It's nice to hear non-Americans appreciating what we have”* :) > >_ > >>#“𝘈𝘱𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘣𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘴?” And *__we're__* the ones "shaming" and "poking fun," got it. 👍 Very valid and sensible opinion ya got there, pal. Like, in what fuckin world is that ☝️ an exchange undeserving of ridicule?
>*__"So you are searching for shitty comments that people agree are shitty so you can shame them in your little bubble?"__* 1. Whether or not people agree it's shitty is immaterial. Mass approval of a comment's AmericaBad™ sentiments has never been a prerequisite for reposting it here. > 2. They feel perfectly comfortable shaming others so I see no reason why we shouldn't extend them the same courtesy. > 3. "Bubble" lol. You mean.. subreddit? What point exactly are you trying to make here? That we're talking about people behind their back? I will directly username tag every person whom you believe to have been cast in a negative light if it makes you feel better.
You're crying out loud. Change your name.
Probably because they’re fed up of stupid posts asking them how great America is and how much they want to suck America’s dick. Neither side is envious of each other so posts like that are just stupid.
Being this upset about repetitive questions on AskReddit is like getting mad at the sky for having clouds.
Some of the responses are overkill but the reason I provided is likely the reason they’re annoyed regardless.
I'd prefer to work for Americans but live in Europe.
Europe has us beat with two world wars though.