> Europe understands that innovation is not good per se
Same applies to economic growth and higher disposable incomes I presume?
> and that an economy should follow the people, not people following the economy.
It's not exactly working though is. Or are you saying that Europeans are somehow "stagnant" therefore the economy should also be stagnant? Which doesn't sound that reasonable or a nice thing to say...
> The us vs them in your comment feels quasi-political and unfounded.
Yeah, I've noticed there's a lot of virtue signaling form some Europeans, especially amongst the wealthier Germans, Benelux, and Nordics who have this "holier than though" posture on how much better they are than Americans(wide brush stroke here) for being non-materialistic (also copium for their low skilled wages), while coasting on generational wealth inherited from those before them.
Well if you're so non-materialistic, why aren't dropping the prices of your housing so other people can actually afford to buy something instead of hoping to profiteer from them like those "greedy" Americans?
As always, the people lecturing you on how money doesn't matter, are those who already have money.
Just like those Germans laughing at Trump when he warned them about Germany's dependence on Russian energy in 2018. [1] They can be so smug and full of themselves sometimes.
I dunno — in the torrent of sludge that came and will come from the Trump administration, how is anyone supposed to distinguish an occasional nugget of truth?
Easy, you use your brain and critical thinking to process the message separately from the messenger and then do your own fact checking. But that's hard and your avenge person is too retarded to do any such research and it's easier just to laugh at Orange Man while being smug.
Like if the Germans would have invested as much brain power to look up where the energy of their industry is coming from and asses the threat of being depended on Russia, as much as they used to laugh at America's big military and at Donald Trump, they'd be in a better state.
Anyone with two working braincells knew Germany's position was vulnerable to Russia. Even EU leaders told them that, not just Trump but also Obama.
Maybe he would like to pretend he's surveyed 330+ million individuals and has assessed each with respect to materialism and ability to understand life.
On the one hand yes, on the other, why would we care about a "stronger" tech sector, if the majority of that tech strength is based on stealing people's private data to monetize it, getting them addicted to digital crack to view ads just so that a small handful of bibliomaneres can get richer while the societal damages are being socialized? What would we gain from it? More "line goes up" nonsense that don't matter to the average person? Does the average American also care?
"So look, you can't afford rent, you can't afford groceries due to inflation, your student loans and medical bills are crippling, but the good news is tech stocks are up 200% since last year"
I also don't want to be on the public roads swarmed with flaky alpha stage self driving cars just so some billionaire nut job can flex on is social media platform and get richer. That kind of "innovation" that I'm glad is regualted.
> "So look, you can't afford rent, you can't afford groceries due to inflation, your student loans and medical bills are crippling, but the good news is tech stocks are up 200% since last year"
You can compare the disposable incomes in Europe and the US. I mean a median American can afford a whole lot more of those things than a median European.
PPP adjusted median household disposable income per capita (with social transfers like public healtchae and stuff) in US was $62k back in 2022. West Virginia is ~72% of the national median. So Sweden?
Of course, money obviously isn't everything (not /s). And income inequality is much higher in WV than in Sweden. It's actually higher than in any European country. Which makes comparisons like this rather tricky (it's not even rich vs poor but median vs poor which is the problem in the US when you compare it to Europe).
The most equal US state (Utah) is still more unequal than the EU country which has the highest income inequality ( Bulgaria).
Interestingly enough before taxes France, Finland, Italy, UK etc. have comparable income inequality to the US.
West Virginia isn't the poorest state though (e.g. it's about on par with New Mexico). Mississippi and Louisiana are.
>The most equal US state (Utah) is still more unequal than the EU country which has the highest income inequality ( Bulgaria).
That can be true while at the same time the 3rd percentile of income earners in the US earn more after taxes than the 3rd percentile in Europe, ditto for the 4th percentile and so on up to the 99th percentile (since the average income in the US is significantly higher).
It can but I don't think it is. I can't find direct stats (I mean I can find nominal but not equivalized/ social transfer adjusted figures) to compare but e.g. 1st quantile income cut-off in Sweden is 64% of the median while for first decile it's 49%
Utah on the other hand (surprisingly or not) has the highest first quintile mean (yeah.. slightly apples and oranges but gives an advantage to Utah) in the US, yet it's still only around 25% of the state median.
it's 62.30 * 1.28 (Utah vs US median in 2022) * 0.25 = $19.936
Sweden:
43.9 * 0.49 = $21.51, so a 1st decile Swede has higher PPP + social transfers adjusted income that the first quintile mean in Utah.
If course it's rather convoluted since I'm too lazy to find directly comparable data. Disregards (uses US PPP + social transfers instead of just Utah's etc.).
However I think it's broadly accurate(ish), considering that Utah has higher than average median income and the highest first quintile income all other states would do even worse.
Of course Eastern European states are poorer but Sweden is closer to the EU average than Utah is to the US average (and Sweden's GINI is around average in Europe while Utah's is the lowest in the US).
>The most equal US state (Utah) is still more unequal than the EU country which has the highest income inequality ( Bulgaria).
This is one of the most shocking things I've read in relation to this. I knew it was bad, I didn't know it was THIS bad. Do you have any sources for this? I need to spread this fact if it can be easily verified.
Taking your comment as more of a zeitgeist-y vibe-y thing that something literal, I still disagree.
Apple's walled garden is more your definition of European than American. Apple sharply limits (or regulates) what you can do on your phone because they think they have a better idea of how you should live your digital life.
Android's openness fits your definition of American with their anything-goes, let's see how far we can take this, approach to mobile computing.
> Apple sharply limits (or regulates) what you can do on your phone because they think they have a better idea of how you should live your digital life.
I think that it's Apple's bottom line that dictates how Apple corral people to live their digital lives. It's not because they are benevolent dictators, inspired geniuses, altruistic utopians or whatever. It's just a way to make more money for themselves. They perfected the walled garden, made huge profits out of it and will fight to keep those walls standing.
