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Interesting. It seems like a big culprit is high cost of living, which makes many jobs no longer worthwhile. Any ideas why it's so much higher in the US than in

Interesting. It seems like a big culprit is high cost of living, which makes many jobs no longer worthwhile. Any ideas why it's so much higher in the US than in India? Is it due to landlords?

leereeves 10y ago
Americans expect and demand a lifestyle most Indians only dream of. For example, electric power consumption per capita is 765 kWh in India, 12,988 kWh in the USA. [1] 1: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.ELEC.KH.PC http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.ELEC.KH.PC
- eli_gottlieb 10y ago
  Admittedly, the vast majority of India is nowhere near as cold as the vast majority of America. Americans have to spend energy avoiding death by frost much of the year.
  - leereeves 10y ago
    If we were willing to accept India-like population density and energy use, we could all live in the parts of the US where that's not the case.
  - ozborn 10y ago
    Like many living in the southern USA my air conditioning expenses are much higher than my heating expenses, I'm sure many Indians wouldn't mind air conditioning either.
yummyfajitas 10y ago
I discuss in the article a bit. India is more capitalistic than the US, at least in this regard. Their safety net is a job guarantee rather than the US's ragbag of free money programs (welfare, disability fraud [1], etc), so you don't get to enjoy a life of leisure under any circumstance. In the US, it's pretty easy to get free money and play video games all day. Second, their regulatory structure doesn't destroy as many low skill jobs as ours does (e.g. in the US, a cigarette wala like Eric Garner gets executed, and the cops shut down many food trucks). [1] NPR did an expose a while back on the massive levels of disability fraud in the US. Apparently it's now a shadow welfare system, significantly larger than actual welfare: http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/

Interesting. It seems like a big culprit is high cost of living, which makes many jobs no longer worthwhile. Any ideas why it's so much higher in the US than in India? Is it due to landlords?

leereeves 10y ago

Americans expect and demand a lifestyle most Indians only dream of. For example, electric power consumption per capita is 765 kWh in India, 12,988 kWh in the USA. [1] 1: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.ELEC.KH.PC http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.USE.ELEC.KH.PC

eli_gottlieb 10y ago
Admittedly, the vast majority of India is nowhere near as cold as the vast majority of America. Americans have to spend energy avoiding death by frost much of the year.
- leereeves 10y ago
  If we were willing to accept India-like population density and energy use, we could all live in the parts of the US where that's not the case.
- ozborn 10y ago
  Like many living in the southern USA my air conditioning expenses are much higher than my heating expenses, I'm sure many Indians wouldn't mind air conditioning either.

yummyfajitas 10y ago

I discuss in the article a bit. India is more capitalistic than the US, at least in this regard. Their safety net is a job guarantee rather than the US's ragbag of free money programs (welfare, disability fraud [1], etc), so you don't get to enjoy a life of leisure under any circumstance. In the US, it's pretty easy to get free money and play video games all day. Second, their regulatory structure doesn't destroy as many low skill jobs as ours does (e.g. in the US, a cigarette wala like Eric Garner gets executed, and the cops shut down many food trucks). [1] NPR did an expose a while back on the massive levels of disability fraud in the US. Apparently it's now a shadow welfare system, significantly larger than actual welfare: http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/ http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-work/