4 ms·

I was making this point a few weeks ago and after looking into it more, I still think it's a valuable point to raise, but the truth is more nuanced than I expec

I was making this point a few weeks ago and after looking into it more, I still think it's a valuable point to raise, but the truth is more nuanced than I expected. States in the US vary in nominal GSP per capita by only 2x — from Mississippi at $35K to Delaware at $70K. In the EU, it ranges from Bulgaria at €6K to Ireland at €55K. (This excludes DC and Luxembourg, which are outliers in many ways.) In fact, even Mississippi, the poorest US state, is wealthier than the EU average (€28K, about $31K)! Only the wealthiest EU countries are wealthier than Mississippi: Luxembourg, Ireland, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Austria, Finland, German, Belgium, France. And of those, only Luxembourg and Ireland have a higher GDP per capita than the US average. So the EU member states vary economically far more than the states in the US do, and the US is more easily characterized as a uniformly "high income" region than the EU is. Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain is really hard to reconcile with the fact that many of us would love to live in the latter countries and couldn't be paid to move to Mississippi.

raphaelj 10y ago
I think you forgot to take into account the fact that that Europeans don't work as much as North Americans: https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm That doesn't entirely explain why revenues in the US are that much higher than revenues in Europe however. The fact that the current trade value of the € against the $ is significantly lower to what it was ten years ago (European debt crisis) also partially explain the different revenues between the two continents.
- vidarh 10y ago
  Indeed, working hours explain surprisingly little: France usually has a higher GDP per capita than the UK despite far shorter working hours. They also move pretty much in sync.
grecy 10y ago
> Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain And that's why GDP per capita is so useless. You have a few multi billionaires running your country, and you have tens of millions of people in abject poverty, tens of millions with no health insurance, etc. Don't look at GDP per capita, it tells you noting about life for the average person.
- oldmanjay 10y ago
  Luckily, we have so many people on the outside flinging poo at us to keep us humble.
- omegaham 10y ago
  How about median household income? Mississippi's median household income is $36,919. This compares to the UK's median household income of $31,617. Note, of course, that this doesn't count social benefits. The UK's household income is lower, but they also get the NHS, better unemployment insurance, and so on.
  - luispedrocoelho 10y ago
    These are gross income values (pre-tax), so, actually they do count social benefits (at least partially, the median household may be the beneficiary of transfers).
- maxerickson 10y ago
  "abject poverty" means something like "the worst poverty you can think of". For the US, that probably means some portion of the ~1.6 million homeless (not all of them though), not the tens of millions of people that are below the national poverty line. We do have about 25 million people with no health insurance.
clock_tower 10y ago
> Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain is really hard to reconcile with the fact that many of us would love to live in the latter countries and couldn't be paid to move to Mississippi. Remember good GDP versus bad GDP; a traffic jam increases GDP, but isn't anything particularly worth buying. Accumulated capital (like Notre Dame and the Louvre) doesn't show up in GDP either, and if anything tends to lower it. There's a lot of bad GDP and not much capital accumulation in the US... Climate also doesn't show up in GDP, now that I think of it, and I think that has a lot to do with the Mississippi situation. Who wants to live in hundred-degree heat with hundred-percent humidity?
- bpodgursky 10y ago
  > a traffic jam increases GDP What? No, it doesn't, in any possible measure. Those are lost hours of productivity.
  - xal 10y ago
    The driving hours usually come out of the participants free time instead of out of the work force. The traffic jam will increase gasoline consumption. You are right though, it isn't a good example. Here is a better one: Someone getting cancer increases GDP significantly due to health care costs.
    - thatfrenchguy 10y ago
      Not in France though :-)
- stepanhruda 10y ago
  Oh man you're mixing up so many concepts. GDP is product - what value you produce during the year. Nothing is produced during a traffic jam. If you want to see accumulated wealth and climate taken into account, compare quality of life.
  - chrischen 10y ago
gragas 10y ago
>Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain is really hard to reconcile with the fact that many of us would love to live in the latter countries and couldn't be paid to move to Mississippi. It seems to me that there are many people who say things like that about most of the less-populated states. To be honest, I'm glad. After moving to SF from a small Midwestern city, I've realized that I couldn't be paid to live here. Even if we don't mention the extremely high cost of living in San Francisco, if we just consider the negative externalities: - Garbage everywhere - Constant noise - Unbelievable homeless problem - High crime rates - Extreme clash of culture (I see anti-tech graffiti on my way to work every day; I regularly overhear pretentious "how could you not be in tech?" conversations) - Infinite suburbia - High rates of mental illness (not that mental illness is a bad thing, but I think it is at least somewhat telling about the environment) I'd still rather live back home in the Midwest, even if we didn't talk about explicitly quantifiable costs of living. There is an entire America out there between the coasts that has absolutely none of the things I just listed.
- dismantlethesun 10y ago
  > High rates of mental illness (not that mental illness is a bad thing, but I think it is at least somewhat telling about the environment) I'd say that mental illness doesn't make one a bad person, (just like having pneumonia isn't a punishment for your sins), but mental illness is a bad thing---it should be avoided, mitigated where it exists, and if possible cured. I'm guessing you might have meant something similar?
- beatpanda 10y ago
  Cool, when are you leaving? Because my friends who actually like the Bay can't find housing. You know where the door is.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
tw04 10y ago
I'm not sure it's really fair to compare Western Europe and former USSR countries in the same breath as the US. You might as well compare California to Mexico because they share a physical border. You'll find similar disparities in income.

raphaelj 10y ago

I think you forgot to take into account the fact that that Europeans don't work as much as North Americans: https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm That doesn't entirely explain why revenues in the US are that much higher than revenues in Europe however. The fact that the current trade value of the € against the $ is significantly lower to what it was ten years ago (European debt crisis) also partially explain the different revenues between the two continents.

vidarh 10y ago
Indeed, working hours explain surprisingly little: France usually has a higher GDP per capita than the UK despite far shorter working hours. They also move pretty much in sync.

grecy 10y ago

> Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain And that's why GDP per capita is so useless. You have a few multi billionaires running your country, and you have tens of millions of people in abject poverty, tens of millions with no health insurance, etc. Don't look at GDP per capita, it tells you noting about life for the average person.

oldmanjay 10y ago
Luckily, we have so many people on the outside flinging poo at us to keep us humble.
omegaham 10y ago
How about median household income? Mississippi's median household income is $36,919. This compares to the UK's median household income of $31,617. Note, of course, that this doesn't count social benefits. The UK's household income is lower, but they also get the NHS, better unemployment insurance, and so on.
- luispedrocoelho 10y ago
  These are gross income values (pre-tax), so, actually they do count social benefits (at least partially, the median household may be the beneficiary of transfers).
maxerickson 10y ago
"abject poverty" means something like "the worst poverty you can think of". For the US, that probably means some portion of the ~1.6 million homeless (not all of them though), not the tens of millions of people that are below the national poverty line. We do have about 25 million people with no health insurance.

clock_tower 10y ago

> Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain is really hard to reconcile with the fact that many of us would love to live in the latter countries and couldn't be paid to move to Mississippi. Remember good GDP versus bad GDP; a traffic jam increases GDP, but isn't anything particularly worth buying. Accumulated capital (like Notre Dame and the Louvre) doesn't show up in GDP either, and if anything tends to lower it. There's a lot of bad GDP and not much capital accumulation in the US... Climate also doesn't show up in GDP, now that I think of it, and I think that has a lot to do with the Mississippi situation. Who wants to live in hundred-degree heat with hundred-percent humidity?

bpodgursky 10y ago
> a traffic jam increases GDP What? No, it doesn't, in any possible measure. Those are lost hours of productivity.
- xal 10y ago
  The driving hours usually come out of the participants free time instead of out of the work force. The traffic jam will increase gasoline consumption. You are right though, it isn't a good example. Here is a better one: Someone getting cancer increases GDP significantly due to health care costs.
  - thatfrenchguy 10y ago
    Not in France though :-)
stepanhruda 10y ago
Oh man you're mixing up so many concepts. GDP is product - what value you produce during the year. Nothing is produced during a traffic jam. If you want to see accumulated wealth and climate taken into account, compare quality of life.
- chrischen 10y ago

gragas 10y ago

>Mississippi's GDP per capita being similar to that of France, Italy or Spain is really hard to reconcile with the fact that many of us would love to live in the latter countries and couldn't be paid to move to Mississippi. It seems to me that there are many people who say things like that about most of the less-populated states. To be honest, I'm glad. After moving to SF from a small Midwestern city, I've realized that I couldn't be paid to live here. Even if we don't mention the extremely high cost of living in San Francisco, if we just consider the negative externalities: - Garbage everywhere - Constant noise - Unbelievable homeless problem - High crime rates - Extreme clash of culture (I see anti-tech graffiti on my way to work every day; I regularly overhear pretentious "how could you not be in tech?" conversations) - Infinite suburbia - High rates of mental illness (not that mental illness is a bad thing, but I think it is at least somewhat telling about the environment) I'd still rather live back home in the Midwest, even if we didn't talk about explicitly quantifiable costs of living. There is an entire America out there between the coasts that has absolutely none of the things I just listed.

dismantlethesun 10y ago
> High rates of mental illness (not that mental illness is a bad thing, but I think it is at least somewhat telling about the environment) I'd say that mental illness doesn't make one a bad person, (just like having pneumonia isn't a punishment for your sins), but mental illness is a bad thing---it should be avoided, mitigated where it exists, and if possible cured. I'm guessing you might have meant something similar?
beatpanda 10y ago
Cool, when are you leaving? Because my friends who actually like the Bay can't find housing. You know where the door is.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

tw04 10y ago

I'm not sure it's really fair to compare Western Europe and former USSR countries in the same breath as the US. You might as well compare California to Mexico because they share a physical border. You'll find similar disparities in income.