3 ms·

As a German living in the US, I wholeheartedly agree with this article, especially the bit about everything being somewhat lower quality. And despite the lower

by aesto 9y ago

As a German living in the US, I wholeheartedly agree with this article, especially the bit about everything being somewhat lower quality. And despite the lower quality, things usually are considerably more expensive anyway. If I might just add one more example: housing. Rent prices in the U.S. are generally about twice what they are in Germany for comparable units, and yet the houses here are incredibly flimsy (walls made out of plywood and windows without proper insulation - you just don't see that in Germany) for anyone but the upper class. And if the comments here are any indicator, the article is also right about the fact that Americans are never even going to realize how poor the quality of life is in comparison to Europe. Instead, they just placate themselves with myths about collectivism, socialism or communism in Europe (none of those are even remotely a thing). Which is all the more heartbreaking because there are some things about the US that I absolutely love.

cthalupa 9y ago
Your claims are not backed by reality. http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/Germany/United-States/Cost-of-living http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/Germany/Uni... You can dive into each individual metric, but the purchasing power is probably the single best one to look at for determining how economically empowered people are, and the US is significantly better than Germany - 2nd in the world, in fact, beaten only by Switzerland. Looking at housing in particular, "Double" is flat out incorrect for rent prices. In the US it is a bit higher, but only about 10%. Double IS correct for purchasing housing... but in the opposite direction of what you're claiming. If you went from living outside of the city in Germany to living inside a major city in the US, then yeah, I could see things being more expensive, but comparing the two countries against each other, it's just completely incorrect.
- aesto 9y ago
  I will concede that you make some good points, however: These statistics simplify things a little because they rely on measures of central tendency - mostly the mean, from what I can tell. Purchasing power is the best example of that. Yes, salaries in the U.S. are on average higher than in Europe, even Germany. However, as we all know, the mean is heavily influenced by extreme values, which occur far more often in the US due to greater inequality. So yes, you can buy more with the average salary, but there are less people who have an average salary. As for the housing stuff: Yes, 'double' was probably an exaggeration (it just happened to be true in my case - although I'm not living anywhere near a major city). However, depending on the size of the apartment, the stats you posted show that the difference can be up to 35%, and as I said, the SIZE of the apartment doesn't necessarily correlate with quality. Apartments and houses can more easily be bigger in the US because there is more space. You are correct that some things are more expensive in Europe. Buying houses, definitely (although it also depends on the country, Germany is a particularly extreme example in that regard (so is the US, though)). However, it doesn't always work out that way. For example, the metrics you posted show that power is 40% more expensive in Germany. That does reflect my own experience. HOWEVER, appliances etc. here in the US are often so crappy (i.e. power hungry), that in the end, you somehow end up paying more anyway. On paper, the US compares pretty well against Europe in terms of standards of living, but my experience is that in practice, this is only true for people from the upper middle class onward.

by aesto 9y ago

cthalupa 9y ago

Your claims are not backed by reality. http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/Germany/United-States/Cost-of-living http://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/Germany/Uni... You can dive into each individual metric, but the purchasing power is probably the single best one to look at for determining how economically empowered people are, and the US is significantly better than Germany - 2nd in the world, in fact, beaten only by Switzerland. Looking at housing in particular, "Double" is flat out incorrect for rent prices. In the US it is a bit higher, but only about 10%. Double IS correct for purchasing housing... but in the opposite direction of what you're claiming. If you went from living outside of the city in Germany to living inside a major city in the US, then yeah, I could see things being more expensive, but comparing the two countries against each other, it's just completely incorrect.

aesto 9y ago
I will concede that you make some good points, however: These statistics simplify things a little because they rely on measures of central tendency - mostly the mean, from what I can tell. Purchasing power is the best example of that. Yes, salaries in the U.S. are on average higher than in Europe, even Germany. However, as we all know, the mean is heavily influenced by extreme values, which occur far more often in the US due to greater inequality. So yes, you can buy more with the average salary, but there are less people who have an average salary. As for the housing stuff: Yes, 'double' was probably an exaggeration (it just happened to be true in my case - although I'm not living anywhere near a major city). However, depending on the size of the apartment, the stats you posted show that the difference can be up to 35%, and as I said, the SIZE of the apartment doesn't necessarily correlate with quality. Apartments and houses can more easily be bigger in the US because there is more space. You are correct that some things are more expensive in Europe. Buying houses, definitely (although it also depends on the country, Germany is a particularly extreme example in that regard (so is the US, though)). However, it doesn't always work out that way. For example, the metrics you posted show that power is 40% more expensive in Germany. That does reflect my own experience. HOWEVER, appliances etc. here in the US are often so crappy (i.e. power hungry), that in the end, you somehow end up paying more anyway. On paper, the US compares pretty well against Europe in terms of standards of living, but my experience is that in practice, this is only true for people from the upper middle class onward.