4 ms·

I love how Americans just think there is no other country that might have, say, higher minimum wages or socialized medicine. It's just impossible they say. Not

I love how Americans just think there is no other country that might have, say, higher minimum wages or socialized medicine. It's just impossible they say. Not sense in comparing or seeing other places approach, America is just too exceptional.

jacob2484 6y ago
Note that in Europe the economies are not as dynamic and has lower GDP growth on average. There are costs to higher taxes and more regulations. We're not exceptional, things are done differently.
- naebother 6y ago
  I always have to remind myself of our glorious GDP growth as I use food stamps to buy groceries after clocking out of a 12 hour shift at Walmart.
  - mjfl 6y ago
    Well, that GDP growth technically means you have a better opportunity to trade up in the USA than anywhere else in the world, if you apply yourself, get yourself trained, etc. you want to make people believe that these career choices are impossible to escape and they really aren’t.
    - DangitBobby 6y ago
      > than in anywhere else the world This is definitely not true. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socioeconomic_mobility_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socioeconomic_mobility_in_th...
      - mjfl 6y ago
        It certainly is true, but academics who want to conduct sophistry can use the metric that gives them the answers they want. Comparing USA to Denmark using in-country income percentiles gives Denmark a much lower bar to hop over for this BS "social-mobility" as defined in the article.
        DangitBobby 6y ago
        You can also use whatever metrics you want, and you haven't even gone to the effort of defining them!
        mjfl 6y ago
        Here's one: use USA percentiles for both countries. Or use Denmark percentiles for both. Only when you use a high bar for US and low bar for Denmark do they come out on top.
- sand_castles 6y ago
  > lower GDP growth on average Europe is the largest surplus region on the planet. I don't get where this idea came from, Europe does the most impressive technology, but doesn't constantly market themselves as well. US is the largest deficit ( needs to constantly import capital to just survive ) country on the planet. If your GDP growth comes from debt, then you are doing it wrong.
- pirocks 6y ago
  This may have more to do with the US not getting blown up during WW2, and the US being the largest single market(in the sense that everyone speaks the same language, has same culture, comparable laws everywhere etc.). And less to do with good policies.
  - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
    >This may have more to do with the US not getting blown up during WW2 It's been 80yr and Japan and Korea are doing fine. The USSR basically force created a large single market over the course of its existence. If it was such a net win for prosperity the economic would have stuck around.
rayiner 6y ago
Nobody says it’s impossible, just that there are trade-offs. France has a monthly minimum wage that works out to under $12/hour on a 35 hour week. It also had 8.5-9.5% unemployment over the last few years before COVID, while the US was half that at 3.5-4.5%. Same thing with socialized medicine. Nobody says that socialized medicine is impossible, just that it requires a level of taxes nobody wants to pay. Again to use France as an example, health insurance is paid for with a 20% tax split between employers and employees: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92419273 https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=924192.... America could easily pay for socialized medicine with such a tax. That’s not how any proponents of socialized medicine in America have proposed to pay for their proposal. Ironically, that’s just a different form of American exceptionalism. “We can have high minimum wages and socialized medicine like Europe without having higher unemployment and higher middle class taxes like Europe.”

jacob2484 6y ago

Note that in Europe the economies are not as dynamic and has lower GDP growth on average. There are costs to higher taxes and more regulations. We're not exceptional, things are done differently.

naebother 6y ago
I always have to remind myself of our glorious GDP growth as I use food stamps to buy groceries after clocking out of a 12 hour shift at Walmart.
- mjfl 6y ago
  Well, that GDP growth technically means you have a better opportunity to trade up in the USA than anywhere else in the world, if you apply yourself, get yourself trained, etc. you want to make people believe that these career choices are impossible to escape and they really aren’t.
  - DangitBobby 6y ago
    > than in anywhere else the world This is definitely not true. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socioeconomic_mobility_in_the_United_States https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socioeconomic_mobility_in_th...
    - mjfl 6y ago
      It certainly is true, but academics who want to conduct sophistry can use the metric that gives them the answers they want. Comparing USA to Denmark using in-country income percentiles gives Denmark a much lower bar to hop over for this BS "social-mobility" as defined in the article.
      - DangitBobby 6y ago
        You can also use whatever metrics you want, and you haven't even gone to the effort of defining them!
        mjfl 6y ago
        Here's one: use USA percentiles for both countries. Or use Denmark percentiles for both. Only when you use a high bar for US and low bar for Denmark do they come out on top.
sand_castles 6y ago
> lower GDP growth on average Europe is the largest surplus region on the planet. I don't get where this idea came from, Europe does the most impressive technology, but doesn't constantly market themselves as well. US is the largest deficit ( needs to constantly import capital to just survive ) country on the planet. If your GDP growth comes from debt, then you are doing it wrong.
pirocks 6y ago
This may have more to do with the US not getting blown up during WW2, and the US being the largest single market(in the sense that everyone speaks the same language, has same culture, comparable laws everywhere etc.). And less to do with good policies.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  >This may have more to do with the US not getting blown up during WW2 It's been 80yr and Japan and Korea are doing fine. The USSR basically force created a large single market over the course of its existence. If it was such a net win for prosperity the economic would have stuck around.

rayiner 6y ago

Nobody says it’s impossible, just that there are trade-offs. France has a monthly minimum wage that works out to under $12/hour on a 35 hour week. It also had 8.5-9.5% unemployment over the last few years before COVID, while the US was half that at 3.5-4.5%. Same thing with socialized medicine. Nobody says that socialized medicine is impossible, just that it requires a level of taxes nobody wants to pay. Again to use France as an example, health insurance is paid for with a 20% tax split between employers and employees: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92419273 https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=924192.... America could easily pay for socialized medicine with such a tax. That’s not how any proponents of socialized medicine in America have proposed to pay for their proposal. Ironically, that’s just a different form of American exceptionalism. “We can have high minimum wages and socialized medicine like Europe without having higher unemployment and higher middle class taxes like Europe.”