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In a lot of European countries, a robust social safety net is the great equalizer. You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - a

In a lot of European countries, a robust social safety net is the great equalizer. You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - and are thus more free to take chances. Furthermore, strong labor laws have compressed salaries towards the mean, so people are not locking themselves into poverty by working low-wage / low-skill work, but there's a difference enough that people are incentivized to get educated. I think it's a decent harmony - compared to other countries, where you have a poor working class and rich/wealthy middle/upper middle class. I think that if education is the only ticket to a better life, then you get stuck with the problem that not all educated people are equal, and only certain educated people get to climb socioeconomic classes (too many schools, too many graduates, i.e inflation)

ipaddr 5y ago
You think in Europe people are more free to take chances than the US? There is less of a need to take a chance so people play it safe. Why risk it all or anything when your needs are met and money gets taxed highly at the upperend.
- yoz-y 5y ago
  There is that, and also less funding and more regulation.
slibhb 5y ago
> You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - and are thus more free to take chances. If Europeans are more free to take chances, why is there substantially less innovation in Europe? I don't think Europe is "worse" than the US. I think Europe is optimized for the poor whereas the US is optimized for the middle class and above. There are good arguments for both of these situations. In the US, it is widely felt that the system should serve the tax payers. Europeans, on the other hand, seem to have a lot more solidarity with the poor who, for whatever reason, don't pay significant taxes. Additionally (and controversially), I think a significant amount of the European attitude comes down to ethnic solidarity. European countries are ethnostates and the US isn't. One interesting thing is that Europeans benefit from American innovation. They have iphones, windows pcs, use google, etc like everyone else.
- alexgmcm 5y ago
  > why is there substantially less innovation in Europe? I know people who started start-ups and spun out side projects here in Europe (both the UK and the continent). One thing I noticed was that when it came time to raise money almost of all of them ended up needing American investment. We don't have anywhere near as much VC capital here in Europe and the banks are incredibly conservative. Plus depending on the country the taxes/fees for being self-employed or starting your own business can be incredibly punitive. > One interesting thing is that Europeans benefit from American innovation. While we do benefit from American innovation I'd also argue it's a sort of 'digital colonialism' for want of a better term - we don't grow our own huge firms like Yandex, Baidu etc. and instead just hand our cash over to American ones (Google, Facebook etc.)
  - zepto 5y ago
    > I'd also argue it's a sort of 'digital colonialism' for want of a better term I think that’s a terrible term for it unless you think that America is somehow responsible for preventing Europe from developing its own tech industries.
    - arvinsim 5y ago
      But US Big Tech does affect at a global scale. What are the chances of a country developing their own search engine? Their own mobile OS and hardware? Their own social networking app?
      - zepto 5y ago
        What are you talking about? Lots of countries have their own social networking apps. Some have their own search engines. Also, quite a few countries have strong computer science schools and developers. Linux was developed in Finland. Raspberry PI was developed in England. “Big tech” isn’t preventing them from developing anything. The only thing holding these countries back is their business culture.
        5y ago
iammisc 5y ago
> In a lot of European countries, a robust social safety net is the great equalizer. You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - and are thus more free to take chances. That is a great explanation in theory, but simply does not work out in practice. In order to support the safety net, the EU has to impose several regulations that remove the ability of people to 'take chances', such as higher taxes on business, paternity/maternity leave policies that cause parents to have fewer children, higher regulatory atmosphere, etc. Whether it's in business, family, education, etc, the EU is not particularly excellent at any. America still has most of the world's large innovative companies, still has a higher birth rate, still has more VC money (and access to capital in general), and still has the best universities and best research institutions.
- silvestrov 5y ago
  > higher taxes on business Denmark + Norway: 22% Sweden: 21.4% Finland: 20% Germany: 15% Nederlands: 25% France: 25% USA: 21% (but 35% until 2017). So the tax argument does not hold, especially for the period before 2017. Birth rates are also the same: https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/total-fertility-rate/country-comparison https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/total-fertility... > the EU is not particularly excellent at any Odd that there are so many EU countries at the list of most happy countries when EU is not good at anything: https://www.cntraveler.com/gallery/the-10-happiest-countries-in-the-world https://www.cntraveler.com/gallery/the-10-happiest-countries...
  - mnouquet 5y ago
    Nobody in the US pays the full 21% after taking into accounts credits and write-offs.
  - iammisc 5y ago
    > Odd that there are so many EU countries at the list of most happy countries when EU is not good at anything Putting words in my mouth. I never said the EU is not good at 'anything'. But it's not as good as America in terms of financing, innovation, or education. One does not need great capital access, top-notch technology, or even the best education to be happy. You sad that european safety nets lead to the ability to 'take chances'. Typically, the result of this would be more innovation, which leads to more capital, which leads to better financing, which incentivizes education so that those with education can convince investors to invest in new innovation. However, the result you claim does not exist in Europe at the same level it exists in America.
sparrc 5y ago
I'm not sure you're talking about exactly the same thing this article is talking about. Social safety nets provide basic access to essentials and (mostly) equalize access to things like healthcare, but don't really do anything to help someone go from "poor" to "middle-class", or any other trip up the social ladder. That person needs to do something to increase their earning potential beyond what their parents had.

ipaddr 5y ago

You think in Europe people are more free to take chances than the US? There is less of a need to take a chance so people play it safe. Why risk it all or anything when your needs are met and money gets taxed highly at the upperend.

yoz-y 5y ago
There is that, and also less funding and more regulation.

slibhb 5y ago

> You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - and are thus more free to take chances. If Europeans are more free to take chances, why is there substantially less innovation in Europe? I don't think Europe is "worse" than the US. I think Europe is optimized for the poor whereas the US is optimized for the middle class and above. There are good arguments for both of these situations. In the US, it is widely felt that the system should serve the tax payers. Europeans, on the other hand, seem to have a lot more solidarity with the poor who, for whatever reason, don't pay significant taxes. Additionally (and controversially), I think a significant amount of the European attitude comes down to ethnic solidarity. European countries are ethnostates and the US isn't. One interesting thing is that Europeans benefit from American innovation. They have iphones, windows pcs, use google, etc like everyone else.

alexgmcm 5y ago
> why is there substantially less innovation in Europe? I know people who started start-ups and spun out side projects here in Europe (both the UK and the continent). One thing I noticed was that when it came time to raise money almost of all of them ended up needing American investment. We don't have anywhere near as much VC capital here in Europe and the banks are incredibly conservative. Plus depending on the country the taxes/fees for being self-employed or starting your own business can be incredibly punitive. > One interesting thing is that Europeans benefit from American innovation. While we do benefit from American innovation I'd also argue it's a sort of 'digital colonialism' for want of a better term - we don't grow our own huge firms like Yandex, Baidu etc. and instead just hand our cash over to American ones (Google, Facebook etc.)
- zepto 5y ago
  > I'd also argue it's a sort of 'digital colonialism' for want of a better term I think that’s a terrible term for it unless you think that America is somehow responsible for preventing Europe from developing its own tech industries.
  - arvinsim 5y ago
    But US Big Tech does affect at a global scale. What are the chances of a country developing their own search engine? Their own mobile OS and hardware? Their own social networking app?
    - zepto 5y ago
      What are you talking about? Lots of countries have their own social networking apps. Some have their own search engines. Also, quite a few countries have strong computer science schools and developers. Linux was developed in Finland. Raspberry PI was developed in England. “Big tech” isn’t preventing them from developing anything. The only thing holding these countries back is their business culture.
      - 5y ago

iammisc 5y ago

> In a lot of European countries, a robust social safety net is the great equalizer. You don't get locked up to work in order to afford healthcare, food, etc. - and are thus more free to take chances. That is a great explanation in theory, but simply does not work out in practice. In order to support the safety net, the EU has to impose several regulations that remove the ability of people to 'take chances', such as higher taxes on business, paternity/maternity leave policies that cause parents to have fewer children, higher regulatory atmosphere, etc. Whether it's in business, family, education, etc, the EU is not particularly excellent at any. America still has most of the world's large innovative companies, still has a higher birth rate, still has more VC money (and access to capital in general), and still has the best universities and best research institutions.

silvestrov 5y ago
> higher taxes on business Denmark + Norway: 22% Sweden: 21.4% Finland: 20% Germany: 15% Nederlands: 25% France: 25% USA: 21% (but 35% until 2017). So the tax argument does not hold, especially for the period before 2017. Birth rates are also the same: https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/total-fertility-rate/country-comparison https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/total-fertility... > the EU is not particularly excellent at any Odd that there are so many EU countries at the list of most happy countries when EU is not good at anything: https://www.cntraveler.com/gallery/the-10-happiest-countries-in-the-world https://www.cntraveler.com/gallery/the-10-happiest-countries...
- mnouquet 5y ago
  Nobody in the US pays the full 21% after taking into accounts credits and write-offs.
- iammisc 5y ago
  > Odd that there are so many EU countries at the list of most happy countries when EU is not good at anything Putting words in my mouth. I never said the EU is not good at 'anything'. But it's not as good as America in terms of financing, innovation, or education. One does not need great capital access, top-notch technology, or even the best education to be happy. You sad that european safety nets lead to the ability to 'take chances'. Typically, the result of this would be more innovation, which leads to more capital, which leads to better financing, which incentivizes education so that those with education can convince investors to invest in new innovation. However, the result you claim does not exist in Europe at the same level it exists in America.

sparrc 5y ago

I'm not sure you're talking about exactly the same thing this article is talking about. Social safety nets provide basic access to essentials and (mostly) equalize access to things like healthcare, but don't really do anything to help someone go from "poor" to "middle-class", or any other trip up the social ladder. That person needs to do something to increase their earning potential beyond what their parents had.