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Because Europe is and always has been a terrible place to be for SWEs. If you want to earn 75% less than your American counterparts and pay 25%+ more in taxes,

by 0xy 5y ago

Because Europe is and always has been a terrible place to be for SWEs. If you want to earn 75% less than your American counterparts and pay 25%+ more in taxes, stay in Europe. If not, get a visa and get out. You are giving up literally millions of dollars by living in Europe. No amount of free healthcare makes up for the gap. By the way, healthcare is low cost / essentially free at most tech companies in the US.

Supermancho 5y ago
In my experience, healthcare is poor at most tech companies in the US. Every now and then you get a "we cover 100%" claim - which again is usually 100% of the premium for their selected plans for you...the same as any other company. It's tailored for the typical college grad and not much more. I've declined company insurance 100% of the time over the last 25 years, since I prefer Kaiser. Ofc it's not unusual for companies to only pay into the cheapest providers, when providing employees benefits. If you have any serious medical issues, you carry your own insurance. Luckily, the salary generally makes this feasible.
- e4e78a06 5y ago
  > If you have any serious medical issues, you carry your own insurance I've never seen this at any tech company in the SFBA. They cover 100% of the premium for yourself and it's only <$200/mo to cover a whole family of dependents. Their plans are always among the best. Copays are the lowest by far of anything I've ever seen, including ACA marketplace plans, my parents' plans, school offered plans, and non-"tech" company plans. $200/mo is way, way less than I pay in taxes to CA state alone. > since I prefer Kaiser Obviously if you want Kaiser and they don't offer it you have to buy it yourself. Personally I don't feel like the difference is too huge that it justifies buying insurance myself. I used to have Kaiser and you get slightly smaller delays (3 days instead of say a week) to see specialists and that's it.
tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
Healthcare is only the thing that people most quip about. Don't get me wrong, there are many good things about the US (e.g. networking opportunities, better availability of new tech, VC for startups, freedom to do things that just aren't possible in Europe), but OTOH, it's much harder to find safe walkable neighborhoods, excellent public transport, solidly built houses, and in San Francisco apparently human feces are a problem because of a homelessness crisis.
kragen 5y ago
The US healthcare system has very poor outcome measures across the board; even rich areas in the US have poorer health outcomes than many other parts of the world. If you're young this probably doesn't matter unless you have a chronic disease. Old people might prefer to be middle-class in a country with reasonable healthcare than superrich in a country where decent healthcare is unavailable at any price.

by 0xy 5y ago

Supermancho 5y ago

In my experience, healthcare is poor at most tech companies in the US. Every now and then you get a "we cover 100%" claim - which again is usually 100% of the premium for their selected plans for you...the same as any other company. It's tailored for the typical college grad and not much more. I've declined company insurance 100% of the time over the last 25 years, since I prefer Kaiser. Ofc it's not unusual for companies to only pay into the cheapest providers, when providing employees benefits. If you have any serious medical issues, you carry your own insurance. Luckily, the salary generally makes this feasible.

e4e78a06 5y ago
> If you have any serious medical issues, you carry your own insurance I've never seen this at any tech company in the SFBA. They cover 100% of the premium for yourself and it's only <$200/mo to cover a whole family of dependents. Their plans are always among the best. Copays are the lowest by far of anything I've ever seen, including ACA marketplace plans, my parents' plans, school offered plans, and non-"tech" company plans. $200/mo is way, way less than I pay in taxes to CA state alone. > since I prefer Kaiser Obviously if you want Kaiser and they don't offer it you have to buy it yourself. Personally I don't feel like the difference is too huge that it justifies buying insurance myself. I used to have Kaiser and you get slightly smaller delays (3 days instead of say a week) to see specialists and that's it.

tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago

Healthcare is only the thing that people most quip about. Don't get me wrong, there are many good things about the US (e.g. networking opportunities, better availability of new tech, VC for startups, freedom to do things that just aren't possible in Europe), but OTOH, it's much harder to find safe walkable neighborhoods, excellent public transport, solidly built houses, and in San Francisco apparently human feces are a problem because of a homelessness crisis.

kragen 5y ago

The US healthcare system has very poor outcome measures across the board; even rich areas in the US have poorer health outcomes than many other parts of the world. If you're young this probably doesn't matter unless you have a chronic disease. Old people might prefer to be middle-class in a country with reasonable healthcare than superrich in a country where decent healthcare is unavailable at any price.