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> It's something I've lamented before: Even Americans get kind of brainwashed that their local culture is inferior and everything is better in New York (and Cal

> It's something I've lamented before: Even Americans get kind of brainwashed that their local culture is inferior and everything is better in New York (and California) because that's where so much of our popular media originates and is set. This reminds me of how Americans are brainwashed into believing that European culture is dramatically better than American culture (Americans are dumb, fat, ignorant, and uncultured while Europeans are intelligent and enlightened). This seems to have eased as our world has become more interconnected, but about a decade ago (before living abroad), this was definitely the impression I had from American media. I'm sure there's some truth to it in certain statistical abstractions, but in general there's enormous variety in America that a comparison of medians doesn't capture. Moreover, there's a lot of cherry-picking that goes on in those comparisons: for instance, I'd never heard any discussion about the significant (~30-50%) discrepancy in take-home (i.e., after tax, healthcare, pension/retirement, etc) income for professionals nor the high cost of living in Europe. Certainly nothing that could feasibly justify stereotypes of American inferiority.

cinntaile 4y ago
I don't get the link between income and culture here? It feels like you should have ended your post before bringing that up.
- throwaway894345 4y ago
  I probably wasn't clear, but I was remarking about the belief that European culture and social systems were superior. How much a person takes home is related to the quality of those social systems (it's definitely not the only indicator, but it's one that isn't discussed often).
soperj 4y ago
>discrepancy in take-home I think that has more to do with the discrepancy in time at work though as well. If I make half as much as someone working 60-70 hour weeks (as someone who works 35 hour weeks), that makes a lot of sense.
- throwaway894345 4y ago
  According to some quick Googling, this seems unlikely (see below). Europeans do get more paid time off than Americans, but I doubt they're working 30-40% less than Americans. > The average number of weekly hours worked by full-time workers in the European Union was 37.1 hours a week as of the third quarter of 2021 Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1197097/average-working-hours-eu/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1197097/average-working-... > For those [Americans] in the typical age range for full-time work, the national average landed at 40.5, indicating that most employed adults work a 40-hour workweek https://www.zippia.com/advice/average-work-hours-per-week/ https://www.zippia.com/advice/average-work-hours-per-week/

cinntaile 4y ago

I don't get the link between income and culture here? It feels like you should have ended your post before bringing that up.

throwaway894345 4y ago
I probably wasn't clear, but I was remarking about the belief that European culture and social systems were superior. How much a person takes home is related to the quality of those social systems (it's definitely not the only indicator, but it's one that isn't discussed often).

soperj 4y ago

>discrepancy in take-home I think that has more to do with the discrepancy in time at work though as well. If I make half as much as someone working 60-70 hour weeks (as someone who works 35 hour weeks), that makes a lot of sense.

throwaway894345 4y ago
According to some quick Googling, this seems unlikely (see below). Europeans do get more paid time off than Americans, but I doubt they're working 30-40% less than Americans. > The average number of weekly hours worked by full-time workers in the European Union was 37.1 hours a week as of the third quarter of 2021 Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1197097/average-working-hours-eu/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1197097/average-working-... > For those [Americans] in the typical age range for full-time work, the national average landed at 40.5, indicating that most employed adults work a 40-hour workweek https://www.zippia.com/advice/average-work-hours-per-week/ https://www.zippia.com/advice/average-work-hours-per-week/