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The US hegemony gives your country massive wealth. US GDP per capita is 30% higher than Germany. Europe is extremely poor compared to the US even when they're n

The US hegemony gives your country massive wealth. US GDP per capita is 30% higher than Germany. Europe is extremely poor compared to the US even when they're not paying for defense. The US has more than enough money to fix its domestic problems. There's just no political will. Nobody votes for the person who wants to fix difficult problems when you can just vote for the guy who points out flaws in the other guy's plan. (Europe is not really any different today - we're just lucky we got the big issues settled a few decades ago before social media gave everyone a voice)

tetris11 3y ago
GDP per capita requires just 1 multi-billionaire to bump those percentages up. You can't make such a QoL comparison that way.
- strangesmells06 3y ago
  Id like to see a median comparison or some other stats.
  - ttyprintk 3y ago
    It doesn’t change the argument much: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income Off topic: China has done a great job pulling half a billion people out of poverty and it shows.
- kalleboo 3y ago
  Just look at Americans though - they drive expensive trucks, have huge homes, middle class people can even own boats to require those trucks to drive back and forth with from their homes that have much land they can park a boat on it. Europeans are stuck in tiny apartments in cramped cities and take the train, bus or ride a bike. The US may not be sustainable but it has massively better QoL, I have so many friends who have moved to the US because you can live so much better with the same job.
  - dingusdew 3y ago
    [dead]
  - atombender 3y ago
    Your picture may be biased by what you see around you, and it seems to make some assumptions such as big trucks and homes being proxies for true affluence (a lot of what you're describing is funded by debt) or that big trucks and homes equals high QoL. I've lived for many years in both the U.S. and Europe, and the things you mention seem very superficial. The U.S. has barely any public transportation infrastructure, it's ridiculously car-centric, it has enormous inequality, lacks a functional healthcare system (leading to dystopian situations like "medical bankruptcy"), suffers from insidious pollution (PFOAs are an American invention; meanwhile, a lot of drinking water in the U.S. does not meet requirements for safe levels of lead, and the U.S. is still mostly on fossil fuels), and has a deeply dysfunctional political two-party system that constantly threatens democracy. A lot of people visiting from the U.S. or other countries marvel at my European country's high quality of life. We have great public healthcare, and a significant social safety net for the disadvantaged. We have a great public transportation infrastructure, a surplus of green energy (no coal), and there's generally little need to own a car for many people, nor a car-obsessed culture. We work less and allow more time for family and friends. Everyone gets 5 weeks of paid vacation every year, by law. Sure, we get paid less, but financial wealth isn't everything. Considering healthcare, we (both individuals and the state) spend a lot less than the U.S. I don't have any data on the sizes of apartments, but plenty of people live in big (perhaps not by American standards) detached houses here.
    - kalleboo 3y ago
      > the things you mention seem very superficial They are. But they're still expensive(†). My point is that GP says the US can't have nice things because they're spending all their money on the defense of the rest of the developed world and Europe is just rolling in dough to spend on public infrastructure. The US absolutely has money that it can spend on these things if it wanted to, but it doesn't. $60k pickup trucks (the median cost) aren't a thing anywhere else in the world, and in every thread here on EVs it's full of excuses of why these vehicles are ESSENTIAL to the functioning of US society. If all of that money was spent on public infrastructure instead, they could have much nice things. I totally agree that lots of people are suffering in the US. It's not being spread equally. I totally agree that US politics are completely dysfunctional. I agree that that is the problem. I'm just refuting GPs argument that "it's because we're sending money overseas". It's because you're misallocating money locally. GP is saying Europe can have these things because the the US is defending them. I'm saying the US has more than enough money to do these things, if they allocated it the same as Europe does (even after removing military spending) (†) Debt, sure, but Japan's national debt is 200% of GDP and people are touting them in this thread as an example of how you can have your cake and eat it too.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
surneaaa 3y ago
> Nobody votes for the person who wants to fix difficult problems when you can just vote for the guy who points out flaws in the other guy's plan This is the major flaw with democracy and the reason it’s a moral imperative for the US to spread democracy. It’s easy for a small group (in reality, many disparate small groups) to manipulate a large population. While technically it’s true the people of the US could fix this with voting, in reality it’s an insane way to operate. Our democracy was originally founded with restrictions on who could vote as well at a time when we had much stronger cultural bonds. Limiting who could vote mixed in with a healthy culture is necessary for democracy to work - otherwise it is exploited. We need and deserve leaders who want to do the best for their people. Representative democracy allows for parasites to prevent this while placing the onus on the voter for their woes, knowing full well the voter will never be able to organize in a meaningful capacity because the population is too large and diverse. If the answer to our problems is always “get out and vote better”, nothing is ever going to get done and anyone pushing that idea is either ignorant or malicious.
- Gud 3y ago
  You are producing a lot of words, but what are you actually saying? Less democracy, let the elites take care of it?

tetris11 3y ago

GDP per capita requires just 1 multi-billionaire to bump those percentages up. You can't make such a QoL comparison that way.

strangesmells06 3y ago
Id like to see a median comparison or some other stats.
- ttyprintk 3y ago
  It doesn’t change the argument much: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income Off topic: China has done a great job pulling half a billion people out of poverty and it shows.
kalleboo 3y ago
Just look at Americans though - they drive expensive trucks, have huge homes, middle class people can even own boats to require those trucks to drive back and forth with from their homes that have much land they can park a boat on it. Europeans are stuck in tiny apartments in cramped cities and take the train, bus or ride a bike. The US may not be sustainable but it has massively better QoL, I have so many friends who have moved to the US because you can live so much better with the same job.
- dingusdew 3y ago
  [dead]
- atombender 3y ago
  Your picture may be biased by what you see around you, and it seems to make some assumptions such as big trucks and homes being proxies for true affluence (a lot of what you're describing is funded by debt) or that big trucks and homes equals high QoL. I've lived for many years in both the U.S. and Europe, and the things you mention seem very superficial. The U.S. has barely any public transportation infrastructure, it's ridiculously car-centric, it has enormous inequality, lacks a functional healthcare system (leading to dystopian situations like "medical bankruptcy"), suffers from insidious pollution (PFOAs are an American invention; meanwhile, a lot of drinking water in the U.S. does not meet requirements for safe levels of lead, and the U.S. is still mostly on fossil fuels), and has a deeply dysfunctional political two-party system that constantly threatens democracy. A lot of people visiting from the U.S. or other countries marvel at my European country's high quality of life. We have great public healthcare, and a significant social safety net for the disadvantaged. We have a great public transportation infrastructure, a surplus of green energy (no coal), and there's generally little need to own a car for many people, nor a car-obsessed culture. We work less and allow more time for family and friends. Everyone gets 5 weeks of paid vacation every year, by law. Sure, we get paid less, but financial wealth isn't everything. Considering healthcare, we (both individuals and the state) spend a lot less than the U.S. I don't have any data on the sizes of apartments, but plenty of people live in big (perhaps not by American standards) detached houses here.
  - kalleboo 3y ago
    > the things you mention seem very superficial They are. But they're still expensive(†). My point is that GP says the US can't have nice things because they're spending all their money on the defense of the rest of the developed world and Europe is just rolling in dough to spend on public infrastructure. The US absolutely has money that it can spend on these things if it wanted to, but it doesn't. $60k pickup trucks (the median cost) aren't a thing anywhere else in the world, and in every thread here on EVs it's full of excuses of why these vehicles are ESSENTIAL to the functioning of US society. If all of that money was spent on public infrastructure instead, they could have much nice things. I totally agree that lots of people are suffering in the US. It's not being spread equally. I totally agree that US politics are completely dysfunctional. I agree that that is the problem. I'm just refuting GPs argument that "it's because we're sending money overseas". It's because you're misallocating money locally. GP is saying Europe can have these things because the the US is defending them. I'm saying the US has more than enough money to do these things, if they allocated it the same as Europe does (even after removing military spending) (†) Debt, sure, but Japan's national debt is 200% of GDP and people are touting them in this thread as an example of how you can have your cake and eat it too.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

surneaaa 3y ago

> Nobody votes for the person who wants to fix difficult problems when you can just vote for the guy who points out flaws in the other guy's plan This is the major flaw with democracy and the reason it’s a moral imperative for the US to spread democracy. It’s easy for a small group (in reality, many disparate small groups) to manipulate a large population. While technically it’s true the people of the US could fix this with voting, in reality it’s an insane way to operate. Our democracy was originally founded with restrictions on who could vote as well at a time when we had much stronger cultural bonds. Limiting who could vote mixed in with a healthy culture is necessary for democracy to work - otherwise it is exploited. We need and deserve leaders who want to do the best for their people. Representative democracy allows for parasites to prevent this while placing the onus on the voter for their woes, knowing full well the voter will never be able to organize in a meaningful capacity because the population is too large and diverse. If the answer to our problems is always “get out and vote better”, nothing is ever going to get done and anyone pushing that idea is either ignorant or malicious.

Gud 3y ago
You are producing a lot of words, but what are you actually saying? Less democracy, let the elites take care of it?