4 ms·

And yet standards of living in Europe are comparable to those in the US, and preferable at the median. Our attention is captured by speculative valuations of un

And yet standards of living in Europe are comparable to those in the US, and preferable at the median. Our attention is captured by speculative valuations of unicorns, and yet people actually need real stuff made, drugs developed and made etc. Europe does perfectly well in many non winner takes all sectors where English language and network effects are less relevant. The political instability created by the US neoliberal experiment is something I hope we can avoid over here too.

gizmo 2y ago
Europe is much much poorer than the US, actually. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F3PGpsrWEAEiplB?format=jpg&name=medium https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F3PGpsrWEAEiplB?format=jpg&name=...
- Certhas 2y ago
  EU GDP per capita 2022 is the same as US GDP per capita 2017. Unless you want to say that the US was much poorer in 2017 than it was in 2022 that's a fairly ridiculous statement. Also, the highest productivity places in the EU have much lower hours worked per capita than the US, with Germans on average working 25% less than Americans and the EU as a whole working 13% less than the US. https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm
  - gizmo 2y ago
    World Bank: European Union gdp per capita for 2022 was $37,433, a 3.33% decline from 2021. U.S. gdp per capita for 2022 was $76,330, a 8.7% increase from 2021. It's not even close?
    - Rinzler89 2y ago
      GDP per capita as a stand alone metric doesn't mean much.
      - gizmo 2y ago
        All rich countries have high GDP per capita and all poor countries have low GDP per capita. Zero exceptions. Despite the shortcomings of GDP as a metric it still tracks prosperity very accurately.
        Rinzler89 2y ago
        You can't get any more obvious than that, but that wasn't my point to say that higher GDP doesn't make you richer than a low GDP, but to say GDP/capita as a number alone is not a measure of wealth, income or prosperity between countries, even in the EU. For example Ireland has by a long margin the highest GDP/capita in the whole EU, and it would make you think the average Irish worker earns more that any other worker in the EU and drives a Lambo, but that's not what's happening. It's because most US corporations funnel their EU money through their Irish holding companies skewing the statistic.
        gizmo 2y ago
        > For example Ireland has by a long margin the highest GDP/capita in the whole EU No, Luxembourg does.
        bigfudge 2y ago
        But in both cases it's because of weird corporate tax loopholes rather than the underlying productivity or utility to the median individual.
    - Certhas 2y ago
      Sources please? Are these nominal dollars? World bank data in PPP dollars is reported as 64,600 vs 45,900 here: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank?tab=chart&country=USA~DEU~GBR~FRA~KOR~JPN~CHN~IND~OWID_EU27 https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank?... Germany is at 53,900 there, but a good chunk of the difference is simply that US works more per capita. GDP per hour worked is 74$ in the US vs 69$ in Germany, 53$ in Canada. Sweden is ahead of the US. And the EU also includes countries like Bulgaria, which at 29$ is barely ahead of Russias 28$. https://data.oecd.org/lprdty/gdp-per-hour-worked.htm https://data.oecd.org/lprdty/gdp-per-hour-worked.htm France is at 65$ per hour worked, but Germany and France also have significantly lower poverty and inequality rates by any measure you chose, with France more equal than Germany. The US, of course, remains the dominant economy of the world by any measure. There is no question of that. But the exponential nature of economics, and the structural differences between these different economies, means that GDP numbers compared directly are fairly meaningless. Edit: That last sentence is too strong as stated. GDP obviously matters a big deal in the grand scheme of things, especially as you jump from lower or middle income to high income countries. But it's all logscale. A factor of 2 is a big deal, a factor of 1.2 might not be.
  - kortilla 2y ago
    Yes, if you had 2017 salary in the US today you are much poorer. Inflation was no joke
    - Certhas 2y ago
      These numbers are PPP, so inflation adjusted.
  - Certhas 2y ago
    > EU GDP per capita 2022 is the same as US GDP per capita 2017. Can't edit anymore, but: That were nominal numbers, and thus useless. See here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40673552 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40673552
- bigfudge 2y ago
  These are mean figures, not median.

gizmo 2y ago

Europe is much much poorer than the US, actually. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F3PGpsrWEAEiplB?format=jpg&name=medium https://pbs.twimg.com/media/F3PGpsrWEAEiplB?format=jpg&name=...

Certhas 2y ago
EU GDP per capita 2022 is the same as US GDP per capita 2017. Unless you want to say that the US was much poorer in 2017 than it was in 2022 that's a fairly ridiculous statement. Also, the highest productivity places in the EU have much lower hours worked per capita than the US, with Germans on average working 25% less than Americans and the EU as a whole working 13% less than the US. https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm https://data.oecd.org/emp/hours-worked.htm
- gizmo 2y ago
  World Bank: European Union gdp per capita for 2022 was $37,433, a 3.33% decline from 2021. U.S. gdp per capita for 2022 was $76,330, a 8.7% increase from 2021. It's not even close?
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    GDP per capita as a stand alone metric doesn't mean much.
    - gizmo 2y ago
      All rich countries have high GDP per capita and all poor countries have low GDP per capita. Zero exceptions. Despite the shortcomings of GDP as a metric it still tracks prosperity very accurately.
      - Rinzler89 2y ago
        You can't get any more obvious than that, but that wasn't my point to say that higher GDP doesn't make you richer than a low GDP, but to say GDP/capita as a number alone is not a measure of wealth, income or prosperity between countries, even in the EU. For example Ireland has by a long margin the highest GDP/capita in the whole EU, and it would make you think the average Irish worker earns more that any other worker in the EU and drives a Lambo, but that's not what's happening. It's because most US corporations funnel their EU money through their Irish holding companies skewing the statistic.
        gizmo 2y ago
        > For example Ireland has by a long margin the highest GDP/capita in the whole EU No, Luxembourg does.
        bigfudge 2y ago
        But in both cases it's because of weird corporate tax loopholes rather than the underlying productivity or utility to the median individual.
  - Certhas 2y ago
    Sources please? Are these nominal dollars? World bank data in PPP dollars is reported as 64,600 vs 45,900 here: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank?tab=chart&country=USA~DEU~GBR~FRA~KOR~JPN~CHN~IND~OWID_EU27 https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank?... Germany is at 53,900 there, but a good chunk of the difference is simply that US works more per capita. GDP per hour worked is 74$ in the US vs 69$ in Germany, 53$ in Canada. Sweden is ahead of the US. And the EU also includes countries like Bulgaria, which at 29$ is barely ahead of Russias 28$. https://data.oecd.org/lprdty/gdp-per-hour-worked.htm https://data.oecd.org/lprdty/gdp-per-hour-worked.htm France is at 65$ per hour worked, but Germany and France also have significantly lower poverty and inequality rates by any measure you chose, with France more equal than Germany. The US, of course, remains the dominant economy of the world by any measure. There is no question of that. But the exponential nature of economics, and the structural differences between these different economies, means that GDP numbers compared directly are fairly meaningless. Edit: That last sentence is too strong as stated. GDP obviously matters a big deal in the grand scheme of things, especially as you jump from lower or middle income to high income countries. But it's all logscale. A factor of 2 is a big deal, a factor of 1.2 might not be.
- kortilla 2y ago
  Yes, if you had 2017 salary in the US today you are much poorer. Inflation was no joke
  - Certhas 2y ago
    These numbers are PPP, so inflation adjusted.
- Certhas 2y ago
  > EU GDP per capita 2022 is the same as US GDP per capita 2017. Can't edit anymore, but: That were nominal numbers, and thus useless. See here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40673552 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40673552
bigfudge 2y ago
These are mean figures, not median.