31 ms·

This is an interesting take, because it contrasts with GDP PPP [0] which is suggesting that America is in fact being overtaken by its rivals although it has man

• OfficeChad 2y ago
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• spiderfarmer 2y ago
  The EU is number one in quality of life and that’s all that matters to me. If we work just hard enough to maintain and maybe even improve it, other countries can do their pissing contest.
  • ragebol 2y ago
    Quality of life costs money, and if we're not competitive, sooner or later that money will run out.
    • Cumpiler69 2y ago
      It's crazy how so many people don't get this basic economic fact and think public welfare in EU just rains from the sky for free. No, EU welfare state is not some magical hack nobody else thought of, it's just paid from the working class' wages and then redistributed to those in need. Without innovations and highly profitable industries generating well paying working class jobs, with what will you pay for that welfare and quality of life? Billionaires and corporations certainly aren't gonna pay for it out if their profits, so the working class has to. But if the working class has no more high paying wages anymore due to stagnating growth , then your welfare budget also goes bye-bye. You can't just vote yourself more welfare and higher public sector salaries and pensions out of thin air without an economic growth to back that up. I mean, you technically can, but it doesn't end well as was proven every single time this was tried.
      • kiba 2y ago
        Well paying job just mean that the primary distribution mechanism of wealth is through having a job, rather than only creating only jobs that are necessary. That's grossly inefficient. I rather pay people to stay at home rather than gunk up our industries with make-work, or worse actively making things worse. Innovation is important sure, but also efficient use of resources, including cramping down on negative externalities. That increases welfare and quality of life, ideally with no need to spend an extra dollar.
        • Cumpiler69 2y ago
          That's some idealistic stuff that's not gonna happen. The real world doesn't work like that. Yeah it's ineficient but it's the one we got right now. You're not gonna change it with your comments and beliefs. Meanwhile rent is due next month and you need to pay up by using these "ineficient" mechanisms set in place by powers higher than you.
          • kiba 2y ago
            Idealistic? So what? I am just pointing out the contradiction of people's thought. I perfectly know well it's not how things should work but how it works right now, but if people believed silly things I am going to point it out. You are welcome to point out flaws in my thinking.
        • AnimalMuppet 2y ago
          Stop thinking in terms of dollars. Think in terms of stuff - that's the actual wealth. You can move dollars around with or without jobs, but somebody has to make the stuff. Someone has to grow the food. Otherwise, you have dollars but not food, and you can't eat dollars. So the thing about jobs is, we really need jobs that actually produce stuff. We don't just need jobs, we need somebody to create the wealth. First it has to exist, then we can worry about how it gets distributed. So if you have a bunch of people who are not necessary, then the best thing to do is not to let them starve (which is also immoral), nor to give them pointless jobs (which is soul-destroying), but to find something useful for them to do.
    • kiba 2y ago
      Quality of life also doesn't cost money. Road infrastructure in the United States might as well be a form of digging holes and then refilling it back up again. Grossly inefficient when we could invest the infrastructure money into world class public transit.
      • wombatpm 2y ago
        I think you fail to grasp just how big the US is. Driving from Chicago to Minneapolis is ~430 miles/ 6.5 hours depending on weather and traffic. Every 10 miles or so there is an exit and usually some small town. Every 50 to 100 miles a bigger town. As I recall, after the Chicago suburbs you hit Rockford, Janesville, Madison, Baraboo, Tomah, Eau Claire, Menominee, and Hudson before you get to the St Paul collar communities. So 9 stops on on a single track running between two major cities, with only 1600 more miles to Seattle. And while the distance between stops increase, the population greatly decreases as you head west. Now road construction could be better. Because while Illinois has 300k lane-miles of road, it seems like they only have 200k of asphalt and 100k under construction at any given point in time.
        • Jensson 2y ago
          Scandinavia is sparser than USA and as large as the larger populated states, still has asphalted roads and public stuff even up north.
          • spiderfarmer 2y ago
            American exceptionalism at its finest.
          • jandrese 2y ago
            This is a bit misleading as those countries tend to have the vast majority of the population crowded into a handful of cities that are fairly close together and then a vast untamed wilderness where close to nobody lives. It's easy(ish) to have rail between Oslo and Bergen, less practical to extend that rail to Oldervik.
        • 2y ago
    • torginus 2y ago
      I have had this niggling feeling for a long time that money (and capitalism) gets increasingly more divorced from reality, particularly as money is printed and these astronomic speculative stock market valuations are created based on some optimistic future scenario. This is not some pearl clutching moralistic argument, but a practical observation based on: - Transfer of ownership is not necessarily possible. You can't buy a technologically sensitive company because of regulations. Even if you can buy a foreign firm, transferring the talent, operational base etc. might not be possible. A CEO can't sell off his share of stocks even if they're worth billions because the loss of investor confidence. - Physical limitations on quantities of goods. There is a finite supply of real estate. If everybody in the world wanted a new car suddenly (and had money for it), car prices would go through the roof, and only a small fraction would actually get it. Imo capitalism is not flawed in the way that it is incapable of handling these situations, but it is very flawed in that money is an increasingly poor proxy for the abstract concept of value. This flawed nature of capitalism has been long since endemic (and dare I say integral) to the system, much more value has existed on paper than in reality (see banks), but I think there might be a breaking point at which the system might collapse and hyperinflation would set in.
      • Ferret7446 2y ago
        It is precisely because individuals suck so much at correctly perceiving the allocation of value that free market economies ("capitalism") completely blow centrally planned ones ("socialism") out of the water. So the fact that you think money is divorced from reality is a very normal, mundane misconception.
        • torginus 2y ago
          You're taking my argument in the direction I never intended, then taking the dicothomy to the extreme, and then claiming victory unsupported by evidence. - I never wanted to contrast 'capitalism' and 'communism' or whatever. I merely wanted to point out that the fundamental absurdity of capitalism requiring infinite growth in a finite system has been resolved by having the growth of wealth coming from speculation on future unrealized value. Since I (or anyone else) can't predict the future, it might happen that things do not come to pass as they were expected and that future value might not be realized. Money is divorced from reality, it derives its value from the collective trust and belief by the people participating in the system that it can be exchanged for goods and services. In a system of rational and impartial actors, that belief is backed by chiefly existence of said goods (which is the real size of the economic pie) and less by the speculation of future potential that might or or might not happen. So in summary my argument is not between communism or capitalism, but a captialism that is backed by real world value and one that is backed by future speculation. Even if the former can create less economic growth, we can be certain that growth is real. - Central planning works. Great public works certainly are dreamt up and funded by governments yet they contribute enormously to the wealth of nations and enable a lot of value to be created. The moon landing was centrally planned and executed by a country whose per capita wealth was on par with modern day Poland, yet is considered the greatest achivement in history. - There are no real 'centrally planned' or 'free market' economies, as all countries employ both concepts to some degree. But if we were to make a argument, we could say that the US belongs to the 'free market' camp and China belongs the 'centrally planned' camp. Both countries are doing extremely well, this very discussion is about finding which one is actually doing better.
    • willtemperley 2y ago
      Exactly and the fact that, for example, West and Central Africa are waking up [1] to the fact that France has been scamming them out of untold billions, probably trillions is going to shift power significantly. This is happening now. Senegal are following Chad in cutting ties with French military. [1] https://theconversation.com/cfa-franc-conditions-are-ripe-for-replacement-of-the-west-african-currency-rooted-in-colonialism-expert-226969 https://theconversation.com/cfa-franc-conditions-are-ripe-fo...
      • willtemperley 2y ago
        Downvotes without comment are pathetic. Step up and make an argument. It's real, it's happening and Europe needs to wake up.
      • readthenotes1 2y ago
        Because of the travle game(1) I learned that it was/is common for the leader of the former French colony to send hundreds of thousands in bribes to the president of France... (1) Travle posted here on hn months ago, but unfortunately a Webapp that downloads so I can't give you a url
      • spiderfarmer 2y ago
        The economy is not a zero sum game. If other countries are doing well, all the better.
        • Cumpiler69 2y ago
          >The economy is not a zero sum game. Most parts of the global economy are. If you're selling cars for example, there's a fixed amount of drivers on the road you can sell cars to, so if you're VW, you're now competing with cheaper cars from Asia for those same drivers. You can't create new drivers out of thin air to expand the market demand for cars. Once the market is saturated, without having any moat, you enter in a race to the bottom. And that's what Germany's economy is discovering right now and why Europe's share of global GDP has been declining for the past 20 years.
    • devjab 2y ago
      You are correct but it’s also more complex than that since competitive can mean many things. Currently the vast majority of government income for European countries is income tax, and income tax is usually more profitable when the market is actually competitive. Which means you need small local businesses and local production. Having completely optimised and global logistics and value chains isn’t necessarily good for wages. We can tax the wealthy and fortunes more than we do, and we probably should, but within the current systems it wouldn’t change that much. So in some sense many European countries are better prepared for economic downturns than the US even though European countries don’t have a lot of major corporations which don’t produce anything locally. Obviously it’s even more complex than this. Part of what is bringing down the economies in France and Italy is workers rights. Being able to retire at 60 is great, but it was also something that was obtained when people didn’t live as long and have as few children. Though Greece seems to have managed ok without having new public management plunder their country.
      • Workaccount2 2y ago
        >Being able to retire at 60 is great, but it was also something that was obtained when people didn’t live as long and have as few children. Short aside this reminds me of: In the US, my Boss's neighbor is an 85 year old woman who retired 42 years ago. And still gets a paycheck twice a month (with CoL increases) and full health insurance. She became a municipal clerk when she turned 18, worked 25 years to get a full pension, then retired at 43. The optimism (maybe pessimism?) people had back in the day was wild. I nearly fell out of my chair when he told me this.
  • egeozcan 2y ago
    Life in the EU is amazing for me, and probably for you too, as well as many others enjoying it here. However, we can't overlook the struggles of those who are turning to radical populist parties.
    • dachworker 2y ago
      I don't think the far-right is fueled by economic stagnation, but I do think that, were we living in an economic golden age, people would be able to ignore and excuse the increased prevalence of foreigners on "their" streets.
      • decremental 2y ago
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      • Cumpiler69 2y ago
        [flagged]
        • stogot 2y ago
          Well said. Better than I could put into words
          • aguaviva 2y ago
            No, it's just an inspid rant. Let's pick a spot at random: But at the same time the state somehow has money to house feed and medically care of millions of illegal immigrants Do you honestly think the government is literally simply "housing" all the authorized immigrants? As in, literally writing checks to their landlords? And literally paying their grocery bills, each and every week? Do you actually think that's what's happening? Remember, the rant wasn't referring simply to new arrivals, but literally to all the "millions" who have been here for decades. With the tacit approval of US society at large, for the simple reason that (authorized or not) the vast majority form an indispensible part of its workforce, doing the hard work that most Americans refuse to do. I'm not saying the migrant crisis isn't a huge, costly mess. But for whatever is happening, I just don't get these weird, distorted and emotionally manipulative narratives.
  • zpeti 2y ago
    Which country? This matters a lot. I doubt you are in Greece, or Italy, or Portugal. Did you know on GBP PPP Warsaw and Budapest are now better places to live than Madrid, Lisbon and many other Mediterranean cities? It’s crazy. Perhaps Berlin and Copenhagen are still ok, but even France is on a completely unsustainable path that will explode in the next 10-20 years.
  • dachworker 2y ago
    Where does this notion come from? Many Europeans cannot even afford proper AC in summer and heating in winter.
    • Jensson 2y ago
      Of course they can afford it, its just a cultural difference. > Many Europeans cannot even afford proper AC in summer and heating in winter. Basically nobody lacks heating in winter, that one is made up. The thing people lack is AC and its just because people aren't used to it so they don't see it as a need. Edit: Saying this is like saying people can't afford shelter in USA, it is true and there are many homeless but it describes a tiny fraction.
      • matwood 2y ago
        And a lot of people in the northern US also don’t have AC. It just wasn’t necessary until somewhat recently. Had little to do with affordability.
      • bluGill 2y ago
        Many Europeans have a mild climate where the few days AC is really better than no AC isn't enough to be worth it. Particularly if you stick to western Europe when you mean Europe, (eastern Europe has a harsher climate but also still coming out from soviet days and so doesn't have the wealth needed to put AC everywhere though some are getting close)
      • rootusrootus 2y ago
        > The thing people lack is AC and its just because people aren't used to it so they don't see it as a need. I suspect it's just that Europe is mostly north of the US and AC is more luxury than necessity. Places in the US like Seattle, which is still south of much of Europe, only recently rose above 50% AC prevalence. It's become much more popular as the climate as grown warmer.
      • mbs159 2y ago
        > Many Europeans cannot even afford proper AC in summer and heating in winter. A lot of people don't need AC, and heating is a non-issue almost everywhere.
  • mytailorisrich 2y ago
    Quality of life is the result of economic prosperity. If the economy falls behind then quality of life will follow at some point. In fact quality of life is already not so great and decreasing.
    • Cumpiler69 2y ago
      >If the economy falls behind then quality of life will follow at some point. If only Europeans would accept this truth and wake up that something has to change yesterday. What's happening to Greece is just the mining canary for what's gonna happen in much of the rest of EU later, if there's no preventive change of course.
    • bluGill 2y ago
      Only partially true though. A rising tide can lift all ships. The EU can benefit from advancements in the US invests in because of our wealth. This goes the other way as well, even thought he EU isn't putting out as much, they are putting out something and that benefits the US. So long as they don't fall so far behind that it isn't worth trying to bring them up - but this is unlikely, I'm not even sure how this could happen.
      • mytailorisrich 2y ago
        No it's not "partially" true. Noone claims that people in the third world enjoy great quality of life, for instance. You can't benefit from the advancements of others if you cannot afford them... > I'm not even sure how this could happen. It can always happen but it is gradual and takes time. Places like India or China were once the richest areas of the world, only to fall behind and become among the poorest later on because they stagnated while others progressed.
        • bluGill 2y ago
          That is why it is partially true. There are many other factors as to great quality of life. If you have all those other factors as well then a rising tide can life your boat too. Some third world countries have seen this over the years, and others are seeing it now. Some have seen it and then something (often a coup) reverted them to bad quality of life.
  • ms30 2y ago
    Declining/Aging Population becomes the issue. Solutions will probably come from Biology/Nature. Human Quality of life seems to flip the natural "evolutionary script" wrt to population growth. Shrinking population = shrinking landlords/bankers/labor/traders/military/scientists etc In nature, where there is environmental instability/resource scarcity you see a Quantity over Quality reproductive survival strategy (which is similar to what we see poorer regions of the world) that fuels population growth. On the flip side, where there is resource abundance and stability there is growth in population. But we don't see that happening in the richer/higher developed regions with humans. Its like advanced human society/culture has worked out how to override biology. We currently work around falling population(and the shrinking factors of production) with tech/automation, financial/military arm twisting and immigration which gives rise its own social and cultural instability. Nature has found other population models though. Ants(Eusocial insects) have solved their population/survival issues by have a single Baby factory. There are theories that the Haplodiploidy it produces makes ant societies function smoother. While Meerkats have collective breeding model which is similar to what certain Feminists talk about when they say Make Kin not Babies. It will take a couple generations of futzing about in unnecessary directions before we solve these issues. So patience with the people who don't know what they are doing is key.
    • benterix 2y ago
      I tend to agree to a certain extent. From my observation it seems that a certain amount of suffering in life creates strong motivation for overcoming it. If you just have a very happy life you don't have that strong motivation to change things.
      • Cumpiler69 2y ago
        >If you just have a very happy life you don't have that strong motivation to change things. Or you see no way out, feel defeated and see that positive change is impossible or futile. It cuts both ways. Inaction doesn't always mean a rosy life.
        • benterix 2y ago
  • JohnFen 2y ago
    As a US citizen, I look with envy on the quality of life in many EU countries.
    • nickpp 2y ago
      You can look closer, if you want. The EU is cheaper and cheaper for the American tourists. And please make sure to visit some of the Eastern European countries, like Romania or Bulgaria too. They are part of the EU as well.
    • matwood 2y ago
      As has I’ve heard said, the best place to make money is the US and the best place to spend money is the EU. If you believe this is the case as I do, the next step is to figure out how to lifestyle arbitrage. Make US wages while living in the EU. I’m older with bit more freedom than when I just started out, but this is exactly what I’m doing. My plan is to eventually quasi retire to the house I’m currently renovating.
    • rootusrootus 2y ago
      I love living in the US and visiting the EU. For me, that seems to be the very best arrangement. Early on, I was infatuated with the perceived better quality of life in the EU, but I see now that I could not easily create something comparable to what I enjoy in the US unless I was an elite member of EU society. My guess is that this is true for the majority of US residents on HN.
  • RestlessMind 2y ago
    > The EU is number one in quality of life and that’s all that matters to me Probably it is time for you to learn the plight of fellow Europeans then. The society is stewing for quite some time now, for example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_vests_protests https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_vests_protests The symbol has become "a unifying thread and call to arms" as yellow vests are common and inexpensive, easy to wear over any clothing, are associated with working-class industries, highly noticeable, and widely understood as a distress signal. Rise of far right parties across Italy, Germany, Hungary, Poland, France and many other countries is another clear signal that EU's quality of life may not be great for everyone there.
    • spiderfarmer 2y ago
      Being number one doesn't say it's good for everyone here. It says more about how bad it is in the rest of the world. Also, here in The Netherlands the yellow vests were mostly conspiracy theorists who would pull something to protest against out of thin air. That movement died down pretty quickly. Protests here are almost always against (perceived) government overreach. In most countries even being able to protest is considered a luxury. That's why you don't see that many in the US.
      • ashoeafoot 2y ago
        The idea that conspiracies could thrive under economic stress doesn't even occur..
        • WhatIsDukkha 2y ago
          Well being loopy isn't too good for economic success so that's a factor? Though for sure I've met some incredibly loopy people that had some great dice roll streaks. But there are a lot of other factors in the problem and making it an economic issue really obscures some of the more important factors. Intellectual laziness, idle brains, idle hands, toxic memes and bad actors making bad use of them.
          • 2y ago
  • NeinMiez 2y ago
    [dead]
  • loxodrome 2y ago
    I’m an American living in France for the past two years and cannot wait to move back to the USA. The taxes are so extreme and salaries so low that no one can even invest in the stock market. If I stay here, I will be able to leave virtually nothing to my kids when I die. The EU can take its 5 weeks of vacation and go fuck itself.
    • ein0p 2y ago
      Have you seen the steep exponent on the US debt? You won't be able to leave anything to your kids if you move to the US either. Might as well enjoy 2 weeks vacation, rather than 2.
    • fennecfoxy 2y ago
      Instead, you'd rather spend all of that money on healthcare in the US and still have nothing left behind. What's the point of inheriting a life in a corporate hellscape (presuming you live in a tech city).
    • gchamonlive 2y ago
      [flagged]
    • sho_hn 2y ago
      On the other hand, it's absolutely fantastic to have a young daughter and have her virtually not impact our finances at all for many years, between clothes/toy gifts from friends, gov subsidy, free healthcare, free education and low levels of keeping-up-with-the-Joneses on after-school activities, plus knowing I won't burden her financially either as I happily live out my retirement on a decent pension. I may not leave her a lot of inherited wealth, but she may also not really need any to have options. (That said, my personal frame of reference for why this is better and wonderfully stress-free is years lived in South Korea--that ultra-low fertility rate has reasons--, not so much the US.)
      • fakedang 2y ago
        At the current trajectory of the EU though, don't count on it. She will regret you guys not having built up an inheritance for her, considering that EU tier 1 and tier 2 towns and cities are being rapidly bought up by American private equity.
  • asdasdsddd 2y ago
    That's what the chinese thought in the 18th century :). A fun quote for the europeans here: "Our land is so wealthy and prosperous that we possess all things. Therefore, there is no need to exchange the produce of foreign barbarians for our own." - The emperor at the height of Qing China
    • asah 2y ago
      This was in fact so true that the Brits forced the matter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_Wars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_Wars
      • anon291 2y ago
        If your lesson from history is that hubris works, then that's very interesting.
      • Der_Einzige 2y ago
        Ironically, the most drug liberal places in the world, i.e. Silicon Valley, are the source of what this article talks about, productivity gains! You just need the right drugs, in this case, Psychedelics.
      • trhway 2y ago
        That is the point - the Brits were able to force the matter. If you aren't up-to-date on technology, specifically military tech, you're going to have matters like this forced upon you. Que the Ukraine giving up the nukes (and later getting rid of even non-nuclear missiles).
      • marcosdumay 2y ago
        There are a few centuries and a lot of decline between those.
    • DiogenesKynikos 2y ago
      The Emperor is not necessarily the guy to go to for the man-in-the-street view from China.
  • bjourne 2y ago
    Though it has very much decreased in recent years due to rampant inflation. My real wage has decreased since increases have been lower than inflation. For unemployed and low earners it is even worse.
  • deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  • voidfunc 2y ago
    Enjoy it while it lasts, your social programs are a gift from the US historically subsidizing your defense.
    • quonn 2y ago
      This always went both ways with the EU providing a market. When the US stops to provide defense, watch and see the EU reaction, starting with all things digital.
      • anon291 2y ago
        As India and China both produce solid middle classes demanding American products, this will matter less and less. We're already seeing this on the West Coast of America (what I know) where Asian and Indian cultures are gaining more and more influence.
        • quonn 2y ago
          It will not matter less and less because China can and will satisfy that demand themselves without relying on American products. So far the US exports about half as much to China compared to the exports to the EU (2022). And it will likely export less to China in the future. India is not even close to replacing the huge European middle class and even if it were it has proven to be a highly unreliable partner. And so far the US exports to India are not even 15% of what is exported to the EU (2022). The EU middle class comprises around 280 million people. Almost as many as the whole US population. And it is culturally and politically aligned with the US to a large extent. It‘s a huge market to loose. Nobody would drop 15-20% of their exports to try to save 5% of their defense budget all while loosing influence and power.
      • 0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
        The US is also a market for EU products. To reverse roles in your argument: Imagine if the US put sanctions on EU companies because EU militaries aren't doing enough to help the US fight cartels in Mexico. Seem reasonable?
  • naming_the_user 2y ago
    This feels like a huge generalization to me. The US, UK, EU and realistically most developed countries I would say have fairly similar quality of life within margin of error. I've travelled a fair amount and everywhere is basically the same. For an individual it's really going to come down to lifestyle and what you prefer. Some people like urban living and walkability, if that's you then you probably want Japan or old world metropolitan European cities. Some people want a house on a few acres and national parks the size of countries, if that's you then you probably want the US. Working cultures are different but then there is no average on that either. People on HN tend to assume everyone is an office worker or something which is actually a fairly narrow slice of the middle of the spectrum. Equally though, online (you can see it in this thread) there's sometimes a weird focus on the absolute worst outcomes which I've always found baffling. If you're planning to become a poor fentanyl addict then yeah, don't go to the US, find a country with a safety net, it'll be more fun.
    • amrocha 2y ago
      [flagged]
      • lordloki 2y ago
        I can understand this perspective if you've never been here and base it all on what you read online.
        • amrocha 2y ago
          I lived in Canada for 12 years and regularly visited the US for pleasure and work.
          • signatoremo 2y ago
            Versus people who live in the US in this thread who told you otherwise?
            • 2y ago
  • jandrewrogers 2y ago
    The higher quality-of-life was likely true at one time but I think it is quite arguable now in much of Europe. There is a palpable sense of decline that weighs too heavily on everything. How "quality" is a life without meaningful optimism for the future? It is the quality-of-life of a pensioner waiting for the graveyard. An underrated benefit of the markedly higher standard of living in the US is that people can choose to trade standard of living for quality of life if they wish. American culture seems to preference maxing standard of living but that is optional, and there are plenty of people that make other choices.
    • amrocha 2y ago
      How is the “standard of living” in the US in any way higher than europe?
      • jibe 2y ago
        Air conditioning
        • amrocha 2y ago
          You can just buy an AC in Europe, most of the time you don’t need it though
      • Workaccount2 2y ago
        The US has wealth disparity, not lack of wealth. The US is an incredible place to live if you have valuable skills, and a below average place to live if you don't.
        • amrocha 2y ago
          [flagged]
  • YetAnotherNick 2y ago
    Even within EU there is a clear correlation between economy and quality of life between countries. While yes more social policy improves quality of life, it can't compensate if the economy difference is too high.
  • cynicalsecurity 2y ago
    This quality of life can disappear in a matter of seconds. EU is still not actively working on protecting itself from the Russian threat. The moment Russia attacks which is going to happen since this is what the fascist Russian dictatorship wants, we could kiss our quality of life goodbye.
  • fakedang 2y ago
    The EU could be a powerful neutral third block, focused on providing the best for its citizens, but for that they would have to keep up economically. The EU is currently a massive laggard, worse than China in a lot of metrics, yet having dalliances with some levels of Chinese authoritarianism. Not to mention the current unsustainable state of its welfare state.
  • rdm_blackhole 2y ago
    You forgot to mention that this quality of life is bought with debt and deficits that have been running for the last 30 years. Look at what's happening in France for proof that this is just not sustainable. The US has a massive advantage tough,their currency is the global currency accepted and needed everywhere that is backed by the US army. Much less so the Euro. The cost of all these social programs has to come from somewhere and currently the majority of these costs are shouldered by the middle class that is being squeezed to the max and speaking as someone from the middle class, I can assure you that having a couple of extra weeks of holiday and more job safety (if you are into that sort of thing) is not worth 55% to 65% of my gross income. Even universal healthcare is crumbling now. At some point the EU will need to get it's productivity up and become competitive once again or all this quality of life will have to go as it won't be financially possible to continue on this path.
  • eikenberry 2y ago
    This is assuming nation-state conquests are out of the picture.
  • roncesvalles 2y ago
    >The EU is number one in quality of life I feel like this is only the case for a very narrow demographic - the young, bicycle-riding, sex-having mid-20s college grad still trying to figure out their calling in life while living frugally without a care. It really sucks being 40 and still earning like 57k EUR or whatever.
    • ragazzina 2y ago
      >It really sucks being 40 and still earning like 57k EUR or whatever. Is this a joke? 60k in France means you earn more than 92% of the population. 60k in Italy means you earn more than 96% of the population. 60k in Germany means you earn more than 80% of the population.
      • roncesvalles 2y ago
        Without challenging the veracity of your statements (which sound implausible if you narrow it down to working age population not in education and working a full-time permanent job), so what? There is no rule that life should only suck for a minority of people and that most people are happy. It may well be that the 90% of people earning <60k EUR live generally miserable lives, and for the top 10%, "the EU is number one" and they post about it on Hacker News.
      • deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    • sofixa 2y ago
      > It really sucks being 40 and still earning like 57k EUR or whatever. Why? If that's enough money for the quality of life you want for the cost of living you have, what does the number matter?
  • mmmBacon 2y ago
    Given European demographics and the changing political landscape, it's hard to imagine that the quality of life in Europe can remain as it was through the 1990-2010's. Additionally, many European cities are essentially museums, riding on what was built centuries ago, with little innovation. If you don't believe this, just go to a German city that was completely destroyed during the war. I'd imagine that Europe is at or near the peak in terms of its quality of life. At least some of the European lifestyle has been due to peace on the Continent. Up until now peace in Europe has been funded by US taxpayers. The situation in Georgia and in Ukraine is what you get when European affairs are left to Europeans. Without the US providing military aid to Ukraine, Ukraine would have fallen and you'd have Putin banging on your back door. Additionally, the EU's inability to supply Ukraine with basic military equipment such as artillery shells is indicative of how Europe is devoid of industrial capacity and couldn't rally in its own defense if it had to.
    • 71bw 2y ago
      >The situation in Georgia and in Ukraine is what you get when European affairs are left to Europeans. What are you smoking? >Additionally, the EU's inability to supply Ukraine with basic military equipment such as artillery shells is indicative of how Europe is devoid of industrial capacity and couldn't rally in its own defense if it had to. https://www.president.pl/storage/image/core_files/2024/11/12/998e369f0515f1c03cb0b22ee79ed9be/jpg/prezydent/preview/EN%20czolgi%20logo%20popr.jpg https://www.president.pl/storage/image/core_files/2024/11/12...
      • mmmBacon 2y ago
        To your country's credit Poland is punching above its weight relative to the rest of the deadbeats but I wasn't talking about tanks. However, you've sent 240 T-72 Soviet era tanks to Ukraine and ~12 Leopard tanks. I was talking basic equipment like: 155mm artillery shells. In that case, unfortunately, the facts are not on your side. The majority of 155mm shells that are sent to Ukraine come from the US. The US has increased production of 155mm shells 6x this year alone. The same is true for body armor and small arms. Europe cannot ramp production in almost any category. Then there's this. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1364467/ukraine-weapon-deliveries-value-by-country/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/1364467/ukraine-weapon-d...
  • clarionbell 2y ago
    The reason for that is that we have offloaded defense to americans and have century of accumulated capital (legacy of colonialism) to spend. How long do you think it's going to last? Even Brussels is getting concerned and that's telling.
• roncesvalles 2y ago
  PPP is an increasingly irrelevant notion in a globalized, digital, and immigration-friendly world. An iPhone or a Toyota Corolla costs the same in the US as it does in China. There is no remarkable arbitrage with real estate either - you're paying for the location and everything that comes with it. There is no secret city where the rent is low, there are plenty of well-paying jobs, you enjoy freedom of speech and can be reasonably sure the milk isn't tainted with melamine (tangent: due to strict US immigration policies and corporate RTO, the Bay Area comes close). PPP suffers from the same problem that "basket of goods" CPI suffers from in that it doesn't account for differences in quality: - of course a car costs more today than it did in 1980, it's a far better car - of course a loaf of bread costs more in California than it does in India - I have certain guarantees about the pesticide levels in the wheat, the accuracy of the labeling, and my ability to seek damages from the legal system in case I chip my tooth on a stone, that I don't have in India At best, PPP tells you something about the differences in cost of labor. But labor isn't everything you buy.
  • pg314 2y ago
    > An iPhone or a Toyota Corolla costs the same in the US as it does in China. A maxed out iPhone costs RMB 13999 in China, which is about USD 1925. The same iPhone costs USD 1599 in the US. In Brazil it costs the equivalent of USD 2565. PPP is still very much relevant.
    • roncesvalles 2y ago
      Shouldn't it cost less in China?
      • Cumpiler69 2y ago
        Why?
    • dtquad 2y ago
      Each country has their own misleading way of calculating PPP. Some probably include the iPhone price. PPP is useless misleading nonsense.
• amsechi 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • loglog 2y ago
    "Losing 30 trillion" is a very entitled view on decreasing real estate prices. Those 600 million people making 1000 CNY/month or less (and probaly another 300 million making a bit more) will be happy for a respite in being priced out of everywhere. This literally increases their purchasing power.
    • alephnerd 2y ago
      > Those 600 million people making 1000 CNY/month or less (and probaly another 300 million making a bit more) will be happy for a respite in being priced out of everywhere Those 600 million cannot afford to buy real estate even at the crashed price. The going rate for a 2bhk in a tier 2/3 is still $100-300k, which is still unaffordable given that median urban household income is $6k and median rural household income is $3k. And this is the crux of the problem in China - all this "overproduction" isn't necessarily due to some grand strategy, it's due to a lack of consumers because salaries are too low.
• kwanbix 2y ago
  When I hear "America’s economy is soaring," I can’t help but think it probably just means the rich are getting richer. Don’t get me wrong—I’m not a communist. But it’s clear to me, especially when you look at how the middle class is struggling worldwide, that capitalism in its current form isn’t sustainable. What we need is some kind of “Capitalism 2.0” or “Capitalism++”. It makes no sense that someone with 300 billion dollars pays less (or even nothing) than a person that makes 100k per year. And this happens on ALL countries. EDIT for those downvoting: just watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM and then tell me why I am wrong.
  • matwood 2y ago
    Covid and the subsequent recovery was and is definitely K shaped. Someone with a house and assets has crushed it. Those without have only fallen further behind.
    • kwanbix 2y ago
      Yes, COVID made it even worst. But this has been happening since before COVID.
      • matwood 2y ago
        Yes, I would say COVID accelerated what was already happening.
    • acchow 2y ago
      You nailed it. This was the case across all developed economies, a direct result of money printing. You did especially well if you had assets bought with borrowed money since your gains were leveraged and your loan principal inflated away.
      • kwanbix 2y ago
        COVID only made it worst, as companies took advantage of COVID to inflate prices.
• sanp 2y ago
  GDP PPP is based on assumptions that - 1) People indifferent countries have the same basket of goods - probably not true for someone living in US vs Chine vs India 2) Accurate pricing data is available (which is not true for big categories like real estate in India and China - a large part of the price is under the table and unaccounted)
• TeaBrain 2y ago
  PPP is only useful for measuring regional purchasing power within a country. As a metric for comparing the relative strength of global economies it is irrelevant.
  • FactKnower69 2y ago
    [flagged]
  • Leary 2y ago
    Just the opposite. PPP is less useful when comparing intra-country than inter-country. It's only relevant because there are barriers to trade, especially in services.
    • encoderer 2y ago
      this is economist-brained and about the same as using CPI as the only measure of inflation. They are models.
• bloppe 2y ago
  PPP matters on an individual level, but not at all on a national level. GDP at market exchange rates is what actually matters in terms of what a country can accomplish on the world stage. And even on an individual level, PPP struggles with accuracy, because things are only ever roughly equivalent. There's a reason why so many individual people are trying to move from China and India to the US and EU, despite all the personal financial disadvantages of doing so.
  • Leary 2y ago
    Wrong. People move from China to India despite the higher prices in America precisely because the increase in wages is more than enough to offset the higher prices.
    • bloppe 2y ago
      True, my comment was ignoring the fact that America's per-capita GDP is higher even after controlling for PPP. People can move for a lot of reasons. Having a much more transparent and predictable justice system is also one of them. For instance, my money would go a lot further in Russia, but then I'd have to live in Russia. But the point stands that market-exchange GDP matters more when it comes to comparing the relative strength of countries, rather than individuals, since it endows the government with greater purchasing strength. An era of trade wars might test this theory, but the ramifications of absolute isolationism would be far more complex than that.
      • corimaith 2y ago
        >For instance, my money would go a lot further in Russia, but then I'd have to live in Russia. It's important to point that if you were moving into Russia as an expat, you've already avoided much of the opportunity costs of building your career there first and instead going in having "made it" in another country. If you are starting out in China or Russia, it's much harder relatively to climb to a similar position within those countries than in USA. Alot of expats might like how much their money goes in China with good CoL, but I'd be suprised if they were to send their children through the conventional route of the Gaokao and ultracompetitive Chinaese University Admissions and labour market. Getting into the Ivy or Berekely or a State Flagship and then FAANG is cakewalk in contrast.
• georgeecollins 2y ago
  A lot of macro economic statistics should be taken with a grain of salt, or more literally: approximations with a measurement error. PPP GDP is useful to compare, particularly politically because if the cost of goods in a country is lower people are more likely to be healthy / comfortable with less income. I think it is a little dubious when you use PPP to compare th3e size of two economies because 1) you are taking two approximate measurements and multiplying them 2) countries with lower GDP / person typically have higher relative purchasing power. In "rich country" (high GDP /person) you can charge a lot for a cup of coffee. In "poorer country" you are likely to charge less. Therefore you can say that person in the poorer country is not as badly off as the absolute numbers suggest. However, if "poorer country" got to the same GDP / person purchasing parity might end up being almost the same. Or, countries with lots of poor regions will have a better PPP, but the cost of living in the places where people have high income may have similar costs. And in general the most valuable purchasing power differences don't happen for the most valuable and traded goods. An equivalent airplane is going to cost as much in India as the USA, on average. At some point the absolute number is also important.
  • dragonelite 2y ago
    gdp is really bad, countries don't even use the same counting methods. I think in the Netherlands they started using criminal activity to pad up gdp growth. Also money printing and inflation is a good way to up gdp. I like energy production and consumption a lot more, modern economies pretty much come down to using energy to either transfer or modify goods, services or data.
    • roenxi 2y ago
      This is actually my preferred measure too. I was happy to use GDP PPP figures because they tell a similar story to the energy statistics on ourworldindata.org. Asia miles ahead, China the most dominant, then the US and then EU. India looking to overtake the EU fairly rapidly if they follow China's footsteps. Of course the per-capita numbers favour the US still. But by absolute figures, the crown goes to Asia. And per capita the Europeans can realistically be said to be behind China for policy making purposes, the trends are clear.
• wtcactus 2y ago
  Europe is willingly self sabotaging their industry and energy production, in the name of some completely irrational environmentalist ideology that states that saving the planet is achieved by making Europe poorer while allowing China, India and a few others to pollute without any restrictions. So yeah, we are getting poorer by the day and on the brink of a major economic crisis. Just look at what is happening in Germany.
  • NotSammyHagar 2y ago
    European auto makers are failing because they can't make EVs that the market wants. And the market doesn't want their ICE vehicles either. They over-focused on very expensive high end EV vehicles. That's why they are hurting, it's not because it's EVs. European ICE vehicles are losing out in China because people there don't want to buy any more gas vehicles, at least most people are getting there. VWAG is losing marketshare in every segment that I see. It's not green power that is killing them, it's not many good cheap vehicles that are killing them - gas or EV.
    • kazen44 2y ago
      making a cheap EV (like the trabant/VW beetle for EV's) would be great. Gas prices in europe are no joke, and considering we are basically in a hybrid war with one of the biggest oil producers for europe, getting rid of energy dependence would be great for europe, and having cheap EV's would be key to that.
      • NotSammyHagar 2y ago
        So we are in agreement that cheap EVS would make sense for invigorating car sales in Europe. So why don't they do it? I think it's because they conclude they can't make any money if they make cheap EVS cuz the labor, batteries, components are too expensive or something for the lower profit per car world of cheaper vehicles. American car companies have gotten addicted to selling huge more expensive cars as a way to keep profits up.
  • newyankee 2y ago
• encoderer 2y ago
  “Find some way to present the data so the bigger number is actually worse” PPP is cope.
• 34573457 2y ago
  Who cares? I'd rather be #1 in disposable income for my people personally: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_capita_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposable_household_and_per_c...
• NotSammyHagar 2y ago
  What's this conspiracy of the US and Europe to destroy developing large economies world wide? If your plan is take over your neighbors, say you'll wipe out democracies and kill people and it's your destiny to win, then eventually the US & Europe will do something. Russia literally talks about taking over the countries around them, bites off pieces and then subverts the countries that are left. That was all before the first piece of Ukraine was taken, Crimea. NK - goal to destroy SK, has a big army and nukes. Worth trying to stop them. China - Chains says the mere existence of Taiwan is worth destroying them. Also taking over the south china sea on the stupid dashed line that says they own the ocean down there. Dictatorships can't stand a functional democracy right next door. India - if they don't plan to destroy the countries around them and take them over, then good on them. The US has been basically ignoring the fact that India is on a slow road to make their Muslim and other non-hindi citizens fail in every way in their society. India said FU to the world and has been happy buying a lot of Russian oil that's under embargo. No one attacked them. The world isn't so simple as "western countries destroy all large growing competitors".
  • newyankee 2y ago
    Well Bangladesh is already killing and destroying Hindu citizens now where the coup was orchestrated with US blessing.
  • z2 2y ago
    Two if not three of these examples are very much related to civil wars or civil-war-like dynamics. If anything, yes, I agree that the world usually isn't so simple to unconditionally take any single side.
• throw__away7391 2y ago
  I've spent a lot of time in a lot of different countries/cities with wildly different economics and I have a very different view of things. PPP in the real world is a bit of a fraud, at least in the way people commonly use it. A lot of things you compare between two countries are in fact very different in reality. You might actually end up paying a lot more in nominal dollars for a lot of things in countries which are supposedly "cheap" to get not even the same quality. I find that the cost to maintain the same quality of life between different countries ends up being much more similar between countries than the statistics would have you believe. I'm in a relatively poor country at the moment. On paper meat costs a fraction of what it does in the US, but what you get at the local market tastes absolutely terrible, uneatable to my spoiled western standards. I think they literally feed the animals trash. To get quality meat you need to go to specialty stores in the rich neighborhoods that caters to the country's elite. There it's actually about 10% more than what I pay at a US supermarket and it still is not as good. The same thing goes for housing, household goods, clothes, etc. In many countries you pay a huge premium for goods imported from the west, and the selection is often quite limited. This has been my experience everywhere in the world. Excluding a few cities where you pay a premium just on the basis of the local job market, you more or less get what you pay for no matter where you go. The differences that don't fit into spreadsheets are quite significant and almost fully account for the pricing differences from location to location.
  • jltsiren 2y ago
    This is the common expat mistake. Your cost of living can grow very high, if you try to replicate your old lifestyle in a country that doesn't support it. With the same approach, you can also find that living in the US is 2x to 3x more expensive than in Western Europe. (I personally settled for 2x by making some compromises.)
    • throw__away7391 2y ago
      No, not really. I specifically use meat as an example because you can buy a chicken pretty much everywhere in the world. To be clear, there are SOME things everywhere that are exceptional and cheap. Here for example I can hire a cook, two maids, and a driver for next to nothing even paying well above average wages, but having a dishwasher or air conditioning is an unthinkable luxury and even a vacuum is quite rare. Then there are a million little things you can't change at any price; you can't drink water from the tap even in my sparkling luxury apartment on the poshest block of the nicest city, and if I ever needed serious medical care I'd be on the first plane back to the US. There are tradeoffs everywhere but when you factor everything in including the overall quality of life in the city itself, prices are quite similar everywhere around the world...as you'd expect, since that's how markets work. My point is that the cost of things is more similar than people think, not what you should or should not buy as an individual, and that these adjusted PPP numbers do not make for valid comparisons. 99% of the time when PPP is used in the popular press someone is trying to bend the numbers to distort the real economic situation to try to further whatever narrative they're pushing. You will never see these people making the argument that Alabama is poised to overtake New York economically because on the average salary you can afford a larger apartment in Mobile than in Manhattan. To me these arguments sound equally ridiculous.
• adverbly 2y ago
  PPP is closer in some ways, but it's not the best... It tends to be biased against strong currencies. The USD has been extremely strong since the pandemic.
• mensetmanusman 2y ago
  PPP is a measure of how easy it is to afford home servants (I.e. the amount of income inequality near the low end).
• nradov 2y ago
  There has certainly been huge GDP growth in China but their specific claims about GDP can't be attempted to be believed. Their numbers have never been independently verified and most of the raw data is treated as a state secret. There is reason to suspect that some of what they're reporting is just made up. Party officials are evaluated based on meeting certain economic targets so there's a lot of incentive at the lower levels to falsify data. The same thing happened in the USSR before it collapsed (I'm not suggesting that China will collapse any time soon, just pointing out that this is a common pattern in single-party authoritarian governments). External estimates based on resource utilization indicate that real GDP might be significantly lower.
• cscurmudgeon 2y ago
  https://mishtalk.com/economics/purchasing-power-parity-silliness-and-the-myth-china-passed-the-us-in-gdp/ https://mishtalk.com/economics/purchasing-power-parity-silli... GDP PPP is meaningless for both geopolitical power and what it means for the average citizen. The average citizen in EU is much better than the one in China/India despite what the PPP numbers suggest as GDP per captaincy matters more. China and Russia resort to bartering due to US sanctions because GDP matters, and not GDP PPP [1]. PPP should be used to compare only similar countries like USA/Canada/UK or those in EU. Or countries in SEA. [1] https://www.intellinews.com/china-russia-to-reintroduce-barter-trade-for-the-first-time-in-30-years-to-avoid-us-sanctions-337867/ https://www.intellinews.com/china-russia-to-reintroduce-bart...
  • dukeyukey 2y ago
    > The average citizen in EU is much better than the one in China/India despite what the PPP numbers suggest as GDP per captaincy matters more. I mean, the PPP numbers say the average citizen in the EU is way better off thant he average in India or China, so eh?
    • cscurmudgeon 2y ago
      No they don't. By PPP, China comes out #1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(PPP)
      • dukeyukey 2y ago
        Per capita of course. We're talking about living standards here.
• janalsncm 2y ago
  I think generic metric metrics like GDP PPP have to be put into context. When I was in China I was shocked by how much stuff there was. Not even nice things, but stuff to the point most westerners would consider cluttered. Rent was also super cheap. On the other hand iPhones were pretty expensive. Enchiladas were super expensive too. These aggregated stats have to guess what you’ll buy and base their estimate off of that. Your actual financial situation will be very dependent on what you need to buy.
• 0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
  >And I expect that Asia is going to start developing some serious military muscle on the back of that because they have access to the history books and have a pretty good view into how Western leadership thinks. The history books say Western countries abandoned conquest many decades ago. The leaders who initiated colonialism are long dead. Nowadays all we have are handwavey analogies to colonialism when someone wants to be provocative. Countries aren't people: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXz0kbMKPu0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXz0kbMKPu0