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America sucks as a business environment: * Crappy immigration. I can get around the EU (Schengen) and across borders without breaking stride. In the US, it's 3

by madaxe 13y ago

America sucks as a business environment: * Crappy immigration. I can get around the EU (Schengen) and across borders without breaking stride. In the US, it's 3 hours minimum, and that's assuming you get in. * Crappy legislation and tax. Your tax codes suck. Starting a business sucks. In the UK, fill in a single bit of paper, and pay your corporation tax when it's due. Flat percentage of income, two rates, one for most businesses, one for huge businesses. Don't get me started on the strength of behemoth corporate interests lobbies. * Crappy businesses. The American way seems to be to hold a gun to your "partners'" heads, and use lawyers to enact your will. In Europe, people actually tend to trust one another. * Crappy security. By this I mean not "THERE SHOULD BE MORE POLICE", but rather "I don't know if I can run a business in the US without the state meddling, and/or simply taking it away from me, and/or the state collapsing leaving mayhem both for a business and for anyone stuck out there when the brown stuff hits the whirly thing.". I just don't understand why anyone would want to either start a business in the US, or do business with the US. We used to, but pulled out, as the EU is a plenty big enough market, and far more... humane. Come to Europe, it's nice here, and there are paid holidays.... and a government.

davidw 13y ago
> I just don't understand why anyone would want to either start a business in the US, or do business with the US. Here are some companies you could ask: Apple, IBM, Microsoft, Google, HP, Facebook, Cisco. Here are some others: http://yclist.com/ http://yclist.com/ It could well be - I would even suspect it myself - that the US is an imperfect country. And yet it seems to have a few companies who are able to do business there notwithstanding the harsh conditions.
- atlanticus 13y ago
  Europeans are always upset that the first country to market with new products is the US, but if they spent even half the time they spend complaining about America to actually build something useful they would be much better off.
  - madaxe 13y ago
    Ah, American exceptionalism. You're right. Everything but the US is some kind of barren desert which only exists in cartoons. Have you ever left your home city? State?
    - sigkill 13y ago
      But American exceptionalism is a real thing. Well atleast today I don't think it stands for "Well, America is awesome" but more on the lines of "Where in the world will I find 300 million people having roughly similar culture, and for whom I don't need to translate my product into a dozen languages (bonus if it's English since we program by default in English), and who're more probably willing to spend money." Bam, America. I'm not supporting anything, but looking at it from a business point of view this is pretty tempting.
      - madaxe 13y ago
        China and/or Russia. For English, Western Europe.
    - atlanticus 13y ago
      This comment from another site is appropriate: >The deep rooted anti-American theme of the EU does not take long to emerge. This undertone is rarely flaunted, but is intuitively detected. Few seem to understand that it is one of the bases of the United Kingdom’s deep unease with the EU, because UK people simply do not understand or share that objective.
      - madaxe 13y ago
        The UK's "unease" is artificial, constructed by nationalistic media. It certainly has nothing to do with the EU's stance towards the US. Had it, there would be no euroscepticism. The US is deeply unpopular, even in the UK.
- madaxe 13y ago
  It could be that those are the exact corporations of which I speak who control the legislature, thus creating a better environment for themselves at the expense of others. Stick your head out of your shell, and you'll realise there's a world out there, beyond America. I know it's hard to believe, but it does exist.
  - davidw 13y ago
    > Stick your head out of your shell, and you'll realise there's a world out there, beyond America. I know it's hard to believe, but it does exist. Actually, I live in Italy, where some of your "in Europe" lines do not hold true at all.
    - madaxe 13y ago
      Fair enough - and agreed. Berlusconi has done an admirable job of adopting American political mores, in terms of bribery, "special interests", and all the rest. It's going to take years for his chaos to be unwrought. Frankly, things aren't that much better in the UK, but I stand by the fact that it's a damned sight more straightforward to operate a business here than in the US. I have done both, and have lived in UK, US, HK, ZH, DE, FR, BE, SA, so have a fairly broad (but of course still limited) gamut of experience.

by madaxe 13y ago

davidw 13y ago

> I just don't understand why anyone would want to either start a business in the US, or do business with the US. Here are some companies you could ask: Apple, IBM, Microsoft, Google, HP, Facebook, Cisco. Here are some others: http://yclist.com/ http://yclist.com/ It could well be - I would even suspect it myself - that the US is an imperfect country. And yet it seems to have a few companies who are able to do business there notwithstanding the harsh conditions.

atlanticus 13y ago
Europeans are always upset that the first country to market with new products is the US, but if they spent even half the time they spend complaining about America to actually build something useful they would be much better off.
- madaxe 13y ago
  Ah, American exceptionalism. You're right. Everything but the US is some kind of barren desert which only exists in cartoons. Have you ever left your home city? State?
  - sigkill 13y ago
    But American exceptionalism is a real thing. Well atleast today I don't think it stands for "Well, America is awesome" but more on the lines of "Where in the world will I find 300 million people having roughly similar culture, and for whom I don't need to translate my product into a dozen languages (bonus if it's English since we program by default in English), and who're more probably willing to spend money." Bam, America. I'm not supporting anything, but looking at it from a business point of view this is pretty tempting.
    - madaxe 13y ago
      China and/or Russia. For English, Western Europe.
  - atlanticus 13y ago
    This comment from another site is appropriate: >The deep rooted anti-American theme of the EU does not take long to emerge. This undertone is rarely flaunted, but is intuitively detected. Few seem to understand that it is one of the bases of the United Kingdom’s deep unease with the EU, because UK people simply do not understand or share that objective.
    - madaxe 13y ago
      The UK's "unease" is artificial, constructed by nationalistic media. It certainly has nothing to do with the EU's stance towards the US. Had it, there would be no euroscepticism. The US is deeply unpopular, even in the UK.
madaxe 13y ago
It could be that those are the exact corporations of which I speak who control the legislature, thus creating a better environment for themselves at the expense of others. Stick your head out of your shell, and you'll realise there's a world out there, beyond America. I know it's hard to believe, but it does exist.
- davidw 13y ago
  > Stick your head out of your shell, and you'll realise there's a world out there, beyond America. I know it's hard to believe, but it does exist. Actually, I live in Italy, where some of your "in Europe" lines do not hold true at all.
  - madaxe 13y ago
    Fair enough - and agreed. Berlusconi has done an admirable job of adopting American political mores, in terms of bribery, "special interests", and all the rest. It's going to take years for his chaos to be unwrought. Frankly, things aren't that much better in the UK, but I stand by the fact that it's a damned sight more straightforward to operate a business here than in the US. I have done both, and have lived in UK, US, HK, ZH, DE, FR, BE, SA, so have a fairly broad (but of course still limited) gamut of experience.