my two cents as someone that worked in Europe and the US:
> time off
I get 21 days in the US, but any holiday that falls on a weekend I am guaranteed to get on a weekday.
Ultimately it ends up somewhere around 30 paid days off I would guess. Back in Germany, if a holiday fell on a weekend, I just lost it.
> government paid health care
In Germany I had to pay 7.5 percent of my salary + my employer had to match that. When I was freelancing I had to do the full 15%.
The US clearly has the worse healthcare system overall, but I pay a LOT less for MUCH better service. That is however just because of my employer and on a population level it's a catastrophe.
That being said, my impression is also very skewed by FANMAG and the average experience is probably worse.