That’s a phenomenon I have observed mostly only in US-based companies I have worked for.
Generally employees in the US tend do not have a sense of responsibility for the bigger picture, honestly, most just don’t give a shit. There’s no sense of belonging to a bigger cause. This is not meant as some sort of accusation, because I can understand 100% why that is. There's no reason for anyone to be actually motivated. People are treated like slaves, the general mindset is one of extreme superficiality, and even the most self-motivated and ambitious thought leaders end up being drained and exhausted and then dumped.
US work environments have brutal and insane administrative and technical overhead, are extremely inefficient and there is an abhorrent amount of parasitic middlemen ventures that have penetrated deep into even the most simple tasks and concepts. The environment itself is hostile towards efficiency and creativity.
US workers work more hours than in almost any developed country, yet efficiency is lower than anywhere else. It’s a common theme apparently, same shit with healthcare. Most expensive, least efficient and worst health outcomes in the developed world. Decreasing life expectancy, more infant deaths than in Russia and for some parts of the US, lower life expectancy than in Bangladesh. Sounds absolutely wonderful, and is a perfect example of exactly what’s wrong with the general work culture as well. It’s not about reaching some sort of long-term goal together, it’s just splitting the 3 step way up into 30 pieces and leeching and draining money out of every single one no matter the outcome. Short-term profit over anything else, fuck the future, fuck the new debt and fuck everyone else.
Personally, I had to distance myself from getting too invested and attached as well (so, in a sense, also giving less of a shit) because I got seriously depressed after a while.
But yeah, socialism is “evil”. Tell that to anyone of the happy, healthy and wealthy people in Europe enjoying their paid vacation after taking pride in their work, doing it efficiently and being respected as human beings. I guarantee you they’ll know you’re an American. We must have different definitions of freedom over here.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30928403
And gains are redistributed similarly.
There's a reason that every European car company has failed to compete with Tesla on software.
Who cares about Tesla in the bigger picture? Guess where most of the good cars come from - it’s also not the US. Tesla has first movers advantage, but I would strongly disagree that their software is in any way exceptionally better than other software - unless we’re not talking about the same software that powers autopilot killing people left and right. If you’re referring to the general concept of advanced autopilot and so on, sure, they toot their horn a lot, but I’d argue that having stable and reliable software (that inherently takes longer to develop and test) is still the best long term strategy. But it makes sense in the perspective of short term profit over anything…
Give it a few years and Tesla will be overtaken by a mile by even Ford and then another mile by VW and Hyundai.
Is that because of higher government overhead (taxes, regulations) or is it because of some other reason? I doubt it's because of competition, because US companies compete in Europe just fine.
> consider how many of your awesome HFT ventures actually produce anything of value instead of being parasitic and you’ll come to some good conclusions on why even some third world countries have a dramatically higher living and work standard
Two things here: first, I could have mentioned any number of startups which are having real impacts on the world - not the Ubers and WeWorks but the Commonwealth Fusion and the Databricks types. It doesn't need to be HFT - my experience just comes from HFT (also, your European paradise also has HFTs - check out job postings in Amsterdam). Second, maybe by your definition of work standard (lower hours, lots of PTO), other countries have better work standards, but the US has by far the highest salaries for skilled workers. Healthcare costs are not even a consideration when your work pays for excellent insurance. And I would hazard a guess that US companies are closer to the leading edge of tech and therefore more fulfilling to work at. You certainly won't find the breadth of opportunities in Silicon Valley or NYC in any European city, not even London.
Obviously if you are an unskilled worker, Europe is better, but if all the high paid skilled workers start leaving Europe (as they have been for the past 20 years) then you won't have a tax base to pay for the benefits of the unskilled workers.
> but I would strongly disagree that their software is in any way exceptionally better than other software - unless we’re not talking about the same software that powers autopilot killing people left and right
We are not talking about Autopilot but the rest of the car. Take a look at this WSJ article about VW's software development failures [1]. That's from 2021 by the way, very recent. Europeans treat software engineers like factory workers while Silicon Valley treats them like impact makers. That extends to pay, work routines, and everything else. You'd never see a picture like the one in the article where an executive in a suit is presenting to a bunch of other executives in a room.
> Give it a few years and Tesla will be overtaken by a mile by even Ford and then another mile by VW and Hyundai.
Ford, perhaps in trucks. VW and Hyundai, doubtful. If Toyota or Honda had competent EV programs then the conversation would be different.
[1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-volkswagens-50-billion-plan...
I assume it's simply because we produce value with more efficiency and less initial funding.
By the way, on the matter of personal taxes, US citizens are paying, if you take local, state, sales, etc tax and healthcare premiums into account, the same or in some cases even more taxes than Europeans do. They just get absolutely nil in return.
This also extends to companies to some degree, vice versa. There is no real regulation that says you have to shut your unprofitable business down, but you're not going to be in business for very long if you have to treat your employees fairly, which is by regulation.
> your European paradise also has HFTs - check out job postings in Amsterdam
So.. this is pretty much what I'm on about. And I can guarantee you that they have dramatically less expense, overhead and a dramatically higher standard of work.
> That's from 2021 by the way, very recent. Europeans treat software engineers like factory workers while Silicon Valley treats them like impact makers.
The thing is, our "factory workers" are getting, BY DEFAULT, better benefits than even the most highly advanced Silicon Valley "impact makers". Even the fucking janitor gets by law almost a month of mandatory paid vacation, unlimited sick days, complete and utter unlimited job protection in addition to ±80% of his salary in the case of illness, forever, has to be paid, if not (likely) more, a living wage that is on average twice as high as the US minimum wage, has complete and utter protection if he turns out unemployed at some point and he will be taken care of at old age. He will also not be working more than 40 hours per week and especially not unpaid.
THE JANITOR. Everyone.
Yes, our wages for highly skilled workers are not as high as some insane 300k FAANG jobs, but I'd rather have it this way and the janitor happy as well. When you hear about “factory workers” here it is not what you think it is.
> VW and Hyundai, doubtful.
I cannot share much here due to my field of work, but I think you're going to be very surprised.
But the data doesn't back that up. According to the EU, the US has 40% higher GDP per capita [1] compared to the EU. And that's according to the EU, which has to be the most biased source possible.
> US citizens are paying, if you take local, state, sales, etc tax and healthcare premiums into account, the same or in some cases even more taxes than Europeans do
That isn't true, at least for me and many other software engineers. Sales tax is definitely lower in the US because we don't have VAT - typical rates are 7-10% vs. 12-20% in EU. Income tax is also lower in the US. According to this calculator [2] I would pay about 10% lower income tax effective rate on my current income in the US vs. Berlin, Germany. My health insurance costs <$2000/year for a high tier plan so that cost is negligible. Payroll tax for companies is lower. Gas tax is lower, by a substantial margin.
> So.. this is pretty much what I'm on about. And I can guarantee you that they have dramatically less expense, overhead and a dramatically higher standard of work.
What's your point - that EU does have parasitic companies which produce no value or does not? You seem to be flip flopping. And I can tell you the only reason the EU has dramatically less expense is the workers make less. A lot less. I make double what my counterparts in the EU are making. They definitely don't have a higher standard of work either.
> The thing is, our "factory workers" are getting, BY DEFAULT, better benefits than even the most highly advanced Silicon Valley "impact makers"
Are they? Your factory workers get free breakfast, lunch, dinner, multi-thousand dollar offsites and dinners, and the ability to invest your salary in the (private) company? You consider things like guaranteed job protection as benefits, but I see them as lowering my pay and reducing the number of jobs available. There's a reason why European unemployment is 300 basis points higher than US and why far more startups are started in the US. Banning non-competes and at-will employment in California are the #1 reason why SWE wages are so high here.
You may value work-life balance over pay, but that is a personal choice and not an objectively superior option. Some of us are willing to work hard to become wealthy, others are fine where they are.
> a month of mandatory paid vacation
That ends up reflecting in your pay (or lack thereof). The market rate for wages will be lower because the month of vacation will be priced in.
> THE JANITOR. Everyone.
The janitor's benefits are irrelevant. I already said unskilled workers do better in EU. Your original comment was about white collar workers in companies. That means skilled workers. And a skilled worker is going to have a way better life in the US.
> Yes, our wages for highly skilled workers are not as high as some insane 300k FAANG jobs
Not as high is one way of putting it. According to levels.fyi the gap is 2-3x for a senior SWE in most FAANG or FAANG adjacent companies.
> I'd rather have it this way and the janitor happy as well.
And you are entitled to have that opinion, but you shouldn't go around claiming that US companies are "extremely inefficient" or that the environment is "hostile towards efficiency and creativity".
[1] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/portlet_file_entry/2...
[2] https://www.arbeitnow.com/tools/salary-calculator/germany
The US is the richest country in the history of modern civilisation, yet in every possible metric worse then the rest of the developed world, sometimes less than even some third world countries. I would argue that GDP per capita is not necessarily a good indicator when most of the GDP goes into the pockets of the ultra rich and parasitic middlemen instead of back to the population, no? This is also a form of lack of efficiency.
> That isn't true, at least for me and many other software engineers. Sales tax is definitely lower in the US because we don't have VAT - typical rates are 7-10% vs. 12-20% in EU. Income tax is also lower in the US. According to this calculator [2] I would pay about 10% lower income tax effective rate on my current income in the US vs. Berlin, Germany. My health insurance costs <$2000/year for a high tier plan so that cost is negligible. Payroll tax for companies is lower. Gas tax is lower, by a substantial margin.
Sorry, no, obviously any generalisation is not valid for every single individual case, so that's why I was talking about a mean of the population and not specifically you.
However, if we were to start contemplating e.g. how much your health insurance even covers and how much you pay in co-pay (spoiler, its $0 here), even if we don't, we are still surprisingly close to each other, aren't we - and then, considering how much value you receive back of it.. it's not going into your crumbling infrastructure either.
> Are they? Your factory workers get free breakfast, lunch, dinner, multi-thousand dollar offsites and dinners, and the ability to invest your salary in the (private) company?
Actual factory workers, no, but you think our highly skilled workers don't get this? Of course they do, again, maybe only 100k instead of 300k salary off some VC funding, on the other hand you're not going to be spending 100k for stuff we get for free and the janitor and everyone else is not treated like a slave either. Don't you think it is a very reasonable assumption that in a functioning society every part, no matter how skilled or not, has to function properly and be healthy? You yourself are also dependent on every other part functioning properly.
> why SWE wages are so high here
Great, and they are part of an unsustainable bubble and destroying the whole balance between supply and demand, causing inevitable rise to homelessness, crime, mental illness and drug epidemics. I think I'm starting to understand what they mean with "driving over bodies"
> That ends up reflecting in your pay (or lack thereof). The market rate for wages will be lower because the month of vacation will be priced in.
This is correct.
> And a skilled worker is going to have a way better life in the US.
No. He will statistically die sooner, receive some of the worst healthcare in the entire world, live in the midst of poverty and crime, and will have considerable less time to actually live his life.
> You consider things like guaranteed job protection as benefits, but I see them as lowering my pay
Only until you realise that this also applies to yourself, and then consider that you are much more likely to suffer from chronic illness, depression and burnout.
I mean, I do understand your perspective from a very egoistical standpoint, but please just take a look at your country and how that's working out for you these days.
That is your opinion. Output per person (GDP per capita) is the objective measure of efficiency. Also, European taxes on capital gains are about the same as the US, so in fact EU is not really taxing the ultra-wealthy any more than the US. High wage earners are taxed instead, but high wage earners are not ultra-wealthy.
> Sorry, no, obviously any generalisation is not valid for every single individual case, so that's why I was talking about a mean of the population and not specifically you.
Again, that's not supported by the data [1].
> However, if we were to start contemplating e.g. how much your health insurance even covers and how much you pay in co-pay (spoiler, its $0 here), even if we don't, we are still surprisingly close to each other, aren't we - and then, considering how much value you receive back of it..
My health insurance might not have $0 copay but it is low enough that a doctor's visit costs about as much as a dine-in casual lunch would. And I get higher quality doctors, since our doctors make 6-7 figures compared to maximum 100k of EU doctors (the NHS in the UK pays less than 100k GBP for specialist doctors...), so all the talent gets vacuumed up by the US.
And they are not surprisingly close - I ran the numbers with my US income. My income for the same position in EU would be halved or more. So the actual gap in net income after tax and health insurance would be substantially larger.
> No, but you think our highly skilled workers don't get this? Of course they do
Do the engineers at your company get that benefit? How much money do you think they can realistically invest when they make half of their American counterparts and get taxed at 35-40%?
> Great, and they are destroying the whole balance between supply and demand, causing inevitable rise to homelessness, crime, mental illness and drug epidemics
These things are caused by a failure to build housing and prosecute petty theft, not by high wages.
> Our minimum wage is still twice as high as yours.
Netherlands minimum wage is 10.14 EUR/h [2] while CA minimum wage is $14-15/h [3]. And in practice, the wages for low skill workers in CA are around $20/h now due to market demand. Not only that, but the unemployment rate (and particularly the youth unemployment rate which is a proxy for unskilled labor) is much higher in EU.
> No. He will statistically die sooner, receive some of the worst healthcare in the entire world, live in the midst of poverty and crime, etc etc etc.
You are trying to make inferences about a high earner from statistics about the median. That's egregiously incorrect.
> But at least you yourself earn twice as much. Sounds reasonable.
Again, that's your opinion that it's unreasonable. As long as skilled workers continue to migrate from EU to the US due to the higher wages, your opinion is irrelevant. And if you take a look at the makeup of any top ranked master's or PhD program today in STEM or business in the US, you will see that it is 30% European, 30% Chinese, 30% Indian. So I think the market does not really care about your opinion.
[1] https://www.taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-book/how-do-us-taxe...
[2] https://www.government.nl/topics/minimum-wage/amount-of-the-...
First of all, I specifically started off my original post saying that everything that followed is my subjective, personal opinion and experiences. What exactly did you expect trying to argue with me about it?
> Netherlands minimum wage is 10.14 EUR/h [2] while CA minimum wage is $14-15/h [3]. And in practice, the wages for low skill workers in CA
So we're cherry-picking US states and EU countries now instead of going by averages?
> > No. He will statistically die sooner, receive some of the worst healthcare in the entire world, live in the midst of poverty and crime, etc etc etc.
> You are trying to make inferences about a high earner from statistics about the median. That's egregiously incorrect.
Higher earners are still almost equally affected by any of the issues above, as are you. My statement stands.
> Again, that's your opinion that it's unreasonable. As long as skilled workers continue to migrate from EU to the US due to the higher wages, your opinion is irrelevant. And if you take a look at the makeup of any top ranked master's or PhD program today in STEM or business in the US, you will see that it is 30% European, 30% Chinese, 30% Indian. So I think the market does not really care about your opinion.
.. so? We also have a lot of US citizens living here and our universities are filled with expats from all over the world.
Also, BTW.. these students you mention will mostly be left with horrendous, crippling student debt.
Ours will have 0 in student debt because all education is free, so people are also studying for longer periods of time, maybe even your doctor.
> These things are caused by a failure to build housing and prosecute petty theft, not by high wages.
Not by high wages, by disproportionally high or low wages. There is enough housing in the US already. There is just simply no way to afford it for anyone but high-skill workers because of this. Combine that with the absolute lack of social housing or regulation and poverty and you arrive at exactly the inevitable rise of homelessness and crime that you think needs to be cracked down upon instead of fixed at its root.
> Again, that's not supported by the data [1].
I cannot see any of your data taking into account other expenses and correlations to expenses that the US population is affected by and EU citizens are not. Obviously the tax rate on paper is lower, but that wasn't my point to begin with.
Let's just leave it at that. You have your opinion, I have my opinion, end results matter and statistics are speaking loud and clearly.
However w.r.t. "capitalism" vs "socialism" I must say that it is related but wrong lenses to look at it. The right distinction is "individually" vs "collectively" owned.
US corporations are "collaboratively owned" even if they are "private" in theory. This is what makes them work the same as "collaboratively owned bureaucracies". Working in a big US corpo is like getting a cozy job in a government. European SWE companies are "individually owned", even if they are surrounded by more social-inclined environment (which comes with it's own pros and cons).
And for low/unskilled workers, in the UK they're with an agency so they can be sacked anytime, while in Germany they're hired on a 6 month contract, then swapped with others for 6 months, then the previous guys return after 6 months, it's rather insane. So much for social protection or whatever.
Mercedes parts QA people and warehouse workers are on 6 days/10-12 hours for 3-6 months. Literally looking at an advert right now. Wage doesn't even matter (it's minimum), that kind of schedule is bad for quality. Also, great European work/life balance lol
What I'm trying to say, it's more of a company problem.
I’m also not saying that we don’t have problems in Europe either, but they are not structural and by default