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Comment by kahawe | Hacker News Reader

> * Simply put, in Europe you make enough cash so at the end of the month you dont ever have to consider you will be in debt unless you want to buy a ferrari on your way back from work.*

I am from Europe and this is a completely ludicrous and false statement. If anything I would expect my USA counterparts to get way more salary after tax each month simply for the ridiculous taxes I am paying here (48%) plus we are paying some more taxes on ANYTHING we buy including food and water.

There is, however, a big difference between spending mentality - most Europeans shy away from going deep into debt and will typically only take loans on housing and cars but not to spend on luxury and entertainment; we by and large don't have that culture of ver-spending is ok and then keep shifting the debt from credit card to credit card. Matter of fact, I don't even know if VISA here would let me do that more than once...

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Credit cards act as a buffer between steady salary income and patchy spending. Many people both in the US and Europe live within their means across the whole year, but take a big holiday or trip in the summer and spend more in one month than their usual disposable income. Having a credit card makes it easier to accommodate lumpy spending like that.

Food and water is cheaper in all the European countries I've been to -- all staple foods like milk, eggs, butter, vegetables, most meat, and most groceries, including bottled water (local!) which is $1.20 for a liter. Good bottled mineral water in the US costs $3-5 per liter, for example. I lived in Austria, spent lots of time in Germany, and have gone grocery shopping also in Italy and Portugal. (The UK is not "really" Europe in its laws, so I don't count it.)

As complex as this might be to actually measure, here is a stab at it - the Big Mac index seems to disagree: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mac_Index#Figures

Big Macs barely qualify as food and are not a staple, or even remotely desirable to have your people eating.

Fast food and restaurant food is relatively expensive in Austria. Good, healthy, whole food ingredients are subsidized.

I am Austrian (born and raised) and am working in Germany now and have been around Europe and the world - what are those subsidies for food you are talking about? You probably mean the Austrian government and the EU are subsidizing local farmers?

Buying local farmer products will vary in cost and when you go to the supermarkets (Lidl, Aldi and Hofer EXcluded, their "food" is absolutely horrible) and buy organic food it definitely is expensive; a bit less in Austria than in Germany though really good and very delicious food is scarce in Germany in comparison. I found the food you can buy in the US cheaper when you go by price per unit since packages are way bigger there and you have a ton more to choose from.

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