> For what it's worth I'm from Denmark, so maybe its totally different in the US.
To weigh in a bit on some of the differences between employment in Denmark and the US.
- In the US there are no mandated (paid or unpaid) vacation days/time off (with the exception of 3-4 of the 50 states).
- There are no mandated paid sick days.
- You are granted at most 12 weeks of unpaid sick leave per year by the FMLA however if you actually take advantage of this, most companies will simply let you go for another, unspecified reason (as you are not required to document or explain why you have let go or fire an employee).
- There is no mandated paternity leave, paid or unpaid. Maternity leave falls under unpaid sick leave.
- On average (but not required), employees get 10-20 days of paid time off (combined between vacation and sick time).
- The US obviously has atrocious health care costs that unless you are very lucky end up eating non-negligible portions of your paycheck. (just insurance before any actual received care is on average is ~450USD/month)
- US Universities cost a lot of money and if you aren't going into the trades, you will be dedicating a large, non-negligible portion of your paycheck towards paying loans (avg: ~40k USD loans, ~150-300USD/month).
- In almost any part of the US outside of a small selection of major cities, you cannot work or live without a car. (avg car insurance ~150USD/month, avg cost of fuel ~150-200USD/month, maintenance, etc can be assumed to be another 25-100USD/month).
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That works out to on average around ~900-1200USD/month or ~10.8k-14.4k USD/year in costs (if you aren't going to university you can subtract 450USD/month or 5400USD/year from this) that are essentially unavoidable for the overwhelming majority of Americans which likely are avoidable in a country like Denmark as long as you don't live in an overly rural area.
Realistically this means that for the average American (~31k/year), anywhere from 17-46% of their income goes to expenses that aren't necessarily applicable to people in a decent chunk of western Europe (particularly the urban/suburban parts). And on top of this, for many Americans, any life complication or sickness that prevents them from working causes that percentage to rise (both from increased costs and decreased income).