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Comment by kalnins | Hacker News Reader

There is an interesting side effect here. Salaries throughout EU vary a lot. This will give people chance to better understand the salary differences between countries.

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I doubt it. It'll be apples and oranges. Can't even compare salaries between companies in many countries because a salary isn't expressed as a single amount. It's a combination of some gross periodic amount, a random collection of benefits which differs from employer to employer, and even "the same" benefits can have radically different values (e.g. health insurance from provider A instead of provider B).

There's no way for candidates to derive the real value from such a complex offer, let alone compare it to other offers. I imagine employers would like to keep it that way.

When comparing across countries, you'll also have to factor in how things are taxed in said countries and what you get in return for those taxes.

"Health insurance" is not a benefit in any EU country that I know of. Are there any EU countries where health insurance is as messed up as in the US?

If is offered in a lot of tech companies in Ireland, and at least some in the UK.

It isn't needed in the same way, but it makes a lot of things easier. Get seen faster, get money back from visits, etc.

In France you get 'top up' insurance called a mutuelle (the state pays the first 70% - 80% of most healthcare costs - chronic conditions are paied 100% by the state). A basic mutuelle is obligatory at all jobs, but many will provide a decent one (that includes glasses, advanced dental work, hearing aids etc) as a benefit.

Basic mutuelle is not mandatory e.g. in the public sector in France.

It's mandatory in the private sector:

https://www.economie.gouv.fr/entreprises/mutuelle-entreprise...

I didn't realise that was the case for the public sector - my wife's a nurse and hers is provided.

In France you usually get a mutuelle through your company, helping to pay the extra-costs for things not reimbursed or not fully (fancy glasses, psychologist, this kind of things)

Some companies present it as a benefit, typically if using Alan

In the Netherlands private health insurance is obligatory but not tied to an employer, however employers can negotiate better group policy deals or compensate somehow. My last employer for example paid a bit extra for me to chose my own (was a salary line item) and my current actually pays for one directly. The basic insurance is all the same regardless of provider, but they vary on secondary benefits.

For me at least, this wouldn’t really be a deciding factor among competing job offers.

Indeed and the "group discount" or in Dutch collectiviteitskorting has been banned recently. So there is even less of a difference now.

Relatively common in the UK for white collar workers in private companies to get private healthcare included or after paying a small pre-tax cost.

Just to clarify, health insurance is a benefit-in-kind in the UK which means you legally pay tax on it at your marginal tax rate. If you earn over about £50k you have to pay 40% of the value of the health insurance etc.

Yes, most EU countries have free health services but health insurance is very common in both the Nordics and Southern Europe in my experience.

The Nordic countries might look similar to each other from the outside but in fact they often differ substantially.

In Norway (about 9% of the population [1]) at least it appears to be similar to the UK (about 13% or respondents to a survey[2])

So I'm not sure if that counts as very common and in Norway it is largely a perk offered by companies as part of the salary package rather than something that individuals choose for themselves.

On the other hand Denmark has about twice as many people with private health insurance [1] as Norway and about the same population.

[1] https://www.nrk.no/norge/nesten-en-halv-million-nordmenn-har...

[2] https://www.finder.com/uk/health-insurance-statistics

Government employees in Spain have an option to use MUFACE which gives them access to private health centers. Some companies will offer private health insurance as a benefit. Most residents of Spain should have access to the public health system, exact details depend on each autonomous region.

Public health tends to have better resources, but longer wait times. Private health has shorter wait times, though these would definitely increase if more people started using it.

In Germany, private health insurance is the norm above a certain salary level (it's not actually mandatory but when you read about it online, makes it seem so). There is a hybrid private-public insurance option below that level.

It's common for employers to subsidise the private insurance at least.

And no, it's not messed up like in the US, although it's a large expense by European standards/cheap by US standards (the insurance companies raise the rates every year, and are protected by legislation in doing so, a bit like a utility company).

Small correction: because contributions to the public health insurance fund are capped at a certain salary level (just shy of 60.000€/year), it would actually be pretty stupid to opt out of the public model just because you earn a lot. Private insurance can be attractive for people in Germany because i.e.

- their are no eligible for public insurance (only impacts a very small number of people, who are in many cases "independently wealthy", i.e. are not actually working)

- have very specific employment structures (most public school teachers benefit from having a private insurance due to certain government benefits paid to them)

- require or want certain benefits not offered by public insurance

- think that because of their special circumstance, private insurance will work out cheaper for them long-term (usually when you have the financial capacity to enter the private system at a very young and healthy age)

Even with socialized healthcare everyone prefers private if they can afford it.

Not really. I lived in three different european countries (France, Germany and Poland) and the switch to private was never worth the price : way more expensive for a barely better service. With public healthcare, you have the power of the numbers. Way more people are on the public side, which drives the prices down. If people are not willing to pay an astronomical price for their health, then health companies follow as long as they make decent profit.

Literally every EU country has health insurance as a benefit. This is on top of the default healthcare provided by the country in question. Depending on the insurance, it can get you things such as private hospital rooms, dental plans, better eyecare, payment plans, or even extra income guarantees if you're unable to work.

> Literally every EU country has health insurance as a benefit

Well while private insurance is obviously available everywhere in some/many(?) countries employers only provide it for a very small proportion of workers.

Private health insurance absolutely is

While that's technically true also in EU, the salaries are quite directly comparable, because these benefits are a much smaller portion of total compensation than in USA, as the difference between e.g. no employer-provided health insurance and very good extra health insurance is simply not that much money in EU, and also because similar job roles offer a roughly similar level of benefits.

Like, if I'm comparing two offers, the difference in money value of the benefits provided by the best offer and the worst offer (let's assume that apart from some fancy words they're really providing the bare minimum required by EU law) is going to be at most something like 10% of the compensation - but the difference in offered salary may easily be much, much more than that.

Sure, things like performance-determined pay/bonuses may be a big part of the total compensation in some areas (e.g. sales) but not as much as in USA, and benefits even less so; in EU market generally the contracted amount is not that far from the total compensation.

Realistically the gross salary has very little bearing in the net salary between EU countries. Taxation, social contributions and health care deductions at source are vastly different.

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