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Comment by logicchains | Hacker News Reader

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It's telling that the measure of quality of life you use in this comment is entirely materialistic in nature. I also challenge the idea that US provides 'access to better medical care', as it is pretty well documented that Americans spend more for lower quality care compared to similar developed countries.

I believe this cultural divide is a big reason America won't make it back to the top - insatiable desire for wealth and a lack of values-based principals. Ironically US companies are the first to tout their 'values' in the workplace.

> I believe this cultural divide is a big reason America won't make it back to the top

What top are you referring to?

We're in a thread about a US company announcing its new $30B fundraise from a group of elite US growth investment funds arguing about whether this company will be able to overthrow the $4T US tech behemoth and suggesting that all the other US tech behemoths are actually stifling progress.

Seems like you’re in a thread about people’s quality of life and talking about giant mega corps’ big money. Has it been trickling down yet?

If you are in the bottom 30% of earners, the EU is better.

If you are in the top 30% of earners, the US is better.

And the top 1% get to have fun on a private island.

> bigger cars

I gotta say, I found this one especially funny as I currently don't have a car and that's actually my biggest luxury: being able to go around without one and no spending time in commute.

> more food

Yeah, so I don't want to be a Debbie Downer, but as a European who visited the US, your food is definitely not something I would use as an example of your QoL.

You went to the wrong parts and ate the wrong things.

I used to live in Paris for a spell and the food here in San Francisco is better. California has some of the freshest and best local produce in the world. If you eat at real restaurants (not McD), and intentionally buy fresh food (which is available at normal grocery stores too) then you're getting great quality food. I think there is much better access to a variety of foods, of suitably high quality, and the variety of cuisines at restaurants is laughably incomparable. The prices are definitely higher, but the median income in SF is significantly higher, so I think it may still be a smaller % of salary for most people.

For some reason people associate fast food and junk as "American" and then extrapolate that as what typical American diet is. Maybe there are parts of the US that are much poorer and with worse access to food distribution, but I'd assume that rural and impoverished Europe is the same.

In the current age everyone can eat everything everywhere, apparently there are even people who fly their bread everyday from France to New York. So when we talk about food in some place, its usually about the general practices and not the possibilities.

For example the food in London is shitty even if you can find some of the best restaurants there. The problem with London is that you can't fit those restaurants into your daily routine, the default is a sad meal deal from Tesco or something.

Yes and unlike London, the default in many parts of America are great.

> San Francisco is better

Yeah, but you're a tramp if you're not making >$250k/year. Of course wealthy people will have access to excellent food, and that will be true everywhere from Moscow to SF through Shanghai. I'm more interested in what the common plebes can get their hands on.

> and the variety of cuisines at restaurants is laughably incomparable

Might be; I only went to Colorado, Utah, New Mexico and Florida, so YMMV. But in my experience, sure, there are a lot of cuisines, but frankly, save for the Mexicans, all of them sucked hard: very salty, very sugary, very spicy, but .

Now I'm sure you can get excellent local fruits/vegetables in California thanks to the climate, but I doubt they would be notably worse or better than anything you will find around the Mediterranean.

I have a friend who needs a medication that costs more than 30,000$ a year. Here in Canada it is 100% covered by our government health insurance regime. In the USA he would be bankrupt (or dead).

Here in Canada if I have an accident i do not have to worry about being bankrupt if the ambulance brings me to the wrong hospital.

I am really not enthusiastic about the so-called superior quality of life some US-ians like to boast about.

> In the USA he would be bankrupt (or dead)

Why? I live in the US. I have the best healthcare coverage in the world. I pay absolutely nothing for it, ever. No matter the cost. And I have access tot he best doctors, innovations, and technology in the world.

Tell me again why your friend would be dead? It sounds like you really have a poor understanding of American health care.

I suppose you work... and have an employer who pays for your extraordinary insurance?

To your last point, the answer is probably much different in China

>As measured by prosperity life in the US is better; the poorest US state has a higher GDP per capita than most western European countries.

GDP per capita/prosperity is a poor proxy for quality of life. The US is lagging most of the developed world in most quality of life metrics, even as reported by US news outlets, which don't rank the US in even the top 20: https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/rankings/quality-...

>Americans have bigger houses, more food, bigger cars,

The size of one's house or car is at best weakly-correlated with quality of life. I would rather not own a car at all and be able to walk everywhere, rather than spend hours of my life commuting in a gigantic SUV.

>bigger salaries, and access to better medical care and schools if they've got an okay job.

The US ranks the lowest in the developed world for life expectancy, and among the highest in obesity globally (obesity being a major determinant of health). The US remains the only developed country where an unlucky dice roll (e.g. genetic-linked cancer) will bankrupt you and destroy the livelihoods of your children.

This is not the flex you think it is.

Keep in mind there are two Americas, a wealthy one and a not wealthy one; someone posting on HN is likely in the former bucket, and not juggling a retail job and doing Uber on the side while being unable to afford healthcare.

I'm not sure even wealthy America is better off. They might have their $3M mansion in a nice town but it will still have no sidewalks, be 2 miles from school, and an hour from major city center.

I don't know where you've gotten the idea that wealthy Americans spending $3M on their homes can't have sidewalks or live near major city centers. It's a big country, so there's lots of places that don't have sidewalks or aren't near a city. But any wealthy American who wants those things can easily get them without making compromises.

(The school thing I'll grant you, although in a car-centric country a school 2 miles away often takes like 5 minutes to get to.)

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