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Comment by marcusf | Hacker News Reader

> There's not much point comparing working conditions between Europe and the US when one of these places has widespread unemployment and there is literally rioting on the streets, as was the case not very long ago.

Which continent are you talking about now? Sounds like both?

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The situations in the US vs. the European nations that have been in serious trouble recently are barely comparable.

Even in the past year or so, with fears of further recession fading and growth returning to the PIIGS group, Greek unemployment is still running at over 27%, while the US is running at under 7%.

Similarly, while the US and elsewhere saw significant protests as part of the Occupy movement, they were mostly peaceful in nature. The violence seen on the streets of Greece around 2010-2012 as severe austerity measures were taken was on a different scale entirely.

But isn't that exactly a result of trying to be more "USA" (by having an economic union)? Besides, comparing US with a single European country is pretty pointless. One could easily turn the table around by choosing Norway instead of Greece.

What I took offence to was comparing Europe as a whole to America. It doesn't necessarily make sense given the different make-up of the continents.

I have to volt-face that a bit though in that I was a bit surprised at both unemployment rate and labor force participation rates between EU and US. I.e. this graph didn't look like what I was prejudiced to think: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.TLF.CACT.ZS/countries...

It's crazy listening to US rhetoric about the job market given your relatively low unemployment, high labor force participation and relatively high average salaries.

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