10 ms·

Do not compare EU salaries with the US

AntiImperialis4 6y ago
DO compare it and see how much one can end up saving in a given time in the US, even after paying for healthcare, education etc.
- jason0597 6y ago
  Did you read the Twitter thread? The person writing the Twitter thread clearly outlines their feelings about the need to contribute to the social safety net. > I wanna give back, im okay with that > I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs
  - AntiImperialis4 6y ago
    Yes, I did read the whole thread. Nobody is stopping one from voluntarily donating to a non-profit or for-profit organization, or being involved in one for that matter. In Europe, most people don't work 3 jobs because either it's not legal to do so or those jobs don't exist because of debilitating regulations... or at some point, making more isn't really worth it because of how high the taxes go up.
    - pidg 6y ago
      The occasional donation to a non-profit might help people subsist, but it doesn't build a better society with more opportunities for everyone. Nobody needs an obscene salary for writing code when others are struggling to afford the basics. As an aside, I remember being really taken aback when I went on holiday to the US and most of the menial jobs were being carried out by Hispanic and Black people. I guess if you are a white American you get inured to it, but as a white European it was kind of creepy and a bit repulsive.
      - marcinzm 6y ago
        Race aside, how is that different than western europe importing eastern europeans to work their menial jobs?
        pidg 6y ago
        I guess freedom of movement allowing Eastern Europeans to legally live, work and pay tax in Western Europe without jumping through hoops, and immediately being able to benefit from the social systems there.
    - Normal_gaussian 6y ago
      The financial efficiency of a well managed charitable organisation is atrocious compared to state programs. This is largely due to state programs having the capability to actually solve problems. Eliminating working three jobs is desirable, it isnt debilitating to prevent exploitation of workers, its enabling. Setting a minimum wage and maximum working hours creates a minimum quality of life. For most people this is desirable. As far as I can see you'd either have to be a sadist, or incredibly obsessed with how well off you are vs others to not want this.
- scotty79 6y ago
  You'll get ruined in US if you get cancer in your close family despite 'paying for healthcare' all your life. In my uncharitable opinion US is good for earning money as a young, highly educated person and for nothing else. So go there when you are around 25, work your ass off at whoever pays the most for your skillset, spend as little as possible and bail before 35. Later you're screwed. You'll still make more and more there but the money is going to be useless.
  - marcinzm 6y ago
    >You'll get ruined in US if you get cancer in your close family despite 'paying for healthcare' all your life. Not really if you have insurance which as a software engineer you would have. Might hit your $10k out of pocket maximum but you salary will easily cover that. edit: When my dad got cancer his insurance actually PAID him a cash payout for every treatment on top of paying the medical costs. He works at a non profit.
    - jason0597 6y ago
      The person in the Twitter thread notes how her minimum wage mother had cancer. I think it is highly unlikely that someone working at a minimum wage job would be covered for that by their insurance (I may be wrong) This now infamous reddit comment puts it into perspective very well: https://old.reddit.com/r/ABoringDystopia/comments/hj6t3t/nothing_new_under_the_sky/fwl8aom/ https://old.reddit.com/r/ABoringDystopia/comments/hj6t3t/not...
      - marcinzm 6y ago
        The comment I replied to made broad statements and based on the second sentence was talking about anyone with a cancer risk and not just those making low income. I don't disagree with your statement about costs to those lacking decent insurance, I merely disagree with creating broad generalizations unfounded in reality.
      - rayiner 6y ago
        Are you really unaware of Medicaid? Here in Maryland, a 3-person household like the author's can make up to $29,000/year and be eligible for Medicaid.
- kamyarg 6y ago
  Per the author's twit, without the higher taxes etc. they would not have been able to afford becoming a software engineer without this welfare setup. Also, yes you save much more, but when your mother has cancer and dad is disabled(As the author explains), realistically much more than what you save ends up being spent to take care of them and paying their medical bills.
  - bserge 6y ago
    I have to say, she might be wrong about that. The US is different, sometimes worse, but people have adapted. In the US, she would've been able to buy a laptop for dirt cheap or get it from some charity or just someone looking to get rid of it for free. I myself got my first laptops and smartphones from the US, it was cheaper than buying locally, believe it or not. Most, if not all MOOCs are from the US. Tons of blogs, content, documentation in English, written by Americans. Free for all, just learn and show your skills. But yes, if there's an unforeseen medical emergency, you could go bankrupt in the US, while you'd be taken care of for free (or nearly free) in Europe.
  - AntiImperialis4 6y ago
    >they would not have been able to afford becoming a software engineer without this welfare setup. Maybe if her parents didn't have to pay so much in taxes, they'd be able to save for her education... or she'd be able to pay back in no time, specially because of the amount of money she could be making. >yes you save much more, but when your mother has cancer and dad is disabled, realistically much more than what you save ends up being spent to take care of them and paying their medical bills. That's not achieved by magic. It's just an insurance scheme, but at a national level, and you can't opt out even if you have different values. Not only that, you don't magically get better care either, because you still have to fight for limited medical resources. In most European countries, it's achieved by nepotism or corruption. In some others, you have an option of buying additional private insurance on top of the national scheme, which if you make enough is a no brainer because of how bad the waiting is, depending on what illness you happen to get.
  - marcinzm 6y ago
    They'd realistically have Medicaid in the US which doesn't have high out of pocket costs. Probably social security payments for disability and various other government programs. Some programs would even pay the mother (or a relative) to stay home and help their disabled spouse. Community college is fairly inexpensive in the US so there's that as well.
- arctangos 6y ago
  I hope that advocates of purchasing power parity comparisons are prepared to factor in implicitly consumed but not easily purchasable goods. Otherwise, they would miss out on many of the things that truly matter in life. For example, in the EU, my middle class neighbors’ children safely bike and ride the train to and from their excellent publicly funded schools, after school activities, and friends’ houses requiring little to no adult supervision while in transit.* What do private schooling, chauffeurs, and security personnel cost in the US, anyway? *Of course, COVID does interfere somewhat with this, but this is true worldwide.
exabrial 6y ago
It seems she's fairly ignorant of how things work here as the vast majority of his fears are unfounded. That's ok though, the point about comparing salaries is very valid, there's extreme cost of living differences among many other things. For a lot of Americans, the fear we have is being completely dependent on the government. Look at who is exiting presidential office, look who is entering. Attaching our fates to these bozos isn't something I necessarily relish.
- digianarchist 6y ago
  Disagree on the cost of living point. London and Dublin are comparable to a lot of major US cities yet wages are much lower than these cities. Even Canada pays better than a lot of European cities when you factor in COL between say Toronto and London.
  - raverbashing 6y ago
    > Even Canada pays better than a lot of European cities when you factor in COL between say Toronto and London Doubt. The sinking CAD is an issue and COL (except for rents) is usually lower in Europe
    - 908B64B197 6y ago
      I don't get why they don't simply use the US dollar at this point.
- tao_oat 6y ago
  What do you think her fears are, and why are they unfounded? I understood her primary point as being about inequality and justice: "I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs"
  - JPKab 6y ago
    I grew up in a family whose income put us below poverty line. I didn't have to pay for college, due to Pell grants, yet she thinks that in the USA, a good student can't go to college without money. That's just not a thing. But the media in the US creates that impression for Europeans. Also, the idea that poor people with cancer in the US are left to die. Not accurate. Medicare, medicaid, etc. Not saying its good, just saying she's deeply misinformed in the typical socialist left-wing media stereotypes and oversimplifications.
cnorthwood 6y ago
It seems very hard to compare the two figures. I guess the interesting way to compare them would be what's the disposable income you have to spend normalised against purchasing power. So gross salary, less taxes (payroll and any others if applicable), pension contributions, student loan repayments, medical insurance contributions (and other out-of-pocket expenses relating to that you may have to pay in a typical year), and then baseline cost-of-living (rent/mortgage payments), but there are so many variables there it seems very hard to be directly comparable. All I know is if I earned what I did now (which is an excellent UK salary) in Silicon Valley, I wouldn't be able to afford to live by myself in a two-bedroom flat in a desirable area, which is what I do now. I've no idea how much I would have to earn in SV to have the same quality of life as I do in Manchester, UK. (I figured it out for London and it's approximately a £20k premium due to the rental premium in London)
- sjg007 6y ago
  Put it this way, in Silicon Valley, a family of 4 making $100k USD qualify for affordable housing programs.
  - scrose 6y ago
    That seems pretty good to be honest. I’ve seen affordable housing listings in NYC for families of 1-2 with income limits topping out at 160K.
    - kevindong 6y ago
      For example, this lottery [0] from early 2020 permits individuals with an income of $168,130 to qualify for the affordable unit. Affordable housing units developed during some of the late 2000s to early 2010s had very, very high income limits. Those housing programs have mostly been sunset at this point but units built under those programs retain the income bracket levels then in effect. http://web.archive.org/web/20200110053546/http://www.nychdc.com/content/pdf/ProjectAdvertisements/Hunterspoint%20South.pdf http://web.archive.org/web/20200110053546/http://www.nychdc....
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jelliclesfarm 6y ago
She is merely saying..as I read it..that she doesn’t mind paying more taxes because she has already benefited more from the system than she expects to earn. The world we live in right now was created because of CAPITAL. Not TAXES. Even taxes exist only because of capital. I am tired of people instructing others how to think. If someone wants to compare their EU salaries with the US, let them! What is even the point of the Twitter thread except that the author says she is ‘ok with paying more taxes’. This literally has no value unless she also reveals how much she pays and how much she has gotten out of the system. The problem we have with our economic system..at least in theory..is the lack of A Constant. Either we should have a constant fixed population or a constant steady rate of consumption or stable prices or constant renewable resources. It is very difficult to have maintain equilibrium all the time when there is so much dynamic flux.
Kreotiko 6y ago
I agree, I don’t consider a good trade a much higher salary but having to live in that society. Life is not only about money and in this sector we are lucky enough to have a above average salary everywhere in the world.
hn3333 6y ago
The US salary situation is clearly superior. I wish I had somehow made my way into the US after getting my MsC in CS. But some choices led me elsewhere. Anyway, if I did, I'd probably be retired by now.
xxffgg557 6y ago
So many assume that programmers get handed high 6fig salaries here... Good luck with that, hope you are really the best of the best or you're barely going to scrape 6fig despite what all the comments / articles say!
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rayiner 6y ago
Whatever your politics, we should endeavor to stop giving oxygen to rhetoric that misstates easily verifiable facts: > I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs About 5% of people work more than one job in the US: https://www.qualityinfo.org/-/it-takes-two-or-more-oregon-s-multiple-jobholders-in-2019 https://www.qualityinfo.org/-/it-takes-two-or-more-oregon-s-... In Germany, where the author is based, that figure is 3.5 million of a labor force of 45 million--over 7% https://www.dw.com/en/germany-more-and-more-people-work-multiple-jobs/a-52082037 https://www.dw.com/en/germany-more-and-more-people-work-mult... > My father is disabled and my mom had the mentioned medical issues. Portugal has a disability pension of 430 euro per month: https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/progdesc/ssptw/2018-2019/europe/portugal.html https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/progdesc/ssptw/2018-2019/eur... The average Social Security Disability benefit in the U.S. is $1,260 per month: https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/082015/what-are-maximum-social-security-disability-benefits.asp https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/082015/what-are-max... Additional benefits are paid to disabled workers with families--the average is $2,200. That is higher than the cost-of-living (PPP) adjusted average monthly wage in Portugal. > My mom had cancer on minimum wage back in Portugal and we didn't pay a fucking cent A minimum wage worker with a disabled spouse would almost certainly be eligible for Medicaid, which has extremely low out-of-pocket costs: https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/cost-sharing/cost-sharing-out-pocket-costs/index.html https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/cost-sharing/cost-sharing-... You can take anecdotes and spin out a story that is highly misleading. You can find people abusing public benefits and spin out a myth about "welfare queens." But you can also find plenty of people who have fallen through the cracks of the system for whatever reason, and spin out a myth that we have no safety net and people are dying in the streets.
- handelaar 6y ago
  Whatever your politics, we should endeavor to stop giving oxygen to rhetoric that misstates easily verifiable facts * Your comparison between Portugal's social security system and the US's includes only one source of support, but several are available. (Cost of housing is one.) Neglecting this easily-verifiable fact has the same misinformational outcome as lying. * "Medicaid has extremely low out-of-pocket costs" is not a reply to "we didn't pay a fucking cent". Your (not-included) estimates of how much money a US resident definitely will have to pay is by definition never going to be as good as zero. It's almost like you're setting out to smooth over this also-easily-verifiable fact with "rhetoric".
threwawaysoff 6y ago
The only way to compare them are to exhaustively enumerate benefits, taxes, costs, and risks of costs beyond the salary number. Comparing these numbers across countries would allow for a more apples-to-apples comparison.
code4tee 6y ago
Very little in this post is true and highlights the sort of false image people paint of the US: - Most people work multiple jobs to make ends meet: False - Low income people don’t have health coverage: False - The US doesn’t have any form of government safety net health coverage for its people: False. Medicaid covers low income population and Medicare covers the older population. Not saying any of the above is perfect but these false pictures people paint of the US deserve to be called out.
mkl95 6y ago
A few things about the EU's (especially southern / eastern EU) job market: - There is a job shortage at the moment. This is not as acute in tech but the situation in tech is not good either. - Startups are chronically poor. There is little investment in startups and it's hard to secure it. If you are involved with a small startup it's likely it has existed for 5+ years and it has never had a round of more than €100k. - Companies can't just compete with each other here the way they do in the US. There are a number of EU laws that limit job mobility and competition, which mostly affect tech / engineering / insert qualified trade. This is an issue for companies and workers. - Salaries are low when compared to rent and property prices. Feel free to avoid the EU vs US salary conversation. As a developer in the uglier side of the EU I know experienced developers in the not-so-well-off states of the US are doing way better than experienced developers in the not-so-well-off countries of the EU.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  > Startups are chronically poor. There is little investment in startups and it's hard to secure it. If you are involved with a small startup it's likely it has existed for 5+ years and it has never had a round of more than €100k. Why not re-incorporate in SV? Sounds like the VC ecosystem is simply broken. Where are Europeans investing then?
uxp100 6y ago
This feels like a faux-woke way to justify workers being paid less. The subtext here is that European workers can't be paid more because of overhead of various public services, and I don't think that's true. If there were a few big European companies closely located that were hiring as much as SV tech hired, I think wages would go up. Not matching US salaries, but some. I really don't know anything, but I guess Germany where I would expect that to happen. If some self driving car related company funded by idk, BMW or Siemens or someone tried to scale up really fast. The other day people were mocking the EUs program to encourage European semiconductor tech, but I think Neural Network accelerator chips are still a niche that new companies could develop in.
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waihtis 6y ago
In this context, it would also be fair to note that Portugal gets much more than it gives into the EU: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48256318 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48256318
SuperFluffy 6y ago
I live in Germany, and I do compare salaries to American numbers. This is the very reason why I will never work for German companies ever again, because I'm not willing to be dependent on wage labour until the end of my days. I am working remotely for a US startup, who a) value my skillset instead of using antiquated tech, and b) who pay twice what I made before in Germany, and c) recently made me a cofounder. German startups aside, our big multinationals happily create teams working in the the US and Germany, while paying their German employees a fraction of their American colleagues. I know of cases in pharma, automotive, and erp. I'm loathe seeing this contentment with the wage situation in Germany. If wages for in demand fields like Software engineering are essentially flat for 30 years and €70k are considered an amazing salary, how exactly are wages supposed to rise in service sector fields, for example for caregivers? Salaries as part of gdp have deceased over that time range, but the prevalent ideology among my crowd is that one shall not work for money, because that's apparently a dirty thing to do. Software engineers not pushing for significantly higher wages and gaslighting people who do makes them accomplices to the wage surpression that is rampant in Germany and the EU at large.
foogazi 6y ago
> I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs 1. no way “most” people work three jobs 2. But if they were they would still be working three jobs wether you had a US or EU salary
vinni2 6y ago
Many comments here point out Medicaid and Medicare. What about sick pay? In most EU countries you can keep large fraction of your salary until you are able to work again. And what about parental leave? It is another benefit most Europeans enjoy. Finally vacations I get 30 days stress free vacation per year. I might be wrong but are there alternatives for these in the US?
Bancakes 6y ago
Don't sell products in Europe for their USD price in EUR.

DO compare it and see how much one can end up saving in a given time in the US, even after paying for healthcare, education etc.

jason0597 6y ago
Did you read the Twitter thread? The person writing the Twitter thread clearly outlines their feelings about the need to contribute to the social safety net. > I wanna give back, im okay with that > I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs
- AntiImperialis4 6y ago
  Yes, I did read the whole thread. Nobody is stopping one from voluntarily donating to a non-profit or for-profit organization, or being involved in one for that matter. In Europe, most people don't work 3 jobs because either it's not legal to do so or those jobs don't exist because of debilitating regulations... or at some point, making more isn't really worth it because of how high the taxes go up.
  - pidg 6y ago
    The occasional donation to a non-profit might help people subsist, but it doesn't build a better society with more opportunities for everyone. Nobody needs an obscene salary for writing code when others are struggling to afford the basics. As an aside, I remember being really taken aback when I went on holiday to the US and most of the menial jobs were being carried out by Hispanic and Black people. I guess if you are a white American you get inured to it, but as a white European it was kind of creepy and a bit repulsive.
    - marcinzm 6y ago
      Race aside, how is that different than western europe importing eastern europeans to work their menial jobs?
      - pidg 6y ago
        I guess freedom of movement allowing Eastern Europeans to legally live, work and pay tax in Western Europe without jumping through hoops, and immediately being able to benefit from the social systems there.
  - Normal_gaussian 6y ago
    The financial efficiency of a well managed charitable organisation is atrocious compared to state programs. This is largely due to state programs having the capability to actually solve problems. Eliminating working three jobs is desirable, it isnt debilitating to prevent exploitation of workers, its enabling. Setting a minimum wage and maximum working hours creates a minimum quality of life. For most people this is desirable. As far as I can see you'd either have to be a sadist, or incredibly obsessed with how well off you are vs others to not want this.
scotty79 6y ago
You'll get ruined in US if you get cancer in your close family despite 'paying for healthcare' all your life. In my uncharitable opinion US is good for earning money as a young, highly educated person and for nothing else. So go there when you are around 25, work your ass off at whoever pays the most for your skillset, spend as little as possible and bail before 35. Later you're screwed. You'll still make more and more there but the money is going to be useless.
- marcinzm 6y ago
  >You'll get ruined in US if you get cancer in your close family despite 'paying for healthcare' all your life. Not really if you have insurance which as a software engineer you would have. Might hit your $10k out of pocket maximum but you salary will easily cover that. edit: When my dad got cancer his insurance actually PAID him a cash payout for every treatment on top of paying the medical costs. He works at a non profit.
  - jason0597 6y ago
    The person in the Twitter thread notes how her minimum wage mother had cancer. I think it is highly unlikely that someone working at a minimum wage job would be covered for that by their insurance (I may be wrong) This now infamous reddit comment puts it into perspective very well: https://old.reddit.com/r/ABoringDystopia/comments/hj6t3t/nothing_new_under_the_sky/fwl8aom/ https://old.reddit.com/r/ABoringDystopia/comments/hj6t3t/not...
    - marcinzm 6y ago
      The comment I replied to made broad statements and based on the second sentence was talking about anyone with a cancer risk and not just those making low income. I don't disagree with your statement about costs to those lacking decent insurance, I merely disagree with creating broad generalizations unfounded in reality.
    - rayiner 6y ago
      Are you really unaware of Medicaid? Here in Maryland, a 3-person household like the author's can make up to $29,000/year and be eligible for Medicaid.
kamyarg 6y ago
Per the author's twit, without the higher taxes etc. they would not have been able to afford becoming a software engineer without this welfare setup. Also, yes you save much more, but when your mother has cancer and dad is disabled(As the author explains), realistically much more than what you save ends up being spent to take care of them and paying their medical bills.
- bserge 6y ago
  I have to say, she might be wrong about that. The US is different, sometimes worse, but people have adapted. In the US, she would've been able to buy a laptop for dirt cheap or get it from some charity or just someone looking to get rid of it for free. I myself got my first laptops and smartphones from the US, it was cheaper than buying locally, believe it or not. Most, if not all MOOCs are from the US. Tons of blogs, content, documentation in English, written by Americans. Free for all, just learn and show your skills. But yes, if there's an unforeseen medical emergency, you could go bankrupt in the US, while you'd be taken care of for free (or nearly free) in Europe.
- AntiImperialis4 6y ago
  >they would not have been able to afford becoming a software engineer without this welfare setup. Maybe if her parents didn't have to pay so much in taxes, they'd be able to save for her education... or she'd be able to pay back in no time, specially because of the amount of money she could be making. >yes you save much more, but when your mother has cancer and dad is disabled, realistically much more than what you save ends up being spent to take care of them and paying their medical bills. That's not achieved by magic. It's just an insurance scheme, but at a national level, and you can't opt out even if you have different values. Not only that, you don't magically get better care either, because you still have to fight for limited medical resources. In most European countries, it's achieved by nepotism or corruption. In some others, you have an option of buying additional private insurance on top of the national scheme, which if you make enough is a no brainer because of how bad the waiting is, depending on what illness you happen to get.
- marcinzm 6y ago
  They'd realistically have Medicaid in the US which doesn't have high out of pocket costs. Probably social security payments for disability and various other government programs. Some programs would even pay the mother (or a relative) to stay home and help their disabled spouse. Community college is fairly inexpensive in the US so there's that as well.
arctangos 6y ago
I hope that advocates of purchasing power parity comparisons are prepared to factor in implicitly consumed but not easily purchasable goods. Otherwise, they would miss out on many of the things that truly matter in life. For example, in the EU, my middle class neighbors’ children safely bike and ride the train to and from their excellent publicly funded schools, after school activities, and friends’ houses requiring little to no adult supervision while in transit.* What do private schooling, chauffeurs, and security personnel cost in the US, anyway? *Of course, COVID does interfere somewhat with this, but this is true worldwide.

exabrial 6y ago

It seems she's fairly ignorant of how things work here as the vast majority of his fears are unfounded. That's ok though, the point about comparing salaries is very valid, there's extreme cost of living differences among many other things. For a lot of Americans, the fear we have is being completely dependent on the government. Look at who is exiting presidential office, look who is entering. Attaching our fates to these bozos isn't something I necessarily relish.

digianarchist 6y ago
Disagree on the cost of living point. London and Dublin are comparable to a lot of major US cities yet wages are much lower than these cities. Even Canada pays better than a lot of European cities when you factor in COL between say Toronto and London.
- raverbashing 6y ago
  > Even Canada pays better than a lot of European cities when you factor in COL between say Toronto and London Doubt. The sinking CAD is an issue and COL (except for rents) is usually lower in Europe
  - 908B64B197 6y ago
    I don't get why they don't simply use the US dollar at this point.
tao_oat 6y ago
What do you think her fears are, and why are they unfounded? I understood her primary point as being about inequality and justice: "I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs"
- JPKab 6y ago
  I grew up in a family whose income put us below poverty line. I didn't have to pay for college, due to Pell grants, yet she thinks that in the USA, a good student can't go to college without money. That's just not a thing. But the media in the US creates that impression for Europeans. Also, the idea that poor people with cancer in the US are left to die. Not accurate. Medicare, medicaid, etc. Not saying its good, just saying she's deeply misinformed in the typical socialist left-wing media stereotypes and oversimplifications.

cnorthwood 6y ago

It seems very hard to compare the two figures. I guess the interesting way to compare them would be what's the disposable income you have to spend normalised against purchasing power. So gross salary, less taxes (payroll and any others if applicable), pension contributions, student loan repayments, medical insurance contributions (and other out-of-pocket expenses relating to that you may have to pay in a typical year), and then baseline cost-of-living (rent/mortgage payments), but there are so many variables there it seems very hard to be directly comparable. All I know is if I earned what I did now (which is an excellent UK salary) in Silicon Valley, I wouldn't be able to afford to live by myself in a two-bedroom flat in a desirable area, which is what I do now. I've no idea how much I would have to earn in SV to have the same quality of life as I do in Manchester, UK. (I figured it out for London and it's approximately a £20k premium due to the rental premium in London)

sjg007 6y ago
Put it this way, in Silicon Valley, a family of 4 making $100k USD qualify for affordable housing programs.
- scrose 6y ago
  That seems pretty good to be honest. I’ve seen affordable housing listings in NYC for families of 1-2 with income limits topping out at 160K.
  - kevindong 6y ago
    For example, this lottery [0] from early 2020 permits individuals with an income of $168,130 to qualify for the affordable unit. Affordable housing units developed during some of the late 2000s to early 2010s had very, very high income limits. Those housing programs have mostly been sunset at this point but units built under those programs retain the income bracket levels then in effect. http://web.archive.org/web/20200110053546/http://www.nychdc.com/content/pdf/ProjectAdvertisements/Hunterspoint%20South.pdf http://web.archive.org/web/20200110053546/http://www.nychdc....

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jelliclesfarm 6y ago

She is merely saying..as I read it..that she doesn’t mind paying more taxes because she has already benefited more from the system than she expects to earn. The world we live in right now was created because of CAPITAL. Not TAXES. Even taxes exist only because of capital. I am tired of people instructing others how to think. If someone wants to compare their EU salaries with the US, let them! What is even the point of the Twitter thread except that the author says she is ‘ok with paying more taxes’. This literally has no value unless she also reveals how much she pays and how much she has gotten out of the system. The problem we have with our economic system..at least in theory..is the lack of A Constant. Either we should have a constant fixed population or a constant steady rate of consumption or stable prices or constant renewable resources. It is very difficult to have maintain equilibrium all the time when there is so much dynamic flux.

Kreotiko 6y ago

I agree, I don’t consider a good trade a much higher salary but having to live in that society. Life is not only about money and in this sector we are lucky enough to have a above average salary everywhere in the world.

hn3333 6y ago

The US salary situation is clearly superior. I wish I had somehow made my way into the US after getting my MsC in CS. But some choices led me elsewhere. Anyway, if I did, I'd probably be retired by now.

xxffgg557 6y ago

So many assume that programmers get handed high 6fig salaries here... Good luck with that, hope you are really the best of the best or you're barely going to scrape 6fig despite what all the comments / articles say!

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rayiner 6y ago

Whatever your politics, we should endeavor to stop giving oxygen to rhetoric that misstates easily verifiable facts: > I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs About 5% of people work more than one job in the US: https://www.qualityinfo.org/-/it-takes-two-or-more-oregon-s-multiple-jobholders-in-2019 https://www.qualityinfo.org/-/it-takes-two-or-more-oregon-s-... In Germany, where the author is based, that figure is 3.5 million of a labor force of 45 million--over 7% https://www.dw.com/en/germany-more-and-more-people-work-multiple-jobs/a-52082037 https://www.dw.com/en/germany-more-and-more-people-work-mult... > My father is disabled and my mom had the mentioned medical issues. Portugal has a disability pension of 430 euro per month: https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/progdesc/ssptw/2018-2019/europe/portugal.html https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/progdesc/ssptw/2018-2019/eur... The average Social Security Disability benefit in the U.S. is $1,260 per month: https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/082015/what-are-maximum-social-security-disability-benefits.asp https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/082015/what-are-max... Additional benefits are paid to disabled workers with families--the average is $2,200. That is higher than the cost-of-living (PPP) adjusted average monthly wage in Portugal. > My mom had cancer on minimum wage back in Portugal and we didn't pay a fucking cent A minimum wage worker with a disabled spouse would almost certainly be eligible for Medicaid, which has extremely low out-of-pocket costs: https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/cost-sharing/cost-sharing-out-pocket-costs/index.html https://www.medicaid.gov/medicaid/cost-sharing/cost-sharing-... You can take anecdotes and spin out a story that is highly misleading. You can find people abusing public benefits and spin out a myth about "welfare queens." But you can also find plenty of people who have fallen through the cracks of the system for whatever reason, and spin out a myth that we have no safety net and people are dying in the streets.

handelaar 6y ago
Whatever your politics, we should endeavor to stop giving oxygen to rhetoric that misstates easily verifiable facts * Your comparison between Portugal's social security system and the US's includes only one source of support, but several are available. (Cost of housing is one.) Neglecting this easily-verifiable fact has the same misinformational outcome as lying. * "Medicaid has extremely low out-of-pocket costs" is not a reply to "we didn't pay a fucking cent". Your (not-included) estimates of how much money a US resident definitely will have to pay is by definition never going to be as good as zero. It's almost like you're setting out to smooth over this also-easily-verifiable fact with "rhetoric".

threwawaysoff 6y ago

The only way to compare them are to exhaustively enumerate benefits, taxes, costs, and risks of costs beyond the salary number. Comparing these numbers across countries would allow for a more apples-to-apples comparison.

code4tee 6y ago

Very little in this post is true and highlights the sort of false image people paint of the US: - Most people work multiple jobs to make ends meet: False - Low income people don’t have health coverage: False - The US doesn’t have any form of government safety net health coverage for its people: False. Medicaid covers low income population and Medicare covers the older population. Not saying any of the above is perfect but these false pictures people paint of the US deserve to be called out.

mkl95 6y ago

A few things about the EU's (especially southern / eastern EU) job market: - There is a job shortage at the moment. This is not as acute in tech but the situation in tech is not good either. - Startups are chronically poor. There is little investment in startups and it's hard to secure it. If you are involved with a small startup it's likely it has existed for 5+ years and it has never had a round of more than €100k. - Companies can't just compete with each other here the way they do in the US. There are a number of EU laws that limit job mobility and competition, which mostly affect tech / engineering / insert qualified trade. This is an issue for companies and workers. - Salaries are low when compared to rent and property prices. Feel free to avoid the EU vs US salary conversation. As a developer in the uglier side of the EU I know experienced developers in the not-so-well-off states of the US are doing way better than experienced developers in the not-so-well-off countries of the EU.

908B64B197 6y ago
> Startups are chronically poor. There is little investment in startups and it's hard to secure it. If you are involved with a small startup it's likely it has existed for 5+ years and it has never had a round of more than €100k. Why not re-incorporate in SV? Sounds like the VC ecosystem is simply broken. Where are Europeans investing then?

uxp100 6y ago

This feels like a faux-woke way to justify workers being paid less. The subtext here is that European workers can't be paid more because of overhead of various public services, and I don't think that's true. If there were a few big European companies closely located that were hiring as much as SV tech hired, I think wages would go up. Not matching US salaries, but some. I really don't know anything, but I guess Germany where I would expect that to happen. If some self driving car related company funded by idk, BMW or Siemens or someone tried to scale up really fast. The other day people were mocking the EUs program to encourage European semiconductor tech, but I think Neural Network accelerator chips are still a niche that new companies could develop in.

deleted 6y ago

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waihtis 6y ago

In this context, it would also be fair to note that Portugal gets much more than it gives into the EU: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48256318 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48256318

SuperFluffy 6y ago

I live in Germany, and I do compare salaries to American numbers. This is the very reason why I will never work for German companies ever again, because I'm not willing to be dependent on wage labour until the end of my days. I am working remotely for a US startup, who a) value my skillset instead of using antiquated tech, and b) who pay twice what I made before in Germany, and c) recently made me a cofounder. German startups aside, our big multinationals happily create teams working in the the US and Germany, while paying their German employees a fraction of their American colleagues. I know of cases in pharma, automotive, and erp. I'm loathe seeing this contentment with the wage situation in Germany. If wages for in demand fields like Software engineering are essentially flat for 30 years and €70k are considered an amazing salary, how exactly are wages supposed to rise in service sector fields, for example for caregivers? Salaries as part of gdp have deceased over that time range, but the prevalent ideology among my crowd is that one shall not work for money, because that's apparently a dirty thing to do. Software engineers not pushing for significantly higher wages and gaslighting people who do makes them accomplices to the wage surpression that is rampant in Germany and the EU at large.

foogazi 6y ago

> I don't wanna make 250k while most people work three jobs 1. no way “most” people work three jobs 2. But if they were they would still be working three jobs wether you had a US or EU salary

vinni2 6y ago

Many comments here point out Medicaid and Medicare. What about sick pay? In most EU countries you can keep large fraction of your salary until you are able to work again. And what about parental leave? It is another benefit most Europeans enjoy. Finally vacations I get 30 days stress free vacation per year. I might be wrong but are there alternatives for these in the US?

Bancakes 6y ago

Don't sell products in Europe for their USD price in EUR.