[kjetil]

This argument doesn't make sense to me. Better wellfare lowers the risk of working at a startup, which would make more people try it. I guess work regulations and employee rights are make things harder in Europe than in the US, though.

According to Inc., "Norway has more entrepreneurs per capita than the United States":

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20110201/in-norway-start-ups-say...

(Disclosure: I am indeed Norwegian.)

I think the more interesting question is how to create the next Google or Facebook outside the US.

[mhd]

I don't think this is just about startups in that case, it's about big corporations. Most European ones have been around for quite a while, I think it's not as common for newcomers to join those ranks here. I'd be hard-pressed to name big companies that arose just recently.

We do have a bit more middle-class companies, or at least so it seems. As with almost everything, the US is more about extremes than Europe.