[iancmceachern]

I'm not paying the premium for health insurance, no. But I am paying 200 a month to upgrade to "platinum", I'm paying 400 a month because Blue Shield lists a lifesaving medicine I've been on for 2 decades as a tier 3 drug, so I had to battle with them for 3 weeks to get them to "cover" it at 400 a month out of my pocket. I then have a 4k per family deductible we need to reach on top of the drug co-pays. So when my wife thought she broke her toe it cost is 1500 out of pocket. This is the absolute best, top tier platinum" insurance afforded me administered by a "non profit" that was stripped of much of its non profit status for making billions in profit.

All that adds up to 7204 out of our pocket per year before any sort of catastrophic or even regular event like childbirth.

And we're the lucky ones

[prottog]

The difference between $200k and $80k soothes the ache of that $7204 quite nicely, I suppose.

[missedthecue]

This is the big thing. The bigger salary more than covers the difference. And it's not just tech. Nurses in the UK make 25,000 pounds per year, nurses in the US make $85k or more.

I would rather have the higher salary with student loans, my own health insurance, and no subsidized childcare than make 25K GBP (at a higher tax rate!)

[iancmceachern]

Exactly, it's not unheard of for police officers to make up to 300k a year, including overtime, here in the bay area. Starting pay for many "regular" jobs is well over 6 figures here

[wizofaus]

Fine as long as you're able to keep earning said salary. It's the state you end up in when you're not for whatever reason that's arguably the big difference. My own partner's a nurse and has gone through extensive periods where her income has been low or non-existent and while it wasn't really an issue given the presence of my salary to fall back on it's not hard to see how difficult things might become esp. if there were no/limited government subsidized healthcare and high levels of student debt (again, thankfully not such a problem in Australia - even as a foreign student, as she was, there are measures in place to ensure they don't saddle themselves with unreasonable debt. Citizens can often pay off higher education fees within a few years of graduating, and no repayments are required in years your salary is below a certain threshold)

[missedthecue]

Yes in general I agree. The biggest problem is for those who experience chronic un/underemployment.

I'm not against a social safety net, but I don't think the benefits one gets in Europe equals out to the higher income + lower tax rate in the states

[adave]

QoL in Europe is way better than US.Labor laws and life in general is better even with the lower pay as its all relative.

[iancmceachern]

Agreed, I think all those things amount to less stress, less stress to just exist as a regular human.