[tick_tock_tick]

> Europe isn't that poor and many chunks of Asia have a lot of wealth now.

Europe is that poor and while lots of Asia has wealth not by comparison.

> Yet America's appetite and more importantly capability of absorbing all manner of goods remains unimpaired...how?!

We are just that much richer. It's honestly mind-blowing how much more money the average American has then anyone and everyone.

[chrsw]

I'm American and I applied to a software dev role at a European tech company some years ago. The job looked interesting and I thought it would be a fun adventure living abroad. I was shocked how low their salary range was. Even if I got their best offer for that position it would have been less than half what I was currently making. I figured it would be pointless to even to try to negotiate so I just left it alone.

This makes me wonder though, is this sustainable?

[yieldcrv]

It's super sustainable, look at it this way, we talk about various European country's social safety nets and how "America doesn't have that"

well America does, in most states, at low income brackets. free healthcare, subsidized groceries, childcare, even some higher education

which happen to be the same income brackets that most Europeans are at lol

[0xDEAFBEAD]

The most frustrating thing is how successful populist politicians have been at convincing voters that the US is actually going to shit and needs radical change. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy when said politicians start chipping away at the underpinnings of our prosperity. Wake up America, you actually have it pretty good.

[dukeyukey]

The US is very rich, but Europe is not poor. Europe is richer than basically anywhere on the planet _except_ the US. Like even compared to Canada or Japan, Europe is (generally) as rich or richer. Poland just overtook Japan in GDP per capita! Both the UK and France are richer than the oil-rich UAE.

[tick_tock_tick]

I mean on an absolute basis the average European enjoys a very comfortable quality of life and often a better work life balance then most in the USA.

That said in the context of this thread on why countries seem to bend over backwards for the "privilege" to sell to the USA it's because everyone is shockingly poor by comparison.