The point of regulation in Europe is usually to protect people. Regulation in the US seems to be done with the purpose of protection companies. I'm not 100% sure, but this feels non-ideal for most people.
I mean if you cut out the bottom 65% and the top 1% (but perhaps even top 5%) of americans, you are left with a group of generally affluent people who are the actual backbone of the US economy. These people work white collar career jobs, own houses, own stocks, have retirement on track, college debt paid off or soon to be, good health insurance, go on vacations, drive new(ish) cars, let their instagram impulse buying get a bit out of control sometimes, maybe they work from home or are hybrid, and they mostly all go out and vote.
These people are the antithesis of "America is a Shithole", and they know it, so they keep their head down and point at the top 1% like everyone else. It's virtuous and pure to do so (and of course keeps the heat off them, the wealthiest contingent). If you isolate this group and compare them globally, it spells out why for decades so many white collar workers wanted to be in the US rather than Europe or the East.
> If you isolate this group and compare them globally, it spells out why for decades so many white collar workers wanted to be in the US rather than Europe or the East.
Given it sounds like you've already done this, care to share the results you got? When I meet peers from the US, it still seems like things are more rough there, regardless of class, compared to in other countries, but this is of course based on my personal experience, would love to see concrete data about it.
Many examples of when this is not seemingly the goal, hence the "usually". Some people suck, everywhere, and sometimes they end up with power to enact things, this happens everywhere, Europe is probably no better. Hopefully the institutions we've built up and continue to build, are more resilient when the future real tests come though, so far they haven't really been put under real stress.
Please explain how making it difficult to start a business and hire employees protects people. I've never understood that logic but maybe I'm missing something.
The goal isn't "making it difficult to start a business", the goal is to protect people, meaning things affecting the public are more controlled, slower and more bureaucratic to initiate. The slowness is a feature and there really isn't any "difficulty" in starting a business, it just takes time to fill out papers and wait for approvals and what not.
"the slowness is a feature" - I grew up in eastern block of Europe in the 80-90s, this type of sentiment has a real "the party loves you, this is for your own good" vibe.
Difference in opinion isn't authoritarianism or means you live a dictatorship. Slowness is actually a feature in lots of societies, for example in Spain where I live, for better or worse. Your comment gives of a "so you hate waffles?" vibe.
It's very simple to start a business, and it's even simpler to hire people.
It is hard to fire employee, especially when the company is doing good, yes.
It is a bit slow and administratively annoying to start a business in some countries, yes, though in those you can usually start operating while starting AND there are workarounds which is why there isn't enough pressure to stop it (eg, the german "pre made company shell" market is how you actually do it instead of making your own).
Go live a few months as an average middle class person in Western Europe and then do the same in the US. You can argue in favor of US superiority based on GDP and stock market and number of billionaires a hundred other similar metrics, but looking at basic happiness and quality of life there’s really no comparison. Europeans value maximizing family, community, physical and mental health, leisure time, hobbies, culture, and so their laws and policies are written in that way.
I think about this a lot as someone living in the north of England (in a nice town and quite well off) maybe ignorance is bliss but I just don't know how life could get much better, but then I guess some Japanese person living a prosperous life in a nice community might feel the same about where they live (and might not rate the type of life I lead) so I guess it's subjective..
As I said I think idly about this a lot because when you feel like you've found a sort of eudaimonia you want to share it. But whilst personally, I feel like I won life's lottery being in the place and time I am, but that doesn't mean it's the one true way.
Wherever people are, I hope it's the right place for them personally
Yeh all I wanna do I hire a few employees, raise some capital and put my AI nudifier out into the hands of German schoolkids, but damn EU regulators just wants to keep the little guy down I guess
The winning monopolies and CEOs seem to be intent into turning into some kind of techno fascists feudalism with the most corrupt government on earth, uncontrollable start the war machine and increasingly less and generally destroying democracy.
So, I am not sure it is such a win. These guys seem to be winning.
Yep. Growing up, I always defaulted to the "enlightened centrist" perspective that antitrust law and IP law and trade law were failing to help the median person simply due to the difficulty of the problem, that insofar as our regulation was inadequate it was inadequate because it had to balance multiple crossed incentives and stay ahead of world class sprinters who had a systemic resource advantage because the economy will always be larger than the regulators. But the more I learn about the history of these subjects the more I realize that the levers were understood, they did work, and that the present outcomes were entirely intentional.
Reagan and the Chicago school intentionally shifted antitrust and IP law into monopoly mode (Bork and Bowman+Posner). The Consumer Welfare Standard is an obvious fig-leaf over Robber Baron talking points as defeated earlier by Brandeis, the Nine No-Nos (lol) indicate that the failure modes of modern IP policy weren't just understood but contained, and then containment was turned off. Trade is a messier story but Triffin articulated the distributional problems in the 60s so nobody gets to claim ignorance.
The bad news is that there is more corruption that I thought, but the good news is that the problems are more solvable than I thought.