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Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

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Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#161

Post by Redoubts »

opportune wrote: post #88
izacus wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood that argument - Bay Area, the (arguably) richest place on this planet is smaller then Switzerland and it's transit system is catastrophic in comparison to SBB still. I get that you can't cover Alabama with Swiss railways, but why the heck is traveling from Zurich a Swiss mountain top in the middle of nowhere still faster and more convenient than getting from SF to Mountain View?

The thing that pisses me off the most about the Bay Area transit system is how slow it is compared to taking a car. I don’t understand how you can build a rail system that ends up taking 2x longer to get from point A to point B. Even aside from the spotty coverage it’s ridiculous how the train can take longer from station to station than driving

I, too, can't believe how many times I've been Caltrain in an Uber Pool.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#162

Post by runarberg »

EGreg wrote: post #158
runarberg wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One war? Am I miscounting? There is the Spanish American war, the Mexican war, the war of 1812, the US Civil war (slave war), there were numerous Indian wars during the manifest destiny. Several wars in the Caribbean and Central America. I’m sorry if this seems pedantic since it doesn’t affect your point, but I feel like it deserves some clarification.

I should have been clear - I meant a war between the states, analogous to the myriad wars between European countries in the meantime. Empires and Federations are cool that way - the member states don’t waste resources fighting each other endlessly.

I see. You don’t even need a federation, a customs union usually suffice. E.g. there have been zero wars within the European Union for example. Although I’ll admit, looking at the internal struggle is an unfair simplification as European parties (as with the United States) have plenty of that external violence going on.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#163

Post by dsfyu404ed »

deogeo wrote: post #142
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes because the number of stake holders that need to be satisfied and the number of edge cases would increase massively. Look at public transit systems throughout the west whenever they get expanded it's a long painful process because of all the new stakeholders being added and the new edge cases that get brought to light. Edit: Down-voted because inconvenient opinion or down-voted because wrong?

Perhaps because you don't state any mechanism on how the borders of a country increase the complexity of building a particular transit system - you just assert that it is so. Surely the number of stakeholders is more related to proximity, than borders? And China, Russia, and Canada are all large countries, but seem to manage decent mass transit. In sum, you provide a shaky, ad-hoc justification on why it's more diffi…

>Perhaps because you don't state any mechanism on how the borders of a country increase the complexity of building a particular transit system

This is HN. I shouldn't have to exhaustively spell out every detail like I'm on Reddit. I think that stating that a mass transit system that covers more people and more area leading to more stakeholders with more opinions who need to be pleased is more than enough. Presumably most people here have jobs where they work with other people and should be familiar with how increasing the number of stakeholders and/or coverage of a project increases technical and political complexity.

Look at the history of public transit in the DC/Maryland/Virginia area for an example of political complexity scaling with the number of people and different jurisdictions covered.

>China

The land of "the subway is going here, don't like it then screw you".

>Russia

Which built out most of it's infrastructure back when it could operate similarly to China does today.

I would think it would go without saying that having a government that unilaterally steamrolls any opposition to its public works projects is not a practical solution for mass transit in the west.

>Canada

In basically all of Canada you "need" a car. Most here would say that means they don't have good mass transit.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#164

Post by rendall »

chrisseaton wrote: post #134
falsedan wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know this is a troll but: VCs have more funding available and are less risk-adverse, employees are easier to underpay/overwork (rip unions), corporate oversight is less burdensome. This is the first job outside of the public sector that I’ve seen union materials prominently displayed on internal notice boards.

> I know this is a troll I can't understand how my point could be considered trolling. People seem to vote with their feet - they often choose US employers over European ones. The employers with the best conditions and pay in Europe are often US employers! For example local offices of Google.

I left the US to Finland for one third the salary and twice the taxes, but I gained a priceless work-life balance.

My work colleagues are relentlessly competent, and part of that competence is valuing family and leisure.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#165

Post by rendall »

kartan wrote: post #62
baby wrote: post #47

I personally find Switzerland boring and expensive. And I'm not sure your work culture is going to be that different if you work at Google or another tech company. If I go back to Europe I would go to Portugal or Italy or Spain. These countries are laid back, cheap, have good weather and good food. What else do you want? London and some cities in France like Bordeaux or Montpellier are insanely fun too.

> These countries are laid back Have you worked in Italy or Spain? I'm Spanish and laid back at work is not a thing. The main reason I moved to Sweden is for is better work life balance. Never go to live where you go for vacations, you will be very disappointed.

@kartan, are siestas still a thing in Spain? I always imagined workers in Spain roll into work around 10, work till 2, then a 2-hour break, and then go home around 6. I guess that's wrong?

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#166

Post by SlowRobotAhead »

opportune wrote: post #90
SlowRobotAhead wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how many people that don’t buy that argument have driven across the USA a few times?

The commenter restricted it to metro areas and I concur. There is not too much difference in density from cities like Seattle and San Francisco from European cities. I don’t think we should be building high speed rail from Anchorage to Lincoln, NE but there is no reason we can’t have a ubahn/sbahn system in each large city and high speed rail down the coasts

>There is not too much difference in density from cities like Seattle and San Francisco from European cities.

Not sure I can get on board with that. It's the number of cities.

Switzerland has ONE city with a population over 250k. USA has EIGHTY EIGHT or so over 238 times the area. That matters where you invest, how you build, etc.

As to why we can't have high speed rails, ask California.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#167

Post by ScottFree »

snovv_crash wrote: post #156
ScottFree wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In theory. I looked into emigrating to Switzerland a few years ago and I was told that getting a work permit was nearly impossible as a US citizen. Swiss companies have to prove that they can't find an EU passport holder with the expertise necessary for the job before they can hire an American or any other non-EU passport holder. Unless something has changed?

What that really means is that they need to have a job ad open for 3 months that they didn't hire someone else into before they can justify hiring a non-EU citizen. It helps if you're doing something specialized or have some intersection of skills for the justification, but it isn't insurmountable, just hard enough so that they only get the people who really want it.

Do you know an American or Canadian who was hired this way? Or is this speculation?

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#168

Post by nojvek »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #163
deogeo wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps because you don't state any mechanism on how the borders of a country increase the complexity of building a particular transit system - you just assert that it is so. Surely the number of stakeholders is more related to proximity, than borders? And China, Russia, and Canada are all large countries, but seem to manage decent mass transit. In sum, you provide a shaky, ad-hoc justification on why it's more diffi…

>Perhaps because you don't state any mechanism on how the borders of a country increase the complexity of building a particular transit system This is HN. I shouldn't have to exhaustively spell out every detail like I'm on Reddit. I think that stating that a mass transit system that covers more people and more area leading to more stakeholders with more opinions who need to be pleased is more than enough. Presumably…

Really love what they’ve done in Vancouver with the sky train.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#169

Post by snovv_crash »

ScottFree wrote: post #167
snovv_crash wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What that really means is that they need to have a job ad open for 3 months that they didn't hire someone else into before they can justify hiring a non-EU citizen. It helps if you're doing something specialized or have some intersection of skills for the justification, but it isn't insurmountable, just hard enough so that they only get the people who really want it.

Do you know an American or Canadian who was hired this way? Or is this speculation?

Me, twice (I changed jobs). However what I do is fairly specialized, so I'm not surprised they weren't able to find someone qualified in 3 months.

The other part of making it hard is so that the employer doesn't undertake the effort unless they really need the person and can't do with a local. I know the company made an exception for me, as they did for one other employee, but for the most part their policy is not to hire non-Swiss/EU citizens due to the administrative burden.

Re: Living in Switzerland ruined me for America and its lousy work culture (2016)

#170

Post by mruts »

F_r_k wrote: post #108
fastball wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Highest GDP + most powerful military doesn't cut it for you?

Who care about military ? So you can launch some rockets and kill each other ? Lame.. Some of the American people can't even go to the hospital..

It’s illegal to turn someone away from the emergency room. I don’t think you know what you’re talking about.
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