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The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

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Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#361

Post by smileysteve »

staticman2 wrote: post #80
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about: - Your access to mRNA vaccines - Your access to cleaner air due to electric car adoption - Ditto for energy security and renewable sources of electricity - Your chance of dying in a car going down due to new safety features - Your access to crazy advanced cancer treatments that are making progress at almost miraculous paces - Your much improved ability to work from home, cutting out ~2 hours of commuting…

"- Your access to crazy advanced cancer treatments that are making progress at almost miraculous paces" If things were improving "exponentially" like you claim, our lifespan would be accelerating and these "miraculous" treatments would allow us to live 100s of years. What's actually happening is our lifespan is not increasing, and in some years has been decreasing. >>maybe you're depressed But if these "miraculous" "…

But then you look at the cause of of the lifespan decrease; and it's mostly not directly related to healthcare or quality of life* (though easy to argue mental health)

It's drug overdoses, addiction, car accidents.

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#362

Post by HWR_14 »

dogma1138 wrote: post #240
HWR_14 wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't PPP per capita a better measure of quality of life than nominal GDP per capita? I care about what I can buy. Obviously, nominal GDP per capita matters for international vacations.

No, GDP PPP doesn’t measure what you can buy it measure how much things cost. It doesn’t know how much money you have, it doesn’t measure the purchasing power of individuals. It also is based on a basket of 3000 fungible goods and services without accounting for value of quality or outcomes; as explained already in this thread. It doesn’t take into account median income, income and wealth inequality, unemployment rat…

That's not really relevant. I didn't say it was the best measure, I said PPP GDP is better than nominal GDP. All you did was argue that there are better measures. Both which I agree with and is irrelevant. Sure, median income is better than mean income.

Given that, PPP is better than nominal, however you compute the average.

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#363

Post by HWR_14 »

thanksbucko wrote: post #345
dogma1138 wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, your GDP PPP can be double that of the US and it does you absolutely squat if the median wage is 10 times lower. I swear I don’t remember the last time I’ve seen this low level of topical knowledge in a post on HN as this one.

Thanks for posting clarifications and disputations, seriously. I naively thought all the PPP business meant something that I’ve since learned it does not.

It's orthogonal. Nominal GDP (or income) is if you took it to the money exchange and turned it into the same global currency (say US Dollars or Euros). PPP GDP (or income) takes into account how much stuff you can buy.

Whether it's better to take the median income or the per capita GDP (which is closer to the mean income) to represent the "typical" person is a different question.

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#364

Post by nonethewiser »

LilBytes wrote: post #186
cypress66 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of that life expectancy gap is due to obesity I'd guess.

And a strong difference in quality health care outcomes for people of all ages.

Outcomes in the US are high. So are the costs though.

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#365

Post by HWR_14 »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #299
HWR_14 wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't PPP per capita a better measure of quality of life than nominal GDP per capita? I care about what I can buy. Obviously, nominal GDP per capita matters for international vacations.

Neither measure what you can buy. GDP isn't distributed evenly. PPP doesn't effect the distribution. It's just an adjustment. An oil state like Russia has a decent GDP, but the distribution is horrendous. It doesn't matter if you look at GDP or GDP PPP. Neither gives you a great picture "what you can buy" unless you're in the top 1%.

No one said GDP was distributed evenly. My point was PPP GDP is better than nominal GDP. IF you use median income, PPP median income is better than nominal median income.

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#366

Post by EGreg »

bjornasm wrote: post #315
AbrahamParangi wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These stats drive me up the wall because the US is more diverse than every single European country . The life expectancy in California is 81 and in Alabama it’s 74. That’s the difference between the UK and like, Latvia. This matters because when you look at these crude aggregate stats, people naively assume that it means that everything is a bit worse but the actual American story is usually more like broad prosperit…

What a weird way of framing it. The USA is compared with EU, so it doesn't matter if USA is more diverse than single european countries. As you point out, EU is also very diverse.

But EU is more diverse than any single US state!

So like... nyeh

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#367

Post by nonethewiser »

bjornasm wrote: post #318
nemo44x wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More opportunity. More capacity to improve your lot in life. More luxury. More space. It goes on. There’s a reason millions more people from the EU live in the USA than the other way. Or why there’s a line 100s of millions long to come to the USA. Nowhere is perfect but as a world traveler I’d say the USA is pretty great. What I have found most interesting over the last 20 years is that the conversation has moved fro…

>There’s a reason millions more people from the EU live in the USA than the other way. Or why there’s a line 100s of millions long to come to the USA. That the EU has 100million more inhabitants, a history of relocating to the US or american culture and language being extremely present all over western society? >Nowhere is perfect but as a world traveler I’d say the USA is pretty great. "Nothing is like home" - news…

> a history of relocating to the US or american culture and language being extremely present all over western society?

Well these just reinforce his point

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#368

Post by cbsmith »

e4e5 wrote: post #232
rafaelero wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US wages have not followed US productivity for the last 50 years as well.

I don't understand this argument. If everyone has become more productive, why would wages rise? Wouldn't we see that as inflation then? I think the rise of productivity is more seen in the growth of the GDP

So if employees are more productive, you would naturally expect all of the benefits of that increased productivity to go to their employers?

I'm curious as to your reasoning about why people do anything other than the absolute minimum to receive their paycheck.

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#369

Post by FpUser »

lisasays wrote: post #342
FpUser wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

In Ukraine Russian speakers are hardly the minority. What's this supposed to mean? Certainly it's not referring to the portion of native speakers.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_language_in_Ukraine#:~....

Re: The US economy and the EU were the same size in 2008, the US is now nearly 2X

#370

Post by Rexxar »

mrb wrote: post #96

Note this chart shows nominal dollars, not PPP-adjusted. The EU has certainly kept up with the US when looking at PPP GDP from 2008 to 2022: US grew from $14.8T to $25.5T EU grew from $14.3T to $24.3T What that means is that the prices of goods are inflated in the US compared to similar goods in the EU. That's all. Want something interesting? Look at China who grew from $10.0T to $30.3T over the same period (!) Sourc…

Indeed, another way to see this is that's just forex valuation change.

2008 was the peak of EUR value after subprime crises in USA. And the "nearly two times" is more like 1.60 which is explained by the value of the euro coming back from 1.6$ to the more sustainable long term value of 1$.

(usd/eur chart https://www.macrotrends.net/2548/euro-dollar-exchange-rate-h...)

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