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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

#621

Post by krageon »

TheRealPomax wrote: post #394

It also took fascism way further than Europe, so it kinda balances out.

In the US you have young, silly fascism: cops killing anyone who isn't their preferred skin colour in the street. It's all very hateful and not palatable, even for folks that don't think further than the current incident.

In the EU you have older, more refined fascism: a political party subtly (or not so subtly) intimating an entire group of people is a huge problem, a return to "strong leader" values, etc. It's perhaps a bit more seductive, and deliberately so: public perception would be more poor if it was as violence-heavy as it is in the US.

You have to remember the EU is where fascism came from. It was a huge deal before WW2 and in essence it has never really left, it has just gotten better at rebranding.

Eventually you will see the hot new fascism trends in the EU transported to the US as well, it is how fashion works.

N.B.: I'm not a fan (of fascism or other regressive policies), which is perhaps not obvious. I just wanted to make clear that while the US has many problems and they are horrible, most of them are just "well the EU is doing this now so why aren't they???" and you can sort that out by waiting a generation or two. It's how the two areas started out (for ease of dialogue I'm ignoring how the US actually started out, that's a can of worms for another day), after all.

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

#622

Post by blagie »

landemva wrote: post #169
mrb wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" GDP PPP can increase whilst your economy contracts. " Still, if PPP GDP increases, with all else being equal (eg. stable population) it would imply the standard of living is increasing. That is why PPP GDP captures a more accurate measure of the real world. Said another way, what truly matters isn't "GDP growth", but changes in purchasing power/quality of life.

>> it would imply the standard of living is increasing. In USA, GDP includes the explosion of numbers of hospital admin staffers, energy prices doubled, and production of munitions which are given to Europe. That GDP does not increase my quality of life.

It's an interesting argument. My feeling, completely based on spending a lot of time in the EU and the US is, and visited a lot of other countries:

- In general, GDP PPP per capita correlates pretty well with quality-of-life.

- In the case of US versus EU, it doesn't for this precise reason.

The amount of GDP I need to be happy is decent food, housing, education, basic entertainment (e.g. a nice park with a free concert, or a pleasant beach), and medical.

I get all of those in the (lower-income) EU country I normally visit, cheaply, and without much stress. $10k / year provides an adequate quality-of-life. That's not hard to make there, so people pick the careers they want. In the (high cost-of-living) area I spend time in the US, one needs around $150-200k / year to be stress-free. People do work like programming, biotech, law, finance, etc. to make it here.

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

#623

Post by ChatGTP »

throwawaylinux wrote: post #464
ChatGTP wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually think it's the opposite, I always see Americans getting really snarky about Europe, I could go back and find plenty of examples but I have better things to do. Personally I think average Americans have a hard time imaging a world where there is more to life than money. Ultimately whenever I see these "murica" centric posts, I remember them flying in emergency medical supplies from China and everybody being…

> I actually think it's the opposite, I always see Americans getting really snarky about Europe, I could go back and find plenty of examples but I have better things to do. I'm responding to a (one of the many) cases of people being strangely upset and irrational about a simple fact about the US doing better in this one metric recently. There is no "opposite" about it, I never said it does not happen the other way ar…

I'm responding to a (one of the many) cases of people being strangely upset and irrational about a simple fact about the US doing better in this one metric recently. There is no "opposite" about it, I never said it does not happen the other way around, I'm questioning why it is happening this way around in this thread. And again that is making people upset and bringing up other unrelated things, which is quite ironic really.

If it happens both ways then it doesn't matter why, it's a kind of passive aggressive question then? You know that many people don't like America and it's way of operating, which IMO is about maximizing profits and throwing people under the bus to do so. No great national doesn't offer world class free healthcare, sorry. But that is the challenge of our time and we in the USA have failed. We have also failed, very ,very hard leading the world through climate change, so we're just a bunch of rich people with no leadership strength now.

Personally I think it's sad that so many "educated and enlightened" people are okay with making vile accusations and generalizations about others they know nothing about.

Regardless of any of your accusations, being that I'm some kind of generalizing monster, there is no place on earth that worships money like the USA. Sorry but that is just how it is. I've never experienced anything quite like it. Money is the religion. That's why we're having a GDP party.

I know a bunch of Americans and almost all are warm, friendly, generous. Some very driven, very few who struck me as being all about money. I feel sad that many have been to feel ashamed of themselves by this kind of casual bullying.

So do I, but I guess you're also generalizing that most Americans are lovely, because I know many that aren't. Saying this, Americans aren't any nicer per-capita than anywhere else in the world. There are nice people everywhere and there are dicks everywhere.

The problem with America is it's politics and the access lobbyists have to politicians. I think Americans are probably too nice and too gullible to see the situation improved.

Lobbying is a fairly unique problem in the US which causes things like mass shootings at schools to happen. The NRA makes sure everyone has guns (for example).

I don't quite understand what you're getting at. You're upset by the fact that the US economy measured by GDP grew much faster than the EU recently, but you take comfort from the fact that China manufactures a lot of things that other countries buy such as medical equipment and there were shortages of various goods during Covid. I don't know what to make of that but I'm sure there's some interesting psychology behind it.

Again, you're making accusations now. I don't take comfort in it, but I am saying it's important to be humble. I think boasting is a major character floor and again, had China decided not to send supplies, America would've been quite screwed. So yeah, let's be humble no matter how big our GDP cock is.

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

#624

Post by dmurray »

sixstringtheory wrote: post #612
Qwertious wrote: post #581

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More specifically, some valuable types of activities are not even measured in GDP - if you build your own table out of roadside scrap, then you might be immensely satisfied by the table, but it will contribute $0 to GDP. If you follow free instructions online (and look various stuff up on Wikipedia), that will again improve your life but not GDP.

I wonder how that kind of reclamation project could be valued in terms of avoidance of waste, avoidance of expenditure of new resources, and the skill development of the person doing the work (in terms of either/both faster pace of the same value created in future reclamations, and/or future marketability of the skills towards a saleable product).

You could start by valuing it at the price someone would pay for it, plus the price the worker would have paid for that many hours of hands-on education.

This isn't totally farfetched: in some countries if you own your house you pay tax on the rent you would have paid to yourself [0]. Taxing someone for feeding or educating himself seems like a small and natural next step.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imputed_rent

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

#625

Post by hsuduebc2 »

sva_ wrote: post #157
hsuduebc2 wrote: post #153

As a European I have sometimes feeling that we are skanzen of the world. Don't get me wrong. It's much better than to be battleground like before.

> skanzen Outdoor museum?! I couldn't really find a definition for this term.

Basically. It is conserved for the purpose of conservation where change is not desirable.

These outdoor museums are actually preserved villages where people live in these old conditions because they feel good that way. Somehow like today's Europe. Progress is limited and regulated or stopped.

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

#626

Post by nocoiner »

landemva wrote: post #169
mrb wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" GDP PPP can increase whilst your economy contracts. " Still, if PPP GDP increases, with all else being equal (eg. stable population) it would imply the standard of living is increasing. That is why PPP GDP captures a more accurate measure of the real world. Said another way, what truly matters isn't "GDP growth", but changes in purchasing power/quality of life.

>> it would imply the standard of living is increasing. In USA, GDP includes the explosion of numbers of hospital admin staffers, energy prices doubled, and production of munitions which are given to Europe. That GDP does not increase my quality of life.

The energy position of the United States is just …. tremendously, tremendously sound. We’re a net exporter of hydrocarbons, have terrific renewable facilities in place, under development and untapped future potential, and have poured how many hundreds of billions of public and private capital into energy infrastructure in the past decade?

Are you, like, talking about the cost of a gallon of gas or something? Because I can cherry pick whatever numbers you like to craft a reductive substance-free assertion about the state of the US energy production and distribution system.

No argument on the hospital admins, tho (although it’s nice to have at least one in your social circle, so they can get you in with the top tier actual practitioners).

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

#627

Post by geysersam »

karp773 wrote: post #619
HPsquared wrote: post #564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eisenhower put it well. "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick sch…

With all due respect to Eisenhower, this is an example of incredible political myopia. A country does not exist in a political vacuum and has to be able to protect its freedom and the very right to exist. So freedom is not free but comes at a price. How high the price is depends on the situation. Sometimes it's very high, unfortunately. Complaining about this fact is as productive as complainig about gravity: if only…

It's not a fact that the US needs to spend 50% of the global military budget. If anything is myopic, that is.

It can still be argued that it's worth the expenditure. But the cost should be weighted against the alternatives. Neither Russia or China can be said to threaten the US with their military, except with nuclear weapons, but no defence budget protects against those.

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

#628

Post by nemo44x »

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…

I think the history isn’t relative today. It’s skilled Euros moving to the USA. Not the “poor and tired”.

If you’re skilled/smart then the USA will offer a much higher quality of life. This is why these types of people move to the USA and Europe suffers from brain drain. (Hint - high taxes chase people away to better places!)

There are exceptions though! More Americans move to Norway than the other way. It’s a richer country so that makes sense.

But check out this article from today:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/europeans-poorer-inflation-econ...

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

#629

Post by ChatGTP »

boudin wrote: post #611
didntcheck wrote: post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Europeans aren't some superior noble ascetics. People want to consume, and their demand exceeds their ability in practically all situations. So USians are getting more of what they want while most Europeans would jump at the ability to do the same. For the record, I am European myself

Do you have anything to backing this statement? It sounds really false to me. Around me people are not into consumerism at all and are making an effort to not buy, buy second hand when needed, repair and maintain what they own based on environmental impact concerns, not economical. The current energy costs has had an impact but people were behaving this way before that.

I recently went to Australia and I hung out with some relatives. I noticed there, all the cool kids are into this, very few young people buy new cloths and everyone is kind of socially aware and second hand / vintage but good quality clothes are fashionable. Same for things like second hand "fixie" bikes etc.

It was kind of cool actually.

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

#630

Post by pastage »

karp773 wrote: post #619
HPsquared wrote: post #564

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eisenhower put it well. "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick sch…

With all due respect to Eisenhower, this is an example of incredible political myopia. A country does not exist in a political vacuum and has to be able to protect its freedom and the very right to exist. So freedom is not free but comes at a price. How high the price is depends on the situation. Sometimes it's very high, unfortunately. Complaining about this fact is as productive as complainig about gravity: if only…

Tools created will be used, the cost of the US and Russian war arsenal is far greater than just the monetary cost to build them. One could argue that a weapons destructive force should be counted against it.

To strive for peace is not near sighted, it is the only way forward.

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