I think it’s more about two different definitions of freedom. The U.S. defines it as the freedom to choose, where harmful outcomes are an accident of letting people freely choose. The E.U. sees it more as the freedom to live, where choices that harm quality of life need to be restrained.
The EU constrains companies to the benefit of individuals. It's not stopping people from hurting themselves, it's stopping them from being hurt by companies who have phenomenal power over us, more power in some ways than states themselves have.
Whatever criticism the EU attracts for its spending, the PR budget looks to be pretty good value. I'm really baffled by some of these perspectives.
[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/08/lobbyists-euro...
Also, your 30K figure also includes lobbyists from civil rights groups and other NGO's. Not just purely companies.
Lobbying happens, it is how people influence politics. Better to be transparant and open about it them to hide it.
[1] http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2015/57280...
To American values, restrictions on how you do business are as infringing as restrictions on individual rights.
Along that same line of thinking, I think another historical American value/attitude is that a business is a person. More precisely, businesses only exist because individual people decide to take risks with their lives in the pursuit of whatever values they hold. Since they hold the risk privately, they get to hold the rewards privately.
That many people who take such risks value financial profit may be a concern to some, but is a non-concern to society as long as the marketplace is free of coercion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_...