Comment by camillomiller | Hacker News Reader

Comment by camillomiller | Hacker News Reader

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I am sorry for where you stand and I hope you can get to better times soon. That said, I am really sorry but what you describe is NOT the world. It is the United States of America. In Europe we’re having a hard time, but we have a lot in place that would have prevented for the most damaging things you listed to happen, for example you wouldn’t have had to take a second job to afford any medical bills, and you would have had more time to spend with your wife. Contract laws would have prevented your house price increase in the EU.

Sorry if I could sound insensitive to you, but it’s about time that Americans understand that their personal problems are a societal-level issue. And that AMERICA /= the world.

You are not more of a loser than the other guy because of what you’re going through, and you shouldn’t be forced to power through or “soldier through” (see, it’s in the language even) to be ok. There should be a proper societal network ready to help you and to make sure that you can keep contributing to society.

This. I moved from the US to Germany several years ago and while everyone experiences hardship, your life isn't scarred here like it would be in the US.

Breaking your arm at work in the US could result in homelessness, rather easily. You'd have to try hard for that to be the case here - arguably, it's impossible here.

You're talking about a select few countries in Europe, if that. Notice the recent protests in France, notice how Spain is going down the neoliberal hell-hole even more, damn the protesting public health workers [1], notice how a literal peasants' party got lots of votes in very urban The Netherlands because of the political elites ignoring a great chunk of the country's electorate.

And that's just Western Europe and ignoring Britain, over here in Eastern Europe things are even more complicated, let's put it that way.

Later edit: To make it clear, I still think that the average European has got it better compared to the average US resident when it comes to basic stuff like housing and healthcare, just wanted to point out that the direction that we're all going isn't one that gives me hope.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/...

Europe really isn't that much better these days. Obviously it isn't as extreme as in the US, but plenty of people still have had their lives ruined because of the pandemic and most societies are pretending like nothing happened. I hope there is a European country that is set to be better in 10 years, but at least I don't know about it.

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