Hacker News Reader

And just think, Americans (and Canadians) also get much less vacation time than Europeans! Geniuses!

I guess the European peons did learn some lessons from all the centuries of oppression under the feudal nobility. The Americans never had that experience, so they bought into the company line hook line and sinker.

If you're going to attribute history to why the workforce in Europe is the way it is, then the American expectation of the peons to work all the time is because the US never got over having slave labour.

BTW that line of thinking is ridiculous. Europeans and Americans learned about feudalism the same way, from history books. No one who was around when labour laws were going into effect has first, second or third hand knowledge of feudalism, slavery or working conditions during the Industrial Revolution.

In addition to slavery, Americans also had The Frontier. A man who didn't like the wages offered had the option to go make a homestead.

European culture is likely to have been far more shaped by feudalism than American culture is. You don't have to individually remember something for it to have an important effect on your values and actions.

It's not like we came over from Europe or anything.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com