First of all, let’s try to avoid American-bashing, and stay respectful to everyone.
I’ll start: for me it’s the tipping culture. Especially nowadays, with the recent post on !mildlyinfuriating@lemmy.world with the 40% tip, it just seems so weird to me to have to pay extra just so that menu prices can stay low.
There is so much that screams “stress” to me when I think of living in the US that makes me uncomfortable. To just mention that your job can fire you at will and your health care might be attached to your job, or that a person who can not drive a car for health reasons, like me, is basically fucked. Or no sick days and a very low amount of vacation days that you might have to take when you are sick and on top taking them at all is looked down on, while my boss reminds me to tell him when I prefer to take my vacation days, because by law I have to take them.
I could make a very long list of things that come with American life that I find stressful. Just one more tiny thing: I do not have much money, so I have to be careful not to overspent. In Germany the prices on the shelf in the grocery store are the total I will have to pay. In the US the total can be whatever, you just have to be really good at doing math in your head, have enough money to not care or walk around with a calculator. So it is not just the big things that add onto each other. If I am sick I can walk to the nearest grocery store and drug store in less than 3 minutes from my flat, the doctor’s office is inbetween both and the visit is free and medication either free or costs 5 Euro each for what I usually need. My gall bladder surgery was all in all 100 Euro, including ambulance transport on a Sunday because it was an emergency and aftercare with my doctor. My days in the hospital and at home afterwards were fully paid by my employer.
I wonder what America would look like if everyone would live on an European stress level. We do not have no stress of course, but the base line for many Europeans is way lower. On top there is a base line of feeling safer (less shooting, except for Ukraine of course) and more social secure.
It surprises me that despite all that, Americans do rarely complain and are as happy as they are. I admire them for that, but also wish they could have less stress in their lifes.
As someone who spent roughly half my life in the US and the other half in EU, this is very accurate as to my experience in each place. In the US my life constantly felt balanced on a knife edge like everything could fall apart at any moment. When I moved to the EU, even though I didn’t speak the language or grow up there, I breathed a big sigh of relief. I felt like my life was finally manageable.
I think this causes a ton of mental illness in the US that we just don’t see in the EU. Most people I know in the US are on the constant verge of a breakdown and basically just disassociating themselves from reality (usually using drugs, alcohol, religion, or some combination thereof). I think this is why Americans so badly need to put on a happy face. If they didn’t, they’d all have a simultaneous mental breakdown.
America is a developing country with a Guccu bag.
There are some rich areas, but even there, the vast majority of people are poor and live under not-great conditions.
I think the “pursuit of happiness” mindset is still very strong over there. You’re only poor because of yourself, not because rich people fucked you over. So you can’t really complain, because it’s your fault.
I’m always surprised at the huge taboo about nudity. A while ago I read some comments about a Swedish TV show and some people were complaining how unnecessary it was that you could see a guy’s naked butt for a moment. I hadn’t even noticed when watching.
It’s surprising because at the same time US media is often labelled as (over-)sexualised.
I know that opinions on nudity also vary a lot across Europe, some might even be very close to opinions on the US. But for me personally it comes as a surprise because there is often controversy about something I wouldn’t even have noticed.I guess it comes with being founded by puritans.
the Puritans haven’t been a thing for like over 200 years
The fact that they dont have affordable healthcare… Its a human right…
When I read about people being frugal, there’s always something like “I now go to restaurants only once a week”, “I’m driving the same car for 5 years”, “you don’t really need 10 subscriptions for x”. Do people really not cook their own food and spend money that much? My only subscriptions are internet and rent, and my savings would be gone if I’d get a car 🤷♂️
“I discovered cooking at home” “Meal planning” “Dining in”
Bitch, that’s called Tuesday in most of the world.
Are these by posts by newspapers, blogs, or normal people? Because all the people writing for newspapers and financial blogs seem to live in a different world than most Americans. The average car in the US is 12 years old for example.
You also wouldn’t spend hours commuting to work every day. Cars are fast. I don’t know how it is in Europe, but in America, commute time is unpaid and cost of living is obscenely high, so cars are pretty much mandatory if you want to keep a roof over your head and get a full 8 hours of sleep.
Here, cars are not fast. Cities are congested. When I worked on the other side of my small town, getting there by bike or by car cost the same amount of time. In bigger cities there is public transport.
We generally also don’t live hours away from where we work. I got rejected for a jobs because they didn’t believe I’d commute for an hour by car while looking for a new place
But then you have to live in a tiny apartment in the city. Housing in cities is extremely expensive (in terms of cost per square foot).
An expensive apartment in the city might still be cheaper than a rural place plus the cost of a car (which you don’t need in the city).
Well, yes.
That’s not okay.
Dignified living is a suburban house with ample open floor space, a yard for the kids and pets to play in, and no HOA or building manager threatening you with homelessness and catastrophic debt unless you bow to his every whim.
That’s how I grew up, it was a hell of a lot nicer and less scary than the apartment I’m living in now, and housing costs have stolen that life from me. Now you’re telling me I should be happy with what my life has been reduced to? No, I am not happy about it. I am angry.
In Germany HOAs aren’t a thing and by law you have quite good tenant rights. for example once you have an open ended rental contract, your landlord can’t really throw you out on their whim.
Around here, they may not be able to arbitrarily throw me out, but they can decline to offer a new fixed-term lease when the current one expires, and rent automatically doubles if a fixed-term lease is not signed. Is that not a thing in Germany?
I’m currently reading Twilight and judging by the tone it’s normal for 16-17 year olds to go to school by car (or even truck!) that they drive by themselves? I might be ignorant on the subject so correct me if I’m wrong but car culture in general. We just…took the bus or the lucky ones with a free parent got a lift. I’ve even walked to school for the fun of it, granted it was 40 minutes by foot.
I’m nearing my 30s. I don’t own a car and I don’t have a license. I do wish I had one sometimes but once I hop on the bus to the remote place I want to visit, I quickly lose interest once I see the (usually mountainous) road ahead. Driving just scares me.
Most Americans towns require you to have a car because they have little to no public transportation. Can’t get a job without a car in most places, for example.
Being an American, I see a winding mountain road and think about how much fun it would be. Then again, my parents bought me a $1500 shitbox when I turned 16 in exchange for me giving my sister a ride to all our after-school activities.
And I have this weird phobia about taking public transit where they’ll leave without me and I’ll be stranded with no way to get home. Planes, trains, busses, heck even monorails I have to be way, way early because I’m terrified of missing them. And if I have to make a connecting stop I’m even more anxious because they’ll also just leave without me.
you just need transit that’s frequent enough that you stop caring! metros in cities are great example, no one checks the schedule, it is basically always available within a few minutes.
The expectation of everyone having a credit card as soon as they can get one and paying everything with credit to somehow “build” credit. Sounds such a great way to get people into financial trouble at a young age.
In Germany the system is shit too. There is a private monopol company that calculates and stores a score for you. The calculation method is secret, but we know several things can lower your score, such a having too much bank accounts/credit cards, moving too often, if you ever had debts and how fast you paid them and so on. When you ask a bank for a loan, they check this score and may decline if it’s too low. There are some people who have problems getting a loan because they have no records for their score.
On the flip side, without establishing some kind of credit record, nobody will ever give you a loan for a house or even a used car.
That’s the part I don’t get at all. How come is not having any credit history a bad indicator? If anything, it should tell that the person is financially stable to afford things without needing credit.
Where I live (and I think in other European countries too, with exceptions) it works other way around. Having a clean credit record is a good thing and only if you neglect your payments you get negative marks on your record. Having any negative marks generally prevents you from taking any new loans or financing (a good thing!) but negative marks will be cleared after debts have been paid off and some time has passed.
Consider two potential creditors:
- Person A has no credit history at all.
- Person B has had a credit card with a $20k limit for ten years, generally has a balance of less than $2k, and has never missed a payment.
Can you see how B is a less risky client than A? A is essentially an unknown risk, but B has demonstrated the ability to manage their debt. A could still get, for instance, a car loan, but likely not a mortgage. And B will get a lower interest rate.
How is A an unknown? They’ve demonstrated that they don’t make a habit of spending money they don’t have, which most people would consider conservative and responsible.
Dept is fascinating, our system seems to be build around it. And still, I was raised with ‘Don’t spend money you don’t have’ which makes person A more trustworthy to me compared to person B, who seems to live a financially risky life. But of course the bank earns more with person B, paying interest. I would reward this behavior as well, but it’s not the kindest system for gullible people.
The massive dependence on cars. I don’t understand why people put up with this nonsense. I just walk everywhere.
I read a travel guide to another European city I was visiting, and the guide was aimed at Americans. It’s a major really walkable city, with car access as good as nonexistent (wonderful). It surprised me, that some Americans walk so little, that the first advice in the guide was “start by trying to walk around your house”
Have you seen the size of America?
Europe is bigger than the US, but how often do you travel all across? The radius of movement might be a bit bigger in the US, due to bad design (urban sprawl). That’s a choice. You can plan cities better if you want to.
I don’t go from Sicily to Finland every week (but if i wanted to, I could easily do so by train). The size doesn’t matter in my daily life.
I know it’s a clichee but guns. I regularly watch some youtubers from a lot of backgrounds. Science, engineering, music, you name it. And the casual way they talk about guns, even carry them, is deeply disturbing to me.
Yeah I guess it happens that you shoot a gun once or twice in your life. From military service to the plain old “Schützenverein” in Germany. But having them in everyday life is… just… dangerous.
They in-part have open carry in malls. And plazas. I don’t get why everyone carrying in a public space isn’t classified as a danger.
I understand it in rural regions. There is more wild nature in the US. In Europe most wolves have names. In Germany at least.
I still agree with you in general though. It seems weird that guns are a symbol of freedom for many there.
Many years ago, I was chatting with a friend from California and she told me her family votes Republican. As in, by default. No matter the policies or political needs of the country.
Aside from the US parties being very similar back then (pre-Trump), I’ve also learned since then that this may have to do with party affiliation programs.
In the US, you need to register to vote and the parties basically offer to do the registration for you, if you promise to vote for them. So, you end up being ‘affiliated’ with them, even without being actively a member.I’m not sure voting by default to one party is a consequence of registering with that party. Maybe some psychological effect.
I’d say the main cause is the fact there are only two parties to choose from, so unless you are a moderate (or these days right-moderate) it is just a waste of time looking at candidates and their policies beyond party affiliation.
The related issue is this: in some places in america, the primaries are run by the parties. So you can only vote for canidates (within a party) in the primaries IF you register with that party. In some races the primaries are the important part, because everyone knows which party will win the main election, so who gets the party nomination is basically the undecided part.
I thought there are multiple small parties too?
There are, but first-past-the-post all but guarantees none of them ever win a seat.
And their own justice system for some weird reason.
I’ve never understood why the drinking age is higher than the driver licence age.
And taking away voting rights from felons.
Both baffle me.
I’ve never understood why the drinking age is higher than the driver licence age.
Because driving is a necessity and drinking is not.
And taking away voting rights from felons.
That’s an instrument of oppression. Our right-wing party wins by stopping people from voting.
With some infrastructure near your housing and a working public transport, driving isn’t a necessity.
How? If you live in a suburb, even with working public transport, there could be dozens of stops between home and work.
why would the number of stops be a problem?
when i went to secondary school there were 13 bus stops (15 minutes) and when i went to university there were 12 train stops (30 minutes). And i wouldn’t classify either of those as a long commute
That there are long stretches of road where you can’t get somewhat healthy food. I have been on a road trip across Utah, Nevada, Colorado and Arizona, and outside the big citys you only get junk food at petrol stations, but no fruits, no vegetables. I guess it makes sense because salad or fresh food spoils quick and is expensive to deliver to each and every petrol station, especially if they don’t have a reliable power supply in the middle of nowhere. Never thought about it before. In Germany you can get ice cream, chocolate, cake, salad or a full meal (at gas station prices, and lower quality) on the Autobahn.
education.
while supercharged in one specific field during education, general knowledge of the world outside of said field is near zero.
and then education even ends. no real vocational training.
The fees are crazy too. Considering how many fail out of a course and have to deal with this large debt.
boggles my mind. buuuut europe is on a great way to fail there too. I think the swedish fully privatized school system is an utter failure…but it will take time to come to full effect. sweden is doomed.
I thought Idiocracy was a comedy, but meanwhile I believe it was a documentary. I mean, in the US adult men lose their shit and shoot with assault rifles and artillery at beer cans, because of …rainbows.
I don’t understand why y’all are so scared of my sisters and me, or why you believe we would be after your children (dafuq!?). All of this very confuses me, because, Americans say things like “The Land of the Free!”. So, why can’t you just let people be trans? …And now our European rightwing nuts are copying that… Where is this so called freedom, when I’m literally scared about leaving the house? For real, I only leave the house to throw away trash, at 11pm or something.
And, that’s what surprises me about America. People have combined more weapons at home than the military, and want to fight to protect the freedom, but all their actions result in revoking other peoples freedom. …How does this even make sense?
Grew up here thinking all this is normal. Trump opened my eyes to our crazy country. Now I’m a bit of a black sheep of the family. Enjoying all of your responses. Just bought my first European car recently. Hope to go back soon.
You’re talking about a stereotype of a very small subset of Americans. You’re basing your fears on the extremist online postings that aren’t really indicative of Americans in real life in the majority of the country. If you have legitimate reasons to be afraid to leave your house, then I strongly urge you to move. I can’t imagine you’d have much tying you to the area if you never even go outside.
If it’s a very small subset of Americans, then how in the world do some of them have seats in Congress?
You’re talking about a stereotype of a very small subset of Americans.
If they really were just a very small subset of Amercians, they wouldn’t be able to pass legislation based on their intolerance and hatred of others.
I dunno, did you hear about… Trump? Or DeSantis? Who said he wants to “eradicate transgenderism”? Or that since the start of 2023 there have been close to 600 new anti-trans bills? …I have no idea in what world you live, but in mine, transphobia, or at this point it isn’t even “phobia” but just “hate” (I mean, who even came up with the “They want your kids!!” thing??) is sadly a very real thing. We are that what have been some decades ago the gays, before that the women, before that the Jews, before that black people, et cetera. Humans are a very stupid race that’s always doing the same bad things, while just replacing the target group… not learning anything from it at all. By the way, did you know that if you eat meat, you support pigs getting put into GAS CHAMBERS? Where did I hear that before… huh…
Also, sure. Help me move. I would do that. In a heartbeat. But I assume more than big words I don’t have to expect from you? And uhh… where do I move to? Also, I live in a country where the far-right wing party has 30%. Please forgive me for being scared, to know, that minimum 30% of my country are still nazis, I guess.
I was really surprised that quite a few states have a minimum marrying age of 0. And apparently, it’s more common than you’d expect for girls as young as 14 to get married, often to far older men.
What?!
Thanks for sharing, that’s crazy
Let’s keep the ball rolling then:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_labor_laws_in_the_United_States#Agricultural_child_labor
Children as young as 12 or 14 getting married is not at all common. The study the wikipedia article you posted claims less than 1500 hundred children over 18 years that were married at the age of 12-14 in a country of over 330million. It also points out that of those under 18, the vast majority was 17. Not to say that it isn’t a problem and should be fixed, but its not common what so ever and I would guess 90% of americans will never meet someone married under the age of 18 and except for some of the most rural middle of now where places its considered pretty horrific and unacceptable by most americans.
The study was talking about 300 000 children being married. That’s not a few.
And 1321 of them were 14 and younger.
That’s 300k and 1321 respectively too many.
And apparently, at least for some republicans, this is a policy worth fighting for: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.businessinsider.com/mike-moon-gop-missouri-lawmaker-defends-childs-right-to-marry-2023-4%3Famp
Though I agree its too many, (even one is too many) my problem is saying its common. Saying that 1,321 over an 18 year period in a country of over 330 million people is a common occurrence doesn’t sound common at all to me.
He said it was more common than you would expect. So it is a subjective matter. I happen to agree with him as I would expect the figure to be none in a developed country.
18-21 is very common here in the South. I haven’t heard of younger personally. But I’m not rural. Know of some towns very religious and inbred, I’m sure it’s happening there.
