Were You Born on the Wrong Continent?

Thanks to commenter peter, who pointed out the new book by Thomas Gheogegan: Were You Born on the Wrong Continent? Here's a summary of the main points:

He begins by pointing out all the ways people live better in the European Union. They don’t have to worry about the Big Five: retirement, health care, education, transportation and childcare. The government sees to all of these. Since it buys in bulk, it gets great prices, and people don’t have to spend their time worrying about any of those things. Just think how great your life would be if you didn’t have to think about where you send your kids to school, or health insurance, or how long your commute is. And think how much better off you would be in this miserable economy if you didn’t have to worry about the losses in your 401(k) plan (if you had one), and how you would pay for health care if you have to pay COBRA on the paltry unemployment benefits you get if you got fired.

But there is more. In Europe, cities are livable. There are parks, beautiful buildings, wonderful museums, ancient churches, free or cheap concerts, festivals, open-air markets, functional subways, buses and trains, and street-cleaners. Geoghegan references the lovely public spaces with his comment on the banks of violets he saw in Zurich. There is café life, which is a gracious way to live, indeed. In Paris, the cafés are filled with people of all ages, sitting out at all times of the year drinking coffee and talking to each other, not immersed in private thoughts in front of a laptop or staring blankly at the third football game of a Sunday.

They can live this way because they aren’t working themselves to death. They get real vacations, tons of days off which create lots of three and four day weekends, and their daily work hours typically aren’t as long as ours....

How do they live so well, and we don’t? We are the ones with the great average Gross National Product per capita. It’s simple. They pay taxes, so they don’t have to pay for health insurance or retirement. They live in cities, so they don’t have to drive. They get great public education, so they don’t dump tens of thousands of dollars into private grade schools, high schools and colleges to give their kids a head start. The government provides childcare, so both parents can work or not as they see fit. With all that off their backs, they have time to live.

...

[Gheogegan then describes the high unionization among German workers and their strong influence on corporate policy.] With all this participation, workers have a direct stake in the business, and a real reason to pay attention to government and business. That means that everyone has a reason to continue their educations into their adult lives. It explains European TV: there are many talking head shows, and the discussions are rational. Newspapers are doing fine, at least compared to ours, and books sales are holding up. Geoghegan notices that you see people reading everywhere, books and thick newspapers, and in the homes of the people he visits he sees lots of books.

From this summary, it looks like Gheogegan's main point of comparison is Germany and, to a lesser extent, France. Needless to say, things would have looked a lot different had he chosen, say, Greece. In this Salon.com interview, Gheogegan makes the crucial argument about social democracy: it is a system in which government policy tilts toward the middle class, not necessarily the poor:

What are we missing when we measure the GDP?

We don’t have any material value of leisure time, which is extremely valuable to people. We don’t have any way of valuing what these European public goods are really worth. You know, it’s 50,000 dollars for tuition at NYU and it’s zero at Humboldt University in Berlin. So NYU adds catastrophic amounts of GDP per capita and Humboldt adds nothing. Between you and me, I’d rather go to school at Humboldt.

So much of the American economy is based on GDP that comes from waste, environmental pillage, urban sprawl, bad planning, people going farther and farther with no land use planning whatsoever and leading more miserable lives. That GDP is thrown on top of all the GDP that comes from gambling and fraud of one kind or another. It’s a more straightforward description of what Kenneth Rogoff and the Economist would call the financialization of the American economy. That transformation is a big part of the American economic model as it has morphed in some very perverse directions in the last 30 or 40 years. It’s why the collapse here is going to take a much more serious long-term toll in this country than in the decades ahead.

Who is better off in a social democracy like Germany?

Social democracy is good for the middle class even more than it is for the poor. We’ve got it completely backwards here. It’s the relatively educated and well-to-do that do well on European socialism. What’s the cash value of Humboldt education to people who are high school grads? Zero. For the German upper middle class, it’s worth 50,000 a year. That’s the difference. You have to remember, even if there’s universal healthcare, the more educated people always use the system better than the less educated people. They know how to make it work for them.

By some measures though, it's good for everybody. America has this wonderful freedom and openness and this ability to create yourself out of nothing. We’re just much more individualistic a country. I think we have overdosed a little bit on that, but I share that. I’m an America and I’m glad I was born in the U.S. and I always will be. But in terms of receiving the benefits of economic growth and both in terms of enjoying life and enjoying the richness of life in a developed country both in terms of private goods and public goods, quality of life that comes from that and leisure, I think Germany has an enormous amount to teach us.

Comments

[Michael]

Having just read this book, I agree it's pretty poorly written, mainly contradictory in his attitude; never seeming to decide what is what he wants in a country.

Regardless, there are faults with everything, but to want to make things better, even for oneself (as long as it harms no other) is a positive effort for all.

Maybe the life of an ExPat is not for me, but I feel the American Empire is over. The Wall is no longer in Berlin, but is everywhere in America; between the poor and simple and the ignorant wealthy. Barbed wire can be cut, and bullets can be dodged, but we've done this to ourselves, and now there's basically nowhere to run.

I was fortunate to be an American who saved, but I have given my local environment 99-plus weeks to find another similar job ("career"), and very soon, I must move on. The question is, to where?

[Sumpfkraut]

Yes, Germany was a comparatively bad example.

[Eckemann]

“Functional parent?” I think Germany is more like a duplicitous juvenile delinquent. While it maintains a respectable façade, Germany is one of the biggest free riders of the global system, engaging in beggar-thy-neighbor neo-mercantilism with its trading partners befitting a country with "infant industries." Vater Staat at the municipal, state and federal level offers subsidized credit, tax breaks and export financing guarantees to German firms to maintain these trade imbalances. Germany’s industries regularly bribe foreign officials to secure contracts abroad (Siemens, MAN, Daimler), and until very recently German firms have done a roaring business with one of the most dangerous governments in the world, Iran, including trade in industries directly related to Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Germany has tolerated a massive traffic in human sex slaves from eastern Europe, and it has one of the least-integrated Muslim populations in Europe. And Germany is famous for its childish unwillingness to shoulder global responsibilities commensurate with its economic power—witness the token German efforts in the Horn of Africa, Persian Gulf, Bosnia, Kosovo or Afghanistan. On the other hand, Germany is one of the most rapidly aging and shrinking countries in terms of population, so this is a distinctly grandmotherly juvenile delinquent.

[Artinterface]

If I may be permitted to personify nations with a familial theme, I will describe Germany as a "Functional Parent" - a mature, mellowed amalgamation of Mutti und Vati that dishes out harsh punishment when it is pushed too far. No one is perfect after all.

America is akin to a younger sibling. Intent on irritation and grossing you out. The classical rivalry locked in a futile power struggle. It is jacked on teenage hormones and sugar and swings uncontrollably between passive aggression and earth shattering tantrums.

I love both countries and live between the two, but hold the nationality of neither.

[Tumble]

Eckemann,

I agree. That's how I feel on bad days in Germany, and there are many of them.

There are good days, though.

[Orm]

this link given by Sebastian is hilarious.
Lets hope the well known Microsoft Manager Eric S. Raymond refrains from cursing the Author. Also in the back of my mind there is an op ed by the Head of my Health Insurance Com. ramblin over his Dentist who tried to sell him an Individual Healt service(IGEL-Individuelle Gesundheitsleistung) which is deemed not necessary by any public Health Insurance Company, cause it`s seen as purely cosmetic.

[Apuleius]

@Eckemann
Wow! So many (quite nonsensical) clichés about Germany and Germans in just one post. Seems you had some very deep reasons to leave the country. I suggest you best stay away as you really seem to be the epitome of the eternally grumpy and discontent German.
Then there would be one guy less of the kind you despise over here. Looks almost like self-loathing.

[peter]

what the heck is the matter here? so bitter? i am surprised.

[Eckemann]

Weak post. This is an incredibly superficial book that paints the US in the most unflattering colors possible to make Europe shine. This is only possible if you’ve never actually lived in both places for an extended period of time. I was born in Germany and have lived in both the US and Germany for over two decades. If life is so good why are people as depressed, distrustful and grumpy as they are in Germany? Why is there no common courtesy? Why are children treated like pariahs? Why do people cut in front and elbow each other in line? Is it perhaps because there is nil volunteerism or engagement with wider society by the German public? Is it perhaps because rules and regulations have made common sense and common courtesy obsolete? Is it because they have never been asked what kind of society they want? Is it perhaps that the vast majority have been convinced that they are impotent “kleine Leute” without the gumption and wherewithal to define themselves and live their lives as they see fit? Is it perhaps that a life whose main concerns are hairstyles, clothing, automobiles, sex partners and next year’s vacation is ultimately unfulfilling and hollow? Germany is a country where the human spirit is born chained and where it dies with a pathetic, limp satiated whimper. And for the record, nearly everything about the Humbolt Uni sucks. From its dilapidated buildings and obtuse, indifferent professors to its overfilled, stinking lecture halls and Mensa.

[jelly]

Yeah, I was born on the wrong continent. I was born on one where there is little to no freedom of choice, little to no personal responsibility, little to no opportunity besides the cookie cutter mold you end up in by accident, and no liberties to do what you wish with your life besides what the political elite deems acceptable.

This essay is completely ridiculous - as if it desirable to not drive. Desirable to live in a city. Desirable to have a bunch of know-it-alls make every life choice for you because you're too lazy/stupid/irresponsible to do it yourself. Completely pathetic.

Yeah, I was born in Europe. Why isn't there an exchange program where people like me can swap passports with idiots who do nothing but whine about America, health care and education? It's a win-win-win-win situation - the European political elite get another loyal voting sheep, the American culture is enriched by more people who actually think for themselves, and both participants end up where they want to live.

But no, idiots like this guy will be stuck in the wrong country voting for commies, and people like me will be stuck in their own wrong country not voting for anyone because they're all the SAME.

[Peter]

While I agree with the analysis, all these advantages (and most Germans seem to see them as advantages) apparently do not create a great deal of satisfaction within the population.

And it's not about patriotism and all the issues that go with that. There really seems to be no appreciation for these social(-democratic) achievements. Instead, the welfare state is considered to be in decline (see the commenter above) or to be already way too small, unfair, unjust.

So that's my problem with the welfare state: that it creates expectations about outcomes that make actual outcomes always look poor.

[Nathan]

Great article, Hamlet! It makes me really miss Germany. :(

[Sebastian]

Great post,
however this analysis might not hold up much longer since social systems in Germany have been under attack for a long time and are slowly losing the battle. Benefits for the unemployed are beeing reduced; the cost for medical insurance goes up and the services they provide decreases. At the same time the power of the state is getting smaller and smaller since many companies that have been public property are beeing privatized like the Bahn or many locally owned hospitals which led to a lot of firing and re-hiring of staff personal for lower wages or closing of railstations in unprofitable areas. Never to mention problems with maintenance.

This is a trend that has been fosterted by the social democratic party, among other, and is unlikely to stop in the current political climate. Therefore, we might see increasingly American standards, at least in Germany.

- Sebastian

(see http://www.spiegelfechter.com/wordpress/3971/behandelt-uns-wie-strafentlassene for some information on unemployment benefits. It's in German though).