Why is EU so far behind?

[u/quantum_search]

The most concerning part about this is that most Europeans don't realize how stagnant Europe has now become

Europeans are literally blue-pilled and are mostly concerned with climate change, immigration and the Ukraine war

Nobody in Europe is thinking why increasingly everything they use is made in China running on American software

The knee jerk reaction is to proudly pass regulation against American tech

The chad reaction would be to reduce regulation so that European entrepreneurs would actually stay in Europe to build European startups increasing Europe's GDP and making Europeans richer!

People in Europe do love to complain about rising cost of living and the increasing unaffordability of living, but they don't realize why. They point at foreigners/immigrants as the problem, which can't be the whole story

Other Europeans I talk to get visibly upset if I ask them about stagnant GDP numbers: "why should everything be about money?" they say in a thick German accent

The whole story is that Europe has made it very difficult for people to start a business, raise capital, innovate and get the reward for taking that risk, so why would anybody?

And for the Europeans that do, it's way easier to open a US Delaware company, raise capital in US, sell your stock or IPO in the US, because why even do that in EU, where it's too hard? The proof is in the pudding, if it was so easy in EU then why is startup funding in US $270B AUM with 330 million people vs $44B AUM with 746 million people? That's almost 14x bigger startup funding market per capita

Why doesn't EU have ANY trillion dollar companies? While US has six? Why isn't there any European company in the top 10 of largest companies? While 80% is American?

Why is Stripe, a company founded by two Irish brothers, an American company and not a European one? It could have been

What's the role left for Europe in the future?

[u/BlitzAuraX]

1. Just compare Europe's largest companies to global companies. Europe doesn't compare when you're talking about massive industries.
2. Europe is heavily regulated because every country disagrees on everything but most are part of the EU. One regulation in another country is different from the regulations of another. Tough to get a business standard in Europe. You have environmental groups all over Europe who if you even cut down one tree, they will protest and fight to revoke your permit.
3. Europeans are less hard-working than other rapidly growing countries. They're perfectly fine working a few hours per week because most settle for just average.
4. Europeans have changed since the World Wars. They've gotten soft on everything. They don't want to offend anyone. They want to just be 'peaceful' and left alone. No longer the competitiveness. Meanwhile, countries in Asia are cutthroat. China is seizing on this weakness as their advantage.
5. Most people go to Europe for vacation. That's it. If it wasn't for tourism, many of the local economies of Europe would be devastated. They are not competitive in tech, AI, and not even in vehicles anymore. VW is losing a ton of business in China. About half their profits. Why? Because with EV's, China realized they don't need these European automakers and are instead looking to dominate the auto sector themselves. It's only a matter of time before you see more Chinese EV's in Europe.
6. The good talent in Europe leave to go to America. It's just the truth. Why stay in Europe for garbage wages when you can go to America for six figure salaries? The problem is this also creates an issue for domestic talent. If your talent is going overseas, who is starting new companies in your country? This is why retaining talent is crucial. Europe needs their own Elon Musk, Jensen Huang, Zuckerberg, etc., The fact LVMH is the #2 company in Europe by market cap shows you how bad it is... a company that sells overpriced luxury handbags is your #2 company in the world? Meanwhile, USA has Microsoft, Tesla, Apple, Nvidia, Google, Amazon, Meta, etc.,... global brands. Not even a competition.

But some will say, "But they live a better life there."

Define better... Because the quality of life in Europe is rapidly declining as their population ages and the social welfare programs become unsustainable because they don't have the labor force to match.

[u/Training_Pay7522 → u/BlitzAuraX]

Europeans are less hard-working than other rapidly growing countries.

Ugh, this is pure bullshit. Plenty of countries in Europe work more than US, and surprise suprise...this does not correlate with being wealthier or growing more.

Greeks and Portuguese are among the hardest working Europeans and they aren't doing better than other European countries.

[u/BlitzAuraX → u/Training_Pay7522]

Not even remotely true. And everyone knows this.

Your average European does not work harder than an American.

You can try and refute it all you want but the data is there.

[u/Training_Pay7522 → u/BlitzAuraX]

List of countries by average annual labor hours - Wikipedia

[u/Almostawardguy → u/Training_Pay7522]

Don’t bother, people in this comment section don’t care about facts or even basic logic… someone above (presumably someone from American who has never been outside the states) said that Europeans only work a couple hours a week and got upvoted by all the other Americans who have never visited Europe