Making Money in the USA vs. Making Money in Europe

One of my favorite things about the world that we live in and about humans as a species is that we are insanely Adaptable and that we figured out many different ways to live This is what I've loved so much about travel and of living in different countries throughout my life It's the fact that you get very different answers to the same basic human questions of how to live Depending on where you are Roughly one-third of your life will be spent working when all is said and done. And so what is that one-third of your life going to look like? What is your relationship going to be to that work? Depending on what society you've grown up in, you probably have a different answer to that question. I am a product of the United States. I was born there. I grew up there. And I'm still coming to terms with just how much that country has impacted me and how I see the world. Years ago, I left the United States. for many reasons, but one of them being that I felt that the relationship to work and just the lifestyle felt unhealthy, imbalanced. Unhealthy and imbalanced. All of the hustling all the time is just suffocating and it's exhausting. Always keeping up with the Joneses. And this work hard, play hard attitude is one of the things that I think contributes to the excesses that you see in American society. And if you don't figure it out, if you don't play the game, you get left behind. So that's where I grew up. And then I left. and I've spent the majority of the last decade living in Europe and traveling like a ping-pong mall around this continent. And when I left, I could only see the bad in the US and the good in Europe. There's less of that rise and grind mentality where you take work wherever you go. But over time, I realized a few things. Whether I like it or not, the US has left a lasting mark on me. And not all of it is bad. And I feel like... Some of the American mentality has been hard encoded into me and I fundamentally see some things differently than a lot of Europeans my age. There are some things that you will see in Europe that you will never see in the United States and vice versa. For example, when I was living in Paris, I had a doorman in my building. He was a pretty young guy like in his 30s. He was working there for, I don't know, four or five months and then disappeared. I later discovered that I guess he had some kind of medical issue or problem with his elbows. He got a slip from the doctor saying that he had this issue. He just stopped showing up for an entire year before returning and for that entire year he was paid. That kind of thing just does not happen in the US. In the US it's very common to be reachable and available on work-related matters. pretty much any time of day. Whereas in Europe, there are actually laws in place that make it so that you do not have to answer management outside of work hours. And yet for all of the wonderful things that make Europe such an amazing place to live, there are trade-offs. And so in this video, I'm going to explore how we're different and why. Okay, two things I have to clear up. I know how annoying it is for Canadians and Latin Americans to hear me refer to the United States as America, okay? Trust me, I know because my family's from Argentina, I'd just say America out of simplicity. I've tried a different approach in the past using the word Usonian or Usonia, but I just don't see how that's ever going to become a thing. That is so fetch. Gretchen. Stop trying to make fetch happen. It's not going to happen. The other thing is that I'm highly aware that Europeans don't like it at all when I put them all in one bucket. And this is the beauty of Europe, right? It's such a diverse continent with so many different cultures and histories and governments. I get it. You're French or you're Portuguese or you're Danish or you're Polish first. And if you even feel European, that comes second. The thing is, I'm going to talk about how systems shape us, you know, the big trends. There are a variety of systems that are knitting it together, and intentionally so, right? This was done by design. You have the Eurozone, you have the Schengen Zone, you have the EEA, EFTA, and a lot of this has been done so that Europeans can all be a little bit more on the same page and stop killing each other. And in the end, if you look specifically at every single one of these agreements, somebody's always left out, but on the whole, you've got a group of countries that are... At least in theory, trying to work together as a team. And there's another reason for this. Even though the US has pulled ahead in recent years, about 10 years ago, the GDP, or gross domestic product, which is a common economic metric, was roughly the same between the US and the EU. And so that makes comparisons easier. So let me begin by saying that when I first moved over to Europe, it felt like such a relief to come over here and to discover a whole variety of societies that are organized in different ways, but collectively... Education is way more affordable and healthcare is way more affordable and doesn't run the risk of bankrupting you. And there's better paid sick leave and there's paid maternity and paternity leave. Like what is not to like? Sure, okay, so GDP is growing faster in the US and there's lower unemployment. So what? What happened to enjoying life? Right? Yeah. Okay. So there's lots of work in the US and the salaries are higher, but more is asked of you and you can be fired at any time almost. And also cost of living is higher and you got to not forget that. And especially if you want to eat healthy, right? You know, like what's the point of making a lot of money if you're stressed all the time? Here I was this American dude who just arrived on the continent and people my age were getting up to two years of unemployment benefits, which covered like 60 or 70% of their former salary. These are unheard of amounts in the United States it just sounded insane to me such a generous system and then you combine that with these beautiful walkable cities and excellent public transit and all the other awesome stuff that comes with being in Europe it just kind of sounded too good to be true I'm anticipating some people saying that a lot of what I'm saying doesn't apply as much to Eastern Europe as the rest of Europe which fine fair enough but Even in countries like Poland, there's more affordable education and social services than in the United States. So even there, I think a lot of what I'm saying here applies. You know, I'm in Austria right now, in Salzburg, but it doesn't matter where you are. You know, whether you're in Bucharest or Madrid or Ljubljana, like so much cool old world charm. I guess that part of me did sort of resent the Protestant workaholic... thing going on in the US and I'm gonna come back to this point but the thing is I actually really do like working I really love what I do and I feel like in Europe oftentimes I feel like I'm coming up against a headwind and little by little I came to realize that for all the amazing things that this continent has to offer there are trade-offs there are sacrifices that are being made you can't have everything nobody has it all let's talk about efficiency you see I didn't realize this at first but a lot of Europe has a crippling Kafka-esque level problem, and it's called bureaucracy. There has been a lot of noise and complaining about bureaucracy in the United States recently with Elon Musk and the Trump administration, but it is nothing compared to Europe. And I can't generalize here. This isn't the case for all European countries, but a lot of them have it really bad. It is just on a whole other level. In the Nordic countries, They've got their systems more in place, things are more digitized, things are more efficient. So your mileage may vary with regards to this point on bureaucracy. But if you're not dealing with bureaucracy, then you're definitely dealing with regulations. And oftentimes you have to like mail in your paperwork instead of digitally submit it and do all these kinds of like ass backwards things. Okay, before I go any further, I want to speak briefly about BetterHelp, whose support in this paid partnership makes all of the research and writing and shooting and editing of these videos possible. I think there is a huge amount of anxiety that comes with change. I mean, I have felt that myself and it's one of the reasons why I'm making this video series and especially in a time where there is so much change happening in politics and around the world. I have found that therapy is a really powerful tool in a world that moves this fast. I speak to my therapist every week and that has allowed me to better navigate and adjust to life out here in the countryside. It also helped me when I moved to Europe from the United States, which was a big shift, a big transition. BetterHelp has a large network of credentialed therapists that can help you navigate and make sense of what you're feeling, especially if you're feeling anxious. Also, it's designed to be flexible and adapt to your schedule. And another big plus is that you can try different therapists out and change for free if you're not clicking with who you're talking to. And I also like that you can communicate to your therapist however you prefer whether that's via text, call, or video call. It's easy to sign up and give it a shot for yourself. You can just go to the link in the description or go to betterhelp.com slash Nathaniel Drew. Clicking that link actually supports this channel but it also gives you 10% off your first month when signing up. Okay, let's dive back in. I really feel like I did not realize just how good I had it. with regards to convenience and efficiency while I was living in the US. It's just so straightforward. Opening a bank account, getting your driver's license, starting a new business. Because everybody's taking vacations in August or different parts of the year, there are times of the year that it's bad to start stuff. So you have to sort of plan your year around that. That was never the case in the US. Things are always available. Nathan from the future here. I spent a lot of time writing and shooting and editing this video in February and March and now we're in April and an unbelievable amount of new developments have been taking place. Trump with his tariff policy and the mass uncertainty economically speaking around the world is calling into question some of the things that I said in this video. Things that were true for the entirety of my life until I guess the last month or two. I don't know where all this is taking us right we're all figuring this out in real time I just want to acknowledge this just so it doesn't seem like I'm not addressing everything that's happening in the world right now as this series progresses I want to move more and more towards current events and then looking towards the future so definitely more to come just wanted to mention that all right let's dive back in it's hard to beat in terms of efficiency one main language being spoken across the whole country now I moved to Europe because I love the multilingual, multicultural aspect. I really appreciate that. That's one of the biggest, one of my favorite things. I can jump on a train and be in a different country with a different history and a different language over here. And I think it's exactly this uniformity. that I've spoken about in the past that I find kind of disturbing. You know, the same looking strip mall, whether you're on the west coast, in the south, on the east coast, it all looks the same. It's like uniformity that makes things efficient and easier to build out and do quickly. So I guess you're making a trade, right? And you know, honestly, on that point, it's like I love the old world charm. That's why I'm filming all of this stuff in this beautiful city in Europe. But there's constantly renovation work that has to be done because, you know, it's nice stuff that's old that needs repairing. I have yet to step foot in another country that's as business friendly as the United States. I'm not saying it's the most affordable place to do business, but it definitely feels like it's the easiest place to do business. There's a real beauty to having an idea and being able to execute it quickly, you know, and not... constantly having to work through roadblocks. You know, I'm somebody who will get excited about something and will want to bring it to life quickly. It's just nice to not feel bogged down and that is genuinely something that I feel sometimes in Europe. It feels like I am not encouraged to take big risks here. I do feel like my individualism is sometimes seen as a problem here. That again is something that I feel like was learned in childhood. Here you gotta move a little bit slower and you can't deviate so far outside of the system otherwise you get your ass kicked. If I had to draw it out. This is the spectrum and on one side you have gas and on the other you have brakes. The US has built way more towards convenience and efficiency and you know same day shipping. Eat in your car if you want. A two hour lunch break is an absolute eternity. So more on the gas side of things, right? And then in Europe, it's a lot more about regulations and consumer protections. So there's more breaks built into the system. Look at the data privacy laws or food regulations. Thank God for some of the protections Europeans have in place for this because it's frankly quite scary to see what's happening in the US. I don't even know what the FDA even does. It feels like everything is genetically modified now. Kids are allowed to eat sludge at school. I was shocked when I ate in a cafeteria in a French school. It was beyond gourmet in comparison. So, you know, people eat whatever in the US, unless you're a health nut. In which case, you're going to be very health conscious. And once again, an example of the extremes of the country. I think this also goes beyond bureaucracy and regulations. I think it's like a cultural attitude sort of thing. The idea of consumer being king reigns supreme in the United States. And that just does not exist in Europe. Living in France, another place that's very invested in the idea of freedom, you know, liberté. I realized that freedom actually means very different things to different people. In the US, the idea of freedom is tied to being able to do stuff, to be able to... on a gun or getting an appointment very quickly to something right it's okay to work a lot because that's your ticket to the possibility of a better life that's kind of the premise of the american dream whether that still exists or not the french idea of freedom is way more built around the idea of not having to do something as in not having to work one extra minute than is necessary because that is your ticket to a worse life a life spent working more than you have to. You can see this happening because all of the employees in a French store like 30 minutes before it closes start getting nervous and skittish trying to get everybody out so that they don't have to stay late. And I mean this is the country that adopted the 35-hour work week all the way back in the year 2000. I saw this in the Netherlands as well. I was three minutes and really I'm not exaggerating here. I was three minutes late to returning a bike that I had rented. I called to see if I could still return it and the shop owner answered me telling me, The shop was not only closed, but he was already back home with his kids. Priorities, right? And I mean, how can you fault them? There is so much more to life than work. Being a part of a community and getting something from that community, but also contributing something to the community gives you more freedom in the end than the individualistic approach. Europeans have this kind of work-life separation thing mastered. You talked before about not the opportunity for like huge money, just like opportunity just for a more quiet life, which is really cool because it's just a whole different kind of freedom, right? From Sweden to Greece, Europeans know how to take their vacation time, often in July and August. And what this means is that you just never know when things are going to be open. So maybe this is just what it costs to be part of an awesome system that takes better care of its people. You just have to deal with it. more bureaucracy and more regulation. I don't know if there's a way to have it all. It doesn't seem like it. I have a different issue, a different challenge, which is that I have an entrepreneurial brain. Like, I don't have a normal relationship with work. I love what I do. I'm very passionate. And so all these employee benefits, paid unemployment and severance. packages like that doesn't apply to me i'm on the other side of things which is that i have to think very carefully before hiring somebody because if that goes badly it's really bad i have to flip the bill and that can actually be ruinous for a business owner in europe the thing is like I learned very early on in my career that I just, I don't want to be an employee. I don't want to work for somebody else. And even though that comes with all kinds of its own stresses, I still way prefer it. So let me explain a little bit more what I mean by having to be very careful about who you hire. I spoke with someone who used to be the head of HR, human resources, at a fortune 500 company that operates globally. She explained to me, companies are legally mandated to give some kind of reasonable accommodations to find another job if they let you go. Like, a wait period and that wait period can be as much as three to six months and you cannot terminate things immediately unless things get really bad as in like if the employee commits a crime against the employer this makes the cost of failure of running a business orders of magnitude greater in europe versus the united states because in some cases businesses still have to pay employee contracts for years even the business fails. This in turn stifles the appetite and the possibility to take big business risks. And then this goes both ways, right? So businesses can't lay off people right away. There's that wait period. But employees often can't just quit right away. Sometimes they have to give notice and if they've been working at the company for a long time sometimes they have to still work for several months before they can leave. Some of these concepts are very difficult for Americans to understand because for us Still having to work at a company that you don't want to work at anymore. Sounds kind of like indentured servitude. This stands in stark contrast to the legal idea that applies in the United States known as at-will employment, where an employer is allowed to dismiss an employee for any legal reason. at any time. This is why Americans are known for So in the United States you can go from one day having a job and a home to not having a job and if things go really badly not having a home. As a US employer there are just so many less hoops that you have to jump through. Two weeks which is nothing by European standards is traditional in terms of giving notice but not even a legal requirement. And so I know that this horrifies a lot of Europeans but It goes both ways. You know, as an employee, you can step away at any time. And the beauty of the system in the United States, according to a lot of the people, is that there's always going to be work. There's always going to be opportunities out there. You know, the US is used to seeing a way lower unemployment rate than in Europe. Is this freedom? Or is this the illusion of freedom? It's hard to say. What I can say is that a lot of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, which means that these are razor thin margins. That's a lot of stress to live with constantly. Depending on who you are and what you gravitate towards, there's probably one system that better matches your preferences than the other. Without a doubt, I think we're seeing some of the worst of it right now in the U.S. with Elon Musk and the Doge-led mass layoffs that are taking place in the government. Many people are just receiving an email. just like that boom you're done after sometimes many years working for the government it does feel like it borders on cruelty but this is also common in the u.s i mean you see this in the tech sector all the time this is going to depend on the person the circumstances the location right but generally speaking it feels like europeans are okay with dedicating a smaller percentage of their lives to work I'm the American nut job that loves what I do that is willing to put in many many hours This is again where I feel a little bit different and there's downsides to that as well where I have difficulty disconnecting and separating work and life But in general this is a huge source of meaning for me and gives my life a lot of direction I don't know I guess the concept of taking vacation time to just do nothing isn't that appealing to me which again Probably makes me sound like the obsessive workaholic American. I don't know if it was my upbringing that shaped me to be like this, but I feel in this specific respect more at home in the United States. People don't look at me like I'm weird over there. So if we build on this spectrum that I've laid out already, considering the many protections workers have in Europe, we have security, an offshoot of the regulations and work protections, so that with the regulations, sick leave, or unemployment benefits, when life hits you with surprises, you don't fall so far. you won't be bankrupted by health care costs or student loan debt. Well, actually, even if you declare bankruptcy in the U.S., you can't get rid of student loan debt, so I guess I can't make that point. But over here we have risk. And what comes with risk is also sometimes possibility. More work opportunities, more heights that you can climb. Are these heights that you necessarily want to climb? Not me. I didn't want to. I'm not interested in creating a startup that becomes a unicorn and makes me a millionaire, billionaire, whatever. I'm not interested in climbing the corporate ladder. And who benefits from these possibilities, right? Not everybody. It's usually the rich that become a lot richer. This is why once again you end up with a country of extremes. Very rich, very poor. And I think you see this everywhere in the world, but because there's so much wealth in the United States, it's even more upsetting that there are people living in deplorable conditions. The very act of living in the United States. Is a risk and I think you just as an American you grow up in that system and you get used to it You just adapt you develop a mentality around that I'm not entirely sure if I can unlearn that you know my parents taught me to fend for myself To not rely on the government. I guess it's just one way of operating It's kind of sad when you say it that way honestly, but instead of counting on Social Security you're much more focused on Saving up money and investing it and building up a nest egg and this is why there are so many people with side hustles depending on how you look at it it's either a testament of the entrepreneurial spirit of the american people or a disturbing commercialization of every nook and cranny of our lives every hobby and fun activity and every little thing and so while individual people have way more to lose in the united states companies and startups have less to lose the system is better set up for that. And so I think that's one of the reasons why the tech sector is so much further along, so much more developed in the US versus Europe. Restructuring is easier. And so this leads to the counterintuitive dynamic that I wanted to talk about here, which is that this riskier system that the US has, it's like a more conservative system, right? There's less... of the left-leaning progressive social security welfare safety nets in place it creates a dynamic where americans are more prone to take risks and that leads to more innovation more change whereas in europe you have so many more of these policies and that results in a culture of business conservatism you don't want to take as big of risks what do i mean by that i mean like if we look at the definition of the word conservative it's an aversion to change it's more oriented towards preservation of things And so with regards to innovation, I mean the US is so much further ahead. I mean you're watching this on an American platform and you may or may not be watching it on a device that's made by an American company. I mean you're definitely not watching it on a Nokia. And hat tip to Russell Mack Simon who wrote an excellent essay. about this. All these employee protections make it easier for employees to quietly quit, right? You can't be fired unless things get really bad. That can result in a degraded work experience on one level, out of morale, because the rest of the team has to pick up the work that isn't being done by people that are doing the bare minimum. Now, Europeans will go, well, yeah. But in the US, you actually do have burnt out workers who don't have any of the protections and therefore the rest of the team still has to pick up the workload, right? Except people can't take breaks. It's really hard to imagine the Amazon workers having to pee in bottles because they don't have enough time to take breaks situation. Happening in Europe it looks like a dog-eat-dog system where everybody's just trying to become rich And this may go some ways to explain why Americans don't even take all of the little holiday paid vacation time that they get. So we have this dynamic where it feels like you're punished for taking too many risks in Europe and it feels like you're punished for not taking enough risks in the United States. So is either system better? I mean it's not that simple of a question. I will say I definitely know where I prefer to live. I do feel like I left the US with skills that give me an advantage elsewhere in the world. I think some hustle is really not a bad thing. A manageable dose. And I always like that Americans see and recognize hustle. and they will cheer you on. They will not get in your way. Whatever it is that you do, wherever it is that you live, what seems to matter the most is that you find work that is meaningful to you. And I think this is something that's challenging no matter where you are. The way I was able to do that was by starting my own business. And so, therefore, I think I'm grateful to have grown up in a system, in a country, where starting up that business is easier to do. There's a lot more I want to say about this. But I'm going to pause here for now. This is the first episode of an entire series I'm doing, comparing the United States and Europe in a variety of different facets of life. And if you're interested in knowing when those videos come out, please consider subscribing. And please consider liking this video too. If you enjoyed it, it helps me out a lot. It helps make this video show up for more people. You know, got to work with the algorithms. I have done a few Europe versus US videos already, and I'll link to those down below. And I also write very regularly on Substack. So if you enjoy my reflections on life and navigating culture and the world that we live in, that might be of interest to you as well. Again, I'll leave a link to that in the description.

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Timestamps:

00:00 – Humans Have Different Answers to the Same Questions
00:37 – My Journey Leaving the US and learning to live in Europe
03:01 – Generalizations are impossible to avoid
04:39 – Is Europe too good to be true? 
06:38 – There are trade-offs
06:57 – Europe's problem with bureaucracy
09:13 – Life is more convenient in the US
10:27 – The pros and cons of multiculturalism
12:17 – Gas vs. Brakes
13:37 – Different definitions of freedom
14:58 – Thoughts from the Danish
15:30 – Work life balance
15:56 – But what if you're an entrepreneur?
16:40 – The impact of employee protections in Europe
18:04 – The American Philosophy: At-Will Employment
20:41 – Risk vs. Security
22:54 – The counter-intuitive dynamic at play
25:22 – What matters the most
25:50 – The start of a new series