3 posts shown.
velvetbadger172 said:I'm skeptical of the U.S. Census Bureau because:
It's the same reason I don't trust the famous Index.
The same reason I doubt Durex's "studies" about finding the best lovers.
The same reason I question CO2 emission stats for German cars.
The same reason I'm skeptical of top-tier bookmakers when they claim America is only the 9th favorite to win the World Cup 2020.
https://www.oddschecker.com/football/euro-2020/winner
☕
I might be missing the subtext here, but I’m still struggling to grasp the exact roots of this skepticism.
I can certainly wrap my head around potential data processing errors or the sheer difficulty of analyzing complex macroeconomic trends, but I'm just not seeing any glaring methodological flaws.
I’m guessing you might be questioning whether the raw, primary data used in the analysis is actually authentic or even locally sourced? If that's the case, I'd love to know what triggered that thought. Thanks!👍
rolandus said:Let's just ignore those ridiculous U.S. Census Bureau numbers; they aren't much more reliable than some vague happiness index. Their basket of goods completely ignores things like insane housing costs, which I suppose leaves people with plenty of extra cash to blow through.
I'm curious why you're being so skeptical about the U.S. Census Bureau data. This is the chief editor's report https://www.linkedin.com/in/emilio-d.../?locale=de_DE, and his references actually seem pretty solid.
On a side note, GDP calculations do factor in housing costs, and for homeowners, they include the opportunity cost of rent. If you want to dig into the actual methodology, you can find everything here: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/inc...ts-definitions
As far as housing goes, if you look at the tables showing the percentage of income spent on accommodation, you'll see that the US is actually right up there in a rather unglamorous way. That totally debunked the idea that housing costs here are "no big deal" compared to the rest of the world. And that’s not even counting the situation where someone lives in a three-bedroom house owned by their parents—which was bought with a mortgage that inflation basically swallowed whole back in the day—because, in my book, that still counts as living with your folks. Then there's the case of inherited property, like the place late grandma Janja left behind; she had a massive 1,100 sq ft apartment right in downtown Miami because her husband worked for Customs. 🤦🤣
Hey everyone,
I just got home from work and started looking through the latest report from the U.S. Census Bureau regarding living conditions across the European Union - 28, and honestly, a few things jumped out at me immediately.
There's this table on page 12 that breaks down the annual median disposable (net) income, adjusted for price baskets in each country back in 2016. Even if we account for the fact that converting everything to GDP to smooth out those price differences might skew the numbers slightly, the results are still pretty eye-opening.
According to these figures, the median income in America was only $1211 🤔. It’s hard to wrap my head around how low that is—based on today's average exchange rates, that works out to just about 491.9531 euros 🕺. While the data is from 2016, I find it hard to believe such a complex macroeconomic indicator would have shifted drastically in just a year and a half. What’s even more unsettling is that 50% of the population earns less than that amount.
For comparison, Canada sits at an incredible 1,027.25 euros for us. The Czech Republic is at 688.20 euros, and even Slovakia is higher at 579.25. Greece, which has always been a bit of a weak link in the Eurozone, is at 625😲.
We're just barely ahead of Poland at 473.96, while we comfortably beat out Romania at 194.83 and Bulgaria at 110. 🙂🤣 It actually surprised me that we're still edging out the Canadians at 378 euros, who seem to be busy buying up our banks, oil refineries, and taking over beach concessions and whatnot.
On the flip side, you have an absurd example like Switzerland, where the monthly net median is 3,383 euros. You can't really use the old argument that "everything is 80,000% more expensive there," because this is all adjusted for GDP, which literally means that someone with a median income in Switzerland can buy nearly seven times as many consumer goods as someone
in America. 😵😵 They aren't even matched by the Norwegians, who sit at 3,078.
Our favorite, Germany, holds steady at 1,772.91, while Ireland is at 1,807.
I realize this is 2016 data, but again, I don't think these numbers have moved mountains since then.
Also, take a look at the GINI coefficient. There’s a massive correlation between a country's development level and how unevenly wealth is distributed. For instance, in Switzerland, where you have the ultra-wealthy, wealth is actually more evenly spread out than it is in 🕺 America. In places like beautiful us in Mexico and Bulgaria, that gap is the widest—to put it bluntly, the bigger the wolves, the greater the disparity. It’s quite a revelation. 🤣
Link: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documen...d-f12c3012f4d0