The Society as a whole has an amount X of money. This money is not distributed in a fair way and the wages do not reflect the performance people in many jobs deliver, day in, day out. An assistant doctor in a German hospital many times works 80 hours per week and makes less than € 2000. A nurse in an emergency room makes too little money to live in the city where she works. Same is true for policeman, kindergartners and for many other jobs. A VW manager who almost ruined a worldwide company otoh makes € 15 mn, and there’s many example where managers who actually ruined their companies were paid off with millions. I remember one case where it was 60 millions (Vodafone manager Esser) although he almost ruined the company.
I feel that to fully appreciate the intellectual rigour here, I would need to go back to pre-1969 Czechoslovakia. Actually maybe not, the University of Sussex Communist Society (1975-1978) might deliver sufficient preparation, but having had a taste of it before 1969, I never joined. No hope for me now…
Alexis wrote:
In America, where an average house (countrywide average) is $ 200.000 this can work. In Germany house are much more expensive on average, and a german nurse makes between 25-40.000 Euros, before taxes that is.
Housing values in my local area are about 1/2 -2/3 that of Munich, but you couldn’t buy the small apartment for $200K. A young nurse or policeman making $70K a year can in any case afford to buy something, just about, and start gaining equity.
Alexis wrote:
L.A., how poor it is, no difference to the – poor – parts of Mexico City.
LA is hardly poor, but parts of Smell A are indeed very much like Mexico City – not least because most of the people in many areas came from Mexico and are ill educated. In time they do advance to nicer areas if they really want to, many do, some don’t. The guy in the office next to me is a Mexican immigrant who earned his PhD on scholarships, and now makes a comfortable living (I’d guess $145K annually) on which to raise his family, in a house he owns. He lived in a lower cost state first, then moved onward and upward.
Jujupilote wrote:
Where ? I’m an aeronautical engineer (3 years expirience) and I far from 60K ! My manager too !
Your salary here would be about $75K annually. Your manager would make in the range of $120 – $180K depending on his level. His boss (presumably an engineering director with decades of experience) would make about $200K.
(Peter) What you don’t understand: I am much more of a capitalist than you, both in reality AND in ideology. But contrary to you i would like it to stay, while you obviously don’t care if maybe some day the injustice will be so big that we all lose.
Let’s leave it at that. A discussion where you have nothing better to offer than sarcasm is not fruitful. I did not study that stuff to discuss it with people who are not interested in the topic.
Silvaire wrote:
Your salary here would be about $75K annually. Your manager would make in the range of $120 – $180K depending on his level. His boss (presumably an engineering director with decades of experience) would make about $200K.
Do you hire ? I make like slightly more than half of that 
In a well known aeronautical manufacturer, yes.
In all logic, in your example, I would fly a skyhawk, my manager a A36 and his boss an SR22T
Silvaire wrote:
Both policeman and nurses make between roughly $60K to start – $130K per year gross, depending on seniority.
Haha: https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Registered_Nurse_(RN)/Hourly_Rate (If you don’t want to click the link, in the US a registered nurse earns between 45 and 87k$ gross). Which is one half of what you claim but still twice as much as what it would be in Europe. This is about what a doctor in a hospital will earn around here. Doing 60hr weeks.
But we’ve had this discussion so many times that I get tired. Cost of living and earning in the US and Europe can not be compared 1:1. There are too many differences.
When I saw the eclipse in Wyoming in August we were parked next to a couple from the States with whom we chatted during those 4 hours. Both were academics, she was a teacher, originally from England, he was in chemistry IIRC. For them, the trip to Wyoming was the first holiday in five years. During 30 years of marriage, they have visited the relatives of the wife in the UK two (!) times only. Because that’s all they can afford. Don’t keep throwing those absurd figures at us please!
@what_next, I said “in this area”, and what I said was accurate. The US is a large country with different salaries in different areas.
I just looked up the starting salary for a policeman coming directly out of the academy in the town where I live, and it is $57K/year. Captains make double that. Being a policeman in the US can be a good choice for people who have no degree, particularly when considering the retirement benefits. The single, 60 year old nurse who lives across the street from me makes $120K/year because of her seniority and masters degree. More junior RNs with a bachelors degree make half what she makes, or roughly $60K. Nursing is a good job in the US because you can live almost anywhere and demand is high, the downside is weird working hours.
I get around 250 hours paid leave per year, which includes sick time and vacation but does not include holidays. That is more than most people, and I made some career decisions to allow it.
Silvaire wrote:
The single, 60 year old nurse who lives across the street from me makes $120K/year because of her seniority and masters degree.
Why would anybody pay a nurse extra because of a master’s degree? She doesn’t need that for her job. With the same rationale they should pay me double for my pilot job because I hold a ph.d … Around here, employers unfortunately don’t follow this kind of reasoning.
what_next wrote:
Why would anybody pay a nurse extra because of a master’s degree? She doesn’t need that for her job.
Do you know what nurses do in 2017? Senior nurses in the US who perform or support activities like delivering babies or cardiac surgery need extra education and training, often a master’s degree, and are paid for getting it.
what_next wrote:
Why would anybody pay a nurse extra because of a master’s degree? She doesn’t need that for her job.
You can’t compare a nurse in Europe to those RN’s in the US, not by a long run. Healthworkers in Europe are in most cases not academics nor do they need to be as the tasks they may perform are very limited. RN’s in the US do a lot more than that. In Europe most of the work they do is done by assistant docs. Also to be a registered nurse in the US and not just a health worker you need higher education. Far cry and obviously different salary. I have two friends who worked in health care for years and only in their 40ties were able to finally finish their RN exams, the jump they did in salary was quite significant.
But like here too, in the US you can earn quite differently depending on where you are and who you work for. A friend of mine near NY changed from one biochemical company to another with the same function and doubled her salary.
Europe has turned into a very low wage area, particularly if you look at purchase power. With the ascension of the former eastern european countries into the EU, the former first world places were overrun with cheap workers so the whole salary level has gone down. Why do you think lots of German docs and nurses come work in Switzerland? Same goes for other branches too. And not too few emigrate towards the US or Canada as well…. also for a good reason. Europe has mostly socialized medicine nowadays so no wonder the salaries are garbage.
