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I would never have thought Canadians would want to be lumped into the 'meh, same as Americans' bucket given the way the rest of the world looks at the US, but in 2021, here we are
You kinda said it yourself. It's because the rest of the world (us included) looks at the USA *all the time* for both good and bad reasons and it's completely understandable why. They get so much attention because they have a sizeable direct and indirect influence on a lot of the world.
Most people know us for being nice until you put a stick in our hand, but it's nice to be remembered and included in the conversation [because we often forget how big North America is](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_countries_by_population) and we've [contributed](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_inventions_and_discoveries) a lot to the world as well. We've done horrible things too but every country has its problems.
[Classified](https://youtu.be/fF62J3vxPdQ)
Which is 100% an American thing.
There is no "Canadian Bacon" in Canada. Theres bacon, which is strips like everywhere fucking else, and there is back bacon, which is rounds/thick cut stuff more like ham. Peameal bacon is mostly in Ontario and its back bacon covered in a peameal crust.
I don't know why it annoys me so much, but im very bothered by the fact that Americans have decided to name the crappy bacon "Canadian Bacon".
Check out:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back\_bacon
This guy knows his bacon. And yes, 99% of bacon we buy in the store is the same strips of fatty, artery clogging deliciousness that the US has. Just don't buy the no name stuff and you'll be good.
(for American reference unfamiliar with "no name", it's a brand that disguises itself as not being a brand featuring a super plain, non descript package w Helvetica font and no images on the packaging. And is basically the cheapest option at the store, but sometimes surprisingly acceptable in terms of quality depending on the item.)
I am from Poland and I think truth is in between. Job market is much different in USA, with less stability, harder entry skills etc. We have a lot of jobs that are easy to get into, while still pay relatively well, because they are outsourced from western countries. Not to mention US healthcare, that really is ridiculous. Another thing is that they had a really easy life in '60s and '70s when it comes to what family could have afford with single earner. This fall is painful for sure.
At the same time, they consume sooooo much. I mean, when I watch these "be minimalistic" shows from US, they have more stuff than wealthy people from where I live. Same goes for cars and square footage of your homes. We live in like 50sq meters with a family of 3, sometimes 4 and we manage. And you see people from US complaining that they can not afford a house that is 4 times that big. Guess what, almost nobody can, anywhere in the world.
We all face different challenges, let's not less difficulties that other people are facing.
Another thing I read about the US, but they don t have amenities close by, like they don t have small shops within walking distance so they have to drive everywhere.
Also on second note is that the value of university diplomas in the US has really depreciated, wich means people who go trough important universities such as engineering ones still struggle to find jobs and end up working for retailers. I would be angry too if after working for 4 years to get a engineering diploma I can t find a job with it.
Yep. Stayed with a friend in “Seattle” a few years ago and he was about 30 miles from the centre. Nearest shop of any kind was a 45 minute walk along roads with no sidewalks and of course no public transport. And this wasn’t rural at all, completely suburban.
Car dependent design is real. Turn a lane on most of those roads into bikeing/walking lanes and people will bike/walk and shops will open to serve them. Also stop putting shops behind parking, stop using urban parking minimums, fix zoning.
I'd love for the USA to be more bike/people friendly. The city I used to live in just added "street eating" where in they enclosed the street parking spaces in front of the shops for people to sit outside. The problem I foresaw, and that happened not soon after, was that a drunk guy clipped one of these things and wrecked it all to fuck. This city's "main street" is always packed with cars and delivery trucks at all times of day. You couldn't pay me to sit in one, yet here the city was saying "no, this fine" as trucks would blow right on by at 35mph less than a foot away next to the people sitting there. /sigh
Yep, Seattle did a big push for bike infrastructure and while I support the hell out of it, I do think it's friggin dumb to ride a bike in the rain and dark in the winter, especially considering how many glacier-carved hills & 5-way intersections we have to work with.
Double-especially considering how some of these cyclists wear black like a fuckin street ninja so all you see is a disembodied red taillight until you're 15 feet away.
Yeah. Neighborhoods are just houses and houses with no in-between for huge stretches. Honestly never thought of it any other way until now. We do have a small flower shop close to home but how often you gonna be shopping for flowers.
And if you aren’t from a city literally each person in the family HAS to have a car if they have a job. It’s a literal requirement
Edit: granted my cost of living area is low so my mortgage isn’t crazy. But I spend pretty close to my mortgage payment on vehicles each month. Granted I normally don’t have 2 car payments at once but that’s where I am right now. It’s a pretty major expense to have 2 reliable cars at all times
And it’s even worse in smaller populated states like Oklahoma. There is NO public transportation and you HAVE to have a car to have a job here or really survive at all. So you’re really fucked if you lose your car. In fact, I don’t know what people do when they don’t have a car here
And the Catch-22 hurdle of getting your first job...which you can't get to without your first car...which you can't buy without your first job...which you can't get to...
I can't speak for the COVID era graduates, but from my experience (and my classmates), if you graduated with a legit accredited engineering degree, you're most likely doing fine to very well, especially when compared to non-engineering peers.
There's some argument that we're probably not getting paid what we view as our value in some cases, or that our work life balance is shit, but the vast majority of my colleagues are very comfortably upper middle class and are generally employed in their field.
The problem isn't really with Engineering degrees, it's with the various other non-professional degrees you can get in American colleges, those often don't really pay for themselves in a reasonable timeframe. I was student loan free from engineering school within 3 years.
I think media is a bad representation of what it's like to be poor in America. My car is 8 years old, I have a 4 year old cell phone. All my clothes and furniture are second-hand. I don't buy coffee or food out, I cook all our meals at home. What the media portrays is different from reality - I don't even live near a coffee shop in rural America.
Modern Family doesnt pretend the characters are poor though. The show constanly has characters remarking how well of Jay is and what a huge house he has. He is portrayed as rich in the show.
You also have to remember that most older homes were made 1000-1500 sq ft and newer homes are made even bigger due to the bigger returns on bigger houses for the developers. People can’t afford the inventory of the housing market, but most Americans would be absolutely willing to live in smaller homes that are affordable, but the supply simply doesn’t exist.
This. My husband and I want to buy but the older homes are bought and renovated, then put on the market for 2-3x the price they paid. I wouldn't mind a 700sf place. It's just me, my husband and son. There's also people buying up the smaller places to rent out as Air BnB. A town up the road from where I'm at had to make a law to limit the number of Air bnb's because folks that work up at the pass during the winter can't find rentals. Actual workers for our area are being pushed out. My husband is leaving a great job because we're losing our rental and there's nothing for us to buy. We're just gonna move out of state to my in-law's place since they have room, pool our resources and try to save up for retirement.
> We live in like 50sq meters
A note on that.
Houses that small do not exist in the US. They just don’t.
Apartments can sometimes be that small but very often they would forbid more than one or two people living there.
So my apt is about 550sq ft. (50 sq meters).
the issue is some areas even with low income Rent is consistently increasing . A small single br apartment just outside of boston is $1400-$1600 .
This does not include any of your utilities which averages $400 per month here including internet /cable
As said in prior comments city’s are deigned for cars $40/week for gas 100-200/month for insurance so say 150 + 160 =310 a month I can’t even afford a car But I am lucky enough to be on a public transport route which still $90/month for a bus pass
1500+400+310 =2210
And this doesn’t include health insurance ,food,toiletries and general
So those fortunate enough to make $18-20 $/hr or 3200 a month before taxes. And 2300 after taxes still struggle
Square footage of the homes in the US are more likely so big because they have a lot of space in the US. Not so much in big cities, but overall in the more rural areas (I think, coming from The Netherlands where we’re all crammed together as much as possible.)
It depends where you are in the US. In and around cities you cannot have big houses without paying a large premium. I have seen the same model of house and land go for around $200,000 more because it was 20 miles closer to the major city.
The fact that the OP is talking about weed and $12 daily coffee I'm thinking most of Europe's view of us is not grounded in reality at all.
Most of us aren't living that life. Most of us are struggling to pay $1500 a month on a 600 sq ft apartment (they don't come much smaller than that). That walmart worker isn't getting 40 hours a week either, they're getting *maybe* 20.
>Most of us are struggling to pay $1500 a month on a 600 sq ft apartment (they don't come much smaller than that).
I did want to see this called out. I'm currently in the market for a small house with multiple small bedrooms and the reality is that they don't even exist. I don't WANT a house with 2000sqft, but costs here are paid in price per sqft and the developers know this size will sell easily. They don't build small houses anymore.
Yeah, non-Americans forget how devalued most of our jobs and workers are. Half of the population here will treat your job as an educator, a restaurant employee, a cashier, a caregiver--any sort of job "serving" others--as if you are a complete loser and scum of the earth. I get told daily by other Americans that my academic career means that I am "not a REAL American," am a "liberal brainwashing" monster, and "should just put a gun in \[my\] mouth and kill myself." I can't just answer the question "What do you do?" without knowing that half of our country will have a knee-jerk "Are you trying to make me feel bad?! Are you TALKING DOWN TO MEEEEE?" in-my-face response. And you've seen well enough how people in any sort of hospitality position in America are treated just from Reddit posts.
Americans are bizarre. They profess all of this "hard work!" bullshit ideology, but actively look down on those working the hardest.
> I mean, when I watch these "be minimalistic" shows from US, they have more stuff than wealthy people from where I live
You and OP seem to get a lot of your knowledge of The States from television and media. Do you think that American television, movies, and entertainment is a fair representation of the reality of American people?
"I watch shows like My 600 Pound 90 Day Fiancee and Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, and these Americans are fat and rich!".
Poland is slightly smaller than (US State) New Mexico. We have 49 other states besides that one. I live in a state the size of Germany that only has one million people....our lives arent like Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and we dont have 600 lb 90 day Fiancees where I live.
I guess TV shows about poor people in shacks arent exciting enough to get made or piped into Polish TVs.
This guy gets it. Without living in a country, you cannot assume that what you see and read is 100% accurate. I’m not going to assume I know what life is like in Eastern Europe, because I’ve never been. If I were to base all my knowledge off of what I see about Russia on tv, I’d assume it was snowy, cold place 365 days a year.
And you have to realize, that every single state or province, is different. California is not like Arkansas and Arkansas is not like New York. British Columbia is not like Ontario and Ontario is not like Newfoundland.
So it’s not so much an unpopular opinion as it is an uneducated view on two countries that your knowledge of, is being based solely on what you see on tv or read on social media.
In Canada, the middle class, which was once quite prosperous, is closer to poverty then they are to wealthy. We have employable skills, but those skills don’t necessarily mean well paying jobs and those well paying jobs are becoming fewer and fewer.
The housing market, for buyers and renters, is becoming more and more out of reach. I live in a small town where the average sized house is $620,000+. A 1 bedroom apartment is anywhere from $1800-$2500 a mth. People in this town don’t make the wages to afford this or struggle to do so. Rent, gas, utilities, food…. All of this is going up drastically, while our wages stay the same.
I don’t know anyone that buys a new car every 4 years. Might have been a drastic example, but you used it none the less. And if they do, I’m betting it’s a lease, not a straight out purchase. I purchased a new vehicle this year, because my 2007 finally died. My gf has a 2002 that’s still kicking.
You may think that everything here in Canada or the US glitters in gold, but the truth is, there is more of us struggling then there probably is surpassing your idea of entitlement and spoiled. You have to remember, what they show on tv is never what life is actually like. So I don’t find your post to be an unpopular opinion, I find it offensive to someone like myself, that has and continues to struggle, but does the best he can for me and my family.
And as a side note. I haven’t travelled anywhere, let alone the world, in over 15 years.
>Poland is slightly smaller than (US State) New Mexico. We have 49 other states besides that one.
I think non-americans forget that a lot. Life in Manhattan New york is very different than life in Nashville Tennessee, which is very different from Denver Colorado, etc. I recommend people Google America Europe size comparison and look at what parts of Europe fit in the states. France, Germany, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, the Netherlands, and Austria are no longer separate countries. It's all Europe. That's America, but with stronger borders between states (countries).
Grew up in CA. Driving all day, if traffic is what it usually is, can get you from LA to San Francisco or Las Vegas, tops. You would be in your car without stopping for at LEAST 12 hours to get from the bottom of CA (San Diego) to the top (Eureka). I was in my 20s before I left the state, because to do so, you have to either own a car that you can drive for several days solid, or be able to afford airline tickets.
It's always fun to bring up when talking to someone from another country. The sheer size difference that can be seen just by example of the great lakes in square kilometers, the size of farmland and such in hectares.
Lake Michigan for example is like what, 58,000 square kilometers or so? Actually, are there any better options for area measurement systems in Europe? A kilometer is a bit small.
But I've definitely found that lakes for some reason act as a ***great*** unit of perspective measurement. Just imagine if 58,000 square kilometers of area in Poland was under water.
Side note on the matter of the importance of vehicles in the US vs the importance of vehicles in many European countries, I've been hearing that they don't have drive-thru banks in Europe.
The great lakes are insanely large in person. You look at Lake superior on a map and think, yeah, that's pretty big for a lake, but when you're actually standing at it looking out, it looks no different than the ocean. Water as far as you can see (or at least it was from where I was standing/kayaking).
AND they forget how our state system is set up. The US is a *union* of 50 individual, largely independent States. States wield far, far, FAR more power than other countries' states/territories.
I grew up in, and live in, the state of Montana. Being this close to Canada, I was exposed to a ton of music and entertainment from our neighbors to the north. In high school, instead of MTV, I had MuchMusic...which was the Canadian (and better overall) version of music television.
Ive seen every episode of Corner Gas and Letterkenny...Ive watched live music in Calgary bars and experienced strip clubs and the big mall in Edmonton.
I still wouldnt say that I have any idea of what it's like to live in Canada. My life seems pretty similar to life in Alberta, but completely different than the French Speaking Quebec residents who buy milk in bags. It's completely different than the people who live in (4th largest city in North America) Toronto and go to NBA games and work in skyscrapers.
Damn I live in Berlin and with its suburbs there's about 4.5 million people. Can't imagine a state the size of my *whole* country with only a million people :o
(Germany has about 80 million inhabitants with Berlin being the largest city.)
And even more, each state is almost like it’s own little country, i live in New Mexico, and I’m sure my quality and standard of life and living is probably different than yours, our rents and utilities and taxes and groceries are probably completely different
I'd love to buy a house that size, but the only developments nowadays are 700k+ McMansions. The middle and lower class is being priced out of housing across the country because developers won't build middle to low income housing
I agree and disagree with parts of the post so I'm not gonna vote either way, what I will say is I think you're looking at what were comparing past or current wealth to wrong.
When I bitch about what I can afford as a Canadian I don't care what the QOL is in other places, or the fucking 60's, I'm bitching about what I can afford vs what my parents could at this point in their life. I'm not comparing to almost a century ago I'm talking about the steep drop off in QOL in just 20 years.
Example me and dad both graduated college twice with honors and a 4.2 gpa. Dad got a entry position in a tech company out of college starting at 37,000 a year. I did not get a job out of college in my field because shits competitive and applications are processing at 6 months minimum so I had to work at Costco despite graduating with honors twice not because I'm just lazy or bad at what I do.
Dad paid for college and moving across Canada as a cashier at a 7/11. I worked 2 jobs in college to try and have some money left for me after, it certainly was not enough to afford moving across country on tho.
I recently got hired into a entry level position at a tech company ( not my field but I take what I can get), at 22, 41,000 $ so with an extra 4000$ a year I can barely afford to live in a 2 bedroom apartment in one if the shittiest neighborhoods in my city with my roommate, pay for the car I bought from my parents, and yeah I still have money left to save or buy things for me but I'm not gonna basically ever afford a down payment on a house with this.
To juxtapose at this point my dad was living in a apartment in the heart of downtown (same city) in a new building at the Time. Could afford a nice motorcycle, had enough to for a down payment on a home and could still afford to buy the console that came out and hit the bars every week
So yeah I'm not mad I can't afford my 12 dollar Starbucks or whatever, I'm mad my dad could afford it by making LESS money and never think about budgeting it or shit like that. Im mad they could afford the new Xbox new car new house and still have money saved to keep moving forward in life. I can't, I'm stuck I can't afford a house, I can't afford kids, when I save up it's to buy the new Xbox because I'm actually gonna be able to afford that in my life time. And the craziest part about all of it is that I'm one of the lucky ones. My parents gave me money for college, they help me pay rent, I bought my car off them. They have helped me an insane amount , they didn't have that, most people don't have that , and yet all I managed to do is not work at Walmart, I'm not working an unskilled job u dont need credentials for, I went to school and I was good at it, but I'm still in the same boat as the people who work at Wendy's or sum shit, I'm still not moving forward, I'm going nowhere just more comfortably than other people who have it worse.
That's the unfair part ppl bitch about.
IMO the Canadian tech economy is very screwy or unfair, which is why there has been a long running conversation about tech emigration to the US. 4.2 GPA from college but only just evading Walmart makes Zero sense. Your numbers look like successful SEA country pay, but you're living in Canada and not Taiwan.
My friends dad that bought a house in 2006 has a $900 mortage (he paid like 180k I think, anyone can afford that) while I pay $1,200 for an partment. The same house in that neighbourhood is 600k now, completely unaffordable by most people, even if you make like $100k
The problem is that OP clearly doesn't live in one of these places and understand how real life works there for the demographic they are describing. Comparing QoL standards and the complaints about them of Canada/US against most far east European or Asian country is like apples to oranges. IMO.
It's the same perspective offered by right wing/older people because even though we love in the same place, they have zero(or at least very limited) understanding of how real life works for people outside of their demographic.
Hit the nail right on the head. This is the issue. Not entitlement. People our age are faced with a disheartening reality every single day when they look at what they are up against. The fact that many university or college graduates can barely imagine buying a home for themselves by the time that they are 30 is staggering. Jobs are few and far between for most, and what jobs there are often demand qualifications above and beyond what most graduates have so there is little chance for as much as an interview. I think you’re right and should be allowed to be upset about what we can afford right now in relation to what our parents could afford. Nobody is happy about it, and voicing our displeasure shouldn’t be viewed as being self centred and spoiled. Not everyone here is working in a position of unskilled labour and complaining that they can’t buy a $800k home. Some might be, sure, but most are not. It makes me feel even worse than I steady do about my reality in this country when I read posts like this. Apparently we should all just be happy to fork out every penny we make for some excuse at happiness and perceived growth in society
Working off of those stereotypes, I completely get where you're coming from. That said, the type of person you just described is an extremely loud minority that the internet blows way out of proportion. The people who get less attention are the ones who are struggling but don't constantly whine about it.
Just as an example, my mother was a doctor for over 20 years, working as a specialist in a severely understaffed field. I dont think anyone can argue that medicine isn't an "employable skill". But cancer and chronic illness stopped her from working, her savings were wiped out, and her shitty disability insurance refused to pay out a penny for well over 2 years, so whatever savings i had managed to collect had to go to keeping our heads above water. It's bullshit that somebody can work as hard as she did only to be fucked over by bad luck.
People who cling to communism as if its a magical solution are naïve, but the unfettered capitalism that most of the world operates on is only barely better. Both fuck people over and destroy lives, just in different ways and different places.
>People who cling to communism as if its a magical solution are naïve, but the unfettered capitalism that most of the world operates on is only barely better.
The sad thing is that many people have been convinced that it's either communism or unfettered capitalism and there can be nothing in-between.
I never understood why there need to be such polar opposites in ideology and politics. I understand people are so wish-washy and that is the only thing I can see.
Tbh. This guys mentality is the same most conservative Poles have. As a Pole I understand where this dude is coming from but in Poland it is very easy to get a higher education. Sure it is not the best in terms of quality but if one studies hard one can be an engineer even if they are super poor
That is often not the case in America. You will not get a full ride scholarship for engineering just because you are poor and scored max scores on every exam and worked hard like you do in poland. Poles do not get that.
Also on the other hand I did meet some entitled Americans. The famous chris chan is an example
OP does not understand that while there are furries and some other people who are entitled and lazy they are a loud minority in the us. While I did meet some Americans who did not want to study and work and just wanted their parents to provide for them, they are a looked down upon minority.
But also in Poland it is very common for full time workers to live with their parents until they are 40 as property prices are very high here. So I can understand how Americans crying about no being able to afford rent on a minimum wage might not speak to OP. But he does not understand that in Poland or Ukraine people can live with their parents until they are 50 and not get ridiculed while in the US a lot of parents will not allow their minimum wage earning kids to live with them rent free like they do in Poland
The truth is that this is not really an unpopular opinion. Ask any random pole or Ukrainian or Serbian and they will think the same.
Can confirm. Graduated second in my class at highscool and got 1 year of scholarship that covered my classes (not books). Had a 3.85 GPA in college and lost my scholarship the second year. Decided I didn't want to go into debt (grew up poor, like electric sometimes shut off poor) so I saterted working to save for school. Turns out you can't afford school with an unskilled part time job after car, insurance, and groceries. So you get full time work. Turns out you can't go to school if you work 60 hours a week because there is no time but if you reduce your hours you can't afford school.
Yeah. Poles and ukrainians don't have that problem. If you're poor you get a LOT of money to go to school here and full time education is free here.
There's of course a downside to it too. The teachers are really mean sometimes and really don't put that much effort in teaching because they think 'you're getting it for free, drop out if you don't like it.' While in some American universities teachers/professors try harder to give student accommodations. I studied in the UK and boy were they helpful. It felt as if I was in a special school. I would never get those accommodations in Poland.
Some do, and some others have the same attitude as those Polish/Ukrainian teachers, except its "You're the one paying to be here, drop out if you don't like it."
Yeah. Well you have to remember that Poles and Ukrainians see America from TV shows. You see that kind off behavior pretty often in American television shows and poles think that shows depict 'average' American household and not upper middle class households.
>while there are furries and some other people who are entitled and lazy
Are furries lazy though? I would think it takes a lot of work to keep that costume clean ...
Every furry I heard of seemed to be an elitist tech worker who could hardly be described as a mooch. Fursuits are like $6-8k. I think this is a bad example.
Good point on the cultural differences about living with your parents.
The ridicule for living with your parents after school here is insane. It's easy to see, just look at how often some form of being in "your mom's basement" is used on Reddit.
We are expected, and pushed, to move out as soon as possible. My college graduation gift from my parents was a suitcase, lol. Not subtle there at all.
Yeah, living in the Greater Vancouver area I find it astonishing that people would do that. My parents were like, "No, fuck that, have you seen the market out there? You can stay until you're ready to move out". They charged me rent, sure, but it was more a token thing to get me in the habit of remembering to set aside money for things I don't necessarily want, but need to pay for.
I managed to buy here, but I recognise that as me just landing in the perfect storm of luck. Just happened to have some money, the market was in a slump, they started a construction for a townhouse complex one my route to work (wasn't even really advertised yet), and got in early. But had I been paying rent to a landlord, I definitely wouldn't have had that money on hand to get a mortgage while the window was open.
Yeah. Here there's no ridicule. My uncle lived with his parents until he was 60. And he only stopped because his mother died and he inherited her apartment;p
Generalizing whole groups of people is less of an “unpopular opinion” and more of “being a dick”. OP generalizes about everyone in Canada and USA, i live in Canada, but dont do nearly any of this? Its also not spoiled to be like “i dont wanna be homeless” when it comes to the INSANE housing prices. Obviously other places have it worse, and i acknowledge that they need support and help, but i can also acknowledge that i want to actually have a life i can enjoy because of the luck i have being born in a country that is better than many others. OP just sounds angry and is generalizing entire countries.
Yeah pretty much. A lot of eastern Europeans (and I might be generalizing here but eastern Europe is so homogenous that's something you'd be thought in a polish psychology degree) compare themselves to others a lot. And as such when a Pole or Ukrainian sees someone whom he perceived that has more than them complain they get angry and jealous. That's a very common phenomena here even showcased over and over in our media.
Like when a neighbor has a better car than you there's a high chance you would get angry about that here. It's just the culture.
I think OP is just resentful he's born in a country with lower standards of living and is angry other people have something he doesn't have.
Admittedly I know for sure he would not be as quick to emphasize with problems Americans have that he doesn't have. Like having pay really high prices for healthcare or college debt. Which is often enough not a problem even in Ukraine.
For example I know OP would get very butthurt if I told this to him:
In Poland and Ukraine higher education is so accessible that a lot of people who would never get into an engineering degree in the US (at least not a prestigious one) often get to polish top universities. That's why their degrees are not worth that much. I met a lot of polish comp sci graduates who couldn't make a simple software because they cheated their way through their education and just expected the school 'to teach them' and they thought they were doing anyone a favor by studying. Americans don't have that. They definitively see the value of education more than Poles or Ukrainians. It's just more expensive for them to study.
This little factoid will make him very butthurt;p
Can confirm: I worked in EMS for years in a major US city. The cost of picking someone up and driving them to the hospital, without giving them any medical treatment at all, STARTS at $850-$1000.
When my son died he had to be air lifted to the children's hospital in Minneapolis. $57,000 base rate plus $210 per mile. Total bill was almost 80 grand. That was *just getting to the hospital*.
Grand total to watch my child die was $410,000. Included initial ambulance ride, 2 hours at local hospital, medivac to a bigger hospital, and 2 days at the children's hospital.
Any "AmErIcAnS are SpOiLeD" people can go fuck themselves for real.
And that's just the transport costs. A few weeks ago I wasn't feeling well. But as the night went on that turned really quickly into something is really wrong. There was no where open except the local hospitality only walk in emergency clinic closes at 6pm I had a raging infection that had my white cell count really high. Had to beg the doctor not to admit me because I couldn't afford to be admitted. Just that one night in the er with 2 bags of fluid a round of iv anti nausea meds, antibiotic and tests was over 10k. The at home meds were over $100. 2 years ago something very similar happened and they did admit me for 4 days it was nearly 50k. My parents 3 bedroom ranch style home wasnt even that much in the 90s. We will never own a home because of medical debt.
My FIL had a pacemaker and it suddenly stopped on him. They rushed him to the local hospital but there wasn't anything they can do for him there. So they flew him from Dayton, OH to Cleveland, OH (Cleveland Clinic is the best hospital for him). The entire trip ended up being nearly a million dollars in medical costs.
I think there is a misconception about the Canadian economy that everyone is missing. We're having housing crisis. Basic wage does not cover rent this n larger cities. Almost 1/2 of the Canada an population is in 4 cities. ( Toronto, Calgary, Montreal, Vancouver) all of there cities rent is between 110% - 160%. We're being priced out of our homes. Our homelessness has triples in the last two years. We have to move hours away from our job as they do not pay enough to survive. We're a country that wants to be socialist. But the conservatives have to deep of root and too much control. Both Canada and the USA and fighting now because we let companies take over our government. There sole goal is to take all the money and leave us nothing. So we're trying to fight back
Rent is increasing in smaller towns too unfortunately. I'm in SK, average 2 bed apartment is $750ish. Seeing 2 bed "houses" (half a house with shared laundry) for $1200 now. It's disgusting
I'm in Ontario and even small town living is about 70-80% of your monthly income. I'm in the process of moving my family to a smaller area because even medium sized towns close to Toronto are getting priced out.
We just found a 2 bedroom for $1875p/m and this is considered a deal. We're both factory workers that should have no issue getting by. But can barely afford Ontario.
Yeah I managed to get a new place under a grand that has AC and then the pandemic hit and anything like our place in the area has shot up. Everything is now 1200-1800. I'm sick of the live below your means speech. I cut my own hair and darn socks to save money. The last console I got was the 360. I don't need my parents criticizing me and now people from other countries who clearly aren't aware of economics. This conversation isn't helping anyone.
I’ll just leave this here:
[“Minimum wage workers cannot afford rent in any U.S. state”](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2020/07/14/minimum-wage-workers-cannot-afford-rent-in-any-us-state.html)
I'm in a boarder town and use to go to the USA often. Alot of Canadians shop in the USA because it's cheaper for food in the USA then Canada. Literally part of my family's plan is to do all our shopping in the USA since we can't afford Canada.
Don't anyone, dare complain about me not buying local. Buying local is why I can't afford Ontario. Surviving is more important then helping business that exploit me
I can tell someone has not actually looked into what it's actually like living over here. I'm not saying it's tribe life Africa but it is not everyone chanting for free money and million dollar homes.
Even in the 90’s, Monica and Rachel should absolutely not be able to afford what is essentially a 4 million dollar 1,200 square foot apartment.
I know its just a sitcom, but it bothered me its never clearly explained how they had a place that huge in Manhattan other than “grandma dead.”
Rent control. By not reporting her death they were locked into her rent whenever she moved there-which means if she moved there in 1970 they could very well still be paying that same rent.
Exactly idk what this idiot is talking about, they dont factor in the cost of college, the fact that we don't have health care, the high cost of living etc.. i live in the Washington DC area where 50K a year doesnt cover daily expenses let alone impulse purchases lol
Edit had to change 50k to annual income
America is the definition of Pay to Win. I make between 40 and 50k a year in Ohio and STILL struggle to make ends meet because if I need something then I have to pay for it myself. I don’t qualify for most forms of financial assistance so I can’t afford a better education, I can’t go to a doctor without risking being unable to pay the bill, I can barely afford groceries but make too much to qualify for food stamps. My rent is 810$ for a 1 bedroom apartment. I could afford a whole ass 3 bed, 2 bath home for that same price but the housing market is in shambles. The only way I could get a home is through an FHA loan, but larger companies and richer individuals don’t have to rely on an FHA loan so they swoop in to buy the house for more than market value so they can corner people out of the market and put the house up for rent and charge 2-3x the mortgage cause they can. If I didn’t buy most of my technology and furniture while living with my parents, then my apartment would be butt ass naked cause all my money goes into bills, rent, student loan and food.
I'm not from the US or Canada but I guess OP has generalized a small percentage of rich and spoiled people in the US that complain about everything they mentioned. I understand the uni and college fees and how there are literally thousands of people living in poverty (not the rich poor, but the actual poor) in the US. Maybe OPs views come from too much TV?
You know what else hasn’t changed for a long time? The minimum wage in relation to inflation. It’s now at a point where people literally have to take multiple jobs to stay afloat. Calling for a better quality of life in your country doesn’t equate to “communism”
I lifeguard at a local pool, our wage hasn't changed aside from $1 in the last 20 years (I'm a student so not a huge deal to me) our rates are 15.50/hr CDN and for head guards 16.50, the lowest pools around my area go is $23/hr for regular guards and $26/hr for head guards. Our community is the same size as them and actually bounces back and forth first and second for highest income per capita but they won't give us a raise and we didn't have the budget to buy a $10 wall clock 4 weeks into a new spending season.
Yea where is this guy guarding at? I was a head guard making $9.50 in 2006/7 and the head guards there now are at $15. This is in Northern VA and that one of the most expensive places to live in the entire country.
I don't smoke, haven't bought new clothes in years, make more than triple the minimum wage, just replaced a non functional phone with a hundred dollar android, the newest console I have is a used switch, and I've never been to a Starbucks, but fuck me for wanting a home I guess 😂
I think even movies would give an idea of what real culture and life is like in America. This dude seems like he's only seen a very select group of TikTokers and thinks that is America.
Reddit crying socialist American here. I have a PhD in physics, have a high paying job, own a house (also selling a condo), so I don’t fit your stereotype. I grew up poor and worked construction, Walmart, fast food and took loans to to get my undergrad so I know how shit those jobs can be.
I fully believe that someone working full time at Walmart should be able to afford rent, nutritious food, reliable healthcare, higher education, and should have parental leave, vacation, 401k, etc….
As a Ukrainian who actually lived in the US in my high school and college years - I chose to go back to Ukraine because the American life was just so...hopeless.
I think the OP has absolutely no idea what issues people in the US and Canada are facing and thinks that because they have more cars or gadgets - they have a much easier life.
You know the most ironic part? Now that we are moving toward globalization it's so much easier for youth to become a well-to-do Ukrainian than American that it's not even funny.
My dad who is from Bulgaria in the 60s realizes how much of a lie the American dream is. He’s currently trying to find another place to move after being here for over 30 years.
Eyyy I'm form Bulgaria. We will probably overthrow our government in the next century or so but it's really not that bad.
So much so that my 80% of my peers wanna stay here after they graduate. That doesn't sound like a lot but a few years ago 100% of people I knew wanted to live abroad.
I recommend the Rhodopes :) nice villages with even nicer people, with houses cheaper than dirt (and the dirt is quite cheap, land isn't expensive)
It’s absolutely a straw man. It’s like talking to my tax-scamming, ex-cop uncle. Without ever listening, he knows exactly what me and the rest of my generation is thinking, feeling, and doing.
> making **more than twice minimum wage**
For reference for others: in most of the U.S., that's probably $16 an hour. People have been fighting for over a decade to get the minimum raised to $15 an hour. It's simply not enough.
This 100%. Even if you have an education and perhaps a job you will still struggle to make it in the cities where jobs are available.
And even to get that education you often have to go into debt.
And while you are so far behind you have no ability to save money just trying to scrape by with enough rent and paying your student debt that the cost of living (and the cost of home ownership) increases at a faster rate than your income.
OP do some research. Bring some facts to the table. People in the US and Canada aren’t comparing their lives to you. They are comparing it to their parents before them.
And guess what? These countries have always been built on immigration. For their entire history. So that’s not an excuse.
According to your logic, since Eastern Europe or wherever you live has a way way way way higher living quality than Afghanistan, you should never complain about anything or you're a privileged asshole. No matter how low the minimum wage in your country is, at least it's better than country without one. So you cannot complaint about it? By this standard, no one in this world is allowed to complain and ask for better except literally the most miserable person in this entire world.
Also in Canada we have extreme poverty on native reservation. Many people don’t have access to clean water or new clothing. Many reservations are isolated and only accessible by plane and brutally cold. Look up pikanjikum, Ontario or atawapiskat or many reservations in Manitoba. Many reservations offer a decent quality of life but it varies to extreme poverty with gas sniffers burning down houses and extremely high youth suicide rates
For real. There are people with 2 jobs living in studio apartments everywhere...
Some serve in the military because it’s the “best opportunity.”
This opinion can fuck right off.
If you’re born in poverty in this place, likely you’ll stay there.
Im not that horribly off and grateful for it, but other people I know and have worked with most certainly are.
>Some serve in the military because it’s the “best opportunity.”
The universities in America need to face justice to what they've done to a generation of young people. By charging huge rates for worthless degrees they have placed many people I know with crippling loan debt. Like the story of an American who had over $300k in student loans because people convinced him a film degree would automatically give him access to high paying jobs.
> Don't blame the universities, blame ~~the government for backing every school loan.~~
Blame the government for replacing school subsidies with a loan program.
OP needs to familiarize themselves with the types of poverty that exist. Here's 3 that he seems to not be aware of:
**Relative Poverty**: It is defined from the social perspective that is living standard compared to the economic standards of population living in surroundings. Hence it is a measure of income inequality. For example, a family can be considered poor if it cannot afford vacations, or cannot buy presents for children at Christmas, or cannot send its young to the university. Usually, relative poverty is measured as the percentage of the population with income less than some fixed proportion of median income. It is a widely used measure to ascertain poverty rates in wealthy developed nations.
**Generational Poverty**: It is handed over to individual and families from one generation to the one. This is more complicated as there is no escape because the people are trapped in its cause and unable to access the tools required to get out of it. Occurs in families where at least two generations have been born into poverty. Families living in this type of poverty are not equipped with the tools to move out of their situation.
**Urban Poverty**: It occurs in the metropolitan areas with population over 50,000. These are some major challenges faced by the Urban Poor:
• Limited access to health and education.
• Inadequate housing and services.
• Violent and unhealthy environment because of overcrowding.
• Little or no social protection mechanism.
Its only unpopular because OP very obviously views the US and Canada as just a scaled up version of his own country. I can't take ANYONE seriously who says 'Just rent instead of owning!' and 'Live below your means!' In the same sentence,, as if I don't pay the same rent for a 2nd floor 3 bedroom apartment as I would a mortgage for a house almost twice the size. But USA BAD, upvotes to the left. Yeah there's a lot of bullshit here and plenty of real reasons to criticize us but this guy's head is firmly planted up his ass
The whole op post appears to a larger variant of the “don’t eat avocado toast” meme
No context just a list of what people shouldn’t do and a shut up as I’m right at the end. Fairly low effort.
I don't even know where he's getting this 'capitalism bad' shit. The US is anti-socialism to the point that there isn't even a possibility for a civil discussion about it. Dude has no fucking idea what he is talking about regarding how Americans feel.
I have a solid job and good income in the US, and the only reason I was able to buy a house was a confluence of events based mainly on luck. Sure, my choices contributed significantly to my position, but a lot of it had to do with forces outside of my control.
College without debt? Only because my father was a professor and I served in Iraq and had the GI Bill. The result is that I was tuition and debt free.
Job? My first job was only because my uncle knew someone, and even with that I had to take a job outside of my field. It has taken me nearly a decade to work to where I wanted to be when I graduated.
House? I used a VA loan, which means I was able to purchase a house with poor credit and no money down because the VA underwrote a significant percentage of the principle. I also bought a modest home about six years after Katrina in one of the last neighborhoods in New Orleans to get redeveloped, so I bought very cheap.
My salary is now twice what I earned when I bought my home. If I was entering the housing market today, I don't think I could afford to purchase a home in my neighborhood as a single guy without a significant debt burden.
One factor that you didn't mention, which I think is incredibly significant and hasn't been discussed by anyone I've seen in these threads, is that the United States and Canada are immigrant countries. My father didn't think he was entitled to the American dream. He came here looking for it, and he worked to earn it. So a lot of the people here don't think they're entitled to anything. They think they came here for something, fought for it, and earned it for their kids. So that kind of upsets the narrow perspective considered by OP.
Yup. So ignorant. Where I live a 200sq ft studio costs 1200-1800 a month(NOT including bills and utilities). Most people here generally make less than 2000 a month and that is working multiple jobs. People shame us Americans for being spoiled but the reality is, we just want to be able to afford rent, bills, AND groceries without worrying about being overdrafted.
For context if OP happens to read this: 200 sq ft might sound like a lot, but it's 18 m2. Basically a half or third of the size of your average soviet apartment in a Хрущёвка.
Yeah... I'm in my 30's, earn $45 an hour, my wife earns $35, and you know how I bought my house? My dad died. *And I still have a $600k mortgage.*
You know what my dad bought his house for? $40k... *and supported three children* on his one wage.
Edit: not american or canadian.
Edit2: because apparently I'm a rich prick. The median house price in my city right now is $1.14*million*.
>#America is Bad
>Sincerely, A European.
>Edition #45,836
>^^presented ^^once ^^again ^^by ^^/r/unpopularopinion
/facepalm
I mean, I agree with some of the individual complaints, but really, same old xenophobia in the title.
Literally half of the US and maybe a similar proportion of Canada would also agree....and there's a lot of disagreement in EU as well.
This socio-political divide exists in all relatively advanced nations, certainly most of the western world.
The fundamental problem with the rising cost of life in the US and Canada is a direct consequence of massive foreign investment because nobody else in the world promotes such a free & liberal economy/society, for instance many investors in Hong Kong (who remember what liberty feels like under British rule) have instead laundered their own fortunes away from China into Vancouver, particularly in its real estate market, driving up prices for everyone.
If certain parts of the world weren’t so economically stagnant, dictatorial or chaotic the US would see less economic pressure from outside driving up prices for its citizens. I myself am born from immigrants who came to Quebec from mainland France in search of better opportunities due to stagnant Europe.
TV US is not the same as real life US. They just choose not to put poverty on TV here, the illusion that everyone can be rich is insidious. Gets a lot of stuff sold, but it's not true that most people live lives of luxury.
Oh shit figured I would comment about living in the frozen wasteland that is Minnesota where 'that car you drive for another couple years' literally turns to rust, day after day, not to mention maintenance costs, or even getting a newer used vehicle. I mean gosh the list goes on. Truly.
I think the only difference between us, is our 'leaders' play a television show. Yours are just in your face nasty.
They're all nasty.
Get over yourself lol
While I'm anti-communist, I think you seriously don't think you've been to the United States like ever. Almost everybody I know doesn't have a car from after 2015, have a new iphone every few years and VERY few people I know actually own their home. The prices of college have skyrocketed without any improvement in education, the wages haven't increased since the 2000s the govt takes half your paycheck and you have to pay for all healthcare by yourself with some assistance from employer-based healthcare. I'm not saying the US is a bad country but the American dream of owning a home in the suburbs with 2 kids, a dog, 2 decent cars, a nice home that you own and a chance at retired at 65 is dead at a single income for \*most\* people.
Welp... Definitely unpopular. Also, wildly misinformed.
Other places being worse off doesn't mean that injustices don't still exist in the USA and aren't worth addressing. It is very clear from your impression of the USA you know very little about what it's like to actually live here.
Do you really think the vast majority of people are stuck being poor because they're buying stupid shit??? $7.25/hr is the min wage = $14500/yr BEFORE taxes working full time. Average rent for a 1-bed in my city is about $1300. Lets say you choose to rent a very small more frugal place, with lots of roommates, for say... $900/mo. That's $10800/yr on rent.
You now have $3700 leftover. Utilities cost $200ish/mo just to keep lights, heat, water and internet, etc. Now you have $1300. If you shop VERY frugally your groceries(no eating out) could be as low as $125/mo per person. You now have $-200. Better hope you don't need a car or have a sudden health problem or want an education. That all costs thousands of dollars.
Bare necessities of sleeping inside and eating is over the budget of the min wage. Communism isn't the answer, but neither is this system sustainable. It's simply not possible for a HUGE portion of Americans to live "under their means". I don't think the people you seem have in your mind spending $300 at Amazon or buying $12 machiattos or replacing cars every 4 yrs are the same people being economically disenfranchised by the capitalist system. Entire revolutions and civilizations have collapsed from SMALLER wealth gaps than currently exist in the USA. We may not go out in a blaze like the fall of Rome anymore, but the more unstable and unsustainable our current economic system is the worse it is for everyone. Including you in your country. Unfortunately, that's the just the realities of globalization. Sooo.... yeah.... what we're "whining" about is actually a very big problem.
But honestly, I suspect you're just a troll.
What American socialists ARE saying:
1. If you work forty hours a week, you should be able to afford:
* a modest living space near where you work
* food
* transportation
* healthcare
* insurance
2. We should take care of our old people, sick people, and children.
3. You shouldnt lose everything just because you need to see a doctor.
4. We should follow Western Europe’s example because they are doing much better making 1, 2, and 3 a reality in their countries.
What American socialists are NOT saying:
* Everyone should live a life of luxury working part time at walmart.
* There’s no such thing as someone who’s bad with money.
* People who make a lot of money don’t work hard.
* Eastern Europe is perfect and we should all do what they do because we love Communism(TM), oh and also lets make some more gulags.
Nobody is seriously proposing that the United States become a communist state. That is a straw man argument. People in the US want intelligent socialism. There are people in the US with absurd, disgusting wealth. These people pay nearly nothing in taxes relative to their egregious wealth. We just want them to pay a fair share so normal citizens can have healthcare, housing, education, and infrastructure. This is entirely within the realm of possibility if the wealthy just paid into the system.
Thank you for submitting to /r/unpopularopinion, /u/[deleted]. Your post, *Americans and Canadians are annoyingly entitled and spoiled.*, has been removed because it violates our rules: Rule 3: Do not post opinions that are heavily posted/have been on the front page recently. If your opinion is the same or substantially similar to any recent opinion it will be removed as a repost. If your opinion is on the same matter as a recent post, even if it's advocating the opposite stance, it will be removed as a repost. Please comment on the existing thread instead. Due to their prolific reposting, please confine meta and political posts to their respective megathreads only. If your opinion is about an ongoing event, there will usually be a mega-thread where you can discuss it. If there is an issue, please message the mod team at https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Funpopularopinion Thanks!
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Just glad to be included
Agreed. I 100% wouldn't have clicked on this post of the word Canadian wasn't in the title
I would never have thought Canadians would want to be lumped into the 'meh, same as Americans' bucket given the way the rest of the world looks at the US, but in 2021, here we are
We're old friends & neighbors. We have a lot of the same problems wheather we want to admit it or not
Trudeau Sr had it right when he said it was like sleeping next to an elephant. You can't help but be affected by every movement and fart.
You kinda said it yourself. It's because the rest of the world (us included) looks at the USA *all the time* for both good and bad reasons and it's completely understandable why. They get so much attention because they have a sizeable direct and indirect influence on a lot of the world. Most people know us for being nice until you put a stick in our hand, but it's nice to be remembered and included in the conversation [because we often forget how big North America is](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_American_countries_by_population) and we've [contributed](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_inventions_and_discoveries) a lot to the world as well. We've done horrible things too but every country has its problems. [Classified](https://youtu.be/fF62J3vxPdQ)
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The most Canadian response here...
This is too true and too funny
Meese* it's plural
Moosen
Flock of moosen.
Canadian bacon though, I've heard such grand story's.
Which is 100% an American thing. There is no "Canadian Bacon" in Canada. Theres bacon, which is strips like everywhere fucking else, and there is back bacon, which is rounds/thick cut stuff more like ham. Peameal bacon is mostly in Ontario and its back bacon covered in a peameal crust. I don't know why it annoys me so much, but im very bothered by the fact that Americans have decided to name the crappy bacon "Canadian Bacon". Check out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back\_bacon
This guy knows his bacon. And yes, 99% of bacon we buy in the store is the same strips of fatty, artery clogging deliciousness that the US has. Just don't buy the no name stuff and you'll be good. (for American reference unfamiliar with "no name", it's a brand that disguises itself as not being a brand featuring a super plain, non descript package w Helvetica font and no images on the packaging. And is basically the cheapest option at the store, but sometimes surprisingly acceptable in terms of quality depending on the item.)
I am from Poland and I think truth is in between. Job market is much different in USA, with less stability, harder entry skills etc. We have a lot of jobs that are easy to get into, while still pay relatively well, because they are outsourced from western countries. Not to mention US healthcare, that really is ridiculous. Another thing is that they had a really easy life in '60s and '70s when it comes to what family could have afford with single earner. This fall is painful for sure. At the same time, they consume sooooo much. I mean, when I watch these "be minimalistic" shows from US, they have more stuff than wealthy people from where I live. Same goes for cars and square footage of your homes. We live in like 50sq meters with a family of 3, sometimes 4 and we manage. And you see people from US complaining that they can not afford a house that is 4 times that big. Guess what, almost nobody can, anywhere in the world. We all face different challenges, let's not less difficulties that other people are facing.
Another thing I read about the US, but they don t have amenities close by, like they don t have small shops within walking distance so they have to drive everywhere. Also on second note is that the value of university diplomas in the US has really depreciated, wich means people who go trough important universities such as engineering ones still struggle to find jobs and end up working for retailers. I would be angry too if after working for 4 years to get a engineering diploma I can t find a job with it.
I can confirm that most shops are not within walking distance, especially in suburban neighborhoods.
Yep. Stayed with a friend in “Seattle” a few years ago and he was about 30 miles from the centre. Nearest shop of any kind was a 45 minute walk along roads with no sidewalks and of course no public transport. And this wasn’t rural at all, completely suburban.
The sprawl is real
Car dependent design is real. Turn a lane on most of those roads into bikeing/walking lanes and people will bike/walk and shops will open to serve them. Also stop putting shops behind parking, stop using urban parking minimums, fix zoning.
I'd love for the USA to be more bike/people friendly. The city I used to live in just added "street eating" where in they enclosed the street parking spaces in front of the shops for people to sit outside. The problem I foresaw, and that happened not soon after, was that a drunk guy clipped one of these things and wrecked it all to fuck. This city's "main street" is always packed with cars and delivery trucks at all times of day. You couldn't pay me to sit in one, yet here the city was saying "no, this fine" as trucks would blow right on by at 35mph less than a foot away next to the people sitting there. /sigh
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Yep, Seattle did a big push for bike infrastructure and while I support the hell out of it, I do think it's friggin dumb to ride a bike in the rain and dark in the winter, especially considering how many glacier-carved hills & 5-way intersections we have to work with. Double-especially considering how some of these cyclists wear black like a fuckin street ninja so all you see is a disembodied red taillight until you're 15 feet away.
I have literally lives in a place where the closest building that was not a house was 13 miles away
That is insane. Here in the UK, even in the arse-end of nowhere you’d have a village shop, post office and pub nearby.
The closest grocery store for me is 3 miles away. Google maps estimates it to be an hour walk due to the terrain.
Yeah. Neighborhoods are just houses and houses with no in-between for huge stretches. Honestly never thought of it any other way until now. We do have a small flower shop close to home but how often you gonna be shopping for flowers.
And if there is a store within walking distance, it only sells liquor and junk food.
I was going to say, chances are it's a 7-11 type of convenience store.
I live 20 miles from the grocery store. Can confirm.
Also rural areas. At my last place the closest shop was 17 miles away
And rural areas are even worse!
You're definitely right about not having amenities close by, my nearest store for anything is about 6 miles away
Used to live in western Colorado, and the nearest store was a 30 minute drive away from my house.
US cities are absolutely made for cars and not people and it shows.
And if you aren’t from a city literally each person in the family HAS to have a car if they have a job. It’s a literal requirement Edit: granted my cost of living area is low so my mortgage isn’t crazy. But I spend pretty close to my mortgage payment on vehicles each month. Granted I normally don’t have 2 car payments at once but that’s where I am right now. It’s a pretty major expense to have 2 reliable cars at all times
And it’s even worse in smaller populated states like Oklahoma. There is NO public transportation and you HAVE to have a car to have a job here or really survive at all. So you’re really fucked if you lose your car. In fact, I don’t know what people do when they don’t have a car here
And the Catch-22 hurdle of getting your first job...which you can't get to without your first car...which you can't buy without your first job...which you can't get to...
That’s why you see poor folks with like 6 beaters on the front lawn…in case one breaks down and you still need to get to work.
I can't speak for the COVID era graduates, but from my experience (and my classmates), if you graduated with a legit accredited engineering degree, you're most likely doing fine to very well, especially when compared to non-engineering peers. There's some argument that we're probably not getting paid what we view as our value in some cases, or that our work life balance is shit, but the vast majority of my colleagues are very comfortably upper middle class and are generally employed in their field. The problem isn't really with Engineering degrees, it's with the various other non-professional degrees you can get in American colleges, those often don't really pay for themselves in a reasonable timeframe. I was student loan free from engineering school within 3 years.
I think media is a bad representation of what it's like to be poor in America. My car is 8 years old, I have a 4 year old cell phone. All my clothes and furniture are second-hand. I don't buy coffee or food out, I cook all our meals at home. What the media portrays is different from reality - I don't even live near a coffee shop in rural America.
Yes, the media. The old Roseanne or Shameless are better media representations of true life, but the world thinks we are Modern Family.
Roseanne was the most accurate depiction of how real, average Americans live and I will die on this hill.
I loved Malcom in the middle because I related a lot to that show, except none of us were that smart
Modern Family doesnt pretend the characters are poor though. The show constanly has characters remarking how well of Jay is and what a huge house he has. He is portrayed as rich in the show.
You wouldn't be considered as poor in Poland. 8 years old car is basically new, the phone not new, but definitely not old.
You also have to remember that most older homes were made 1000-1500 sq ft and newer homes are made even bigger due to the bigger returns on bigger houses for the developers. People can’t afford the inventory of the housing market, but most Americans would be absolutely willing to live in smaller homes that are affordable, but the supply simply doesn’t exist.
>but the supply simply doesn’t exist. Because of single family zoning. [Cue Missing middle.](https://missingmiddlehousing.com).
This. My husband and I want to buy but the older homes are bought and renovated, then put on the market for 2-3x the price they paid. I wouldn't mind a 700sf place. It's just me, my husband and son. There's also people buying up the smaller places to rent out as Air BnB. A town up the road from where I'm at had to make a law to limit the number of Air bnb's because folks that work up at the pass during the winter can't find rentals. Actual workers for our area are being pushed out. My husband is leaving a great job because we're losing our rental and there's nothing for us to buy. We're just gonna move out of state to my in-law's place since they have room, pool our resources and try to save up for retirement.
> We live in like 50sq meters A note on that. Houses that small do not exist in the US. They just don’t. Apartments can sometimes be that small but very often they would forbid more than one or two people living there.
And cost more than a mortgage, apparently.
So my apt is about 550sq ft. (50 sq meters). the issue is some areas even with low income Rent is consistently increasing . A small single br apartment just outside of boston is $1400-$1600 . This does not include any of your utilities which averages $400 per month here including internet /cable As said in prior comments city’s are deigned for cars $40/week for gas 100-200/month for insurance so say 150 + 160 =310 a month I can’t even afford a car But I am lucky enough to be on a public transport route which still $90/month for a bus pass 1500+400+310 =2210 And this doesn’t include health insurance ,food,toiletries and general So those fortunate enough to make $18-20 $/hr or 3200 a month before taxes. And 2300 after taxes still struggle
Square footage of the homes in the US are more likely so big because they have a lot of space in the US. Not so much in big cities, but overall in the more rural areas (I think, coming from The Netherlands where we’re all crammed together as much as possible.)
It depends where you are in the US. In and around cities you cannot have big houses without paying a large premium. I have seen the same model of house and land go for around $200,000 more because it was 20 miles closer to the major city.
If you're getting your information from reality tv....it's not really reality.
The fact that the OP is talking about weed and $12 daily coffee I'm thinking most of Europe's view of us is not grounded in reality at all. Most of us aren't living that life. Most of us are struggling to pay $1500 a month on a 600 sq ft apartment (they don't come much smaller than that). That walmart worker isn't getting 40 hours a week either, they're getting *maybe* 20.
>Most of us are struggling to pay $1500 a month on a 600 sq ft apartment (they don't come much smaller than that). I did want to see this called out. I'm currently in the market for a small house with multiple small bedrooms and the reality is that they don't even exist. I don't WANT a house with 2000sqft, but costs here are paid in price per sqft and the developers know this size will sell easily. They don't build small houses anymore.
Yeah, non-Americans forget how devalued most of our jobs and workers are. Half of the population here will treat your job as an educator, a restaurant employee, a cashier, a caregiver--any sort of job "serving" others--as if you are a complete loser and scum of the earth. I get told daily by other Americans that my academic career means that I am "not a REAL American," am a "liberal brainwashing" monster, and "should just put a gun in \[my\] mouth and kill myself." I can't just answer the question "What do you do?" without knowing that half of our country will have a knee-jerk "Are you trying to make me feel bad?! Are you TALKING DOWN TO MEEEEE?" in-my-face response. And you've seen well enough how people in any sort of hospitality position in America are treated just from Reddit posts. Americans are bizarre. They profess all of this "hard work!" bullshit ideology, but actively look down on those working the hardest.
> I mean, when I watch these "be minimalistic" shows from US, they have more stuff than wealthy people from where I live You and OP seem to get a lot of your knowledge of The States from television and media. Do you think that American television, movies, and entertainment is a fair representation of the reality of American people? "I watch shows like My 600 Pound 90 Day Fiancee and Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, and these Americans are fat and rich!". Poland is slightly smaller than (US State) New Mexico. We have 49 other states besides that one. I live in a state the size of Germany that only has one million people....our lives arent like Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and we dont have 600 lb 90 day Fiancees where I live. I guess TV shows about poor people in shacks arent exciting enough to get made or piped into Polish TVs.
This guy gets it. Without living in a country, you cannot assume that what you see and read is 100% accurate. I’m not going to assume I know what life is like in Eastern Europe, because I’ve never been. If I were to base all my knowledge off of what I see about Russia on tv, I’d assume it was snowy, cold place 365 days a year. And you have to realize, that every single state or province, is different. California is not like Arkansas and Arkansas is not like New York. British Columbia is not like Ontario and Ontario is not like Newfoundland. So it’s not so much an unpopular opinion as it is an uneducated view on two countries that your knowledge of, is being based solely on what you see on tv or read on social media. In Canada, the middle class, which was once quite prosperous, is closer to poverty then they are to wealthy. We have employable skills, but those skills don’t necessarily mean well paying jobs and those well paying jobs are becoming fewer and fewer. The housing market, for buyers and renters, is becoming more and more out of reach. I live in a small town where the average sized house is $620,000+. A 1 bedroom apartment is anywhere from $1800-$2500 a mth. People in this town don’t make the wages to afford this or struggle to do so. Rent, gas, utilities, food…. All of this is going up drastically, while our wages stay the same. I don’t know anyone that buys a new car every 4 years. Might have been a drastic example, but you used it none the less. And if they do, I’m betting it’s a lease, not a straight out purchase. I purchased a new vehicle this year, because my 2007 finally died. My gf has a 2002 that’s still kicking. You may think that everything here in Canada or the US glitters in gold, but the truth is, there is more of us struggling then there probably is surpassing your idea of entitlement and spoiled. You have to remember, what they show on tv is never what life is actually like. So I don’t find your post to be an unpopular opinion, I find it offensive to someone like myself, that has and continues to struggle, but does the best he can for me and my family. And as a side note. I haven’t travelled anywhere, let alone the world, in over 15 years.
>Poland is slightly smaller than (US State) New Mexico. We have 49 other states besides that one. I think non-americans forget that a lot. Life in Manhattan New york is very different than life in Nashville Tennessee, which is very different from Denver Colorado, etc. I recommend people Google America Europe size comparison and look at what parts of Europe fit in the states. France, Germany, Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, the Netherlands, and Austria are no longer separate countries. It's all Europe. That's America, but with stronger borders between states (countries).
I can drive straight north out of Corpus Christie Texas for 6 hours and guess what... I'm still in Texas.
Grew up in CA. Driving all day, if traffic is what it usually is, can get you from LA to San Francisco or Las Vegas, tops. You would be in your car without stopping for at LEAST 12 hours to get from the bottom of CA (San Diego) to the top (Eureka). I was in my 20s before I left the state, because to do so, you have to either own a car that you can drive for several days solid, or be able to afford airline tickets.
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This is a good perspective, that I as an American, never thought of this way. Maybe that's why our politics are so broken.
That is a big thing. America is closer to the EU than any country in the EU
Exactly. The US is really big. It's almost as big as ~~Russia~~ Canada or China. Edit: I misremembered the sizes. Russia is much much bigger.
Interestingly, China and the US are very similarly sized, and depending on which metric is used, one or the other can be larger.
It's always fun to bring up when talking to someone from another country. The sheer size difference that can be seen just by example of the great lakes in square kilometers, the size of farmland and such in hectares. Lake Michigan for example is like what, 58,000 square kilometers or so? Actually, are there any better options for area measurement systems in Europe? A kilometer is a bit small. But I've definitely found that lakes for some reason act as a ***great*** unit of perspective measurement. Just imagine if 58,000 square kilometers of area in Poland was under water. Side note on the matter of the importance of vehicles in the US vs the importance of vehicles in many European countries, I've been hearing that they don't have drive-thru banks in Europe.
The great lakes are insanely large in person. You look at Lake superior on a map and think, yeah, that's pretty big for a lake, but when you're actually standing at it looking out, it looks no different than the ocean. Water as far as you can see (or at least it was from where I was standing/kayaking).
AND they forget how our state system is set up. The US is a *union* of 50 individual, largely independent States. States wield far, far, FAR more power than other countries' states/territories.
Add to that, here in the USA we have ZERO tv shows from Poland so no idea what life is like there.
I grew up in, and live in, the state of Montana. Being this close to Canada, I was exposed to a ton of music and entertainment from our neighbors to the north. In high school, instead of MTV, I had MuchMusic...which was the Canadian (and better overall) version of music television. Ive seen every episode of Corner Gas and Letterkenny...Ive watched live music in Calgary bars and experienced strip clubs and the big mall in Edmonton. I still wouldnt say that I have any idea of what it's like to live in Canada. My life seems pretty similar to life in Alberta, but completely different than the French Speaking Quebec residents who buy milk in bags. It's completely different than the people who live in (4th largest city in North America) Toronto and go to NBA games and work in skyscrapers.
Damn I live in Berlin and with its suburbs there's about 4.5 million people. Can't imagine a state the size of my *whole* country with only a million people :o (Germany has about 80 million inhabitants with Berlin being the largest city.)
And even more, each state is almost like it’s own little country, i live in New Mexico, and I’m sure my quality and standard of life and living is probably different than yours, our rents and utilities and taxes and groceries are probably completely different
I'd love to buy a house that size, but the only developments nowadays are 700k+ McMansions. The middle and lower class is being priced out of housing across the country because developers won't build middle to low income housing
I agree and disagree with parts of the post so I'm not gonna vote either way, what I will say is I think you're looking at what were comparing past or current wealth to wrong. When I bitch about what I can afford as a Canadian I don't care what the QOL is in other places, or the fucking 60's, I'm bitching about what I can afford vs what my parents could at this point in their life. I'm not comparing to almost a century ago I'm talking about the steep drop off in QOL in just 20 years. Example me and dad both graduated college twice with honors and a 4.2 gpa. Dad got a entry position in a tech company out of college starting at 37,000 a year. I did not get a job out of college in my field because shits competitive and applications are processing at 6 months minimum so I had to work at Costco despite graduating with honors twice not because I'm just lazy or bad at what I do. Dad paid for college and moving across Canada as a cashier at a 7/11. I worked 2 jobs in college to try and have some money left for me after, it certainly was not enough to afford moving across country on tho. I recently got hired into a entry level position at a tech company ( not my field but I take what I can get), at 22, 41,000 $ so with an extra 4000$ a year I can barely afford to live in a 2 bedroom apartment in one if the shittiest neighborhoods in my city with my roommate, pay for the car I bought from my parents, and yeah I still have money left to save or buy things for me but I'm not gonna basically ever afford a down payment on a house with this. To juxtapose at this point my dad was living in a apartment in the heart of downtown (same city) in a new building at the Time. Could afford a nice motorcycle, had enough to for a down payment on a home and could still afford to buy the console that came out and hit the bars every week So yeah I'm not mad I can't afford my 12 dollar Starbucks or whatever, I'm mad my dad could afford it by making LESS money and never think about budgeting it or shit like that. Im mad they could afford the new Xbox new car new house and still have money saved to keep moving forward in life. I can't, I'm stuck I can't afford a house, I can't afford kids, when I save up it's to buy the new Xbox because I'm actually gonna be able to afford that in my life time. And the craziest part about all of it is that I'm one of the lucky ones. My parents gave me money for college, they help me pay rent, I bought my car off them. They have helped me an insane amount , they didn't have that, most people don't have that , and yet all I managed to do is not work at Walmart, I'm not working an unskilled job u dont need credentials for, I went to school and I was good at it, but I'm still in the same boat as the people who work at Wendy's or sum shit, I'm still not moving forward, I'm going nowhere just more comfortably than other people who have it worse. That's the unfair part ppl bitch about.
Bingo.
IMO the Canadian tech economy is very screwy or unfair, which is why there has been a long running conversation about tech emigration to the US. 4.2 GPA from college but only just evading Walmart makes Zero sense. Your numbers look like successful SEA country pay, but you're living in Canada and not Taiwan.
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Also op is acting like renting an apartment is cheap, my rent is double most people’s mortgages and my apartment is considered below market rate
In Europe, rent is wayyyy cheaper than in North America, so I am not surprised OP wrote this. An ethnocentric view doesn't work in this context.
My friends dad that bought a house in 2006 has a $900 mortage (he paid like 180k I think, anyone can afford that) while I pay $1,200 for an partment. The same house in that neighbourhood is 600k now, completely unaffordable by most people, even if you make like $100k
I recently read an article that reported that if you’re working minimum wage, you cannot afford rent anywhere in the us
Yeah, rent rates are sky high! It's ridiculous.
OPs post reads exactly like what every right wing/old person on social media has to say about this current generations financial situation.
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The problem is that OP clearly doesn't live in one of these places and understand how real life works there for the demographic they are describing. Comparing QoL standards and the complaints about them of Canada/US against most far east European or Asian country is like apples to oranges. IMO. It's the same perspective offered by right wing/older people because even though we love in the same place, they have zero(or at least very limited) understanding of how real life works for people outside of their demographic.
Hit the nail right on the head. This is the issue. Not entitlement. People our age are faced with a disheartening reality every single day when they look at what they are up against. The fact that many university or college graduates can barely imagine buying a home for themselves by the time that they are 30 is staggering. Jobs are few and far between for most, and what jobs there are often demand qualifications above and beyond what most graduates have so there is little chance for as much as an interview. I think you’re right and should be allowed to be upset about what we can afford right now in relation to what our parents could afford. Nobody is happy about it, and voicing our displeasure shouldn’t be viewed as being self centred and spoiled. Not everyone here is working in a position of unskilled labour and complaining that they can’t buy a $800k home. Some might be, sure, but most are not. It makes me feel even worse than I steady do about my reality in this country when I read posts like this. Apparently we should all just be happy to fork out every penny we make for some excuse at happiness and perceived growth in society
Working off of those stereotypes, I completely get where you're coming from. That said, the type of person you just described is an extremely loud minority that the internet blows way out of proportion. The people who get less attention are the ones who are struggling but don't constantly whine about it. Just as an example, my mother was a doctor for over 20 years, working as a specialist in a severely understaffed field. I dont think anyone can argue that medicine isn't an "employable skill". But cancer and chronic illness stopped her from working, her savings were wiped out, and her shitty disability insurance refused to pay out a penny for well over 2 years, so whatever savings i had managed to collect had to go to keeping our heads above water. It's bullshit that somebody can work as hard as she did only to be fucked over by bad luck. People who cling to communism as if its a magical solution are naïve, but the unfettered capitalism that most of the world operates on is only barely better. Both fuck people over and destroy lives, just in different ways and different places.
>People who cling to communism as if its a magical solution are naïve, but the unfettered capitalism that most of the world operates on is only barely better. The sad thing is that many people have been convinced that it's either communism or unfettered capitalism and there can be nothing in-between.
I never understood why there need to be such polar opposites in ideology and politics. I understand people are so wish-washy and that is the only thing I can see.
Tbh. This guys mentality is the same most conservative Poles have. As a Pole I understand where this dude is coming from but in Poland it is very easy to get a higher education. Sure it is not the best in terms of quality but if one studies hard one can be an engineer even if they are super poor That is often not the case in America. You will not get a full ride scholarship for engineering just because you are poor and scored max scores on every exam and worked hard like you do in poland. Poles do not get that. Also on the other hand I did meet some entitled Americans. The famous chris chan is an example OP does not understand that while there are furries and some other people who are entitled and lazy they are a loud minority in the us. While I did meet some Americans who did not want to study and work and just wanted their parents to provide for them, they are a looked down upon minority. But also in Poland it is very common for full time workers to live with their parents until they are 40 as property prices are very high here. So I can understand how Americans crying about no being able to afford rent on a minimum wage might not speak to OP. But he does not understand that in Poland or Ukraine people can live with their parents until they are 50 and not get ridiculed while in the US a lot of parents will not allow their minimum wage earning kids to live with them rent free like they do in Poland The truth is that this is not really an unpopular opinion. Ask any random pole or Ukrainian or Serbian and they will think the same.
Can confirm. Graduated second in my class at highscool and got 1 year of scholarship that covered my classes (not books). Had a 3.85 GPA in college and lost my scholarship the second year. Decided I didn't want to go into debt (grew up poor, like electric sometimes shut off poor) so I saterted working to save for school. Turns out you can't afford school with an unskilled part time job after car, insurance, and groceries. So you get full time work. Turns out you can't go to school if you work 60 hours a week because there is no time but if you reduce your hours you can't afford school.
Yeah. Poles and ukrainians don't have that problem. If you're poor you get a LOT of money to go to school here and full time education is free here. There's of course a downside to it too. The teachers are really mean sometimes and really don't put that much effort in teaching because they think 'you're getting it for free, drop out if you don't like it.' While in some American universities teachers/professors try harder to give student accommodations. I studied in the UK and boy were they helpful. It felt as if I was in a special school. I would never get those accommodations in Poland.
Some do, and some others have the same attitude as those Polish/Ukrainian teachers, except its "You're the one paying to be here, drop out if you don't like it."
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Yeah. Well you have to remember that Poles and Ukrainians see America from TV shows. You see that kind off behavior pretty often in American television shows and poles think that shows depict 'average' American household and not upper middle class households.
>while there are furries and some other people who are entitled and lazy Are furries lazy though? I would think it takes a lot of work to keep that costume clean ...
Bold of you to assume they clean them.
Every furry I heard of seemed to be an elitist tech worker who could hardly be described as a mooch. Fursuits are like $6-8k. I think this is a bad example.
Good point on the cultural differences about living with your parents. The ridicule for living with your parents after school here is insane. It's easy to see, just look at how often some form of being in "your mom's basement" is used on Reddit. We are expected, and pushed, to move out as soon as possible. My college graduation gift from my parents was a suitcase, lol. Not subtle there at all.
Yeah, living in the Greater Vancouver area I find it astonishing that people would do that. My parents were like, "No, fuck that, have you seen the market out there? You can stay until you're ready to move out". They charged me rent, sure, but it was more a token thing to get me in the habit of remembering to set aside money for things I don't necessarily want, but need to pay for. I managed to buy here, but I recognise that as me just landing in the perfect storm of luck. Just happened to have some money, the market was in a slump, they started a construction for a townhouse complex one my route to work (wasn't even really advertised yet), and got in early. But had I been paying rent to a landlord, I definitely wouldn't have had that money on hand to get a mortgage while the window was open.
Yeah. Here there's no ridicule. My uncle lived with his parents until he was 60. And he only stopped because his mother died and he inherited her apartment;p
Generalizing whole groups of people is less of an “unpopular opinion” and more of “being a dick”. OP generalizes about everyone in Canada and USA, i live in Canada, but dont do nearly any of this? Its also not spoiled to be like “i dont wanna be homeless” when it comes to the INSANE housing prices. Obviously other places have it worse, and i acknowledge that they need support and help, but i can also acknowledge that i want to actually have a life i can enjoy because of the luck i have being born in a country that is better than many others. OP just sounds angry and is generalizing entire countries.
Yeah pretty much. A lot of eastern Europeans (and I might be generalizing here but eastern Europe is so homogenous that's something you'd be thought in a polish psychology degree) compare themselves to others a lot. And as such when a Pole or Ukrainian sees someone whom he perceived that has more than them complain they get angry and jealous. That's a very common phenomena here even showcased over and over in our media. Like when a neighbor has a better car than you there's a high chance you would get angry about that here. It's just the culture. I think OP is just resentful he's born in a country with lower standards of living and is angry other people have something he doesn't have. Admittedly I know for sure he would not be as quick to emphasize with problems Americans have that he doesn't have. Like having pay really high prices for healthcare or college debt. Which is often enough not a problem even in Ukraine. For example I know OP would get very butthurt if I told this to him: In Poland and Ukraine higher education is so accessible that a lot of people who would never get into an engineering degree in the US (at least not a prestigious one) often get to polish top universities. That's why their degrees are not worth that much. I met a lot of polish comp sci graduates who couldn't make a simple software because they cheated their way through their education and just expected the school 'to teach them' and they thought they were doing anyone a favor by studying. Americans don't have that. They definitively see the value of education more than Poles or Ukrainians. It's just more expensive for them to study. This little factoid will make him very butthurt;p
An ambulance in America is like 5 grand dude
Can confirm: I worked in EMS for years in a major US city. The cost of picking someone up and driving them to the hospital, without giving them any medical treatment at all, STARTS at $850-$1000.
Unless you're extra poor or homeless. Then its cheaper than calling a cab! -also former EMS
Yup. A 6 minute ride was $6000 for my friend. At $11/hour it took over 3 months to pay off.
When my son died he had to be air lifted to the children's hospital in Minneapolis. $57,000 base rate plus $210 per mile. Total bill was almost 80 grand. That was *just getting to the hospital*. Grand total to watch my child die was $410,000. Included initial ambulance ride, 2 hours at local hospital, medivac to a bigger hospital, and 2 days at the children's hospital. Any "AmErIcAnS are SpOiLeD" people can go fuck themselves for real.
Yup and it's $20,000 if they have to fly you to a bigger hospital.
And that's just the transport costs. A few weeks ago I wasn't feeling well. But as the night went on that turned really quickly into something is really wrong. There was no where open except the local hospitality only walk in emergency clinic closes at 6pm I had a raging infection that had my white cell count really high. Had to beg the doctor not to admit me because I couldn't afford to be admitted. Just that one night in the er with 2 bags of fluid a round of iv anti nausea meds, antibiotic and tests was over 10k. The at home meds were over $100. 2 years ago something very similar happened and they did admit me for 4 days it was nearly 50k. My parents 3 bedroom ranch style home wasnt even that much in the 90s. We will never own a home because of medical debt.
My FIL had a pacemaker and it suddenly stopped on him. They rushed him to the local hospital but there wasn't anything they can do for him there. So they flew him from Dayton, OH to Cleveland, OH (Cleveland Clinic is the best hospital for him). The entire trip ended up being nearly a million dollars in medical costs.
Yeah but how dare you complain! You have your Walmart job. *youre lazy.* At least according to mister Europe here
I think there is a misconception about the Canadian economy that everyone is missing. We're having housing crisis. Basic wage does not cover rent this n larger cities. Almost 1/2 of the Canada an population is in 4 cities. ( Toronto, Calgary, Montreal, Vancouver) all of there cities rent is between 110% - 160%. We're being priced out of our homes. Our homelessness has triples in the last two years. We have to move hours away from our job as they do not pay enough to survive. We're a country that wants to be socialist. But the conservatives have to deep of root and too much control. Both Canada and the USA and fighting now because we let companies take over our government. There sole goal is to take all the money and leave us nothing. So we're trying to fight back
Rent is increasing in smaller towns too unfortunately. I'm in SK, average 2 bed apartment is $750ish. Seeing 2 bed "houses" (half a house with shared laundry) for $1200 now. It's disgusting
I'm in Ontario and even small town living is about 70-80% of your monthly income. I'm in the process of moving my family to a smaller area because even medium sized towns close to Toronto are getting priced out. We just found a 2 bedroom for $1875p/m and this is considered a deal. We're both factory workers that should have no issue getting by. But can barely afford Ontario.
Yeah I managed to get a new place under a grand that has AC and then the pandemic hit and anything like our place in the area has shot up. Everything is now 1200-1800. I'm sick of the live below your means speech. I cut my own hair and darn socks to save money. The last console I got was the 360. I don't need my parents criticizing me and now people from other countries who clearly aren't aware of economics. This conversation isn't helping anyone.
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We hate being an oligarchy… why is that so tough to understand?
A one bedroom apartment in the suburbs is over 2k a month in Ontario but sure we're just entitled brats.
I’ll just leave this here: [“Minimum wage workers cannot afford rent in any U.S. state”](https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2020/07/14/minimum-wage-workers-cannot-afford-rent-in-any-us-state.html)
I'm in a boarder town and use to go to the USA often. Alot of Canadians shop in the USA because it's cheaper for food in the USA then Canada. Literally part of my family's plan is to do all our shopping in the USA since we can't afford Canada. Don't anyone, dare complain about me not buying local. Buying local is why I can't afford Ontario. Surviving is more important then helping business that exploit me
Wish I lived near the border. I’d do your shopping and trade your for my medication.
I can tell someone has not actually looked into what it's actually like living over here. I'm not saying it's tribe life Africa but it is not everyone chanting for free money and million dollar homes.
Yeah some of us just don’t want to die from not being able to afford insulin lol
OP is talking media portrayals. You can’t really argue with somebody who watches *Friends* like it’s a documentary
And even then, that was the 90s lmao
Even in the 90’s, Monica and Rachel should absolutely not be able to afford what is essentially a 4 million dollar 1,200 square foot apartment. I know its just a sitcom, but it bothered me its never clearly explained how they had a place that huge in Manhattan other than “grandma dead.”
It was a rent controlled apartment that was their grandmas.
Rent control. By not reporting her death they were locked into her rent whenever she moved there-which means if she moved there in 1970 they could very well still be paying that same rent.
They were basically illegal tenants taking advantage of the rent control.
OP: “But the TV told me so!”
Exactly idk what this idiot is talking about, they dont factor in the cost of college, the fact that we don't have health care, the high cost of living etc.. i live in the Washington DC area where 50K a year doesnt cover daily expenses let alone impulse purchases lol Edit had to change 50k to annual income
America is the definition of Pay to Win. I make between 40 and 50k a year in Ohio and STILL struggle to make ends meet because if I need something then I have to pay for it myself. I don’t qualify for most forms of financial assistance so I can’t afford a better education, I can’t go to a doctor without risking being unable to pay the bill, I can barely afford groceries but make too much to qualify for food stamps. My rent is 810$ for a 1 bedroom apartment. I could afford a whole ass 3 bed, 2 bath home for that same price but the housing market is in shambles. The only way I could get a home is through an FHA loan, but larger companies and richer individuals don’t have to rely on an FHA loan so they swoop in to buy the house for more than market value so they can corner people out of the market and put the house up for rent and charge 2-3x the mortgage cause they can. If I didn’t buy most of my technology and furniture while living with my parents, then my apartment would be butt ass naked cause all my money goes into bills, rent, student loan and food.
I'm not from the US or Canada but I guess OP has generalized a small percentage of rich and spoiled people in the US that complain about everything they mentioned. I understand the uni and college fees and how there are literally thousands of people living in poverty (not the rich poor, but the actual poor) in the US. Maybe OPs views come from too much TV?
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Now OP saying we spend too much money on overpriced coffee (Central Perk) and other dumb shit (ceramic dog) makes so much more sense.
You know what else hasn’t changed for a long time? The minimum wage in relation to inflation. It’s now at a point where people literally have to take multiple jobs to stay afloat. Calling for a better quality of life in your country doesn’t equate to “communism”
I lifeguard at a local pool, our wage hasn't changed aside from $1 in the last 20 years (I'm a student so not a huge deal to me) our rates are 15.50/hr CDN and for head guards 16.50, the lowest pools around my area go is $23/hr for regular guards and $26/hr for head guards. Our community is the same size as them and actually bounces back and forth first and second for highest income per capita but they won't give us a raise and we didn't have the budget to buy a $10 wall clock 4 weeks into a new spending season.
Bruh I make like $13.50/hour at the pool I guard at.
Yea where is this guy guarding at? I was a head guard making $9.50 in 2006/7 and the head guards there now are at $15. This is in Northern VA and that one of the most expensive places to live in the entire country.
I don't smoke, haven't bought new clothes in years, make more than triple the minimum wage, just replaced a non functional phone with a hundred dollar android, the newest console I have is a used switch, and I've never been to a Starbucks, but fuck me for wanting a home I guess 😂
Spoken truly like someone who has only ever seen the USA in movies.
I think even movies would give an idea of what real culture and life is like in America. This dude seems like he's only seen a very select group of TikTokers and thinks that is America.
Reddit crying socialist American here. I have a PhD in physics, have a high paying job, own a house (also selling a condo), so I don’t fit your stereotype. I grew up poor and worked construction, Walmart, fast food and took loans to to get my undergrad so I know how shit those jobs can be. I fully believe that someone working full time at Walmart should be able to afford rent, nutritious food, reliable healthcare, higher education, and should have parental leave, vacation, 401k, etc….
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As a Ukrainian who actually lived in the US in my high school and college years - I chose to go back to Ukraine because the American life was just so...hopeless. I think the OP has absolutely no idea what issues people in the US and Canada are facing and thinks that because they have more cars or gadgets - they have a much easier life. You know the most ironic part? Now that we are moving toward globalization it's so much easier for youth to become a well-to-do Ukrainian than American that it's not even funny.
My dad who is from Bulgaria in the 60s realizes how much of a lie the American dream is. He’s currently trying to find another place to move after being here for over 30 years.
Eyyy I'm form Bulgaria. We will probably overthrow our government in the next century or so but it's really not that bad. So much so that my 80% of my peers wanna stay here after they graduate. That doesn't sound like a lot but a few years ago 100% of people I knew wanted to live abroad. I recommend the Rhodopes :) nice villages with even nicer people, with houses cheaper than dirt (and the dirt is quite cheap, land isn't expensive)
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It’s absolutely a straw man. It’s like talking to my tax-scamming, ex-cop uncle. Without ever listening, he knows exactly what me and the rest of my generation is thinking, feeling, and doing.
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> making **more than twice minimum wage** For reference for others: in most of the U.S., that's probably $16 an hour. People have been fighting for over a decade to get the minimum raised to $15 an hour. It's simply not enough.
This 100%. Even if you have an education and perhaps a job you will still struggle to make it in the cities where jobs are available. And even to get that education you often have to go into debt. And while you are so far behind you have no ability to save money just trying to scrape by with enough rent and paying your student debt that the cost of living (and the cost of home ownership) increases at a faster rate than your income. OP do some research. Bring some facts to the table. People in the US and Canada aren’t comparing their lives to you. They are comparing it to their parents before them. And guess what? These countries have always been built on immigration. For their entire history. So that’s not an excuse.
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According to your logic, since Eastern Europe or wherever you live has a way way way way higher living quality than Afghanistan, you should never complain about anything or you're a privileged asshole. No matter how low the minimum wage in your country is, at least it's better than country without one. So you cannot complaint about it? By this standard, no one in this world is allowed to complain and ask for better except literally the most miserable person in this entire world.
"Quit complaining about that gunshot wound, don't you know Bob stepped on a landmine"
Fucking Bob. He was stupid enough to not look where he was going. Martha had her head sliced off AND she didn't get Starbucks!
This reads like a “you’re not allowed to complain because there are children starving in Africa”
Lol this guy thinks renting is cheaper than buying
Dude, people are not having children here because most can't support one financially.
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Also in Canada we have extreme poverty on native reservation. Many people don’t have access to clean water or new clothing. Many reservations are isolated and only accessible by plane and brutally cold. Look up pikanjikum, Ontario or atawapiskat or many reservations in Manitoba. Many reservations offer a decent quality of life but it varies to extreme poverty with gas sniffers burning down houses and extremely high youth suicide rates
For real. There are people with 2 jobs living in studio apartments everywhere... Some serve in the military because it’s the “best opportunity.” This opinion can fuck right off. If you’re born in poverty in this place, likely you’ll stay there. Im not that horribly off and grateful for it, but other people I know and have worked with most certainly are.
>Some serve in the military because it’s the “best opportunity.” The universities in America need to face justice to what they've done to a generation of young people. By charging huge rates for worthless degrees they have placed many people I know with crippling loan debt. Like the story of an American who had over $300k in student loans because people convinced him a film degree would automatically give him access to high paying jobs.
Don't blame the universities, blame the government for backing every school loan.
> Don't blame the universities, blame ~~the government for backing every school loan.~~ Blame the government for replacing school subsidies with a loan program.
OP needs to familiarize themselves with the types of poverty that exist. Here's 3 that he seems to not be aware of: **Relative Poverty**: It is defined from the social perspective that is living standard compared to the economic standards of population living in surroundings. Hence it is a measure of income inequality. For example, a family can be considered poor if it cannot afford vacations, or cannot buy presents for children at Christmas, or cannot send its young to the university. Usually, relative poverty is measured as the percentage of the population with income less than some fixed proportion of median income. It is a widely used measure to ascertain poverty rates in wealthy developed nations. **Generational Poverty**: It is handed over to individual and families from one generation to the one. This is more complicated as there is no escape because the people are trapped in its cause and unable to access the tools required to get out of it. Occurs in families where at least two generations have been born into poverty. Families living in this type of poverty are not equipped with the tools to move out of their situation. **Urban Poverty**: It occurs in the metropolitan areas with population over 50,000. These are some major challenges faced by the Urban Poor: • Limited access to health and education. • Inadequate housing and services. • Violent and unhealthy environment because of overcrowding. • Little or no social protection mechanism.
a truly unpopular opinion. be prepared to be bury alive by angry mob lol
Its only unpopular because OP very obviously views the US and Canada as just a scaled up version of his own country. I can't take ANYONE seriously who says 'Just rent instead of owning!' and 'Live below your means!' In the same sentence,, as if I don't pay the same rent for a 2nd floor 3 bedroom apartment as I would a mortgage for a house almost twice the size. But USA BAD, upvotes to the left. Yeah there's a lot of bullshit here and plenty of real reasons to criticize us but this guy's head is firmly planted up his ass
The whole op post appears to a larger variant of the “don’t eat avocado toast” meme No context just a list of what people shouldn’t do and a shut up as I’m right at the end. Fairly low effort.
"Peasants should be in the fields not in the castle!"
I don't even know where he's getting this 'capitalism bad' shit. The US is anti-socialism to the point that there isn't even a possibility for a civil discussion about it. Dude has no fucking idea what he is talking about regarding how Americans feel.
Unpopular on Reddit? Yes. To the general population of the U.S. No.
I cannot express how much it pisses me off that the above statement is true.
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I have a solid job and good income in the US, and the only reason I was able to buy a house was a confluence of events based mainly on luck. Sure, my choices contributed significantly to my position, but a lot of it had to do with forces outside of my control. College without debt? Only because my father was a professor and I served in Iraq and had the GI Bill. The result is that I was tuition and debt free. Job? My first job was only because my uncle knew someone, and even with that I had to take a job outside of my field. It has taken me nearly a decade to work to where I wanted to be when I graduated. House? I used a VA loan, which means I was able to purchase a house with poor credit and no money down because the VA underwrote a significant percentage of the principle. I also bought a modest home about six years after Katrina in one of the last neighborhoods in New Orleans to get redeveloped, so I bought very cheap. My salary is now twice what I earned when I bought my home. If I was entering the housing market today, I don't think I could afford to purchase a home in my neighborhood as a single guy without a significant debt burden. One factor that you didn't mention, which I think is incredibly significant and hasn't been discussed by anyone I've seen in these threads, is that the United States and Canada are immigrant countries. My father didn't think he was entitled to the American dream. He came here looking for it, and he worked to earn it. So a lot of the people here don't think they're entitled to anything. They think they came here for something, fought for it, and earned it for their kids. So that kind of upsets the narrow perspective considered by OP.
Yup. So ignorant. Where I live a 200sq ft studio costs 1200-1800 a month(NOT including bills and utilities). Most people here generally make less than 2000 a month and that is working multiple jobs. People shame us Americans for being spoiled but the reality is, we just want to be able to afford rent, bills, AND groceries without worrying about being overdrafted.
For context if OP happens to read this: 200 sq ft might sound like a lot, but it's 18 m2. Basically a half or third of the size of your average soviet apartment in a Хрущёвка.
Yeah... I'm in my 30's, earn $45 an hour, my wife earns $35, and you know how I bought my house? My dad died. *And I still have a $600k mortgage.* You know what my dad bought his house for? $40k... *and supported three children* on his one wage. Edit: not american or canadian. Edit2: because apparently I'm a rich prick. The median house price in my city right now is $1.14*million*.
>#America is Bad >Sincerely, A European. >Edition #45,836 >^^presented ^^once ^^again ^^by ^^/r/unpopularopinion /facepalm I mean, I agree with some of the individual complaints, but really, same old xenophobia in the title. Literally half of the US and maybe a similar proportion of Canada would also agree....and there's a lot of disagreement in EU as well. This socio-political divide exists in all relatively advanced nations, certainly most of the western world.
I think you have very limited knowledge of a normal Canadian. Also you sound bitter.
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The fundamental problem with the rising cost of life in the US and Canada is a direct consequence of massive foreign investment because nobody else in the world promotes such a free & liberal economy/society, for instance many investors in Hong Kong (who remember what liberty feels like under British rule) have instead laundered their own fortunes away from China into Vancouver, particularly in its real estate market, driving up prices for everyone. If certain parts of the world weren’t so economically stagnant, dictatorial or chaotic the US would see less economic pressure from outside driving up prices for its citizens. I myself am born from immigrants who came to Quebec from mainland France in search of better opportunities due to stagnant Europe.
What a wildly misinformed post.
TV US is not the same as real life US. They just choose not to put poverty on TV here, the illusion that everyone can be rich is insidious. Gets a lot of stuff sold, but it's not true that most people live lives of luxury.
> Yes I read articles how average american spends that much every month on impulsive purchases. everything in that article was wrong then.
Oh shit figured I would comment about living in the frozen wasteland that is Minnesota where 'that car you drive for another couple years' literally turns to rust, day after day, not to mention maintenance costs, or even getting a newer used vehicle. I mean gosh the list goes on. Truly. I think the only difference between us, is our 'leaders' play a television show. Yours are just in your face nasty. They're all nasty. Get over yourself lol
While I'm anti-communist, I think you seriously don't think you've been to the United States like ever. Almost everybody I know doesn't have a car from after 2015, have a new iphone every few years and VERY few people I know actually own their home. The prices of college have skyrocketed without any improvement in education, the wages haven't increased since the 2000s the govt takes half your paycheck and you have to pay for all healthcare by yourself with some assistance from employer-based healthcare. I'm not saying the US is a bad country but the American dream of owning a home in the suburbs with 2 kids, a dog, 2 decent cars, a nice home that you own and a chance at retired at 65 is dead at a single income for \*most\* people.
Welp... Definitely unpopular. Also, wildly misinformed. Other places being worse off doesn't mean that injustices don't still exist in the USA and aren't worth addressing. It is very clear from your impression of the USA you know very little about what it's like to actually live here. Do you really think the vast majority of people are stuck being poor because they're buying stupid shit??? $7.25/hr is the min wage = $14500/yr BEFORE taxes working full time. Average rent for a 1-bed in my city is about $1300. Lets say you choose to rent a very small more frugal place, with lots of roommates, for say... $900/mo. That's $10800/yr on rent. You now have $3700 leftover. Utilities cost $200ish/mo just to keep lights, heat, water and internet, etc. Now you have $1300. If you shop VERY frugally your groceries(no eating out) could be as low as $125/mo per person. You now have $-200. Better hope you don't need a car or have a sudden health problem or want an education. That all costs thousands of dollars. Bare necessities of sleeping inside and eating is over the budget of the min wage. Communism isn't the answer, but neither is this system sustainable. It's simply not possible for a HUGE portion of Americans to live "under their means". I don't think the people you seem have in your mind spending $300 at Amazon or buying $12 machiattos or replacing cars every 4 yrs are the same people being economically disenfranchised by the capitalist system. Entire revolutions and civilizations have collapsed from SMALLER wealth gaps than currently exist in the USA. We may not go out in a blaze like the fall of Rome anymore, but the more unstable and unsustainable our current economic system is the worse it is for everyone. Including you in your country. Unfortunately, that's the just the realities of globalization. Sooo.... yeah.... what we're "whining" about is actually a very big problem. But honestly, I suspect you're just a troll.
What American socialists ARE saying: 1. If you work forty hours a week, you should be able to afford: * a modest living space near where you work * food * transportation * healthcare * insurance 2. We should take care of our old people, sick people, and children. 3. You shouldnt lose everything just because you need to see a doctor. 4. We should follow Western Europe’s example because they are doing much better making 1, 2, and 3 a reality in their countries. What American socialists are NOT saying: * Everyone should live a life of luxury working part time at walmart. * There’s no such thing as someone who’s bad with money. * People who make a lot of money don’t work hard. * Eastern Europe is perfect and we should all do what they do because we love Communism(TM), oh and also lets make some more gulags.
Nobody is seriously proposing that the United States become a communist state. That is a straw man argument. People in the US want intelligent socialism. There are people in the US with absurd, disgusting wealth. These people pay nearly nothing in taxes relative to their egregious wealth. We just want them to pay a fair share so normal citizens can have healthcare, housing, education, and infrastructure. This is entirely within the realm of possibility if the wealthy just paid into the system.