Programmer Humor

The US has a higher salary ceiling, but about the same salary floor - at a higher cost of living (higher rent, lack of social safety nets, etc).

Knowledge workers are just appreciated a lot more in the US. Software engineers are the most ridiculous example because it's the one field where you don't need an expensive (in the US) education, but there's also doctors that can make hundreds of thousands a year in private practice if they're really good, senior partners at law firms who make hundreds of thousands partly because they're partners, not just employees. Etc.

The US also has tech companies that make a ridiculous amount of money, so they can afford to pay their engineers.

Oh and then there's the following joke (told in some different ways, so I googled it and modified to how I heard it from my day, an immigrant in NYC:

A big shot Manhattan lawyer calls up a plumber to come out to his home. The plumber takes a look and says, OK, I can fix it today, and it will be $800.

The lawyer raises an eyebrow and asks, how long will it take? The plumber responds, "well, I need about an hour round trip to the supply house for a part, and then it should take me about an hour for the repair"

The lawyer smirks and says, "two hours? For $800? Thats $400 per hour! I'm a lawyer and my hourly rate is $300 / hour!"

The plumber nods and says, "When I came to this country, I was also a lawyer."

Yes there's ridiculous inequality and that IS a bad thing, but a lot of people in Europe are simply not getting paid what they're worth. Like I said, it's not just the tax differences that are the issue, so it's not the European social safety nets costing us our income. It's pretax income that's so different.