[cardy31]

Low-end jobs aren’t non-existent. The EU still has people working at fast food joints. But the EU mandates paying those people a reasonable amount of money. The US is much more guilty of forcing people in low-end jobs to require government handouts despite being employed.

Anyone working in a full time job of any sort should be able to live without government assistance. The EU’s labour laws come much closer to that than American laws do.

[onlyrealcuzzo]

> But the EU mandates paying those people a reasonable amount of money.

Where?

Austria, Denmark, and Italy don't even have minimum wages...

[bigfudge]

This is misleading. In Denmark at least wages are often set through collective bargaining. Wage inequality and rates of low pay are much lower in Denmark than US. They just achieve it by slightly different means. In this case it is state mandated labour laws which give real power to unions, rather than anti-union (and anti-democratic) labour policies in the US and UK.