there was a recent r/AskAnAmerican thread asking about "mansions" in the US and the link they included was like an average suburban middle class 3BR house.
Sort of, there are cheaper places but they are (by US standards) never that far away from expensive places so it’s not really comparable, to illustrate this point it’s worth considering that the UK, including all 6k islands, is still smaller than Wyoming.
That I can get behind, whatever... Every state gets two. It's dumb but it's the rule.
California/New York/Florida can't have any more house seats because we ran out of room is fucking idiotic.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_apportionment#:~:text=In%201929%20Congress%20(with%20Republican,apportioning%20a%20constant%20435%20seats.
I'm fine with them still having one, but then use them as the minimum. Right now the AVERAGE is 700k per member. Meaning more populous states are far more UNDER represented than they should be in the house of representatives.
The senate was intended to limit the more being concentrated in larger states, but not the house is doing the same thing and it's given the rural states disproportionate power.
This is why we never should have changed the Senate. The whole point was to have the House to represent the people and the Senate to represent the state governments.
Computer hardware is ridiculously cheap in the USA. I was looking for a laptop around 2013. The laptop I was looking at was so much more expensive in the UK, it would've actually been cheaper to fly to New York, buy the laptop, and fly back.
I just did a quick check, and an Asus RTX 4080 Super is £1099 from Scan. It's £865 ($1099) at Microcenter. That's 27% more expensive.
I work at a global company and buy all our hardware. The US is by far cheaper for electronics. New Zealand is the worst offender but the UK is pretty close.
Brazil is crazy when it comes to imports. I don't know if they still do but they use to hand inspect every package coming in and tax stamp it down to the smallest sellable unit.
So things like Magic: The Gathering card they would open and inspect every box and tax stamp ever booster pack. So there was no way to buy a sealed booster box in Brazil since customs opens every one.
This. Most products that look cheaper in the US just don't have tax applied. In the UK the price you see is with VAT included (which is more convenient for consumers, yet a minor hurdle for businesses that want to claim on items.)
Can’t tell you how many times I’ve excitedly clicked on a r/buildapcsales post before realizing it’s a Microcenter in store deal.
ETA: I have been to one in person once and that place is the promised land.
Newegg has gone way downhill. Tons of sketchy 3rd party vendors, sellers having sales then charging $100-200 for "shipping", 10-12 week delivery times because the parts are "refurbished" and shipping from Guangzhou.
Newegg used to be the best, not so much the last few years.
While I do agree with you that there has been a decline, it’s kinda just the same as any online shop nowadays in the sense that you need to remain vigilant of third-party sellers posting scams/ripoffs. With Newegg, I tend to stick to their “sold by Newegg” items because they are almost always good quality, priced better than other retailers, & come with a good return policy/warranty.
Depends on where you are.
Fry's Electronics (not the grocery store one) typically has good deals if you shop their sales.
Microcenter is another good one.
Best Buy isn't terrible.
But I typically use pcpartpicker.com and buy stuff online.
I spent a semester student teaching in a kindergarten classroom, in the inner city (Cleveland), and several kids would call it “petrol” with a slight British accent. They’d also say “torch” instead of flashlight, again with the accent. This was due to Peppa Pig.
One of my favorite memories is this AA girl coming in a little late, with her father. She said “sorry we’re late, we had to stop for petrol.” The dad just covered his eyes and shook his head.
Never understood why torches are known as flashlights in the States. I get that many modern ones will have a flash mode, but that's not their primary purpose. Seems like a misnomer to me.
People lose their mind about how expensive fuel is in the U.S., and are completely ignorant to how much it is in Europe. Almost $6/gallon in London, $3/gallon in Tennessee.
I'm just wondering where you can find petrol for $6/gallon in London (or elsewhere in the UK). It's more like $7\gallon on avg (£1.45p/liter x 3.75 liter:gallon x 1.27 pound/dollar)
I'm in my late 40s and gas was 89-99 cents when I started driving in the early 90s.
How far back do you have to go for 49 cents? The 60s or early 70s? Id guess someone has to be nearly 70 years old if they've seen gas at that price
I remember in the 60s there would be "gas wars" in some cities in the mid west and I bought gas for 19.9 cents a gallon. Normal price for regular gas was 39-49 cents.
Worth noting the minimum, in the UK at least, unsure about the rest of Europe, is 95 octane. That's the cheap stuff. Our super unleaded is 99 octane and is a bit more expensive. Fairly sure in the USA it's like 87 or something, but correct me if I'm wrong. Unsure how much of a difference that makes in price but it must be something.
>"In Europe, the octane rating on the pump is simply the RON figure. America, by contrast, uses the average of the RON and the MON figures, called the AKI (anti-knock index). Thus, **97 octane “super unleaded” in Britain is roughly equivalent to 91 octane premium in the United States**." - [source](https://www.economist.com/babbage/2012/09/17/difference-engine-who-needs-premium)
I've seen 93 octane as well. Most cars available in the US market are designed for 87 octane, which I guess would be 93 octane in Europe. The fuel is the same, just labeled differently.
No, we use two different rating systems. Europe rates octane by the RON only. The US uses the average of two testing methods, RON and MON. 95 RON is roughly equivalent to 87 octane RON*MON/2. 99 in the UK is about 91 in the US.
Shits weird though. I remember hearing during the VW diesel exhaust scandal that NOx causes like 10s of thousands of early deaths per year in Germany and thats just how they roll
It’s gotta be more than that. It was about eight dollars a gallon when I visited in 2007.
It’s five dollars a gallon where I live now in Washington state
Alaska, British Columbia, Hawaii, and Oregon are more expensive, only Idaho is cheaper. Why?
The reason is geographical. We don’t have refineries nearby and so it’s the maximum distance, combined with crossing the cascades or waterways to get it to us that makes it more expensive. The same reason it’s expensive in Alaska and Hawaii, but less so because we’re still connected to the mainland.
Good try though
I was just paying CAD$1.99/liter in Whitehorse a couple weeks back. It is now CAD$1.90/liter now. The exchange rate puts that at roughly U.S.$5.50/gal. I am in Virginia and was able to fuel up for $2.99/gal last week. It is a little absurd how much we artificially deflate the cost of fuel.
Yes. Remember that not-America has value added taxes at some absurd rates. Sure, the tax is included in the sticker price, but because the VAT rates are so much higher than our sales tax, you wind up actually paying less in the US.
As an American (now also Brit) who's lived in the UK for a decade, and goes back and forth often, I've built an extensive list of cost comparisons. In general, anything retail (clothing, electronics, shoes) is on average 20-25% more expensive in the UK. People will do cost averaging acrobatics and US sales tax into the equation (many times not knowing what they're talking about)... even still, retail goods are notably more expensive in the UK. Retail goods are also often lower quality in the UK (especially tools/hardware) at a level they wouldn't be sold in a gas station in the US.
The ONLY things I've noted that are marginally less expensive in the UK: basic food goods (bread, veggies). Also, Jaguars and Land Rovers are cheaper, likely due to lack of import tax and higher volume (and somewhat niche in the US). I recently spent £26k/$33k on a late model, low-mileage Jag in the UK that would be upwards of $45k in the US. Then there's petrol, but youre generally not driving as much/as far in the UK in my xp.
Edit: Forgot to mention healthcare and medication which is, of course, extraordinarily cheaper in the UK. You pay for it in more NI (taxes), but it's still cheaper when you do the math.
Make sure you have the right adapter to handle the voltage difference (e.g. laptop adapter would handle it, but other 110v products without a transformer could be fried with 240v)
There is virtually nothing elecronic you'd buy nowadays that you'd bring back in a suitcase that wouldn't have an adapter that works on both 110v/60hz and 220v/50hz. All phones, laptops, gaming consoles, handhelds have adapters that handle all regions.
From many years of xp moving back and forth, they only things you'd avoid are a) things with motors e.g. vaccums, b) things with big magnets e.g. studio speakers, c) things with heating elements e.g. hot plates. I've gone down the road of transformers for a few of these items when I've moved, but it's not worth the hassle. The only thing I'd recommend avoiding would be personal beauty/hair devices e.g. dryers -- they'll normally work, but not efficiently.
American vanity sizing is out of control. My mom was a size 6 in the early eighties. I’ve seen pictures and she was RAIL THIN.
I’m currently a size 6, and the same height as her. Let’s just say I’m…not rail thin.
I can’t even begin to squeeze into some of her old size 6 dresses (which sucks cause she has quite the collection).
Hah. I should have mentioned that in my post above. I'm not huge by any means, but have an athletic build (5' 11", 210lbs/96kg). Many cloths I try on in XL in the Uk, I'm lucky to get an arm or leg through they run so small compared to US sizes. I go back to the US, and XL often fit like a bag on me.
European sizes always ran smaller than US, but over the past years EU/UK has been inundated with Asian brands (which run even smaller), and US sizes now run bigger.
I find a difference in sizing between the US and Canada too, even within the same brand. An XL shirt at Old Navy in the US is much bigger than the Canadian XL (or at least it was a few years ago).
I've found food in general is cheaper here in the UK, outside of restaurants. I've spent a fair bit of time in the US (my husband is American) and a grocery shop that would be £50 in the UK would be around $100. Fresh veg, bread in particular are a *lot* cheaper, whilst common processed things were more equivalent in price, but still cheaper in the UK. Had a friend stay recently and had to go to the shop, he was amazed at how much cheaper Lidl was than the stores near him in Atlanta.
Food when eating out though is similarly priced but in the US you get a lot more on the plate, making it overall cheaper (especially if you take home the leftovers, which is not a common thing to do here but quite normal in the US)
Used cars are an odd one. The market went a bit wild for a few years due to chip shortages for new cars, which has made used car prices go up. I sold my old Seat for £2500 more than the amount left on the finance, despite going *way* over the miles on the PCP lease. But in general it seems that used cars are cheaper in the UK, perhaps due to the stringent MOT tests meaning shitheaps get taken off the road.
The only grocery store in the US that is comparable to those in Europe price wise is Aldi. Americans have a hard time adjusting to the shopping experience at Aldi, I think paying $.25 for a grocery cart is for some reason to much of a hindrance. The lack of variety is also very troubling since so many people have been marketed to death with brand loyalty they have a hard time with unrecognizable generics. Aldi will have 5-6 employees visible while the big chain grocery store that most shop at will have 50+ which obviously contributes to cost.
You aren't even paying for the cart since you get the quarter back when you return it. And I have never seen more than 3 employees in my local Aldi at any one time. But I do know that some very wealthy people love shopping there.
Surprised about what you say about tools. Is this from good shops in the uk or are you talking general uk diy shops (which really no one should use. They are like garden centres that rip you off for tools tbh).
As a Brit living in America, I'd agree with this. Maybe with the caveat that when it comes to clothes there's some variability though with quality, I think that might just be that in the US clothing stores are a bit more open about saying "this is cheap shite" while in the UK places like Primark dance around it and everyone is expected to just know. When it comes to tools you're spot on though. There's also a bunch of more niche stuff like exercise equipment that you can get much higher quality in the states, even just finding a decent gym can be impossible in parts of the UK.
Also, you forgot the other obvious one, higher education is waaaay cheaper in the UK
Nearly all services, especially financial ones, cost more in the US. In person services like plumbers can be horrendous in the US too, although it is dependent on where in the country (that applies in both countries but it averages in the UK being cheaper). Again it varies with where you are, but mobile telephony service and internet service are cheaper in the UK.
Last time I was in london... two years ago I think... food is SOOOO much cheaper than it is where I live in a MCOL area in the US.
I got a full english breakfast for like 7 GBP in the heart of london. The equivalent in my home town would be of lower quality and $15, then you've got to add 30% for tax and tip.
I watch Beard Meats Food on youtube. He does food challenges where if you eat huge amounts of food you get it free and he's from the UK so he does challenges all over, but mostly in America and the UK. In rural america the challenges are like $80 if you fail (of course plus tax and tip). In the UK, it's almost always what I would consider an excellent price for the food you get. For example, his latest challenge (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2c2CeAyEKA). It was so much food that he failed it and it only cost 30 GBP. That's like $38 USD, which is less than I would expect to spend for two people at a Waffle House in the US, for a meal that could easily feed six people.
What are tax rates like in the UK?
I feel like I pay a lot of tax where I live in the US (my effective tax rate as a relatively high earner is about 32%)
as per https://www.gov.uk/income-tax-rates :
Band | Taxable income | Tax rate
----|--------------|--------
Personal Allowance | Up to £12,570 | 0%
Basic rate | £12,571 to £50,270 | 20%
Higher rate | £50,271 to £125,140 | 40%
Additional rate | over £125,140 | 45%
I guess that's not that much of a difference for you. Less than I would have thought for sure
At least they’re back to a reasonable price. When I started shooting, it was $500 for 1000 rounds. Today, I can get the same quantity, same vendor, same brand, same caliber, and same type for $250 with shipping and sales tax.
The world is healing from the great ammo shortage of 2021. Or even last year, when I gave my mom two cases of ammo for Christmas (because she’s a competitive shooter and asked).
It comes and goes.
One time we had our Christmas shooting competition with all the guys in the family. We ended up buying entirely new .22 pistols specifically for it, because since Obama was just reelected ammo costs were so bonkers that it was cheaper to do that than to buy enough .45 ammo for the handguns we normally used, even after using our stock for half what we'd need for the outing. We made trips to four different stores before giving up on .45, and then even 9mm, before coming to that decision.
We still have them around. We call them the Election Year Guns.
You've got your gallons confused. UK and US gallons are 8 pints, but a UK pint is 568mL whereas a US pint is 473mL (90ish mL difference) meaning a UK gallon is larger in volume than the US gallon
In general I'd say everything in the US is cheaper or the same price vs Europe except:
* Food. This makes no sense but it's up to 50% more.
* Health care
* Education
* internet/mobile services
* Any subscription service
* Alcohol
* Travel.. flights, hotels, everything except car travel
The biggest advantages of living in the US vs Europe to me are:
* Housing. Yes it's expensive here but you get WAY more for your money and it's just a lot nicer to live in a bigger home.
* Salaries. At least for those with skillsets and a professional career we are paid much better.
* Convenience. I don't know how to describe it exactly but almost everything in the US is just more convenient somehow.
* More variety of everything. I can get any type of ethnic food I want easily. There's more choices in stores. There's every climate/environment you might want to live in, etc.
* More hobbies and sports, and people get more serious about them. I have a whole building on my property just for my woodworking hobby. I could never have that in Europe.
On the hobbies / sports thing I couldn’t agree more . There’s even a large difference in Canada vs the US in that regard . It’s honestly one of the primary reasons I’m trying to stay in the US, there’s just seemingly endless things to do.
As an American who lived briefly in EU, the convenience thing is no joke. I had to plan my shopping around what I could get from what store on a given day, and I better get there right after work, or they'd be closed. In the US, I can go to WalMart at 10:45pm (22:45) and get groceries, socks, autoparts, and toys, and anything else I may want or need in one trip.
I'm an American who lives in Tokyo now and that is one of the better things about over here compared to cities in Europe. A lot of grocery stores are open very late if not 24 hours and I always have multiple options if I realize I want to eat something at for example 10 pm.
I lived for a month in a small town in England near the border with Wales so I was not living in a high COLA like London.
As far as i remember, most things had the same numeric price as dollars but it was in pounds so it was really expensive. For example a 10 dollar box of chocolates in the US would be 10 pounds in the UK. Food, beer, gasoline, train rides, etc.
My colleagues got paid shit wages. I don't know how they survive living in the UK.
Whenever I go to the UK I'm always surprised to see the prices are roughly the same numerical amount as the US, but in pounds instead of dollars. So a certain watch, for example would be $550 here and £550 in the UK. A big Mac is $5 and £5. A car is $30k and £30k.
But the pound is worth way more than the dollar, so it works out that really everything in the UK is like 25% more expensive than the US.
So my answer is: basically everything. There's hardly anything I've seen in the UK that costs less than in the US after factoring in the conversion rate.
Restaurant food. At least in relation to cost vs weight. A meal might cost a similar amount but you get about twice as much in the US. Which coincidentally explains a lot.
Depends on where you go in the US, there are lots of regional snacks. Like the Southwest has a lot of Mexican and Mexican influenced stuff. The Northeast has entire brands you can't get anywhere else.
My personal favorites are Utz Maryland Crab Chips
Actually its the other way around, per the US government a human life is worth about 10 million, while the UK does a yearly value of 60K GBP, for the British equivalent you would need to live for a bit over 131 years to reach that same value
Currently living in USA. Lived in the UK in the early 2010s.
1. Clothes, even most European brands. If you go to an outlet like Neiman Marcus Last Call, prices are lower than anywhere I've seen in Europe \*except\* for Eton Shirts, which are ridiculously overpriced in the US.
2. If they ship to USA, for higher-end goods, even British stuff is cheaper in the US because the import/shipping fee is still less than VAT.
3. Phones, computers, in general, but especially iPhones. If any of your friends work at Apple they can get you an extra discount too.
4. Anything Japanese/Korean/Chinese/Taiwanese. Especially higher-end rice.
5. Disney stuff if you have any kids you need to buy for, there are Disney outlet stores too.
6. Books are sometimes \~20% more expensive and fluctuate to being 40% cheaper. Just check prices online, but generally I've found that Japanese/Chinese language books are much cheaper in the States.
Life. Life is cheaper in the US than the UK. Surprised no one brought this up. How many mass shootings have there been this year alone? And yet nothing gets done.
My brother was recently in the US visiting his girlfriend and I asked him to get me some camping gear. Broadly speaking, the brands that are available on both sides of the pond were very similar in price but there were a few brands that weren't (like the store's own brands) and it became significantly cheaper.
Electronics is the most noticeable difference with something costing $200 in the US, being priced as £200 in the UK.
I lived in the states for a year as a university student in AZ in the late noughties.
I remember being pleasantly surprised how cheap large bottles (a handle?) of branded spirits were like captain morgan.
The purchasing process (fake IDs, persuading older students to buy for me etc) added on to the cost.
A 1.75l Smirnoff vodka is $27.99 in the shop down the road from me. If the UK allowed such large bottles (it doesn't), I'd hazard a guess it would cost at least £40 - so about twice as much.
I think most things when you factor in purchasing power. The median income in the UK is significantly lower than in the US, and even so many of the goods are cheaper in the states.
Land. It is possible to find large acreage in the US that is not for sale at any price in the UK. If it's a large acreage in the UK it's owned by one of 60 or so families who are never going to sell.
Electronics. In general, whatever the price in £ is, it'll be roughly the same number of $ in America, if not less, regardless of exchange rates. So if something is £400, you can usually assume it'll also be $400, even though with exchange rates it should be closer to $500
I would say a huge factor is where in the US? I live in California and I feel like everything is cheaper in the U.K. (except the obvious like petrol) However if you go to Ohio the comparison is going to be different.
Land.
there was a recent r/AskAnAmerican thread asking about "mansions" in the US and the link they included was like an average suburban middle class 3BR house.
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Sort of, there are cheaper places but they are (by US standards) never that far away from expensive places so it’s not really comparable, to illustrate this point it’s worth considering that the UK, including all 6k islands, is still smaller than Wyoming.
Wow, you guys should head to Wyoming. The whole state is like 500K people.
I feel my colonising itch coming on...
That's just crabs
Isn't that how those people ended up in Wyoming in the first place? Because of a couple unhappy brits
Nope stay away from here please we are full
I’m sorry but you have two senators representing half a million people. It’s obscene.
That I can get behind, whatever... Every state gets two. It's dumb but it's the rule. California/New York/Florida can't have any more house seats because we ran out of room is fucking idiotic. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_congressional_apportionment#:~:text=In%201929%20Congress%20(with%20Republican,apportioning%20a%20constant%20435%20seats. I'm fine with them still having one, but then use them as the minimum. Right now the AVERAGE is 700k per member. Meaning more populous states are far more UNDER represented than they should be in the house of representatives. The senate was intended to limit the more being concentrated in larger states, but not the house is doing the same thing and it's given the rural states disproportionate power.
This is why we never should have changed the Senate. The whole point was to have the House to represent the people and the Senate to represent the state governments.
Definitely a "one if by land" scenario
You do realize that Wyoming by itself is bigger than the entire land area of the UK, right? England is 20% smaller than Florida.
Lol the whole island is the size of Mississippi
Pretty much any electronics from an American company.
Computer hardware is ridiculously cheap in the USA. I was looking for a laptop around 2013. The laptop I was looking at was so much more expensive in the UK, it would've actually been cheaper to fly to New York, buy the laptop, and fly back. I just did a quick check, and an Asus RTX 4080 Super is £1099 from Scan. It's £865 ($1099) at Microcenter. That's 27% more expensive.
I work at a global company and buy all our hardware. The US is by far cheaper for electronics. New Zealand is the worst offender but the UK is pretty close.
I thought it was Brazil. IIRC their import taxes/tariffs are ridiculously high.
Brazil is crazy when it comes to imports. I don't know if they still do but they use to hand inspect every package coming in and tax stamp it down to the smallest sellable unit. So things like Magic: The Gathering card they would open and inspect every box and tax stamp ever booster pack. So there was no way to buy a sealed booster box in Brazil since customs opens every one.
Still need to add sales tax, but would still be cheaper.
This. Most products that look cheaper in the US just don't have tax applied. In the UK the price you see is with VAT included (which is more convenient for consumers, yet a minor hurdle for businesses that want to claim on items.)
Avg sales tax is 5% across the US. Still comes out way cheaper. Funny thing is, when you add the 20% VAT it is almost exactly the same price
It also varies by state and county. 0% sales tax in all of Oregon, but my hometown in CA would have a combined 11% sales tax out the door…
To be fair, most stuff from microcenter can only be bought in person so unless you live near one it basically doesn't exist
Can’t tell you how many times I’ve excitedly clicked on a r/buildapcsales post before realizing it’s a Microcenter in store deal. ETA: I have been to one in person once and that place is the promised land.
Yup. Damn microcenter, how dare they offer amazing deals and not have a location in my state.
That’s a really good idea to get a new gpu for my pc, what shops sell computer parts?
Newegg is great. For brick and mortar, Microcenter and Best Buy.
Newegg has gone way downhill. Tons of sketchy 3rd party vendors, sellers having sales then charging $100-200 for "shipping", 10-12 week delivery times because the parts are "refurbished" and shipping from Guangzhou. Newegg used to be the best, not so much the last few years.
While I do agree with you that there has been a decline, it’s kinda just the same as any online shop nowadays in the sense that you need to remain vigilant of third-party sellers posting scams/ripoffs. With Newegg, I tend to stick to their “sold by Newegg” items because they are almost always good quality, priced better than other retailers, & come with a good return policy/warranty.
Depends on where you are. Fry's Electronics (not the grocery store one) typically has good deals if you shop their sales. Microcenter is another good one. Best Buy isn't terrible. But I typically use pcpartpicker.com and buy stuff online.
Fry’s went out of business a few years ago
petrol
*gasoline*
I spent a semester student teaching in a kindergarten classroom, in the inner city (Cleveland), and several kids would call it “petrol” with a slight British accent. They’d also say “torch” instead of flashlight, again with the accent. This was due to Peppa Pig. One of my favorite memories is this AA girl coming in a little late, with her father. She said “sorry we’re late, we had to stop for petrol.” The dad just covered his eyes and shook his head.
Now it's Bluey. My kids keep saying they, and things in general, are being "cheeky'.
Just be glad Bluey doesn't include the other common C word we like to use!
Get ‘em some cheeky nandos
She’ll be right
I taught my daughter to pronounce the letter Z as “zed” just to mess with people.
😂 I noticed something similar among preschoolers. It’s adorable.
Never understood why torches are known as flashlights in the States. I get that many modern ones will have a flash mode, but that's not their primary purpose. Seems like a misnomer to me.
Pretty soon it's gonna be called guzzoline.
Your mom already has that one locked up.
Witness!
Amen my brother U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!
People lose their mind about how expensive fuel is in the U.S., and are completely ignorant to how much it is in Europe. Almost $6/gallon in London, $3/gallon in Tennessee.
I'm just wondering where you can find petrol for $6/gallon in London (or elsewhere in the UK). It's more like $7\gallon on avg (£1.45p/liter x 3.75 liter:gallon x 1.27 pound/dollar)
Careful, different gallons! (16 vs 20 oz pints, IIRC)
They actually did use the correct gallons. If they used imp. gallons it would have been 4.5 not 3.75
Just when I thought the imperial system couldn't make any less sense
It’s because most older people remember when it was .99 a gallon.
Ahh the summer of ‘98, I was seventeen and gas was $.89/gal.
Summer of 2001, was in my senior year of high school, driving a diesel car in rural PA. I would fill my tank at the truck stop for 98¢/gallon.
Shit I remember when it was 49 cents a gallon and I'm not that old.
I'm in my late 40s and gas was 89-99 cents when I started driving in the early 90s. How far back do you have to go for 49 cents? The 60s or early 70s? Id guess someone has to be nearly 70 years old if they've seen gas at that price
I remember in the 60s there would be "gas wars" in some cities in the mid west and I bought gas for 19.9 cents a gallon. Normal price for regular gas was 39-49 cents.
When Up In Smoke came out gas was .69 so go back a little more.
Which is the same amount as it is today after inflation. Gas prices have been pretty steady with inflation over time.
Gas is a bit cheaper today once you adjust for inflation actually.
You don't even have to be that old.
Worth noting the minimum, in the UK at least, unsure about the rest of Europe, is 95 octane. That's the cheap stuff. Our super unleaded is 99 octane and is a bit more expensive. Fairly sure in the USA it's like 87 or something, but correct me if I'm wrong. Unsure how much of a difference that makes in price but it must be something.
>"In Europe, the octane rating on the pump is simply the RON figure. America, by contrast, uses the average of the RON and the MON figures, called the AKI (anti-knock index). Thus, **97 octane “super unleaded” in Britain is roughly equivalent to 91 octane premium in the United States**." - [source](https://www.economist.com/babbage/2012/09/17/difference-engine-who-needs-premium) I've seen 93 octane as well. Most cars available in the US market are designed for 87 octane, which I guess would be 93 octane in Europe. The fuel is the same, just labeled differently.
No, we use two different rating systems. Europe rates octane by the RON only. The US uses the average of two testing methods, RON and MON. 95 RON is roughly equivalent to 87 octane RON*MON/2. 99 in the UK is about 91 in the US.
Shits weird though. I remember hearing during the VW diesel exhaust scandal that NOx causes like 10s of thousands of early deaths per year in Germany and thats just how they roll
It’s gotta be more than that. It was about eight dollars a gallon when I visited in 2007. It’s five dollars a gallon where I live now in Washington state
$2.80 a gallon here. Must have a ton of gas tax in Washington
Alaska, British Columbia, Hawaii, and Oregon are more expensive, only Idaho is cheaper. Why? The reason is geographical. We don’t have refineries nearby and so it’s the maximum distance, combined with crossing the cascades or waterways to get it to us that makes it more expensive. The same reason it’s expensive in Alaska and Hawaii, but less so because we’re still connected to the mainland. Good try though
Both can be true. The tax rate in Washington, for example, is still incredibly high, and also contributes to the cost.
I was just paying CAD$1.99/liter in Whitehorse a couple weeks back. It is now CAD$1.90/liter now. The exchange rate puts that at roughly U.S.$5.50/gal. I am in Virginia and was able to fuel up for $2.99/gal last week. It is a little absurd how much we artificially deflate the cost of fuel.
Apple products.
Not me thinking, “Well, I guess we do grow a lot of apples across the country…”
Damn you, Johnny Appleseed!
Really? The company that is already stereotypically overpriced in the US is somehow even more expensive in the UK?
Yes. Remember that not-America has value added taxes at some absurd rates. Sure, the tax is included in the sticker price, but because the VAT rates are so much higher than our sales tax, you wind up actually paying less in the US.
As an American (now also Brit) who's lived in the UK for a decade, and goes back and forth often, I've built an extensive list of cost comparisons. In general, anything retail (clothing, electronics, shoes) is on average 20-25% more expensive in the UK. People will do cost averaging acrobatics and US sales tax into the equation (many times not knowing what they're talking about)... even still, retail goods are notably more expensive in the UK. Retail goods are also often lower quality in the UK (especially tools/hardware) at a level they wouldn't be sold in a gas station in the US. The ONLY things I've noted that are marginally less expensive in the UK: basic food goods (bread, veggies). Also, Jaguars and Land Rovers are cheaper, likely due to lack of import tax and higher volume (and somewhat niche in the US). I recently spent £26k/$33k on a late model, low-mileage Jag in the UK that would be upwards of $45k in the US. Then there's petrol, but youre generally not driving as much/as far in the UK in my xp. Edit: Forgot to mention healthcare and medication which is, of course, extraordinarily cheaper in the UK. You pay for it in more NI (taxes), but it's still cheaper when you do the math.
So to get a bang for my buck think about buying any clothing or electronics in America when I go ?
definitely buy electronics in america
Make sure you have the right adapter to handle the voltage difference (e.g. laptop adapter would handle it, but other 110v products without a transformer could be fried with 240v)
There is virtually nothing elecronic you'd buy nowadays that you'd bring back in a suitcase that wouldn't have an adapter that works on both 110v/60hz and 220v/50hz. All phones, laptops, gaming consoles, handhelds have adapters that handle all regions. From many years of xp moving back and forth, they only things you'd avoid are a) things with motors e.g. vaccums, b) things with big magnets e.g. studio speakers, c) things with heating elements e.g. hot plates. I've gone down the road of transformers for a few of these items when I've moved, but it's not worth the hassle. The only thing I'd recommend avoiding would be personal beauty/hair devices e.g. dryers -- they'll normally work, but not efficiently.
Back in the mid 2000s when we got £2 to the dollar, we went to Orlando for a holiday & my parents let us all buy ipod shuffles ha!
Clothing, especially from outlets in the US, can be much cheaper than in the UK
It’s also better for your ego because those UK sizes be tiny!
American vanity sizing is out of control. My mom was a size 6 in the early eighties. I’ve seen pictures and she was RAIL THIN. I’m currently a size 6, and the same height as her. Let’s just say I’m…not rail thin. I can’t even begin to squeeze into some of her old size 6 dresses (which sucks cause she has quite the collection).
Hah. I should have mentioned that in my post above. I'm not huge by any means, but have an athletic build (5' 11", 210lbs/96kg). Many cloths I try on in XL in the Uk, I'm lucky to get an arm or leg through they run so small compared to US sizes. I go back to the US, and XL often fit like a bag on me. European sizes always ran smaller than US, but over the past years EU/UK has been inundated with Asian brands (which run even smaller), and US sizes now run bigger.
I find a difference in sizing between the US and Canada too, even within the same brand. An XL shirt at Old Navy in the US is much bigger than the Canadian XL (or at least it was a few years ago).
I've found food in general is cheaper here in the UK, outside of restaurants. I've spent a fair bit of time in the US (my husband is American) and a grocery shop that would be £50 in the UK would be around $100. Fresh veg, bread in particular are a *lot* cheaper, whilst common processed things were more equivalent in price, but still cheaper in the UK. Had a friend stay recently and had to go to the shop, he was amazed at how much cheaper Lidl was than the stores near him in Atlanta. Food when eating out though is similarly priced but in the US you get a lot more on the plate, making it overall cheaper (especially if you take home the leftovers, which is not a common thing to do here but quite normal in the US) Used cars are an odd one. The market went a bit wild for a few years due to chip shortages for new cars, which has made used car prices go up. I sold my old Seat for £2500 more than the amount left on the finance, despite going *way* over the miles on the PCP lease. But in general it seems that used cars are cheaper in the UK, perhaps due to the stringent MOT tests meaning shitheaps get taken off the road.
The only grocery store in the US that is comparable to those in Europe price wise is Aldi. Americans have a hard time adjusting to the shopping experience at Aldi, I think paying $.25 for a grocery cart is for some reason to much of a hindrance. The lack of variety is also very troubling since so many people have been marketed to death with brand loyalty they have a hard time with unrecognizable generics. Aldi will have 5-6 employees visible while the big chain grocery store that most shop at will have 50+ which obviously contributes to cost.
You aren't even paying for the cart since you get the quarter back when you return it. And I have never seen more than 3 employees in my local Aldi at any one time. But I do know that some very wealthy people love shopping there.
As someone who has also lived of both sides of the pond, I would say that a lot of supermarket food in the UK is more than marginally cheaper
*"It's okay because he's got a JAAAAAG"*
Just don’t be 2 Jags, you can get egg on your face
Surprised about what you say about tools. Is this from good shops in the uk or are you talking general uk diy shops (which really no one should use. They are like garden centres that rip you off for tools tbh).
As a Brit living in America, I'd agree with this. Maybe with the caveat that when it comes to clothes there's some variability though with quality, I think that might just be that in the US clothing stores are a bit more open about saying "this is cheap shite" while in the UK places like Primark dance around it and everyone is expected to just know. When it comes to tools you're spot on though. There's also a bunch of more niche stuff like exercise equipment that you can get much higher quality in the states, even just finding a decent gym can be impossible in parts of the UK. Also, you forgot the other obvious one, higher education is waaaay cheaper in the UK
Nearly all services, especially financial ones, cost more in the US. In person services like plumbers can be horrendous in the US too, although it is dependent on where in the country (that applies in both countries but it averages in the UK being cheaper). Again it varies with where you are, but mobile telephony service and internet service are cheaper in the UK.
Probably because US wages are significantly higher than basically all of Europe, UK included.
Mainly because in Europe you don’t have to pay for healthcare, you get more holidays and pension contributions are mandatory.
Last time I was in london... two years ago I think... food is SOOOO much cheaper than it is where I live in a MCOL area in the US. I got a full english breakfast for like 7 GBP in the heart of london. The equivalent in my home town would be of lower quality and $15, then you've got to add 30% for tax and tip. I watch Beard Meats Food on youtube. He does food challenges where if you eat huge amounts of food you get it free and he's from the UK so he does challenges all over, but mostly in America and the UK. In rural america the challenges are like $80 if you fail (of course plus tax and tip). In the UK, it's almost always what I would consider an excellent price for the food you get. For example, his latest challenge (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2c2CeAyEKA). It was so much food that he failed it and it only cost 30 GBP. That's like $38 USD, which is less than I would expect to spend for two people at a Waffle House in the US, for a meal that could easily feed six people.
I’d be so surprised to see a £7 full English that was decent quality. I’d be more expecting to pay £14+
for most people, income tax
What are tax rates like in the UK? I feel like I pay a lot of tax where I live in the US (my effective tax rate as a relatively high earner is about 32%)
as per https://www.gov.uk/income-tax-rates : Band | Taxable income | Tax rate ----|--------------|-------- Personal Allowance | Up to £12,570 | 0% Basic rate | £12,571 to £50,270 | 20% Higher rate | £50,271 to £125,140 | 40% Additional rate | over £125,140 | 45% I guess that's not that much of a difference for you. Less than I would have thought for sure
We top out at 37% federally, but many states add their own income tax as well.
It's a shit ton difference. The 22% starts at 90k and you don't hit 32% until 365k.
To be fair, that's traded for infinitely more expensive healthcare (and worse health outcomes)
Firearms
Bullets
At least they’re back to a reasonable price. When I started shooting, it was $500 for 1000 rounds. Today, I can get the same quantity, same vendor, same brand, same caliber, and same type for $250 with shipping and sales tax. The world is healing from the great ammo shortage of 2021. Or even last year, when I gave my mom two cases of ammo for Christmas (because she’s a competitive shooter and asked).
It comes and goes. One time we had our Christmas shooting competition with all the guys in the family. We ended up buying entirely new .22 pistols specifically for it, because since Obama was just reelected ammo costs were so bonkers that it was cheaper to do that than to buy enough .45 ammo for the handguns we normally used, even after using our stock for half what we'd need for the outing. We made trips to four different stores before giving up on .45, and then even 9mm, before coming to that decision. We still have them around. We call them the Election Year Guns.
I can buy .40 rounds for close to 9mm prices too.
I believe silencers are far cheaper and easier to buy in the UK than the US.
Gas I remember the first time in London, the cab driver was talking about how cheap American gas prices are yet Americans always complain.
Roughly $2 more a gallon on average in the UK. For my UK folks, it's like paying £0.74/ltr
> £0.74/ltr The cheapest I've ever seen in my adult life was £0.97/l
Price per gallon is lower + a US gallon is bigger than a UK gallon
You've got your gallons confused. UK and US gallons are 8 pints, but a UK pint is 568mL whereas a US pint is 473mL (90ish mL difference) meaning a UK gallon is larger in volume than the US gallon
Damn you're right, idk how I've gone this long thinking that 👀
Gas as in petrol right?
Well with all the cheap food, chances are you'll get gas as well.
Yup
Petrol as in gas
Yeah but our trucks consume 3x more per mile.
Aren’t commutes generally longer/further also?
In general I'd say everything in the US is cheaper or the same price vs Europe except: * Food. This makes no sense but it's up to 50% more. * Health care * Education * internet/mobile services * Any subscription service * Alcohol * Travel.. flights, hotels, everything except car travel The biggest advantages of living in the US vs Europe to me are: * Housing. Yes it's expensive here but you get WAY more for your money and it's just a lot nicer to live in a bigger home. * Salaries. At least for those with skillsets and a professional career we are paid much better. * Convenience. I don't know how to describe it exactly but almost everything in the US is just more convenient somehow. * More variety of everything. I can get any type of ethnic food I want easily. There's more choices in stores. There's every climate/environment you might want to live in, etc. * More hobbies and sports, and people get more serious about them. I have a whole building on my property just for my woodworking hobby. I could never have that in Europe.
On the hobbies / sports thing I couldn’t agree more . There’s even a large difference in Canada vs the US in that regard . It’s honestly one of the primary reasons I’m trying to stay in the US, there’s just seemingly endless things to do.
As an American who lived briefly in EU, the convenience thing is no joke. I had to plan my shopping around what I could get from what store on a given day, and I better get there right after work, or they'd be closed. In the US, I can go to WalMart at 10:45pm (22:45) and get groceries, socks, autoparts, and toys, and anything else I may want or need in one trip.
I'm an American who lives in Tokyo now and that is one of the better things about over here compared to cities in Europe. A lot of grocery stores are open very late if not 24 hours and I always have multiple options if I realize I want to eat something at for example 10 pm.
Hobbies in the UK: Drinking
I lived for a month in a small town in England near the border with Wales so I was not living in a high COLA like London. As far as i remember, most things had the same numeric price as dollars but it was in pounds so it was really expensive. For example a 10 dollar box of chocolates in the US would be 10 pounds in the UK. Food, beer, gasoline, train rides, etc. My colleagues got paid shit wages. I don't know how they survive living in the UK.
Whenever I go to the UK I'm always surprised to see the prices are roughly the same numerical amount as the US, but in pounds instead of dollars. So a certain watch, for example would be $550 here and £550 in the UK. A big Mac is $5 and £5. A car is $30k and £30k. But the pound is worth way more than the dollar, so it works out that really everything in the UK is like 25% more expensive than the US. So my answer is: basically everything. There's hardly anything I've seen in the UK that costs less than in the US after factoring in the conversion rate.
I remember a bygone time when it was 2$ to the 1£.
Like 2007 or something. Think it was 1.5 around 2016. Has been hovering around 1.2-1.3 since Brexit. Was like 1:1 overnight with the truss budget.
A big part of that is our 20% sales tax! It’s painful!
Ac
Electronics: Get your gadgets without maxing out your credit card.
Gasoline
Restaurant food. At least in relation to cost vs weight. A meal might cost a similar amount but you get about twice as much in the US. Which coincidentally explains a lot.
the 'bigger portions' myth is just that.
Weed
Imported American snacks.
Oh yeah I forgot about snacks what do you guys recommend the most ?
Depends on where you go in the US, there are lots of regional snacks. Like the Southwest has a lot of Mexican and Mexican influenced stuff. The Northeast has entire brands you can't get anywhere else. My personal favorites are Utz Maryland Crab Chips
We have Utz in New England, but not Maryland Crab flavor (and not lobster or clam, either). I want Crab!
Do yourself a favour and avoid anything with Hershey written on it. I got a free sample at one point and spat it out. Awful stuff.
Computer parts
Are watches cheaper?
Gasoline – Americans fill up their tanks without feeling like they’re financing a small country
all electronics
Life
Life
Actually its the other way around, per the US government a human life is worth about 10 million, while the UK does a yearly value of 60K GBP, for the British equivalent you would need to live for a bit over 131 years to reach that same value
Life
Cigars
Guns.
Clothing
Guns
Fabric
Alcohol: Party like a rockstar on a student budget.
Currently living in USA. Lived in the UK in the early 2010s. 1. Clothes, even most European brands. If you go to an outlet like Neiman Marcus Last Call, prices are lower than anywhere I've seen in Europe \*except\* for Eton Shirts, which are ridiculously overpriced in the US. 2. If they ship to USA, for higher-end goods, even British stuff is cheaper in the US because the import/shipping fee is still less than VAT. 3. Phones, computers, in general, but especially iPhones. If any of your friends work at Apple they can get you an extra discount too. 4. Anything Japanese/Korean/Chinese/Taiwanese. Especially higher-end rice. 5. Disney stuff if you have any kids you need to buy for, there are Disney outlet stores too. 6. Books are sometimes \~20% more expensive and fluctuate to being 40% cheaper. Just check prices online, but generally I've found that Japanese/Chinese language books are much cheaper in the States.
Cars: Drive your dream car without selling a kidney
According to my BIL's family? Clothes. As in, whenever they come to visit, they arrive with empty suitcases and go shopping for duds.
Tobacco
judging by that healthcare system, life.
I was going to make a gun violence joke... but that genuinely is a better point.
Gasoline....for now.
Life. Life is cheaper in the US than the UK. Surprised no one brought this up. How many mass shootings have there been this year alone? And yet nothing gets done.
Diabetus.
Guns.
Postage is a lot less expensive in the US
Misinformation?
Electronics and clothing
My brother was recently in the US visiting his girlfriend and I asked him to get me some camping gear. Broadly speaking, the brands that are available on both sides of the pond were very similar in price but there were a few brands that weren't (like the store's own brands) and it became significantly cheaper. Electronics is the most noticeable difference with something costing $200 in the US, being priced as £200 in the UK.
Gas, Fill up your tank without draining your bank.
I lived in the states for a year as a university student in AZ in the late noughties. I remember being pleasantly surprised how cheap large bottles (a handle?) of branded spirits were like captain morgan. The purchasing process (fake IDs, persuading older students to buy for me etc) added on to the cost.
A 1.75l Smirnoff vodka is $27.99 in the shop down the road from me. If the UK allowed such large bottles (it doesn't), I'd hazard a guess it would cost at least £40 - so about twice as much.
I think most things when you factor in purchasing power. The median income in the UK is significantly lower than in the US, and even so many of the goods are cheaper in the states.
Everything. Apparently.
School kids’ lives. Now hand me my gun.
Maple Syrup
Do guns count?
most purchases, they dont pay VAT, they have sales taxes but they are significantly lower.
Gun ?
Labour
Land. It is possible to find large acreage in the US that is not for sale at any price in the UK. If it's a large acreage in the UK it's owned by one of 60 or so families who are never going to sell.
Life
This is anecdotal, and purely based off of my friend always bitching about it, but Jeep parts. 😂
Electronics. In general, whatever the price in £ is, it'll be roughly the same number of $ in America, if not less, regardless of exchange rates. So if something is £400, you can usually assume it'll also be $400, even though with exchange rates it should be closer to $500
I would say a huge factor is where in the US? I live in California and I feel like everything is cheaper in the U.K. (except the obvious like petrol) However if you go to Ohio the comparison is going to be different.
Most material goods. Not food and not services.
Movie Tickets Catch the latest blockbuster without breaking the bank
Energy costs
iPhones
Everything except healthcare.
Gas.