66% of Americans say they want extended European-style vacation policies at work

Parents have to pay for university in Europe unless they are poor. And while there are no fees, the costs are typically between 30k and 100k per child.

edit: In Germany. I‘m German and I have studied there. I should know.

edit2: Someone said this comment could be interpreted as the cost per year which is not the case. This is the total cost.

Tuiton in France is $500-600 USD/year for any European citizen. And degrees are only 3 years in France.

How so? Isn't this quite dependent on country? As far as I understand here in Norway, there are no costs associated with University.

Higher education is free in many EU countries, you often only have to pay if you want to study abroad. The ones that are not free aren't anywhere near as expensive as you describe.

BS.

Depends on the country. All public universities (and these are the best ones) in Poland are free, for example.

Uhm, what?

If you live with your parents, and the university is free, where does that number come from?

And if you don't live with your parents, you live with others students, spending 600-1000 euro month for living, how do you reach that numbers?

Places like the Netherlands and Switzerland generally pay around €2k a year for all students. The only place I know of anywhere near that price is the UK.

What? My parents send me the child allowance ("Kindergeld") they received for me for the 6 years I was at university, plus 100 EUR/month. I also had a regular job earning 450 EUR per month, so I had around 700-800 EUR of income per month with a 240 EUR rent. Tuition was 500 EUR per semester, so around 80 EUR/month. I was health insured for free via the insurance of my parents. I had around 300-400 EUR per month for food, electricity, and internet, which was more than enough for a single nerd. I financed vacations etc. via freelance work and savings from jobs I had when I was in school and my civil service. This was in Germany from 2008 to 2014.

Overall, I estimate that my university education cost my parents around 7000 EUR. And this wasn't even educational costs, but mostly living expenses.

There's no single policy that applies in all European countries. In a lot of countries there's no tuition fee (I live in one of them and went to university here), in some there's a token fee per year (a few hundred euros), and in some others students have to be fairly substantial tuition fees. Nothing close to the numbers you're quoting though. $10-20k per year is the highest I've ever heard of for public universities in Europe.

Bachelor + Masters is 10 semesters usually. 1000 * 12 * 5 = 60.000. Well in the range that I quoted. And depending on the city the actual costs can be more.

> edit: In Germany. I‘m German and I have studied there. I should know.

I am also there and I didn't pay any monies anywhere for university(unless you mean fancy private university?). All state universities are free and we only paid some misely amount every 6 months for the city-ticket(free access to all public transport in the city, cool stuff). Also, state pays each child ~125/month until they are 25.

I believe you are in some different parallel universe entirely O.o

As I said in my comment it has nothing to do with tuition fees.

I'm sure that the GP comment referred to total costs, not just tuition. Cost of living in a German city for 5-6 years can definitely add up to 30k-100k. Note that the costs of attendance typically cited by US schools similarly include cost of living, e.g. housing and meals (e.g. [0]).

[0] https://sfs.mit.edu/undergraduate-students/the-cost-of-atten...

By your logic then this is also "the cost of having a job."

Nobody discusses costs like this.

Here is a realistic estimate for Munich.

A room costs minimum 350 Euros or may easily cost 1000.

Food and going out costs at least 100 Euros or healthy food 200-300.

The subway ticket at that time cost 70 per month.

There are some additional costs such as health insurance etc.

Tuition at that time was 500 per semester for me.

Spending a semester abroad as is common is usually far more expensive.

And by law your parents have to pay. You are not required to even work.

On average parents are required to finance housing and food with 930 per month.

Source: https://www.verbraucherzentrale.de/wissen/geld-versicherunge...

If you are a parent you need to save this money and pay it. Some students sue their parents for that every year in Germany (most know they have an obligation). Google it. For the family this is a real cost.

Then what exactly is your point? That people require money to live? My parents spent exactly $0 on my education, as every student gets a grant of around €3000/m, and you can get a low interest student loan for the rest.

Some sources:

35.000-45.000 for the Bachelor alone.

https://www.verbraucherzentrale.de/wissen/geld-versicherunge... (Verbraucherzentrale, semi-public consumer protection agency)

10.000 per year:

https://m.faz.net/aktuell/finanzen/meine-finanzen/frag-den-m... (one of the top quality newspapers in Germany)

36.000 und 75.000 per child:

https://www.sparkasse.de/pk/ratgeber/bildung/studium/studien... (Sparkasse, pretty much the largest credit union)

Up to 133.000 (1851 per month):

https://www.studis-online.de/studienkosten/

But sure, believe what you want.

Your comparison is completely wrong. Not getting into specifics of rental prices, or student eating/socialising habits,

> Tuition at that time was 500 per semester for me

This is the number people talk about when they're talking about tuition costs for Americans. Everyone needs shelter and to eat, whether they're a student or an engineer at a FAANG.

It's $5-10k fo r community college depending on in or out of state. It's $10-$20k per year for a university for most, and if you look at a "top" university, it's significantly more.

University of Boulder which is a top-50-USA-university is just shy of $40k per year for tuition. Stanford is $55k, and UPenn (Which was the most expensive I could find) is $61k per year.

> And by law your parents have to pay. You are not required to even work.

That may be true in theory. In practice, many parents are in an income range which makes the child not eligible for educational support (Bafög), but which also does not allow supporting the child with 1000 EUR/month. The thought of telling my parents "you are required by law to send me more money, do it!" never occurred to me. They had a house to pay off. Both my mother and father worked more hours per week then I did for university (around 4-5 hours per day, at most, and only during the semester - I did nothing for university for around 4 months during the semester vacations). When my father was the same age as I when I started university, he had already worked for 7 years and paid rent and food money to his parents. So I think paying at least the rent, tuition, and food myself was the least I could do.

The comment I replied to did not mention tuition costs. The claim was that incomes can be low because there is not cost for letting students study. And the costs are absolutely there.

The fact that some of the best US universities have outrageous tuition is neither new nor surprising nor does it invalidate my claim. I drew no comparison to the US, you are drawing that comparison.

Well. I‘m just telling you what is required by law. In some sense the fact that you feel like they could not easily pay the costs just supports what I was saying. Namely that it is a cost not be neglected by saying „oh it‘s free here“.

Ah, but then your first comment is highly misleading, because when you talk number, readers assume cost per year.

You are basically saying that living in Europe in a university city cost anything between 6000 and 20000 euros each year.

Maybe a bit high, but I think I can agree.

But living is a cost all around the world, and universities in Europe add a very low overhead on top of it, while universities in US can easily triple your cost of living, so I still don't see your point

Good for you. I paid around 70 per month and it only covered the subway network between my apartment and the university. Or whole network for 85. That‘s not exactly cheap.

Which country? I should have clarified that I‘m talking about Germany which is certainly part of Europe. And for sure nobody here gets 3000 per month.

In Germany students receive no grant (other than the regular Kindergeld for children) unless their parents together earn less than 40k before taxes.

Really? I never thought that could possibly be interpreted as cost per year. I can clarify that.

My point is that the statement that salaries can be low because university has no cost is wrong. The cost is significant even without tuition and therefore salaries absolutely matter.

And without even a shred of doubt, a US tech salary of supposedly around 150k compared to perhaps 80k in Germany more than balances the extra costs for university over a time of 20 years that the kids grow up.

That would be England and Wales. The countries of the UK have different education systems.

Sorry, that was a typo. I meant to write €300/m. Just looked up the numbers, and the exact amount is €360/m as a subsidy, and up to another €700/m in a low-interest loan (0.59%). This is in Sweden.

In Sweden you get a student loan and a grant to pay for housing, food, transport etc from CSN. [1] The grant is about 1/3 of the total sum.

I studied at university and my parents paid nothing. Even as an adult student could I go back and get the grant part. In Sweden the state pays for you to study.

[1] https://www.csn.se/languages/english/student-grants-and-loan...

> And degrees are only 3 years in France.

Uh, no, France follows the European-wide bachelor's master's doctorate system when it comes to granting european credits. Which means that, yes, you can follow the normal cycle of 3 years (license/bachelor's), 5 years (masters), 7 years (doctorage), and these will basically count if you're looking to study abroad.

Some of my coworkers have 2 years of studies (IUT/BTS). Some have 4 (M1). Some of the PhDs in my company have 9 years, other 11, others are both working and researching at the same time. There's no mandatory 3 years.

European citizen, or EU citizen?

Beginning 2013, there is the semester tickets for students, which is twenty euros per month.

Before that, 70 euros? Where were you living, Freising?

Two external rings were around 50 euros at the time, and many students rent inside the (old) 4 inner rings, or the first external one if you study in Garching

> Here is a realistic estimate for Munich

Munich is the most expensive Germany city, just saying...

in austria the tuition fee for foreigners was (or is if they haven't changed it) dependent on how much an austrian student would pay for tuition in that foreign country.

>Really? I never thought that could possibly be interpreted as cost per year. I can clarify that

Well, 30k-100k is about right for the annual cost of undergrad in the US and school costs are much more commonly discussed as per year than in total around here.

>My point is that the statement that salaries can be low because university has no cost is wrong. The cost is significant even without tuition and therefore salaries absolutely matter.

That seems a bit misleading as well. Almost all of that cost is unrelated to university attendance. People incur costs for food and rent regardless of whether they're university students.

> The comment I replied to did not mention tuition costs.

It absolutely did:

> Tuition was 500 EUR per semester, so around 80 EUR/month.

Possibly it was edited in after you wrote your comment, but it's there clear as day.

And this is in fact a good thing because the state benefits from higher tax revenue as a result of a skilled workforce.

The American obsession with making children pay their own way for everything is counterproductive at a social level and frankly revealing (and sickening) in terms of what it says about us as a people. God forbid someone (a literal child!) “gets something for nothing”.

This is really the core problem with America: a significant chunk of the population is literally mean and cruel and antisocial, in the sense that they oppose the idea of helping others as a concept in itself. People will search for reasons to justify their inherent belief that it should not be done. In fact in many cases they will actively promote cruel and counterproductive policies because it makes them feel better!

And as a result there's really not a single social system in america that is not rotted to the core even if it exists. Social Security is an insane mess to be on. Programs like food stamps are thrown to the states who underfund them in the best of cases, and in many times actually sabotage or deliberately shrink them, even when it results in receiving less money for the programs. That's the goal!

I think European Citizen, it's been a while since I checked but they specifically mentioned Swiss citizens in the documents that I read.

Munich. And TUM is at Garching. And I paid 70. I know what I paid. It was 70 every month, year after year.

You are mixing live costs with tution costs. That way even jobs are costing you money. So it stays: BS

I believe you paid 70 euros. I just wanted to highlight that, beginning 2013, that's not a problem anymore thanks to the semesterticket.

I'm not sure how anything you said refutes what I said.

Can you clarify?