I've always wondered why Americans and Europeans keep their shoes on at home. Is there a practical reason for it?
I've always wondered why Americans and Europeans keep their shoes on at home. Is there a practical reason for it?
Europeans keep their shoes on at home
We don't
only americlaps do that
I don't know anyone who keeps them on. There's a difference between thinking your mom's spine will shatter if you don't remove them as soon as you cross the threshold and always wearing shoes indoors
So we can run out of the house faster in case of nuclear bombs dropping on us.
Maybe the people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki should have worn shoes too.
No one keeps their shoes on when chilling at home. There's not as strong of a social rule to take your shoes off in the house in the US though. depends on the house. Some people don't want to see your socks/feet
I think some meds and english people do
How did that work back in the days when all the boomers had full carpeting?
No one does. It's normal to take your shoes off in order not to bring dirt in the home
Closest European attempt at humor
Triggered, Fatty McFattyfat? :^)
I feel like this is just a thing in movies because they know it's just a set and they don't give a shit if it gets dirty and then off course people think that's how Americans live
nta but boomers would just step on the carpet with their shoes. but then again boomers are all poisoned in the head from lead. zoomers don't really wear shoes in the house as much as boomers do and it mostly just depends on the household.
Oh, really? I thought Americans even kept their shoes on when relaxing in bed
nope, not normally. there's no strong stigma against it though like there is in other countries
second closest european attempt at humor
nope, not normally. there's no strong smegma against it though like there is in other countries
that's a retarded american habit, same goes for wearing hats and shades inside.
Why do Westerners wear sunglasses everywhere? Is it because their eyes are more sensitive to sunlight?
I think that actually raises an interesting point, the need for acting in films to be as realistic as possible is quite modern I think, people in John Wayne's films weren't as preoccupied with their acting being "raw" and "real" and such
A Russian told me he thought all Americans are rich because he saw in movies that we lived in mansions
Yes most things foreigners think about america is literally from movies
No one keeps their shoes on when chilling at home. removing shoes if you visit somebody elese house is seen weird and disrespectful, you ar enot at your house, what next take a huge shit in their bathroom?
I put my shoes on when I leave my apartment and I keep them on for a minute when I return and put the groceries in the kitchen. But apart from that short time I walk around in socks at home. Or in special bath sandals after I have showered to let the feet dry completely before I put on socks again.
Now post feet
Here is mixed. Some people do some don't.
i have "house shoes" i put on when coming out and in the kitchen. actual shoes i take outside i take them off at the door because they're often muddy
I no longer have patience for europeans complaining that americans stereotype them. They literally just believe everything they see in movies uncritically. They genuinely unironically believe that ordinary median income americans make six figures and live in nice two story houses
Not just movies. I saw in a Wall Street Journal documentary, that a US trucker makes 120,000 dollars a year. That would be considered TWO annual salaries in a very (very!) well paid job over here.
Jokes aside there is a different approach compared to japan.
In the west we are used to sit on chairs and put everything on the table, the floor isn't considered something to sit on and use like a table.
That doesn't mean you want your floors dirty of course, but it makes people less inflexible.
Can confirm, wall to wall carpeting was everywhere by the 1970s here, but it took time for people's habit to catch up.
I wash my floor once every 3 months
The median income in Germany is higher than the median income in the US. This isn't some kind of debatable esoteric question.
Truckers are one of the higher paying blue collar jobs, especially in the us, and some of them work really long hours and drive almost every single day. A lot of them like to no-life trucking and invest all their money so they can retire early.
median income in Germany
It's 52,000 Euros, so about 26,000 after taxes and all of the mandatory insurances. (Health, care, unemployment, social security)
The median individual income in the US (not household) is around 45k usd, which is weaker than euros, and we pay also pay taxes while having a higher cost of living than you do.
Yes, but on the other hand, your government doesn't garnish about 50% of what you make from your salaries every month.
Health, care, unemployment, social security
Also known as giving free shit to immigrants
Americans can't really bend down to take their shoes off.
usd, which is weaker than euros
I just looked it up. Since Trump has been in office, the US dollar dropped from being worth 0.96 Euros to being worth 0.88 Euros. Wow.
We do, nobody takes the shoes off at home
indoor isolation layer
The brits love of indoor mold is truly unmatched. We try to compete with our badly designed climate friendly drywall shitboxes (€850 000 + 140 000 tip for leeches), but we haven't reached your levels of early onset COPD and systemic rheumatism yet.
dear god please make it drop to like 7:1 SEK:USD like it was a decade ago
I paid somewhere between 30~35% of my gross income as taxes last year. So it's not really that far behind.
But they don't have anything to sell, really. All the stuff comes from China. Americans still build cars (in Canada and Mexico), but they're all too big, far too expensive, and to inefficient.
The month before last I saw one guy coming to my local Aldi in a Ford pickup truck. It almost needed 1 1/2 parking spots. Like when you park in a normal spot and there are cars on either side, you can't open the doors anymore, and the truck sticks out half a meter.
It's because our eyes actually open and let in light.
Europeans keep their shoes on at home
We do not.
So only the people who live in the household are allowed to walk without shoes inside? So if your friend hangs out with you. He has to wear shoes indoor for several hours?
brits love of indoor mold
Our houses are almost designed to trap mold, ironically people's newer habits have made it worse. In the old days people struggled to heat their homes so it was cold all the time anyway, but due to theories about "bad air" causing illness, people opened windows frequently. Since central heating became a thing people have jealously guarded the heat in their homes and rarely open windows in colder weather. Brits struggle with the idea of airing homes, but foreigners from hot countries even more so, hence that little African boy dying the other year because his house he lives in was one enormous mold spore.
Brits struggle with the idea of airing homes, but foreigners from hot countries even more so
i had a syrian neighbor who i traded help with, and when i went into her apartment all the ventilation was shut and it was like standing in the bathroom after a hot shower
I told her to open up unless she wanted to pay thousands in damages
but foreigners from hot countries even more so
Over here I've come to think that houses/flats in countries like Turkey, Syria, Irak etc. are always well aired or don't have doors and windows that shut tightly. Why? Because every year a bunch of them die from carbon monoxide poisoning when they get the idea that they can just put a charcoal grill in the living room and heat with that, keeping the windows shut of course and then they won't have to pay the expensive gas bill anymore.
It never ends well.
I just ran a German tax calculator and your mandatory health insurance is way too expensive, the median German pays more on just the health insurance than the median Norwegian makes in total welfare payments per year. Is there any motion to switch to a single-payer system in Germany?
Is there any motion to switch to a single-payer system in Germany?
No, and I don't know what that is. Our system is a solidarity system. Unemployed people and the many, many immigrants don't pay anything and still have a health insurance. Also health care costs for older people that are retired are much higher than those for normal people that still work and pay for the insurance.
It's when the government act as the sole healthcare provider. It tends to lower individual cost burden of healthcare by making it a public rather than individual responsibility. For example, we have higher healthcare expenditure per capita than Germany does, but a much lower tax burden where the median Norwegian pays ~24% tax on income.
Oh, that's interesting. But no politician has brought it up here. And I don't think our government would have the money for it. You can afford some nice things as a country because you have enormous wealth from the oil business. We still struggle to bring the former GDR up to code and are still paying a special tax for them that has cost more than 2 trillion Euros over the last 35 years. It's so much that for example schools in the west have leaky roofs and streets aren't repaired anymore, they get road signs "30km/h limit, road damage" instead. (Not even kidding about that.)
You can afford some nice things as a country because you have enormous wealth from the oil business
Britain also has this model and they get comparable healthcare outcomes to Germans while having a much smaller tax burden, and also spending less on healthcare as a percentage of GDP. We spend less of our GDP on healthcare than Germany too, even though we're able to spend more per capita on it.
FAT CUNT LOL
they get comparable healthcare outcomes to Germans
Oh no, they don't. Their NHS is a lot worse than our German two class system, and they have a lot less doctors and nurser per 100,000 persons in the UK. I wouldn't want to live in the UK for that reason. (I'm not well and healthy and I rely on regular visits to my doctors.)
Our relationship with the floor is completely different from that of the Japanese. We usually don't do anything on the floor. We use tables, sofas, beds.
Besides, if you have dogs, like probably most of us do, the floors will be dirty anyway. For me, the floor has always been dog territory.
Furthermore, it's nice to be well-dressed at home.
mention running
bunger responds thinking its a joke
It's actually neither for me.
I have hardwood floors and although they get cleaned every few days, there's always some fluff or dust you don't want to gather on your feet.
So I wear slippers in the house, I put them on after taking my shoes off.
In the winter it would be too cold to just walk around on the floor in socks anyway.
I think it's a good compromise. Though walking in socks would be more comfortable
how can you feel at home when you don't take your shoes off? A big part of the relaxation of being home is that you can just take off your shoes and let your feet breathe air and just chill, I don't think people who keep their shoes on at home can ever truly feel at home