To put into perspective, in Vietnam, 12 eggs cost only $1.22 maximum (this is considered expensive).
What is the median American income btw?
To put into perspective, in Vietnam, 12 eggs cost only $1.22 maximum (this is considered expensive).
What is the median American income btw?
According to this website the median US income is $19,300 while Vietnam’s is $3,150. $8 in the US is therefore only slightly higher proportionally to the median income than $1.22 is in Vietnam.
What this misses out on is that there are regional differences from state to state inside the US in both prices of goods as well as median income. It also has to be said that $8, according to this table, is significantly higher than the average price of a dozen eggs in all US states except Hawaii, with the national average being around $5.
According to this article, one chicken egg in Vietnam is around VND2,100, which converts to about $0.08, making a dozen eggs $0.96. Maybe there is also some variety in the price depending on whether you buy them in the supermarket or from a local farmers’ market, i don’t know if there are price controls on eggs in Vietnam…
If this data is correct then $5 is less of a chunk out of an $19,300 income than $0.96 is out of $3,150, meaning that eggs are more affordable for the median income in the US than Vietnam.
But this still doesn’t tell you the whole story because we haven’t yet looked at the overall distribution of income for the lowest earners in society. It is possible that with Vietnam being a less unequal society than the US, the poorest people in Vietnam still have more relative purchasing power than the poorest people in the US do.
You hinted at it but comparing ratios of median wages is meaningless because if you fracture a bone in Vietnam you don’t have to pay several thousands of PPP adjusted dollars for treatment.
It’s not entirely meaningless but it doesn’t tell the whole story.
Still, it’s better than what you usually see people do when they try to argue which country is better off, which is simply comparing GDP, or GDP per capita, often not even taking PPP into account. Looking at the ratio of median income to costs of living, while not perfect, is still giving you a better picture of how people actually live than mindlessly citing GDP numbers.