These international comparisons are virtually always incorrect, and always in the direction of overstating the generosity of foreign systems. To take one example: The Italian subsidy is 80% of wages *up to a cap* around €1,200 per month.
https://twitter.com/Public_Citizen/status/1333443931648917504
In fact, the US fiscal response has to date been larger than is typical in other wealthy countries, relative to our GDP. The smaller headline numbers for total spending in the European packages shows they're not as big or as universal as you think. theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
"Indeed, the U.S. provided fiscal support equivalent to roughly 12 percent of its GDP, data from Moody’s Analytics show, one-third more than Germany and twice as much as the U.K. Other than Australia, no large, wealthy country did more to support its economy."
What "fiscal support" means is payments like this. If European countries really had a worker-focused COVID fiscal response that was different in kind in the way American liberals imagine, their fiscal support numbers would be larger than ours, and they're not.
Now of course, the US-Europe difference can change over time, with the failure of congress to pass a new relief bill. But the volume of monthly lost wages was so much higher in April than now, you'd need to go a long time for that gap to reverse. And the vaccines are coming.
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