A number of figures illustrate the difference. Governments in the European Union earn, on average, about 45 per cent of gross domestic product, compared with less than 30 per cent in the US. As a result, European governments are able to fund universal access to health care, higher education, family support and job training that the US cannot guarantee. European countries topped the World Happiness Report's life satisfaction ranking, while the United States came in at 19. In 2019, life expectancy in the European Union was 81.1 years, compared with 78.8 in the United States. As of 2019, the share of national income earned by the top 1 percent of households in Western Europe was about 11 percent, compared with nearly 20 percent in the United States. In 2019, the US emitted 16.1 tonnes of carbon dioxide per person, compared with less than 10 tonnes in the European Union.
