Originally Posted by parnel
...Why does the US have a higher standard of living than we do?
...
It doesn't.
Standard of living in the United States
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
The standard of living in the United States is one of the highest in the world by almost any measure. On measures such as the UN Human Development Index the United States is always in the top ten, though generally ranked lower than the Scandinavian countries, Canada, Australia, and Japan; Canada and Norway have alternately held the top spot for some time.
Link.