I spent a few years living in Europe, where table service at restaurants tends to be excellent but not fawning. Americans often observe that Parisian waiters are rude. They are not. They are very efficient and are often fantastic resources at pricey restaurants where you're not sure what you should be ordering. But they're not your friend and they don't pretend to be. They don't need your tips, they get paid quite a nice living wage. The French government requires employers, including restaurants, to pay living wages.

If a natural disaster threatened to strike Berlin or Paris, employees would seek shelter immediately, and if their employers objected, the French and German governments would prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law.

There's a huge difference in priority between living here in the United States and living in other industrialized nations. We're one of the only industrialized nations in the world, with the partial exception of the UK, with a national government that does not prioritize the rights of workers to be paid a living wage and to work in safety.

Somehow we've been sold on the idea that not protecting workers is actually a matter of freedom. We're all more free because corporations get to abuse us. Try to wrap your head around that one.