The worst thing a company can do is try to sell you more soap. The government on the other hand can literally ruin your life (or even end it in some countries).
The EU is doing a fantastic job of keeping everyone distracted by pointing the finger at the "evil American tech companies" while simultaneously doing the opposite when it comes to privacy from government...which is the real threat.
I could point to many instances of this but the easiest one is the EU commission currently pushing a ban on encryption.
The more European point of view is that companies are run by greedy people on who we have no control and we need the government to keep those in check. We have control over the governments and it's O.K. to take them down by force from time to time.
Mass protests are a thing and we vote quite often on who are those "government people", what control we have over the companies? It's very scary to let some businessmen to run the the stuff that our lives depend on. Why trust Musk, Gates, Tim Cook or any other magnate act in our benefit when they all show monopolistic tendencies, profit over human lives and rent seeking?
I don't know if the Europeans or Americans are right about it but overall it appears that the Europeans are having it better despite the stats about money showing smaller amounts of it.
The US is one of the oldest democracies on earth.
"You can give the government infinite power, we will do a revolution, no big deal."
Do you have any idea with how much suffering each revolution has been paid for?
And remind me again how the revolutionaries overthrew Nazi Germany?
The sowjet bloc created decades of suffering and blood but according to you that's fine because we can take them "down by force from time to time"?
It's just difference of attitudes. Europeans tend to trust the government more than the corporations.
No need for ridiculous examples, for every bad politician example there exist a bad corporation example. You say nazis, I say Bhopal disaster. No need for that, at least the Nazis payed dearly for it. Corporations are unaccountable.
>And remind me again how the revolutionaries overthrew Nazi Germany?
Remind me how the Nazis are doing these days?
What a perfect comparison for how toothless corporations are compared to governments.
Americans don't think politicians are a different breed of people, they treat them differently because their position in government gives them a lot more power and impact than corporations.
> Who said anything about giving government infinite power?
Infinite power is an exaggeration but EU governments are giving themselves broad surveillance powers while directing your attention at behavioral advertising.