Why is the median considered "poor"? The true poor in Mississippi are way worse off than those in Germany. If you neglect everything it takes to live a good life like public capital, education, healthcare, time off with family, a retirement, total years on this earth and ignore the insane inequality in Mississippi then sure the median numbers are not that far off.

> Why is the median considered "poor"

Because most big-city coastal Americans think of the median Mississippian as that way.

> If you neglect everything it takes to live a good life [...]

We're speaking past each other somewhat. You seem to have a belief system that says a good life is not possible without the stuff that Germany provides via taxation and redistribution. Whether that stuff is a necessary or sufficient condition for a good life for you, I'm not sure; but it is clear you place a lot of importance on it.

I'm saying that in America, more of those things are left to choice to the people, and that a good life, even a great life, is available to the average Joe (hence my banging on about the median) in one of the poorest states in the union, to a degree that is not matched anywhere else.

Put another way: you've defined a good life in large part as access to taxpayer-subsidized goods and services, or at any rate the lifestyle outcomes enabled by such access. By that metric, you're right, Mississippi comes behind Germany, and America as a whole likely behind Germany. But if you look at people voting with their feet over the past few decades, more Germans settled in America than the other way around in absolute numbers; which is even more striking if you consider the difference in population. Clearly there exist people who value the stuff that America has to offer that Germany doesn't.