Freedoms in Europe that US citizens DON’T have
This list is certainly not the ultimate list; YMMV depending on the country and depending on the item; also some of the items seem confusing. It’s clearly not to be taken especially seriously.
Interestingly, this list contains both freedoms from and freedoms to. I’ve heard suggestions that the main difference between most EU countries and the US is that the US focuses on freedom to do whatever you want, while most EU countries are also interested in freedom from things like, poverty, disease, homelessness. But there are important freedoms to also, like freedom to get an affordable education. Some can be phrased either way (for example, the list has: “freedom to live without a car” is also “freedom from the obligation to buy a car”). So, yeah, I don’t think the from/to distinction is particularly meaningful.¹
[Width regard to freedom] Americans often have in mind the absence of something: occupation, oppression, or even government. An individual is free, we think, when the government is out of the way. Negative freedom is our common sense.
To be sue, it is tempting tho think of liberty as us against the world, which the notion of negative freedom allows us to do. If the barriers are the only problem, that all must be right with us. ... But is the removal of something in the world really enough to liberate us? Is it not as important, perhaps even more important, to add things?
People who have negative freedom and are supposedly “free from coercion” can still be powerless, manipulated by other means than state power, dominated by economic forces beyond one’s control, confused by misinformation in a information landscape that is supposedly “not censored”. Positive freedom is the freedom to act meaningfully and have the ability to shape one’s own future, with the aid of institutions like, the rule of law, reliable infrastructure, affordable education, affordable healthcare, paternity leave, a social safety net, and so on.