European investors are just bankers (with a few exceptions).
Also you might have heard of a little company kicking the shit out of Intel... ARM. Based in Cambridge UK, that is also where most tech investments in Europe are happening (not London or Berlin).
Also, Germany and Switzerland are much more quiet and private about investments. You won't hear about many of them.
These days you can invest in a UK startup, and have the government pick up 100% of the tab if it fails. Not to mention insane tax breaks (100%+) for r&d and for exploiting patents. The UK already has crowd equity.
If you get all your news from YC then you're probably stuck in the silly valley echo chamber.
Keep in mind the other notable differences between here and the US such as free health care, a larger number of paid holidays etc.
The service prices (health, education, banking, communications, etc) are generally much lower than in the US, though, so it's hard to get an accurate comparison of cost-of-life.
The varied answers you get about London salaries is because the financial industry pays pretty well, competitive with SV or NY money. Everyone else gets paid peanuts. Or goes contracting like me.
There's something mysterious about the low wages for programmers.
