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My oppinion as a western european:
1 Demographic: The U.S. population has been growing at roughly 1% annually, compared to only about 0.2% in Europe. On top of that, Europe is also aging more rapidly, and migrants to Europe are generally less high quality than those entering the U.S. As a result, the U.S. benefits from a larger and younger and more high quality consumer base.
2 Regulation: Europe also places more regulations and barriers on businesses, which dampens activity and slows innovation. Generally capital flows to where it can generate the highest returns. While Europe does offer opportunities, the U.S. market generally provides a more favorable environment because investments can often go much further.
3 Goverment spending: Another important difference is the role of the state. In Europe, government spending accounts for about 51.5% of GDP, compared to around 36.2% in the U.S. Since state spending is generally less effective at generating long-term growth than private entrepreneurship, this also tilts the balance in favor of the U.S. (See higher income tax and more taxation in general)
There are definitely more factors, but these are just the ones that come quickly to mind right now.
My take is that its the fragmented regulatory, consumer and financial markets that are the biggest problems here. It's not that there is a ton of regulation its that there are 20+ versions of the onerous regulations.
It's too difficult to scale a business in europe because despite efforts and the goal of the EU it is in no way a single market. When you want to scale your business rather than just export consumer products this becomes a massive issue, which is why every notable new company in europe usually starts in their own country (and perhaps very similar neighbours) and then rather than expanding into Europe they launch in America and eventually list themselves there, and only then start expanding into the rest of Europe.
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