Betcha didn't know the US outscored the Germans in armor KOed in the west, despite having plain Shermans against cats. (Actually, only about a third were cats and the rest weren't anything to write home about).
As for Hastings, he is a middling quality military historian. His late war German campaign book is an OK book, not a great book but an OK book.
I'd put the American and British airborne divisions against the very best German divisions. But once you got below the top Allied divisions, the quality of the average soldier diminished much more precipitously than with the German divisions.
If that were not the case, then there is no way on earth the breakout at Normandy should have taken 2 months. The allies had a level of air superiority unmatched in military history, they had their best and freshest troops and with some exceptions (e.g. SS Hitler Youth division) they were facing divisions which the Germans considered their second and third rate devisions. Supposedly elite Allied divisions at Normandy such as the British "Desert Rats" division performed poorly. The Allied Airborne troops did superbly, but they didn't have a whole lot of company in that regard.
You will no doubt call this "rot" but I am quite certain it's the truth. Which is why the Allied Generals studied the failed Normandy breakout operations (Goodwood, Charnwood, etc) after the war to see how they could be improved upon.