Ask HN: living and working in US

I wanted to ask for your comments. I'll try to keep this as short as I can.

I'm a 26yo enterprise Java dev and the sole provider for my little family (wife and toddler). We're EU citizens. We spent the last 8 years in UK, and have recently moved to Belgium looking for a change. And change we got, but not the good kind. So want to move again. My wife keeps saying we should move to US, perhaps California. She thinks we'll finally have some sunshine, lots of affordable fresh food, perhaps live in a house with garden, beautiful nature close enough to actually go camping for the weekends, and friendly and approachable people. And she's probably right about these, but I'm a little scared about what we'd be giving up. Namely,

40h workweek 5 weeks of holiday a year free/cheap health insurance free/cheap education up to university level for our daughter.

Am I being paranoid? I hear stories from both ends of the spectrum. Some say they've been working 60h/week with no holiday for 5 years, in which case all that sunshine and nature have as much value as a travel brochure. But others claim that US is developer's paradise. And while health insurance is expensive, some get it from their companies or it's offset by the substantially higher salary. Some claim that public education system is also underrated.

What's your opinion/experience with this? What would you expect re: work/life balance & health insurance in a decent (choose your own definition) company? Any comments on school education? General cost of living?

Also, I do realize US is huge, but California is the only state I get to hear about - please give a shout for your favorite place!

Thanks a lot for comments, they are important to us.

Plan a holiday to the US, look things over and then make a budget (emigration is far from cheap), save and then decide to back out or bite the bullet. Don't do anything permanent until your visa is in the bag for you, your spouse and your child. Hollywood and anecdotes are not good inputs to a life determining decision like this, consider it a huge project and devote resources accordingly.

Why is Belgium disappointing you?

The US is definitely not paradise but it may give you chances that are hard to replicate elsewhere. At the same time, I know plenty of people that are successful in the EU. It usually boils down to the people, not the place.

Well, given that his wife longs for "finally have some sunshine, lots of affordable fresh food, perhaps live in a house with garden, beautiful nature close enough to actually go camping for the weekends, and friendly and approachable people."

I'm going to guess: high housing prices, population density killing nature & unfriendly people. Given that this is HN, I'd add "government and population actively hostile to entrepreneurship" on top of it.

You should talk to other people who emigrated, though. One of my friends did, and they found for example that they could hardly afford child daycare because that isn't subsidized in the States, unlike Belgium. There are probably multiple such small surprises lurking.

The problem is that no country is perfect. You can't get 'free daycare', 'good weather', 'affordable fresh food', 'beautiful nature close by', 'free healthcare', 'friendly and approachable people', '5 weeks of holiday' and 'free education' all in one serving. (Though I believe strongly that friendly and approachable people can be found anywhere, it's a bit of a reflection on how you are usually.)

I say that as someone that has lived in a lot of different countries. (.nl, .pl, .ca, .ro and a bunch of others besides but too short to consider relevant in this context).