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Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

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Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#31

That's a big life decision. I've lived in Europe my whole life, but I have a lot of friends and relatives in the US. I've also lived in 3 different European countries, and of course I know people from just about all the Western European nations. There's a lot got you to think about. This is only a small part, off the top of my head: - If you're American, you pay tax worldwide. Most countries have higher tax than the…

if I have family there do I still need visa to live with them?

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#32
Go find out. What are your career plans? Do you want to do websites or work in a bar? How do you value short commutes/cheap living costs vs. high incomes? How do you value high income versus rain or snow? if you haven't visited many places in europe, perhaps you have traveled the US can say e.g. "I'd do anything to get Californian climate, I couldn't stand Minnesota"... With some more info we can give you a hint.

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#33

That's a big life decision. I've lived in Europe my whole life, but I have a lot of friends and relatives in the US. I've also lived in 3 different European countries, and of course I know people from just about all the Western European nations. There's a lot got you to think about. This is only a small part, off the top of my head: - If you're American, you pay tax worldwide. Most countries have higher tax than the…

if I have family there do I still need visa to live with them?

You will unless they are closely related enough to give you citizenship rights. Nationality law is completely different from country to country within Europe, though.

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#34
Prepare to be much worse financially. You will earn less, pay higher taxes (as percentage) and will feel much poorer.

Cars, especially nice ones, are much more expensive (in absolute numbers, not only as percentage of income) to buy and own. Petrol is several times the US price.

Rents are higher in most cities (at least compared to income). Maybe only SV is worse compared to Europe.

All tech gadgets are more expensive, roughly at +20% in absolute terms, because of VAT

And yeah, on top of that you get "free" healthcare, which is usually of very questionable quality.

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#35
I think the cheapest European citizenship you can buy is Maltese citizenship for just €650k + 25-50k each for spouse and children. Maltese citizens have visa-free access to 168 countries and territories, thus ranking the Maltese passport 9th in the world (the highest ranking of all the recent new member states of the EU) according to the Visa Restrictions Index. check out http://www.maltaimmigration.com/

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#36
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if I have family there do I still need visa to live with them?

You will unless they are closely related enough to give you citizenship rights. Nationality law is completely different from country to country within Europe, though.

It's my fathers sister.

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#38

I did this: moved to the U.K. for several years. To echo some of the other excellent comments here, I think the main takeaways should be: 1. Compensation is generally lower than in the US. That's worth keeping in mind depending on your age & long terms plans, if you have those already. Don't let it turn you off from the idea, because living elsewhere can be wonderful, but it's worth being clear that this probably isn…

freelancing sounds nice but I'm willing to just work out there and start from the bottom to make my way up.

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#39

I think the cheapest European citizenship you can buy is Maltese citizenship for just €650k + 25-50k each for spouse and children. Maltese citizens have visa-free access to 168 countries and territories, thus ranking the Maltese passport 9th in the world (the highest ranking of all the recent new member states of the EU) according to the Visa Restrictions Index. check out http://www.maltaimmigration.com/

If you have relatives from Europe look into citizenship via decent. My grandmother was born in Ireland and I was able to acquire Irish citizenship because of that. Now I have dual US/Irish citizenship

Re: Ask HN: Thinking of moving to Europe from USA

#40

Do remote work for US company...

I can't find even remote work inside the US lol I know HTML, CSS and basic JS

Nowadays that's like trying to find work as a mechanic because you know how to change a tire.

I know HTML, CSS, JS, C++, C#, PHP and Hack - and I often can't find work because the bar of competence for many programming jobs still requires knowledge of frameworks, libraries and processes that I don't have experience with, and because the freelance market is global. It can be difficult to tick all the boxes and stand out in a crowd of millions.

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