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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

#121
Europe is great. I have several friends who've made this move. I'd say that they have a higher and more relaxed quality of life at a much lower salary than I know of in the U.S. Salaries are lower, taxes are higher, but I think it balances out well.

One thing I've noticed is that if you're willing to live a bit outside of a major city and along a commuter rail line (a commute not extraordinary by U.S. standards but seemingly insane by European), housing costs can be much much lower.

With a few exceptions, the kind of tech work will likely be more prosaic in nature. The kind of big startup scene you might find in SV or other places in the U.S. does exist in Europe, but not at anywhere near the scale or with the kind of capital availability that's present in the U.S. On the upside, the work tends to be very stable.

Long-term, you'll have to think about retirement and either make a decision to stay or return and start saving up. If you come back to the U.S., the system is designed to offer you a reasonable retirement, but only after decades of saving. You may not think that's important at 26, but you'll likely start to feel it at 36. If you stay in Europe, you'll need to figure out the local retirement system and how that work.

If you pull that trigger and stay in Europe, you'll probably want to look at giving up your U.S. citizenship because you'll be obligated to pay taxes the entire time you're in Europe (there's some deductions, but you'll still have to do all the paperwork).

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

#122
post #85

I assume you want a career as a software engineer. This is my list: - Berlin: cheap (getting expensive quick, but still cheap for a large city), multicultural (many, many people from all around the world, lots of people speak English, those who don't usually understand you), Germans themselves are very open and interesting as a nation. Berlin has a vibrant startup scene, which is nice for getting your first job as a…

I would not suggest Germany or (german) Switzerland to people that don't speak german.

Studying another language is part of leaving your comfort zone. People can start with the several apps available today, they don't even need to go to an actual class.

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

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I never been to the US, but I imagine it's much more homogeneous than the EU I'd argue they are mostly the same. IMO, The US is pretty similar in structure to the EU where the US as a whole is comprised of many states, each with their own laws. Yes there are federal laws but for the most part, each state can do whatever they want. Each state / region has vastly different cultures and standards of living.

> Each state / region has vastly different cultures and standards of living. The culture in the US varies some from region to region (midwest vs northwest vs south etc), but it's absolutely false to say that the differences are "vast", especially on the state-to-state level. Standards of living vary much more between urban/rural even within states than they do across states generally. Leaving aside the fact that EU s…

I imagine you are correct that the cultural differences across Europe are greater, and yet everybody in the us definitely don't watch the same tv shows, and if i go to Memphis TN, there are plenty of people who I just can't understand what they're saying for the life of me, even though we speak the same language. (I'm from Montana). Probably not as much as Europe, but it is there.

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

#124
post #119

If you are a programmer/designer you can get a 3 year freelance visa in Berlin, Germany. I currently live in Berlin with that visa. Your standard of living in Europe will vary. Sure, some places offer free healthcare (not exactly free - see taxes), better public transportation, and decent quality food at lower tier supermarkets. That's all great. On the other hand, you'll likely take a huge hit in salary and pay high…

> I wasn't able to save nearly as much as I did in NYC Never having lived in the US, is the savings you are talking about in terms of percentage of your cost? i.e. if the only cost you have is rent and its 2800 vs 700, i would need to save at least 4 times as much to cover the difference.

Typically these are measured in absolute numbers. I'm not sure why you'd want to measure as relative ratios.

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

#125
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What our disposable friend claimed was that there are few "real tech companies", not that there are few roles. There's some truth in that; there are lots of jobs working for banks, supermarkets, consultancies, publishers, etc, but relatively few in companies which are either pure-play tech (who is the British Microsoft or Dropbox?) or even consumer web (who is the British Facebook or Google?). That might or might not…

ARM is pretty well known

Yeah that's literally the one that comes to my mind. Germany seems to have a strong robotics market (not only industrial, but also self-driving cars kind of stuff etc.) but most job posts I see are either straight in German or require a good command of it.

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

#126
I'm from Amsterdam, lived in the US recently for 2 years (Atlanta). Salaries are lower in the EU, taxes are higher, rents are lower. On the other hand I found many things to be more expensive in the US : health care, car insurance, education, groceries.

I found that in the end it turned out to be more or less the same.

What's left is culture shock, which is actually very good for you, broadening your horizon.

In Europe everything seems smaller though, that's a real difference. Also architecture has more history.

One important advice though, which is true for every country: learn the language!!

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

#127
Sidenote, if you or your mom, happen to be jewish.. You can get a free ticket to Israel, give you citizenship, the government will help you with housing and actually give you money, and hebrew lessons.. They also have a booming tech industry.. I lived there for a couple of years and while not exactly in mainland Europe, it is very European. I currently live in Mexico City and thats also a great non-Euro option !

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

#128
post #124
post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wasn't able to save nearly as much as I did in NYC Never having lived in the US, is the savings you are talking about in terms of percentage of your cost? i.e. if the only cost you have is rent and its 2800 vs 700, i would need to save at least 4 times as much to cover the difference.

Typically these are measured in absolute numbers. I'm not sure why you'd want to measure as relative ratios.

Because i need to be able to cover the costs (i.e. what is the savings in terms of purchasing power rather than absolute savings). If i lose my job tomorrow and my rent is 2800, I don't really care that i save 1k compared to 700 per month (under the assumption i can't increase the purchasing power of my savings somehow).

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

#129

Do remote work for US company...

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

1. Learn something that can help you to do stuff that people are willing to pay for. You already know some webdev, so maybe go ahead and spend a couple of months trying out some frontend frameworks. There are ample amounts of frontend jobs everywhere in US, EU and Asia.

2. Find a remote job in US. Even a junior position with a low salary would allow you to live decently in most European places (maybe except downtown London, etc.).

3. Pick a random European city you might like, get an airbnb and just go there for a while.

4. If you like it, stay. If you don't, pick another city. If you can't make the decision in 3 months, move to a cheap place in Asia and go back when you can. Flights are cheap. Places to stay are cheap. Just lower the bar. You don't have to live in the middle of Paris or London this whole time.

5. Travel a lot and profit. Unless of course your prefer to go through a routine of choosing a single place, finding a job in there, networking, making lots of new friends, etc. There's your tradeoff, but hey, you are 26.

[edit: paragraphs]

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

#130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Each state / region has vastly different cultures and standards of living. The culture in the US varies some from region to region (midwest vs northwest vs south etc), but it's absolutely false to say that the differences are "vast", especially on the state-to-state level. Standards of living vary much more between urban/rural even within states than they do across states generally. Leaving aside the fact that EU s…

I imagine you are correct that the cultural differences across Europe are greater, and yet everybody in the us definitely don't watch the same tv shows, and if i go to Memphis TN, there are plenty of people who I just can't understand what they're saying for the life of me, even though we speak the same language. (I'm from Montana). Probably not as much as Europe, but it is there.

You're right of course that not everyone watches the same TV shows (etc), but the major cultural divide is urban/rural, not state-by-state or region-to-region.

There was an interesting discussion of this and related topics here just the other day: 'Duck Dynasty' vs. 'Modern Family': 50 Maps of the U.S. Cultural Divide (nytimes.com) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13264083

I moved in the last year from a mid-sized city in the northeast to a sightly smaller mid-sized city in the south, and everyone keeps asking me excitedly about the culture shock. People eat more okra here and it's hard for me to understand the speech of the few people I've met from more rural areas of the state. That's it. The culture here is "mid-sized US city," just like where I came from. It's almost disappointing.

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