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Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

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Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#41

Post by cahoot_bird »

hellosputnik wrote: post #3

Maybe I'm becoming (or already cynical), but I'm increasingly tired of the genre of posts/reels/TikToks where someone moves to Vietnam, Portugal, Thailand, Mexico, etc. and comes back with profound observations about how "people there really know how to live" and how life is simply better there. A lot of "I've discovered a better way of life abroad" stories seem to quietly assume continued access to US wages, US asse…

I suspect some people moved there years ago with the lower cost of living little money around the time/since of the four-hour workweek tim ferris movement . Some countries do not allow public criticism, so of course they would make videos of wonderful places to live hoping to scratch income-wise by after some moving there with no backup plan. Just a little critical thinking.

I can understand the just indiehacker and mvp/yolo it, but there is real risk there and I'd question the wisdom of that.

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#42

Post by Schlagbohrer »

I hate it when americans use the false statistic of comparing waiting times for healthcare between the usa and another country. It's a false statistic because in the united states, there are a great many people who need healthcare but can't afford it so their waiting time is inifinity truncated only by the fact that they'll eventually die. If their wait times were averaged in with all the americans who are rich enough to see a doctor, the stats wouldn't look so rosy.

In a universal healthcare system the average wait times might be higher but every single person gets the healthcare they need.

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#43

Post by Schlagbohrer »

mahirsaid wrote: post #5

Soon there will be restrictions on this. If the data ever gets presented and catches public opinion then i suspect the restrictions will start coming and salary caps based on expat workers will start to deter them from leaving. Quite the contradiction if you want people to stay. We all know this is the attitude of the admin ATM.

The trump admin changes to passports for transgender people have already caused problems for transgender americans who either want to travel or are already abroad.

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#44

Post by Schlagbohrer »

metalman wrote: post #30

Lots of americans and others, show up here in Nova Scotia (and other places) and try and settle down, many are what I call "lifestyle refugees", and are often well off but traumatised by something or the other, but as the merry pranksters say, "wherever you go, there you are", then there are the "helpers" who are bringing some sort of idea that nobody is unaware of, another category is the wealthy , self centered, ci…

Canadians have told me Nova Scotia has had population decline over the past generation. Are there vacant homes and disused land there?

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#45

Post by porknbeans00 »

dgellow wrote: post #32
hellosputnik wrote: post #3

Maybe I'm becoming (or already cynical), but I'm increasingly tired of the genre of posts/reels/TikToks where someone moves to Vietnam, Portugal, Thailand, Mexico, etc. and comes back with profound observations about how "people there really know how to live" and how life is simply better there. A lot of "I've discovered a better way of life abroad" stories seem to quietly assume continued access to US wages, US asse…

> A lot of "I've discovered a better way of life abroad" stories seem to quietly assume continued access to US wages, US assets, US equity compensation, or US retirement savings. What’s the issue with that? You obviously have lower income in the rest of the world, the US is literally the wealthiest country. If you can benefit from US income and live in places that suits you better it’s clearly a pretty good situation…

I remember in 2012 or so I did a baseline comparison of a typical Starbucks employee in Montana versus a Silicon Valley software engineer and the cruel reality was that even thought he software engineer was making a lot more in their salary they were wildly more poor than the Starbucks employee.

at the time ( this has changed ) the Starbucks employee could own a home and put into that equity. so lower cost of living and ability to save towards equity massively overwhelmed any perceived value of a 'high salary'. Throw in the cost of living in the Bay Area and the reality was the software engineers were barely subsisting while the barista was actually building a life for themselves.

essentially. even inside the continental US.... the cost of living and cost of equity, tax structures, etc all matter a great deal. That doesn't change leaving the US. In fact it largely just gets more complicated.

but you can ABSOLUTELY make a whole lot less in a region where you will live better and make more money Long term.

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#46

Post by dgellow »

47282847 wrote: post #31
dgellow wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add some nuances, as someone living in Germany, it’s correct you might have to wait months for a medical appointment, but not for emergencies. Psychiatrists, psychotherapists are generally overbooked and you likely have to wait 3-6 months (sometimes more), which isn’t great if you are in a bad place. However if we are talking about breaking something, you can get everything happening quickly and efficiently. Perso…

What German health care providers don’t tell you is that you have the legal right to get faster psychological assistance, and they have to cover the costs of a private therapist if you can show that there is no availability in your area. They try to make the process as ugly as possible, and I understand that typically you will not have the capacity to deal with that in times of need, but with some more awareness arou…

Thanks, that's great info to share. I remember trying 116117 and reaching out to a bunch of places and not having any luck with it in my region, but it was just after Covid, anything assistance related was overwhelmed at that time

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#47

Post by fivetomidnight »

mahirsaid wrote: post #7
hellosputnik wrote: post #3

Maybe I'm becoming (or already cynical), but I'm increasingly tired of the genre of posts/reels/TikToks where someone moves to Vietnam, Portugal, Thailand, Mexico, etc. and comes back with profound observations about how "people there really know how to live" and how life is simply better there. A lot of "I've discovered a better way of life abroad" stories seem to quietly assume continued access to US wages, US asse…

regardless if you hate hearing them promoting their experiences or not, it's still true. People want to have fun and live happy not worry about school shooting, healthcare costs, living standards. I watched a video of a teacher that moved from Canada to China. He explained how much him and his family love it there, after 14 years he moved again to Singapore and loves it there just a little better than China. it is NO…

> I think it's natural. We were literally doing that none stop during 1500's , 1400's ,1300's, just imagine the ancient silk-road.

That's not quite true. Just looking over my families ancestry data. There are outliers, but most died in a couple kilometer radius where they were born. Even more further in the past. At least until the 1650s when it's hard to find data. Before the 30 year war, both documentation gets rarer and poeple apparently didn't have lastnames as they did today. It wasn't neccessary. ...Because they moved so little...

Sure, silk road. But how many people moved along a bigger part of it?

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#48

Post by esbranson »

47282847 wrote: post #31
dgellow wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To add some nuances, as someone living in Germany, it’s correct you might have to wait months for a medical appointment, but not for emergencies. Psychiatrists, psychotherapists are generally overbooked and you likely have to wait 3-6 months (sometimes more), which isn’t great if you are in a bad place. However if we are talking about breaking something, you can get everything happening quickly and efficiently. Perso…

What German health care providers don’t tell you is that you have the legal right to get faster psychological assistance, and they have to cover the costs of a private therapist if you can show that there is no availability in your area. They try to make the process as ugly as possible, and I understand that typically you will not have the capacity to deal with that in times of need, but with some more awareness arou…

> legal

> don’t tell you

As a Wikipedian who has edited primarily on US legal systems but also Germany's ... I seriously doubt more than a handful of non-attorneys have any clue about the actual workings of the German legal systems.

The biggest issue is of course the lack of codified laws and regulations. (Note that collections like the Gesetze im Internet are more like US Statute Compilations. If you don't know what the Statute Compilations are and have never heard anyone mention them, case in point.) The Swiss SR is odd man out of course, even though it's unofficial it's still usable. US states and states like Germany do however follow similar court reporting practices, e.g. court case decisions are only selectively published, so we have similarly little insight into how laws are actually implemented in practice. (The US federal government is better, but its impact on everyday people is incomparable.)

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#49

Post by mindslight »

bitwize wrote: post #11
meszmate wrote: post #6

Europe gets romanticized way too much. Healthcare often means months of waiting and very hit-or-miss doctors. Bureaucracy is worse, salaries are lower, and there are plenty of stupid laws and corruption too. It is probably better if you value slower life, more vacation, and working less. But it is not some obvious upgrade over the U.S. Just a different set of problems. (I'm hungarian)

Still better than the US system.

Bingo. "months of waiting and very hit-or-miss doctors" is my average experience in the US. The financial aspect is a lightning rod because the setup is so patently absurd (fake prices and nobody knows anything until afterwards!), it's easily documented (phone pic of a fraudulent bill), there's more bandwidth to post online when you're merely dealing with the billing hell, and of course in the true American spirit there are a bunch of entrenched interests looking to make a lot of money from taking the abstract desire for change and using it to push concrete policies that enrich themselves. But the actual care being provided is its own hell well before. The individual workers in the system do snap to attention when things get real, but those times are basically the exceptions that prove the rule.

Re: Americans Are Leaving the U.S. in Record Numbers

#50

Post by mindslight »

diogocp wrote: post #27
aemoron wrote: post #14

I was lucky enough to visit the US before Trump's 1st term back in 2015. I even considered working there. Sure, the customs and TSA were uncomfortable experiences, but that's nothing compared to what my dual-citizenship colleague had on a recent trip. They were taken into a backroom for questioning at Houston airport for hours with no explanation and ultimately let go with no apologies, nothing. The "crime" was using…

> it shall be unlawful for any citizen of the United States to depart from or enter, or attempt to depart from or enter, the United States unless he bears a valid United States passport. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1185#b

So that seems like something that should be easily dealt with in a few minutes - request that they present their US passport, apprise them of the fine for entering without having obtained a US passport, and/or turn them away since their entry would be illegal. None of these require hours of questioning in a back room.

I'm tired of this trend of people using a violation of the law, especially administrative style infractions, as a justification for arbitrary horribleness.

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