Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service • Hacker News Board

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#561

Post by lytefm » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:14 PM UTC

eldaisfish wrote: post #534

deanc wrote: post #190

Overall my experience in Helsinki has been hugely positive. I’ve been here now over a decade and have settled with work and family life. Work life balance is great, there’s a beautiful outdoors to enjoy all year, and the people are warm and kind, if not difficult to start with. All that said, there’s a lot of bullshit and hot air here in this thread: - public healthcare is great until you have something difficult to…

You've forgotten one major aspect of life so far north - the near absolute lack of sunlight in the winter which is about 5 months of the year. My first year in Finland, i got SAD - seasonal affective disorder - and it was horrible. No amount of money or learning Finnish can address that. Oh and there's yet another downside to an ethnically homogenous society like Finland - you'll never be more than a tolerated person…

SAD is definitely a thing. Certain Lamps and Vitamins do help, though - so does a walk during lunchtime. I'll always prefer fewer sun hours during Winter over regular > 25°c (77°F) during summer.

I'm surprised about the second point though. Outside Helsinki, sure - but in HKI I've met enough non-white people who grew up there, speak Finnish and didn't feel like that at all. I felt like the language is more important for being considered a „proper Finn”.

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#562

Post by renkku » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:17 PM UTC

Torille

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#563

Post by dougmwne » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

reynhaim wrote: post #410

One thing I would like to address when it comes to higher taxes and lower pay than what you might get in the US is that to some degree, it's making the society a better place for the 90% who are not enjoying top salaries. Consider the situation of me and my wife, we got monetary aid for attending the free high quality universities. This had nothing to do with the wealth of our families, it's available for everyone. J…

Life in the USA can be seriously depressing. There is a constant awareness of just how unequal everyone's opportunities were. There is a lot of visible poverty and crime. I have personally watched people eat bits of food out of the gutter in San Francisco. There's also a lot of animosity between the haves and the have-nots. Daily conversation with strangers can be a minefield. Does this person not have access to health care? Do they have hundreds of thousands in school or medical debt? Do they expect to ever be able to retire? Does their job even allow them any paid vacation? Is a comfortable and well-paid job hopelessly out of reach for them? Have they experienced racial discrimination in school or work?

For many, many people, the psychic pain of all this inequality is too much and they retreat into bubbles of people very similar to themselves. Communities, schools, workplaces, and social networks can be shockingly segregated by race and class and people constantly get more unable to relate to the lives of others.

A little extra money is worthless in comparison to all that. Please enjoy the egalitarian society that we will never know.

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#564

Post by lytefm » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

ptero wrote: post #533

finn_american wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They immediately reply in English and have little tolerance for someone speaking their language with even a vague accent. Have seen it many times.

Interesting. Is this professional conversations or in stores / restaurants / on the streets? I thought English is not spoken by many folks over there, at least outside the IT/tech scene.

My experience at the store/ when ordering drinks has been that I'd get the replies more often than not in Finnish and had to switch to English myself when it was something that I didn't understand. Key is to get the pronunciation right - which is far easier as a German.

And yes, younger people know English well and will usually switch to English if you're struggling - unless they think that their English is too bad (which it usually isn't).

Alcohol is very expensive though!

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#565

Post by cambalache » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:39 PM UTC

Zanneth wrote: post #560

cambalache wrote: post #3

Maybe I am being dumb (Finnish application officers, do not read this) but I dont understand what the offer is. A 90 days business visa? Forget it, I just read this: > The “90-Day Finn” program is funded by the Helsinki Business Hub and is specifically targeted at “technical professionals” on the west coast of the United States. Hub will fund the “90-day free transfer package to Helsinki” and invite children. This an…

Kinda ironic that the site and a bunch of commenters on here are boasting about how egalitarian Finland is, and yet this is an opportunity to temporarily relocate that is only offered to top Silicon Valley talent.

The "global lower middle class" is screwed in that sense, I know it because I belong to it. If you are from a rich country or have elite qualifications, the world is your oyster. If you are at the other spectrum and come from an impoverished, war-torn country you could get asylum if you play your cards well. It's an incredibly shitty situation of course, but there is some chance. If you are from a poor, but mostly peaceful country and you have skills but not Ivy League/SV brand-recognition level, you are pretty much "screwed".

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#566

Post by dharma1 » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:46 PM UTC

eru wrote: post #443

dharma1 wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Singapore is one of my other favourite cities in addition to Helsinki! In many ways it's very different though - while the taxes are lower, its generally much more expensive, especially if you have kids. Singapore is a very dense, packed, hot city - you get a bit of island fever and are not so close to nature. Helsinki is literally the opposite. Singapore and Helsinki are both very, very safe, but I find Sing…

Helsinki could also have badly paid migrant workers, if they wanted to. Instead they don't let migrant construction workers nor gardeners nor cleaners etc into the country, which is worse for global inequality. But, out of sight, out of mind. (There's more to say about income distribution in Singapore, but having migrant workers, even if badly paid, is a plus in my book. If Singaporean immigration was more open, they…

>Helsinki could also have badly paid migrant workers, if they wanted to. Instead they don't let migrant construction workers nor gardeners nor cleaners etc into the country, which is worse for global inequality. But, out of sight, out of mind. (There's more to say about income distribution in Singapore, but having migrant workers, even if badly paid, is a plus in my book.

I also think low-skilled migrants are ok, to a degree. Migrants from EU can travel and work in Finland freely without visa. There are many Estonian, and some Bulgarian etc construction workers - but there also legally enforced minimum salaries for everyone. In Singapore there is no minimum salary and that is one of the causes of their extreme income distribution.

> With kids: I think it's mostly expensive if you are an expat and go the expat route with everything. If you go more local and earn a decent amount of money, the amount you save in taxes should more than make up for some extra costs. (There's also a breakeven point for expats with kids at private international school, but it's obviously much higher.)

This is true - but getting a space for a foreign child in local schools in Singapore is really, really difficult. So you almost have to factor in private school fees. Other costs are fairly comparable to Helsinki, except health care, and cars are even more expensive in Singapore - you don't really need one though. But you're right, post-tax income quickly becomes attractive in Singapore for people on higher levels of income.

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#567

Post by woobar » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:49 PM UTC

alkonaut wrote: post #482

Dig1t wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2.5k - 4.5k sucks :/

But take home pay in Helsinki is basically rent+food+beer money. ´ Take home pay in the US is college money, rainy day money, retirement money... Can't really compare take home pay in a welfare state with US take home pay. It's just not possible. Now: if you plan to retire in the US, obviously your equation would be slightly different. Paying for an education in the US, then moving to a place where salaries are set a…

Looking at the Finland pensions [1], I'd think you would like to save extra for retirement. Max government pension is less than SSA benefit in the USA (€1,368 vs $3,113)

[1] https://www.etk.fi/en/finnish-pension-system/pension-securit...

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#568

Post by lbrito » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:50 PM UTC

There's a lot of people here commenting that significantly lower disposable income isn't really an issue because of social welfare.

In general I agree with that claim, but talking specifically about pensions/retirement: how can you be so sure that 20, 30, 40 years down the road you'll get the same deal as retirees are getting today?

The way I see it, most advanced democracies have some variation of an intergenerational pension system. These systems were planned in a post-war, high-growth context. A lot of countries are having some kind of trouble with pensions, resorting to increasing minimum retirement age (Portugal, UK, Russia come to mind -- I'm sure there are others) or otherwise trying to find alternative funding for increasingly expensive pensions.

Again, I still think the trade is fair (less "personal" income in exchange for more social benefits, healthier and happier society), but I find the certainty people talk about pensions a bit odd.

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#569

Post by johnisgood » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 4:51 PM UTC

perttir wrote: post #528

johnisgood wrote: post #450

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - public healthcare is great until you have something difficult to work with or non acute. Enjoy the months longs waiting times to see a dentist. Months? What? Why? We have universal health care but the dentist is just days away... if you have pain, usually 1-2 day, or immediate extraction. I live in Eastern Europe.

Yeah, if the problem is not acute, usually it's months and months of waiting, now even longer because of the covid.

That is messed up. I am planning to go to a dentist to have all my teeth fixed, I expect it to be done this month. Well, one tooth per week at worst.

Re: Helsinki Relocation Package: City as a Service

#570

Post by exDM69 » Fri, Nov 06, 2020, 5:00 PM UTC

throwawayzRUU6f wrote: post #501

exDM69 wrote: post #449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You don't necessarily want to use that angle on Finland... the gas tank is pretty large and gas is highly taxed, both figuratively and literally. While the cost of car ownership and general cost of living is high, I'd like to point out that you don't necessarily need a car if you live and work in Helsinki. Or at least you don't need two cars in the household. A bicycle is a perfectly viable option for transport for…

Well, good luck hauling small kids, furniture, gardening or construction materials by bike or public transportation. Most of the adults are not singles in their twenties or early thirties, living in a rented flat. Once you get a family or buy a house, owning a car is basically a must. And the price tag for it in Finland is very high. 1000e a year just for mandatory car tax, mandatory yearly checkup and liability insu…

I have plenty of friends who have kids, do gardening etc and don't own a car (or even have a license) in Helsinki.

Most people in Helsinki live in apartments so construction etc is not an issue. If you can afford a house in Helsinki, car ownership is not a significant chunk of your budget.

And I have plenty of friends who do have a car for kids etc, but only one car per household. Which is not viable in many places in the world or even elsewhere in southern Finland.