To explain first, I would like to say that I’m not asking about temps, local flavor, ease of transfer or the like.
My wife and I are stuck in the US while caring for her father. When the inevitable happens, however, we would like to be prepared to head out ASAP. We’ve done a lot of searching but I thought I’d ask here in case someone’s done some legwork for the same goals as us. I traveled a bunch as a kid in the military but that was a very long time ago and I wouldn’t trust my notions of the countries in question to have remained the same.
Basically, a lot of our goals will be achieved just by not being in the US any longer but we’d hate to end up in a spot that’s working hard to emulate the current social and political climate here. Just as an example, we don’t consider a large portion of Europe to be feasible for us due to the widespread tracking, online verification, etc. These aren’t huge points by themselves but does lead one to believe that it’s similar enough in it’s trajectory to warrant concern.
I can answer any questions you might have that may be able to help guide suggestions but I’ll leave it at this for now so I don’t throw too many wrenches in the conversation.
Thanks for your time!
Let me start by saying that some of my best coworkers are American immigrants. They are hard working, humble, and always willing to learn local customs. However, these are highly skilled workers who secured a job ahead of time, and they contribute to the local economy.
Then we have loads of economic migrants from the US. They distort the local market, especially housing, and instead of assimilating to the local culture they try to impose their norms on us.
I always welcome the first group of migrants and vehemently oppose the second group. So, if you are coming to work and in exchange enjoy the benefits of a more humanistic and social system, you’re welcome. Otherwise the locals will try to make your stay quite unpleasant.
I understand your sentiment completely. My intention is to be as invisible as possible and make little to no social impact, which is how I behave here as well. In IRL, I’m nice to everyone I meet and I don’t think I ever participate in any discussion that would include me providing my opinion on a topic, regardless of whether or not I feel informed about it. I leave that for everyone else, lend an ear if it looks like they need to say something and then just non-commitally nod that I understood them. It’s a rare occurrence as I don’t interact with many people outside of stores or wife and child. If my life continues it’s current trajectory, the locals will hopefully not even be aware of my existence.
I’m not sure what an economic migrant is. Does that mean moving to a country because they want a bigger impact of their money to live a fancy lifestyle or does it mean moving because they need a cheaper economy to live? As for distorting the market, I don’t think that’s a risk as we will be working out of necessity and don’t have a bunch in the way of savings. We’re not what the US would call wealthy or even well-off. I guess we fit square in the center of middle-class but that will drop when moving.
Thank you very much for your thoughts.
You guessed right with the economic migrants. Americans aren’t the only ones doing it, though. In Europe, it’s primarily the British moving to Spain and Portugal, but others do it, too.
In terms of trying to influence local customs: this ranges from very blatant (canvassing or campaigning in favour of socially conservative causes) to seemingly innocent, but so common that people are annoyed about them even more (trying to introduce American tipping culture to pubs and restaurants). Usually the best people in this regard are well-traveled Americans who already lived abroad. Of those, by far the best adjusted are children of former military personnel stationed abroad.
Thanks very much for the clarification and insight.