I’ve been saying it since 2016: the EU should start granting political asylum to people from the US.
edit: I did say political
I moved from the U.S. to Germany in 2020.
My running joke since was wondering whether I’d be eligible for citizenship or asylum first….
Almost over the finish line for being eligible for citizenship, but I feel like asylum isn’t that far off.
You don’t need asylum if you are a legal resident. Asylum is the most insecure form of permit, especially in Germany, where the society is currently getting more and more hostile to migration, including labeling countries like Afghanistan as “safe countries of origin” and organizing deportations with the Taliban.
Hence the “joke” part….
I think we don’t want open entrance policies in place that would make it easier for MAGAs to come over. Best to have some kind of requirement which filters out the MAGAs as much as possible, say minimum education level to get a work or digital nomad visa or only people from “at risk groups” such as Transexuals qualifying for asylum.
Were I am now, Portugal, there’s pretty open immigration policy for Brazil with no actual minimum requirements and the result is that we imported a ton of far right muppets from there, to the point that in the last Brazilian Presidential election the proportion of voters for Bolsonaro in Portugal (as Brasilians can vote from abroad) was a lot larger than in Brasil - since Brasilians resident in Portugal can get Portuguese nationality after 5 years, this also help fuel the rise of the Far Right locally.
Having some kind of reasonably easy and fair system to filter out the Fascist assholes would be much better.
omg then the EU as we know it wont exist for long if such policies were to be implemented.
because it would be full of people?
which are as good as the native population?
Are you saying “they’re not sending their best”?
unfortunately even their (middle east, africa) doctors are just as intelligent as our average man or women. crazy to think about!
i want some east asian or jews as immigrants! theyre more intelligent than the average european.
You could move to East Asia or to Israel yourself. That is, if you’re intelligent enough.
why would i? these are not my people. i dont look like them.
Canada seriously needs to make a big show of offering the same thing. It’s now or never.
We don’t have the housing. Carney needs to get the government into home building yesterday.
it’s the perfect time to use that Canadian steel and aluminum
as if i had any in the first place!
now i will read about canada. thx
deport all the illegals. its easier and faster than house building.
No no no, you’re trying to be a better place than the US. Stop talking like them.
we deport and then the can come the legal way!
Most in Canada are here legally, might want to check your sources.
dude, as much as i’m anti-immigration, you’re overdoing it, and also, your proposals are ineffective.
in germany, for example, the population that immigrated since 2012 makes up approx. 3% of the total population. that means that the population is roughly 3% larger than it would be without that immigration.
that is what you should be talking about. 3% larger population means higher workforce (supply of labor), and therefore lower wages (prices for labor). That is because the immigrants add almost no demand for labor (since they have a low buying power).
Demand for labor is mainly driven by growth, and we’ve had two big waves of growth since 1800: Quantitative (industrialization) and qualitative (IT work). Since both of these two waves end their growth approx. now, the demand for labor goes down. There’s no point in importing more labor force, it would only make the wages go down. That is what you have to talk about: the decreasing wages through the import of cheap labor. It’s essentially wage-dumping in the own country. That is what the people should be talking about. Not racism. We’re not better people than them, we just need to get the workforce smaller to drive the wages up.
That requires, ofc, that the borders are closed also for goods and products. If products have to be produced inside the country because the borders are closed, companies can’t just do the wage dumping in another country.
Btw, almost everywhere the number of illegal immigrants is extremely low. In the US, they make up 25% of all immigrants, IIRC, which is not much. There’s not much there to talk about, especially since these illegal immigrants are good at hiding and hard to catch. But what you can do is to study the socio-economic consequences of immigration/high birth rate and then draw your conclusions. If you really care about the people, you’d first close the borders in all developed countries, and then drop the birth rate really really low. That would give power to the people, since they are in higher demand, and keep the wages as high as possible, because the production would stay approx. constant (think the farmland is constant) but the consumption is lowest, so there’s more resources for everyone.
This seems like a really bad take.
Do take a look at the age pyramid @Miaou posted. Germany needs a lot of young people to herd its old people. German ministers flying to the Phillipines and Kenya and Brazil to find care workers – that’s for a reason! And dropping the birth rate lower does not mean more high-paying jobs, it means more low-paying care jobs in relation to total number of jobs.
In addition there are a bunch of jobs that Germans don’t really do anymore (plucking asparagus, slaughtering hogs, cleaning office buildings, …) because they are badly paid hard labor which are however in some way useful to society.
Granted, preventing migrants from taking bad jobs may mean that high-paying automation jobs open up. But that’s the only silver lining. (Fwiw, Japan had a very strict immigration policy, because they figured that elderly care might be something easily accomplished with robot dogs and other gimmicks. It turns out though that that assumption was wrong. It also turns out that a lot of people from countries like Malaysia and the Phillipines would love to work in Japan, despite the racism. So Japan has adapted its policies on foreign labor somewhat now.)
Please stop parroting this notion that Canada’s problems mirror those if the united states.
The number of so called “illegals” pales in comparison to the number of foreign investors buying up property and jacking IP the rental rates.
I’m just going to correct you here. The problem if Canadian housing isn’t foreign investors (they account by like 2% of the real state market), but the absurd zoning laws and the “missing middle”.
Check our “oh the urbanity” youtube channel, they do a really good analysis on Canadian houses markets.
i bet canadians would not be so angry if people like them (colour, religion, mindset!) would be the immigrants but according to this: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_immigration_statistics
60% are people from third world cuntries.
i cant blame the canadians!
A lot of scientists get paid terribly in Canada unfortunately. Certain industries are non existent or exist to support the US industry (mainly pharma)
I’m doing my part fleeing to Sweden, granted I’m a programmer and game dev so not a scientist. I’m done letting the US profit off my skills though
You will like it, Sweden has a nice relaxed working culture where we actually care about how people feel at work.
Welcome home to the capital country of gaming!
Thank you! I’m so excited to make my way. Just hoping the US holds out long enough for me to make the move I’m definitely a bit scared with how fast it’s all happening here
I’m in the process of getting certified to be a nurse in New Zealand. Fuck this country.
I assume you’re taking a big hit salary-wise (a trade-off I would make, for the record).
Well I’m going back to school there first to get an actual degree. After that though yeah I’m expecting to make around 1/3 what I am currently, between switching countries and going from automation engineering to level design. I think it’ll be a worthwhile trade-off too
If you take into account all the things you don’t have to pay, that salary is not that low
Out of interest, since moving continents is no small matter in my opinion; what makes that, and making a third in terms of salary vs the US, a worthwhile trade-off?
Lots of reasons over the years but the most immediately pressing is I’m trans so if the US starts black bagging people I’m high up there on the list
Ah gotcha yeah that makes a lot of sense! I hope that kind of bigotry dies out again soon but doesn’t look like its slowing down. I hope you can feel safe and be more like your true self now.
Unfortunately I don’t think it is going to die out, I think it will need to be rooted out at the cost of lives. The feeling safe part is important but I’ve been living my true self a while now. I make an active effort to not pass too well so that other trans people who feel they can’t show themselves can see me and know there are others around. That was important for me early on so I want to provide that. Has led to some less than stellar interactions though even in Seattle…
Certain stuff, and especially rent, is a lot cheaper in Europe, though.
It was a pretty big shock for us when so many of the Ukrainian refugees that arrived during recent years came in SUVs, and they looked quite new, too. But in Ukraine, one of Europe’s poorest countries by far, cars cost a lot less, too.
Remember that your last place of residence in the US determines your voting residence while living abroad. If possible, move to a swing state (preferably with low population, and preferably in a swing district for local elections, too) long enough to establish residency before moving abroad. Plan ahead now and maximize the impact of your vote in the long run. Also register as a republican so you can vote in republican primaries (to vote for anyone who isn’t Trump), as well as making gerrymandering harder.
Did you just job hunt over there and get a work visa?
I’ve got enough tech experience I probably could have. I’m going back to school though out of savings and going to get on a student visa
Interesting. How easy is it to stay over there if you go to school? Are the student visas hard to get?
I have to line up a job before I graduate because I don’t qualify for like a “just graduated give me some time to settle” visa, so that may be difficult. I don’t really know if the student visa is hard to get. I need to be accepted to school first then I can use that to make my visa application, so the timing is going to be pretty rushed. I’m going to have to set up moving and living, basically be in standstill for a bit waiting to see if I can pull the trigger, then hope the visa clears
As long as you get accepted into the school, and as long as you meet the basic requirements like having enough money to support yourself and stuff there generally shouldn’t be a problem getting the visa approved. But the processing time is a killer. I’ve seen Migrationsverket take so long to process the visas that several students had to start their masters program a couple months late. The university did allow them to start late, but they really really struggled getting caught up and quite frankly the school shouldn’t have allowed it because there was really no chance of them succeeding in the program because of it (this was prior to Covid and there was no remote option for any of the coursework). Those students were really screwed over and would have been better off deferring enrollment until the next year. But the department was desperately lacking funding and needed to get as many people enrolled as possible. So they were maybe a bit dishonest about how much of a challenge it would be to get caught up.
Anyways, submit the visa application as early as you possibly can and hope the Migrationsverket processes the application quickly. Otherwise you’re at the mercy of your school and whether they’ll be willing to let you start late. Im assuming post-Covid you’d be able to attend classes remotely, so at least you wouldn’t have the issue of falling too far behind and flunking out…
Where you going to? I’m a data engineer living in Malmö. I can help you get settled if you’re in Skåne
Depending where I may get accepted, I’m likely to end up in Umeå, Boden, or Skellefteå. So just a bit further north than Malmö 😅 I appreciate the offer though
Oh that’s nice; far up north. Hope you’ll enjoy it up there! All the best and awesome you’re choosing to come here!
Don’t forget to get rid of your US citizenship or they’ll still profit off your work.
i thought it was just that if the country you’re in taxed you less than what the US would, then you have to pay the difference to the IRS?
… and there’s no way in hell the US taxes less than sweden (and for anyone that hasn’t had an ice pick lobotomy that’s a good thing)
*edit: foreign tax credit
That’s correct. You’d have to be earning way, WAY over the average Swedish salary before you start owing the IRS anything. That said, I wouldn’t put it past Trump to remove the foreign earned income exclusion to coerce people into moving back to the US as part of the ”trade war” nonsense.
wow yeah i hadn’t considered that
fucking ew
How so?
side note: Brain drain from an adversary is one of the reasons why the US completed the Manhattan Project faster. History repeating itself. Maybe this time around the fusion project is completed faster with the intention of long term peace without the need for deterrence.
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
First you gotta pitch that as a startup, why should I invest in this brain drain long term peace?
Left for Taiwan in the first Trump presidency. Haven’t been back since.
deleted by creator
Website optimization. My customers are global so I can work remotely.
Jealous! Taiwan is an amazing place
Come visit. We are a very welcoming country and love foreigners and tourist!
When you gonna go full China? Feel like that’s the best bet at this point.
I prefer to call it West Taiwan, at this point, China needs democracy and what best to bring it than Taiwan.
$16M for 3 scientists for 3 years? I hope those scientists are bringing their whole labs with them?
Why not? That’s ~1.77 million per year per scientist. Yes, that is a lot of money. But if you think about it, those scientists might be able to start multibillion dollar economies. They can train hundreds of experts in their field. And some lousy CEO of some stupid company gets paid more
Maybe they are just being well paid
This is a foreign concept to American scientists.
Also very foreign to french scientists tbh
Top level scientists/professors are like famous sports players. Recruiting them is a prestige boost which attracts students and employees, but also can have very direct results if they manage some breakthrough or novel solution.
Talking about labs. Building, organizing and running those is far harder than spending money on equipment usually.
i hope they are engineers or doctors. not the “science” of gender studies. lol
You got a problem with people wanting to not be pieces of shit huh?
Anyways here is some good book recommendations for everyone else.
1: My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness by Nagata Kabi
2: Fun Home by Alison Bechdel (Yes the same Bechdel behind the Bechdel test)
3: How We Fight for Our Lives by Saeed Jones
What’s wrong with gender studies? Fiji has three genders!
deleted by creator
There are as many as we want, they’re a social construct.
EDIT - Just so anyone reading this knows, their deleted comment was, “There are more than three genders.”
i deleted it because the joke was not obvious nor good. i think there are only 2 sexes. afaik, gender is something other in english?
Sex and gender are not the same thing. Sounds like you need a gender studies course.
it might be interesting to hear what the people say in such a course, but tbh i doubt i would change my mind. this gender stuff is very weird to me. (downvote now. atleast im honest xD )
Dang. That’s cool.
I hope you have the day you deserve. lol.
The atmosphere is nearly perfect for an EU resurgence. American workers potentially willing to leave is only one piece of it. You also have interest in drawing together as a continent against a new shared enemy. Hell even Germany is ready to drop their spending limitations to actually try to rise to the occasion.
I really wish they’d take it a step further and pump heavy investment into the region - and not just defense. Isn’t it exactly the right time to build European industries to replace the American ones they are no longer sure they can trust?
So true! I especially hope the software industry will be a focus. That’s where security and civilian life converge and Europe has the skilled labor to pull it off.
Take me with you, I’m neither an average fighter nor a brilliant scientist, but you can’t live a trans-sister to die in this wasteland of burgers and guns!
Need any IT?
Germany needs plenty. But only the cheap ones with expert knowledge. That’s not how they would word it though
Well, the correct german word is to say ‘Fachkräftemangel’ which in my experience translates to ‘We need someone with 20+ years of experience, that we can pay like an intern’
Couldn’t have said it better
I suddenly like a lot of things about France.
I have a vps with OVH which is French, and pretty great.
I’ll 100% sign up with eutel (?) satellite internet if it’s ever available here.
I’ve also been using mistral l, a French LLM, to draft some documents lately.
I’ll 100% sign up with eutel (?) satellite internet if it’s ever available here.
I’m just wondering, why? Do you not have any decent broadband options available?
Fiber’s still going to be better than satellite, but obviously if you can’t get fiber, satellite is probably better than aging copper.
Yeah, at home we do have fiber.
I’d like it for my camper trailer. Something like an RV.
Here in Western Australia we have reasonably good 5G mobile coverage in cities and towns, but it’s patchy outside of those areas.
Having satellite internet really opens up a whole lot of cool places you can set up to camp.
Oh yeah, you Aussies have a huge outback, I can see it being great for usage in a camper. Boats are another great use case I think.
I don’t mean to be critical, it’s great that you know the term outback, but that’s not quite the right usage.
It tends to refer to very remote very arid places. As in outback explorers used camels and often perished due to dehydration.
We do have very lush forests with rivers and so on along the coast, which is more popular with campers than in the outback.
Oh, tbh I thought Outback referred to the Australian wilderness as a whole, though I guess I’ve mostly heard it used in the context of desert overlanding.
Then I think there’s also “the bush”. What parts of Australia does that refer to?
Yeah so bush in that context is pretty much “forest”, but Australia’s has a pretty unique vibe. In the same way jungle isn’t really “forest”.
We call areas with fairly homogeneous species a forest like karri forest or jarrah forest, but in the absence of something more specific it’s just bushland / bush.
That’s pretty cool
In Estonia we have specific words for forests of most common trees. Spruce is kuusk, spruce forest is kuusik. Pine is mänd, pine forest is männik. Etc. Otherwise it’s just “forest”.
Still, none of our forests, even ancient untouched ones, look as beautiful as the Australian rainforest. Which I’ve admittedly only seen in movies and Forza Horizon 3.
Would love to visit one day, but I’m not sure if I’m planning on ever visiting Australia. It’s so far and there’s not all that much I want to do in Australia in particular - though the car nut in me wants to drive the Mount Panorama circuit and it IS very close to Blue Mountains and a few other national parks, so if I find a few other things I’m interested in, Australia will start looking pretty attractive. I mean there’s the great barrier reef too, but I think the reef tourism is actually very damaging for the reef, so it’s best not to go see that?
It will take me sometime to save enough money, but once I do I am fleeing as well.
France is crushing it lately it seems.
I’m looking forward to hearing all the people that say raising taxes would lead to all the talented people leaving the country addressing this.*
Realistically I understand that they’re all talentless lying bastard failsons that just wanted to make more passive income from their family’s wealth and no journalist will ever challenge them on it.
If only I had money…
Aw shiz, now when it turns out US scientists don’t know sciency stuff because hustle culture















