cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/12815833
I keep hearing that Americans left or right of the spectrum are prepared to leave the country in droves every time their opposing party’s nominee is elected, and nothing ever happens, save for maybe a handful of people. That’s been going on for the last 20 years, if not longer. Empty words at this point.
We don’t track emigration statistics, so it’s hard to pin down trends. And international trends are tough to sift through because American immigrants don’t represent a significant number in most countries. It’s also likely that the polarized political extremes will offset. Like, if a bunch of racists left in 2008 when Obama was elected, they probably came home by the time Trump was elected, sending a roughly equivalent number seeking more progressive nations. And those outliers don’t amount to much compared to the number of immigrants that enter and leave the country every year under normal circumstances.
So even if we had numbers, you probably wouldn’t see spikes.
I think for most Americans who want to leave it’s going to be hard or unattainable. This is a VERY broad generalization and anecdotal, but any time I’ve looked into moving to other countries (primarily European countries), it has seemed that you need to be a skilled worker or have a lot of capital to support yourself while you work through the visa process to stay as a student or an entrepreneur or whatever. Having only a bachelor’s degree in German and International affairs (and that degree has aged 10 years), that doesn’t include me; I’m not a Doctor, not computer scientist, nor an engineer, or any other type worker that could be described as skilled and I don’t have a lot of spare cash either.
Sorry I’m about to rant, but I need to get this off my chest so skip if you don’t care to read this: Currently, I can’t afford to go back to school, so I’m hard-pressed to figure out how I could make it happen. I interned in Germany for a year way back and I’m kicking myself that I didn’t use my time while I had the residence permit to better myself and try to get an in by applying for a master’s program at nearby universities or seeking further employment with NGOs, non-profits, or companies willing to bring me in. Instead I treated the experience as a vacation and while I have lots of good memories and I learned a lot and I now speak the language well (and I still do after a decade) I keep coming back to how I could have done more. I did not get a permanent place in the company I worked with and I did not build my network, it makes me sad that I did this to myself. I want to go back to Germany for my own reasons that have nothing to do with today’s politics, I just felt like I fit in there. I don’t feel entirely hopeless about my prospects of returning, but I’ve increased the difficulty substantially by letting so much time pass without taking further steps. Now I’m just confused and don’t know where to begin (again.)
In any case, that was only my experience; your milage may vary as they say and if you did read the last paragraph, then I appreciate you listening. I would actually be interested to hear other people’s experiences as to how they made it abroad and how they did it and what trials the experienced along the way. If any of you are considering moving to another country, whatever the reason, I sincerely hope achieve that goal. Living abroad is an experience that I would encourage anyone who can manage it.
Edited for grammar and spelling
it makes me sad that I did this to myself.
I’m usually all about personal responsibility / owning your own fate, but you gotta know hindsight is 20/20 man. You made some choices that didn’t turn out - but it’s hardly like you spent your tuition $ on dank weed or something.
I’m currently in the process of immigrating to another country from America because of this.
The immigration group I worked with has hard statistics showing a rapid increase in Americans applying for bias with Trump presidency, and his now potential reelection.
Out of a group of ten friends, two of us are getting visas due to trump politics, and two others are going down their family ancestry route for visas into Germany. So that’s 40% of the people I know, including myself.
It’s not cheap to do this either. It’s a real commitment in money, time, energy, and risk. But that’s what it takes to have a plan B for if the shit show lands again, because it’s a full on dictator ship next round.
Were too?
My family and I are going to be out of the country for unrelated reasons at the time of the transition and I’m grateful for that.
If I could I would make that plan as well.
