It’s not that London is too big, but that other large UK cities are too small | Hacker News Reader

It’s not that London is too big, but that other large UK cities are too small

blogs.lse.ac.uk

79 pointsedward157 comments

As someone who lives in the UK, visiting London is like visiting a different country. Sometime's I'm amazed just how 'better' everything looks and is. You can clearly see that this is where all the money is funneled into. It even has it's own subway covering the whole city! Where is this sort of commitment to anywhere else in the UK? All that really happens is all the money is poured into London, it then slowly expands, and as HS2 is proving, to the detriment of everyone else.

An American in New York...same thing

No way. America has plenty of fast growing cities, just none around the NYC area.

To be fair that's another way of saying "Europe has plenty of fast growing cities, just none around the London area"

I think we have improved transport economics so much that the size of a metro area needs adjusting in our minds - London has commuters from Birmingham, Cambridge and beyond - in the same way that NYC has commuters from Pennsylvania and even Philly.

The winning City in an area sucks in all the surrounding populations - it's just now that transport links mean that those surrounding populations are in what used to be called other cities and are now just suburbs.

We need better town planning not ways to hold back cities to certain geographic locations

Sometimes people live in the city and commute to work in the suburbs.

I propose, instead, that New York City is a suburb of Philly.

It does not invalidate the argument - they are both effectively the same "metro area"

The Bay Area, while very far from being a well planned live/work/commute environment, does have a somewhat unique structure. It is made up of 3 geographically dispersed, relatively equitable major cities, albeit with different strengths (SF - international cachet, SJ - largest city plus proximity to Silicon Valley, Oakland - future opportunity).

There are arguably more high end jobs in the suburbs surrounding these 3 major cities than in the city centers themselves. While this has removed the issue of one major city sucking in all of the surrounding resources, it has also distributed all of the problems of a major city center throughout an entire region - extremely high housing costs, horrendous traffic, etc.

Since each municipality in the Bay Area enjoys near ubiquitous power over local development and policy, it is also very difficult to implement effective regional plans to improve these issues.

I would argue it's one metro area with three authorities that plan and co-ordinate poorly and has no decent overall town / civil planning (for example like most cities, there is a focus on increasing land price being a good thing - generally not for future equitable growth)

The politics and social Dynamics in the US seem completely wrong for growth that I would consider positive in most regions. There is instead a lot of low density strip mall style growth and the resulting structures and density will largely be protected from reexamination due to risk of losing grandfathered building rights.

I would be interested to know which cities are consolidating high density areas while growing such that they will have a Manhattan.

Seattle?

But I don't think every city needs Manhattan style density. Four, five story mid-rise density is the answer. Austin's urban core is building heavily in that style. I was just in Milwaukee for work as was surprised by the huge number of mid-rise buildings all over downtown. Just to show two midsized cities with insane growth at the core.

You ever been to LA? Or San Francisco? Chicago? Miami? Boston?

New York might be a huge metropolis, but it's by no means the only one.

Where is this sort of commitment to anywhere else in the UK

It's in, for example, Cambridge, which over the past decade has become living proof of the idea that improved links to London can make a place prosper.

I've been living in Cambridge for many years and over that time its acquired a very London-like vibe around the center, business/science and biomedical campuses. The second train station just opened, the 3rd is in planning, and a subway (or underground busway) system is being considered to link them together.

I went into Cambridge city centre the other day, and was saddened by how much like every other run-down city centre it now looks, how dirty and smelly much of it was, how unremarkable in almost every way. Apart from some nice architecture around the old buildings, the city centre has very little to recommend it these days. We also seem to have more and more seasonal visits from tourists, language school kids and so on, just to make things a bit less pleasant for everyone else.

Part of the reason I hardly ever go into the city centre any more is that the transport system is so awful and expensive. At one point it was literally cheaper to park illegally and pay the fine promptly than to park in a major city centre car park! The new railway station and "new" trains into London have come in for plenty of criticism even in just a few weeks that they've been in use so far and, ironically, we're actually predicted to lose out from HS2 here as it pulls some of the attention over to the west.

There's still a scholarly feel around the university areas, of course, and a feeling of industry around the out-of-town science and business areas, but I'm not sure how much of that has anything to do with outside investment rather than the business and academic communities themselves.

If Cambridge is what "commitment" by the government to areas outside London looks like, they really need to up their game.

A run down city centre that's wall to wall with people and full of busy shops and cafes.

'...I hardly go into the city centre any more...'

Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded.

Except that when I went in the other day, the shops and cafes weren't particularly busy, and the car parks and bike racks weren't full.

When it is crowded these days, it seems to be more temporary visitors like tourists and summer school kids than locals. Even the students aren't around as much as they used to be, as some of the university departments that used to be based in the centre have moved a lot of their work to sites further out now.

Fair enough. I've only been a few times in the last few years and it's always been heaving. You had to wait in queues to get a seat in a coffee shop an that was during the holidays.

The city centre has changed noticeably over the past few years, if my visits are at all representative. There's less of interest generally and in particular a lot of the old independent shops and food/drink places seem to have gone, so I tend to go elsewhere or online for most things now. Apparently I'm not the only one -- it's hard to imagine I'd have done what I did the other day without queueing even once if I'd tried the same thing even a year or two ago.

I find it striking that I have met friends who live nearby down in London more often than I've met them in Cambridge lately. I've also done more of my bricks-and-mortar shopping in the big shopping centres down London way than in my local city centre. There's so much more to do and it's just generally so much more interesting and alive (and, frankly, clean) that contrary to krona, I find it very different to the feeling in central Cambridge these days.

Tax-wise, it's actually the other way around. Taxes paid by Londoners pay are bankrolling all the infrastructure of the country.

Is it though, or is it simply that companies trade all over the UK but they're mostly incorporated in London and thus the numbers are inflated?

Either way, as somebody who has moved to the commuter belt for work, I think investing in the northern powerhouse and high speed rail would probably help the need for us to all be here which forces more taxes to be generated here.

Part of it is that; another part is that many people grow up outside London, spend a lot of their working life in London, then retire to somewhere outside London.

I think trying to read anything into regional tax flows isn't very productive.

I think similar arguments have been made about the top 1 or 10% of earners - that there shouldn't be any effort towards curbing their economic activity because they are net contributors whereas low-earners are not net contributors.

I think arguments like that ignore the interconnectivity of complex national systems (e.g.) a London business whose customers and suppliers are based around the country.

> I think arguments like that ignore the interconnectivity of complex national systems (e.g.) a London business whose customers and suppliers are based around the country.

And indeed employees. I'm based in Cheshire (home worker), we have offices in most cities and large towns across the country (and indeed globally). How much of my income tax is counted towards 'rural northwest' and how much to 'London' where the HQ is. How much of the profit I generate gets allocated to London.

For public investment, this is because spending £1 in London might generate £1.50 of economic improvement, but a similar project in Birmingham or Manchester might generate only £1.05 of improvement.

Are you comparing similar areas of London and other cities? If you don't visit anywhere outside central London, it's only fair to compare that with the centre of other cities.

I feel like this is a self-fulfilling prophecy though.

If they never make serious investments anywhere else, then nowhere else can develop the kind of economy that allows London to perform this well.

This is something that really needs supporting proof (in so much as there is proof of any economic estimate). I'm sure a convincing case could be made for the contrary. A relatively small investment in a neglected transport system in Leeds (for example) may well yield greater returns.

Getting the train down from where I live in Cheshire to London is like going forward-in-time three years. It really is! It's a silly and trivial example, but there are chains of shops and restaurants that I don't recognise when I go down, but they'll start to appear in the north in three years.

I know, we even have a new pound coin down here that might trickle its way up through some petty change.

3 years really isn't a long time. To me going to London is like going back in time 10 years, crowded, terrible transports, and the pubs all shut at half ten!

Nonsense. London is a net taxpayer for the UK [1], hence the periodical discussion of establishing an independent city state (which will not happen IMO). Instead of being jealous of London, the rest of the UK would be better off realising that London competes with other global cities and that the success of London benefits UK (but sadly instead they voted for Brexit) [1] https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/may/23/uk-budget-d...

And what rents does that tax-paying capacity derive from? Extracted from whom?

Global trade? Production? Tourism?

More like farming, harvesting of other natural resources and electricity generation, long-distance transport infrastructure, warehousing, and actual housing for many of the people who commute into London every day to provide vital labour but can't afford to live there.

London makes a lot of money because it's dominated by high-return service industries, most famously the financial sector based in the City. It includes relatively little in the way of production, manufacturing and storage, which don't scale as well but are obviously essential to everything else being possible.

Farming? Are you mad? It contributes as little as 0.5% of the country's GDP. What other natural resources are being "harvested" to enrich London so much?

The vast majority of London commuters live in Greater London, so its housing is largely provided for by itself. Even if you assumed every human being in the "commuter belt" travelled to London daily, the GLA would still account for ~73% of the population, and this is plainly an absurd assumption.

While London may not contribute as much manufacturing, it still manages ~6% of the UK's manufacturing output. At the same time, just retail in London produces almost as much for the economy as rUK manufacturing.

Your whole thesis is laughable. You seem to be upset that the poorer parts of the nation can trade with London to provide it goods and services. Should you not be upset at the farming, storage and transportation rUK "harvests" from abroad? This dwarfs London's "harvesting" of rUK.

London itself has nothing to do with profits from this trade being unequally distributed. Westminster, sure, but London? No.

Farming? Are you mad? It contributes as little as 0.5% of the country's GDP.

Not everything is about GDP. You belittle farming, but without food to eat, Londoners would not be generating a lot of economic output at all.

The original point here was that London generates disproportionate tax revenues, but only because it is home to more scalable service industries and relies on the less lucrative but essential supplies and infrastructure from elsewhere.

What other natural resources are being "harvested" to enrich London so much?

Almost none of the UK's electricity supply originates within London, even if we take that to mean Greater London.

London also has no major sources for fuels.

Your whole thesis is laughable. You seem to be upset

Why would I be upset about anything? I only commented that London is able to generate disproportionate tax returns because it's service-based and relies on the rest of the UK for support. That's not a "thesis", it's a simple economic fact, and everything I've mentioned in support it of is readily verifiable for the price of a Google search.

and relies on the less lucrative but essential supplies and infrastructure from elsewhere

As does rUK, with rWorld. As do most UK cities with rUK. Similarly with farming; London _and rUK_ can (and do) fulfil a significant quantity of their demand from abroad; it is possible to fulfil more.

I do not belittle farming, but trading for food does not equal "extracting rents" as the OP you were responding to requested, and nor does farming constitute a huge industry rUK is somehow being defrauded of the profits for.

Almost none of the UK's electricity supply originates within London

Energy production is not a natural resource. The only "rUK" resource we input is Gas, but it's not clear how much of rUK can claim to be losing out here. Most of rUK would not be the natural "owners" of this resource, and - again - it is traded on the open market, so can be fulfilled from elsewhere.

Why would I be upset

To rephrase/reconsider: you seem to somehow confuse trade with rent extraction, unless you simply did not read the OP's point of contention you were contributing to.

If this were to be true, rUK would be one of the world's worst perpetuators of this form of wrong, given its greater dependency on rWorld in exactly the manners you describe.

We just seem to be quibbling over how we interpreted the points other posters were trying to make about prioritisation for London and rents now, which I don't think is going to get us anywhere, so perhaps we should just agree to disagree on this one.

no, what eh was saying (correctly) is that even if it's true that London need to import the things you listed from other countries it would not make a big difference in his prosperity. For example it's laughable that you mentioned farming, as UK heavily relay on imports already and the sector constitutes only 0.5% of the GDP. So basically London would be better off without the rest of the UK

Let's be clear about a little factual detail first: the UK is 76% self-sufficient at producing home-grown food (DEFRA, March 2016). While we also import a significant amount of food, and this is useful for both variety and the security of the food supply, the majority of what most of us eat most of the time was grown in the UK.

But even if you can give that up and you have enough supply to import all your food from elsewhere in the world, how are those imports going to get into London? There's limited spare capacity for freight ports on the Thames. Even if you could finish the London Gateway -- which isn't actually in London anyway, and you probably couldn't build anything like it further in -- and significantly expand its capacity from what is currently planned, you'd still need the warehousing and logistics to go with it, and then you'd need all the staff to build and maintain and operate all of this, and then the supporting infrastructure and services to go with those staff. That's an awful lot of new space and new relatively low-paid workers to fit into your hypothetical newly-independent London, just to make up for not having land-based supply of food and drink.

So again, as I have said repeatedly, London is only disproportionately strong economically because it is primarily based on high-margin service industries and relies on the rest of the UK to supply much of the low-margin infrastructure it needs for the basic operation of a city that size. You can argue over whether that beneficial financial arrangement is literally rent-seeking, but certainly the economic effect is similar: London currently benefits disproportionately from the UK's public spending and government-supported infrastructure, but that spending and infrastructure development is only possible because of what is also going on elsewhere in the UK.

A lot of London's net tax income comes from the way taxes for country-wide businesses land in their HQ, which is more often than not London (or at least the south east).

> It even has it's own subway covering the whole city!

Not the same I know, but Milton Keynes (a UK garden city supposedly planned and designed like an American city) has a mostly interrupted cycle path network covering the whole city, which to some hugely preferable to a subway network. The only problem with this is that things are too spaced out for the average person to want to cycle so barely anyone uses it, which is strange because Milton Keynes buses charge £4-5 per person to travel only a couple of miles.

All I've heard about London from fellow expats is: 1) it's laughably expensive, and it forces you to spend a big part of your salary just for a room in a cramped apartment unless you want to live hours away from your office, 2) it's a hellhole full of scum.

You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.

Ok, I know I might be relatively lucky, but just to provide a different anecdote: I spend 34% of my take-home income to live in a big studio in a leafy neighbourhood with Edwardian houses, 35 minutes from work door to door taking the tube, next to 2 parks. I'm pretty happy. Like all big cities London has better and worse neighbourhoods and the experience you get living in them varies greatly.

34% to live in a studio sounds ludicrous to someone paying 25% to live in a townhouse (in a smaller city in the south).

Yes... Perhaps it's because so much other housing is so expensive in London, relatively many other properties can look like a bargain

25% on the studio, and another 25% on utilities, car and food.

A hellhole full of scum... I don't know where these people have been, but that isn't the London I know.

The outlook of London (and the rest of the U.K.) will likely change dramatically as the hard Brexit looms closer. A major advantage London had was access to the 500M large European labour market - which will close with Brexit, making London less competitive and attractive to Europeans than before.

We know very little about what the Brexit agreement will look like. As long as high paying jobs exist, nothing stops highly skilled European people from continuing to get them, even if that involves a bit more bureaucracy.

Not really: it's not bureaucracy that scares us Europeans, rather than the fact that over 50% of the country voted in an indisputably racist way to lower immigration. It's the fact that Europeans in the UK feel mistreated and disliked now.

Imagine what the working class in the UK have felt like for the past 30 years.

Agree but try "last 300+ years" rather than 30. Sadly I don't think Brexit will be their salvation. The problem with the UK and class has always lied with domestic politics. This wont change whether we're in or out of Europe.

Imagine what they'll feel like when they realise limiting immigration will not save them but lead to more austerity.

If it does, imagine what they might do when they realize that.

A rapidly changing first-world is producing a lot of losers - but they're not yet disenfranchised and many of them are even armed.

I'm a little concerned about this.

We're entering a new industrial revolution - a lot of white collar jobs and blue collar jobs are being disrupted or eliminated. For example every factory and driving job will disappear in our lifetimes, many office jobs will be disrupted. New jobs will be found, we'll be more productive, and the world will be better because of it, but history shows us that this sort of disruption and destroyed livelihoods leads to violence, revolutions and unrest. We will see a similar situation to the original industrial revolution.

I do think it is misguided and harmful to attempt to try to find scapegoats for structural changes in society (popular just now are immigrants, muslims, corporations or evil federal governments), which is why I disagree fundamentally with almost every argument advanced for Brexit (from foreigners are taking our jobs to the evil EU is out to crush our democracy). It will not end well when people don't see improvement in their life but suffer more, and wonder who is to blame if not immigrants.

If that were the case, which it isn't, they would've voted against Eastern Europeans, not Western Europeans.

Whilst some people may have had racist intentions in voting leave, it is not fair to say that 50% of the country voted in a racist way. Also why does a desire for lower immigration automatically mean you must be racist?

Sure it's fair. We intelligent and moral people in America have already determined that anyone who voted for Trump to be decent facto racist. This is just a small extension of that. There's no other possible explanation. None at all. The other side is evil, and just want to watch the world burn. Can't they see that were building a better world and they just want to live in ruins with their pure bred families.

Not all but certainly a healthy double digit percentage. The rest are easily manipulated followers.

I'm sure it's not the whole 50% but it is a significant number, I've even seen it on my own family and it isn't very nice. This part of Brexit worries me more than the economic issues.

I wonder how many times I need to repeat myself on HN before the message gets across...

I voted for Brexit, but I did not vote based on immigration policy. In addition to seeing no major problems with the current immigration arrangements from an economic perpective, one of my grandfathers was an immigrant to the UK, and I'm glad to have my mixed ancestry, if nothing else it made my childhood more interesting.

The problem really is with the media. They've set out Brexit as a two-issue debate. The only two issues that get discussed are immigration and the economy. So if you voted for Brexit you're either a racist or an economic luddite. I bet you can't even guess why I'd vote for Brexit without being driven by those two factors. That's the level to which the debate has been simplified in the media.

So let me say this, speaking as a Brexit voter, you are welcome in this country. Don't let the media tell you why those 50% of voters (which wasn't 50% the UK population) voted the way they did, they haven't got a clue.

You forgot to tell us the reason why you voted leave

I intentionally omitted the reason I voted leave to highlight how limited the public debate has been (i.e. that it's not possible for many Remain voters to guess any other reasons than the two I outlined).

If you are curious about the reasons I voted to leave, look through my comment history around the time of the Brexit vote. I may explain it again later once I've made my point about the media's role in limiting the public debate.

I presume you wanted to remove the EU's influence over British law.

This position was widely discussed in the British media [1]. Suggesting otherwise is bananas :-D

[1] A Google search for "Brexit sovereignty" gives plenty of articles, from across all newspapers.

British sovereignity is certainly closer to the reasons why I voted for Brexit, but it's not the full picture. The main problem I have with the EU is how it's run. I'm not opposed to a union with other countries, just not the union we have, and the structure of the EU makes it resistant to any change that doesn't strengthen the current power structure.

One of the complaints I have about how the media has portrayed the issues is that it's conflated membership of the EU with being European, by focusing so heavily on the immigration angle. I'm still a European if I want to be outside of the EU. The EU is still mostly a trade organisation. Nobody calls people from the US anti-American if they criticise NAFTA (they are of course different arrangements, but certain comparisons can be made). Yet the portrayal of a European who is critical of the EU is of someone who is anti-European.

If you want a view that certainly wasn't emphasised in the Brexit debate, here are some of the comments of Tony Benn about the EU:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQY2CHx4d3U

Every single person I know that voted leave did it on economic grounds. I'm sure a proportion was flat out racism but it's nowhere near 50%.

Indisputably racist? Theres no other explanation you can entertain?

As a non-EU immigrant who has lived here for 10 years and is still struggling with visa issues, the idea that it will involve just "a bit" more bureaucracy is laughable. The bureaucracy is appalling. Europeans who have any alternative will undoubtedly go elsewhere.

> As a non-EU immigrant who ... is still struggling with visa issues

Amen. I was trying to decide between working in the UK or in Europe several years ago. I'm from a common wealth country so I assumed getting a UK visa would be cheap/easy.

No way José! The UK visa requirements were positively assinine in their requirements (everywhere you've visited the last 10 years, visa fees totaling over 800£). Requirements for someone with a university education and no criminal record or even a speeding ticket, which yes, you must also declare when applying.

It was basically an complicated and expensive process designed to catch you lying (intentionally or by omission) so they could deny you the visa.

I ended up going to a European country. Showed them my working contract and a copy of my university degree. 110€ and I had a 3 year work visa within 6 weeks.

The UK is insane for immigration.

you might find the following fairly interesting:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/sep/01/home-office-...

as a third-worlder, I've started to keep a running spreadsheet of all visa fees (and associated costs) I have paid that I would not have to pay if I were a first-worlder. (Schengen application fees multiple times, UK visit, Hong Kong visit, UK student, etc.)

The only one I can let slide so far is the one for my student visa in the UK (especially the NHS coverage parts) as I've never paid income tax in the UK.

I like Chilie's approach to visa fees: they charge you whatever your country charges Chileans. So it's something like €100 if you are German and €1200+ if you are from the UK :D

I actually think it's free for Germans since most of EU don't have visas with most of Lat Am.

For some reason I read the first line of this comment as "I like China's approach to visa fees..."

In rapid succession I thought, why would China tie their visa fees to Chile? Are Chilean geopolitics closely aligned with China? Is there some complex macroeconomic formula that involves Chilean immigration patterns? Is China just trolling the West by randomly pegging their visa fees to Chile?

I should really pay more attention when scanning HN comments.

> The UK is insane for immigration.

Completely. I could immigrate to Germany for about 1/20th of the cost (in application and legal fees) that it is taking me to simply maintain my residency in the UK. And is despite being a native English speaker, Oxford graduate, resident here for 10 years, and founder of two UK companies.

By the time I get permanent residency here, I will have spent over £12,000 on application and legal fees, and hundreds of hours on paperwork.

Those in the UK who believe that they can remain an internationally competitive and attractive destination with this kind of visa regime are -- I'm sorry, there's no polite way to say this -- utterly fucking delusional.

The problem is highly skilled Europeans can also get those jobs elsewhere. Berlin, Amsterdam, Paris, Dublin, Munich, Stockholm, Copenhagen, etc.

And if somebody is willing to suffer through bureaucracy and be humiliated in that process, for a city that has an insanely high cost of living, then why would people go to London instead of San Francisco or New York?

The problem with leaving the EU is that the EU provides competitive advantages and opportunities that are now going to be gone.

Plus that referendum is signaling to me, an European, that I'm not wanted there. Oh and I'm also a Romanian and we've been used as scapegoats in the UK's anti-immigration campaign. Don't think that I'm going to forget that easily.

Maybe what you are describing is in fact a good thing?

London gets correction on its growth, rest of the UK sligtly benefits by getting industries back which can no longer be served from within EU. Which will lead to slowdown or reversal of inequality growth.

The remainder of the U.K., outside of London, has a larger dependency on the EU. These regions will suffer disproportionately more than London.

"In particular, Northern Ireland (the UK’s poorest region), the North East (England’s poorest region) and the South West (Southern England’s poorest region) appear to be the most dependent on the ability of the UK to trade in goods with relatively few restrictions with other EU countries." [1]

[1] "UK regions, the European Union and manufacturing exports" http://speri.dept.shef.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Brie...

I can feel the pain with regards to Northern Ireland.

Though, it's hard to justify how Northern Ireland happen to become the UK’s poorest region, given how Ireland is more prosperous than the UK by the numbers.

The whole situation is hilarous IMO.

If I thought that was going to happen I would have voted for Brexit, if we go through with it the regions are likely to suffer the most, in particular car manufacturing.

>for a city that has an insanely high cost of living, then why would people go to London instead of San Francisco or New York?

Because that's even harder. The American visa system is even more insane than the UK one. I'd love to move to California (if only for a couple of years) but it seems to be totally impossible when it comes to a visa.

Yep, but you can choose Berlin, Milan, Madrid

This is exactly how I feel about the whole Brexit mess, as an European that is working in the UK. For me, moving here was as simple as getting on a plane and handing my Spanish identity card to a customs officer. This is my benchmark for the post-Brexit immigration system: if it is one iota more inconvenient for an European like me to move to and work in the UK, I will pack up my stuff and go somewhere else, because I would not have even considered coming here in the first place if that was the case.

Like you said, there are plenty of other places full of smart people in Europe. I feel strongly about doing this as a political statement, or "voting with my feet". In Spain, brain drain is a serious problem that politicians pay attention to, so maybe it will give the UK's negotiators some pause when thinking about this.

so you're going to punish the brexit voter by doing exactly what they want and leaving

good job

Well, if what they want will harm them long term, why not?

I really feel for the raw deal Poles, Romanians and Bulgarians have had in the UK media. People act like these are primitive countries with hordes of would-be immigrants desperate to take advantage of the UK's "generous" (HA!) benefits system ... and it's simply not true. Charlie Brooker had an excellent piece on the news coverage, once the EU restrictions were completely lifted in the last few years: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jai4v4aNe-s

My partner is Hungarian, I'm English - the atmosphere in this country is fucking retarded, she has a degree in international finance and is just finishing qualifying as a ship broker, her education level exceeds mine and nearly everyone I know, she's lived here for 10 years, always paid taxes and is raising her son here but somehow she's a problem.

In the longer term we are looking at a move to Germany as she speaks fluent German (she worked as a translator), Hungarian and English and I'm a programmer.

I've never been particularly proud of been British (I didn't get to tick a box saying where I wanted to be born) but these days I am ashamed.

I don't know your situation, but I can't help thinking that some of the attitude you describe is more perception than reality.

One of the things even our current government has managed to say reasonably clearly is that people from the EU who are living and working here legally today will be welcome to stay post-Brexit. They're quibbling over details, because that's what politicians and diplomats do, but I don't think anyone serious is suggesting that someone like your partner or her son should lose out here.

Similarly, there are some very nasty racist/xenophobic people in the UK, and sadly there always have been, and it looks like there are similar unpleasant undercurrents in various other places around the EU as well. However, exactly none of the Leave voters I know would be among those people. There seem to be plenty of reasons people voted Leave that have nothing to do with the immigration issue or somehow wanting to "throw out" citizens from other EU states. One group of people I talked to before the vote were even tending towards Leave for exactly the opposite reason: they had nothing against reasonable immigration, but didn't see why the EU should have an advantage over, say, someone similarly qualified or connected but from the US or Australia, and they wanted the whole immigration and visa system to be forced to update for the 21st century. (Possibly an optimistic view of the likely outcome, but a reasonable enough position in principle, IMHO.)

I am not ashamed to be British because of the Brexit vote, but I am sad about how it's been portrayed particularly in the media and by a rather unpleasant part of the Remain contingent online, because I think it makes some people feel far less welcome here than they still are by most Brits.

That's how the life in the world with borders is. Anywhere in the world.

The situation when the color of your passport is more important that any of your eduction, qualifications and experience is the rule, not an exception. It is how the world works by default, for people outside IT, and for most people inside IT too.

I'm kind of annoyed how people from first-world countries are suddently striken with this revelation when it suddently affects somebody they know, shows how blind they were when it didn't.

My favourite thing has demonstrating to people how complicated it is for me (non-EU/UK) to go just about anywhere from the UK as a base (brexit makes no difference to this).

I originally wanted to live/work here, to the extent of job hunting and getting offered a job - I decided not to go ahead because I would have to go through hell every time I wanted to take a break/vacation and go somewhere.

Living/working in the schengen zone means I can just hop on a plane/train and go to a variety of places. Why wouldn't I do that?

The problem is that those are not native english speaking countries.

Barcelona is a great city, but if you don't speak any Spanish and/or Catalan (and don't intend to learn) then good luck building a life there. Life is more than work. The ability of the general population to speak acceptable English in say Spain, is abysmal.

And it's like that in many EU countries. The same applies to Paris, Munich, and Amsterdam. Some cities and countries are easier to live in for English speakers, and the UK in combination with Ireland is probably a prime example.

As a British person (who voted to remain), this makes me really sad to read. I think immigration helps to keep society from stagnating.

I feel like the UK will be diminished, and that it will have deserved it.

(Currently working on emigrating.)

>>> Berlin, Amsterdam, Paris, Dublin, Munich, Stockholm, Copenhagen, etc.

All cities that have another language than English, and don't have a quarter of the jobs in London.

>>> San Francisco or New York?

It's impossible to get VISA to live and work in the USA, for an European. Americans don't seem to realize how closed their country is.

You do realise Dublin is in Ireland and they speak English natively.

Also, one can easily live in Berlin with just English (as long as you don't need to interact with government too much)

or you know, live a little and learn a language (or enough to get by).

If you follow closely the UK government's positions and actions for the last 2 years, it's only logical to assume that the outcome will be negative. The only question is how much negative. ( hint: a lot )

As an EU national who came to the UK 5 years ago, I'm in the process of preparing to leave in a year.

Already numbers show that even if the outcome is vague, a large percentage is alrady leaving ( mainly low-wage workers that are affected from a weak GBP )

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-24/immigrati...

Now imagine what happens when people realise they'll need a Visa or getting a new passport and rejecting their own. I'd certainly leave. My bet is that a 30~50% of EU nationals will leave within the next 5 years, which is a huge blow to London and the UK.

Flipside is that the UK still has one of the most interesting tax systems in Europe aside from Monaco, (London and UK) property just got 30% cheaper for those not earning in pounds and London is still a global prime city (Brexit or not, don't really see that changing).

The country will be fine in the end. If anything, with how things are going, they'll probably end up either 1) not leaving (not that likely), or 2) end up with a very similar deal to what they have now (a lot more likely). But it will take years to figure things out and put it all together in a deal.

It makes no sense whatsoever for both sides to be mad at each other -- the EU and UK make good trading partners, part of the EU or not.

> It makes no sense whatsoever for both sides to be mad at each other -- the EU and UK make good trading partners, part of the EU or not.

It doesn't. But that's the thing, the actors here are not in for the greater good like you. They have selfish micro-perspectives and all they care is maintaining power => votes. So for the particular UK government, priority is satisfying their voters. And those voters are ... not that smart or aware of how economies/countries work.

Again, look at what they say, and then look at what they do, since the campaign for Brexit started. Common sense is the thing that you will not find. Unfortunately.

> The country will be fine in the end.

Yeah, the sky will not fall. Everything will be "fine".

> As long as high paying jobs exist

Reading the news and from rumors, companies are planning to move away or at least to keep London on hold and instead hire people somewhere else.

Brexit is also weakening the pound, which means that is much easier for European companies to be competitive with London salaries.

I've been in London for almost 4 years and I've a very good position so I'll probably stick around for a while and see what happens. In the meantime, I'm having a look for better opportunities somewhere else.

Except London is Apha++ city. Besides NYC nothing comes close to its power and influence.

Here's my take as a Mancunian, now living in London, whose career also took in trying to help the Manchester tech scene in various forms.

Some years ago I was involved in various projects to help make Manchester and the wider North West "the Silicon Valley of Europe". Yorkshire had similar programs. No doubt Germany, Italy, Estonia, Spain, they all have very same-ish intentions. The deal is they all go to the European Development Fund, say "Hey, look at this impoverished area, give us some money and we'll do things to lift them out of the doldrums!", and each programme has limited success.

Over five years ago I was offered a job in London and moved. It worked out for the best. I realised quite quickly the London market was prepared to pay me quite well in comparison to the Manchester market.

I went back to Manchester after a few months and met with directors, founders and entrepreneurs and explained how they could make Manchester the Silicon Valley of Europe without any EDF funding or major programmes. The solution was quite simple:

Pay the best rates in Europe.

They looked aghast as I explained: if you want the best companies, you have to have the best people and processes as well as the best ideas. To attract them, you have to compete with the best salaries. Sure, you can hire "good enough", but then you must realise you are going to get "good enough" people, and that might be the difference between a lifestyle business and running a unicorn.

Either way, the differential between Manchester and London was too high. I was a CTO of a company paying graduates what Manchester firms were prepared to pay Senior Developers. In fact, I actually saw one firm advertise for a CTO at a rate that I would be hard pushed to recruit for in London as a junior developer role.

The directors explained to me this was unthinkable: their business model relied on the cheaper costs of doing business in Manchester, that they provided a cost-effective solution to what they perceived as the "London madness". I told them to watch and wait and see: London would continue to leap ahead, Manchester would flounder, and they would all see the problem ahead of them.

I even told other developers they should move. "Too expensive" they told me. OK, the rents are high, it's true. But I can earn 2x-3x as much as I can in Manchester down here, and my food, entertainment and other ancillary costs are no more than 1.5x-2x what they would be in Manchester: in real terms as a percentage of income, living costs in London are actually lower. And in one interesting case - heating bills - the temperatures being 1C-2C warmer down here meant that my bills were literally pound-for-pound cheaper.

Everybody told me I was wrong, that the cheaper economies of Manchester led to higher living standards, to better companies, to companies more likely to last than the "silliness" of London.

We're five years on. The data suggests that I was right, everybody I spoke to in Manchester was mistaken, and London continued to outgrow and eat everything in sight. Until last June and the Brexit referendum, where the non-Metropolitan majority decided to shoot the economy in the foot in resentment of the Metropolitan-elite's successes.

There is much we need to do to prepare for the future, but I sense the answer remains the same:

Pay. People. More. Money.

It has consistently worked in every territory it has been tried in, in part because in the past the local circumstances allowed for high incomes due to the unique proposition of the area. We're now working in a global industry where people can work anywhere.

If you want to catch up to California, steal their people by paying them at least the same salaries. If you want to catch up to London, do the same.

Interesting - the cost of living (i.e. rent) is so absurdly high in London, and so much less in other cities, that you could have a better lifestyle there on a much lower salary. But I can imagine not everyone does the maths and people will still flock to the higher pay checks.

Exactly, what matters is the money left on your bank account when everything has been paid.

I have saved far more in London than I ever could in Manchester.

Living costs in Manchester took out about 85% of my pay each month. In London it's more like 75%. Why? The salaries are vastly higher for the same job, it outpaces living costs.

Do you honestly think we're all idiots and hadn't done the maths?

If you have saved more in London than in Manchester then I don't understand the reason of your comment as this is what I explicitly stated in mine: the paycheck doesn't matter.

If you saved more with a bigger paycheck, that's good. If you saved more with a smaller one, that's equally good.

Did you read my post? I directly call out living costs as a poor argument. Rent is high - it's the worst one of the lot. My rent is about 2x what an equivalent place in Manchester would cost me. My salary is 2x-3x what Manchester will pay me.

And I get to live on the outskirts of a city that holds some of the finest museums, galleries, theatres, bars and restaurants on Earth.

I'd actually like to get the data on this, because I don't see it. Housing in London is exorbitant not to mention commute times and travel costs in my experience outweigh the the difference in living costs you mention.

I highly recommend the metropolitan line. I'm living in a nice 1 bed in Harrow for £995 a month (not cheap but not a massive stretch for me). The fast met line in the morning can have me in Liverpool street within 45 minutes from leaving mine. As fond as I am of hating on London to my friends, I would be worse off moving out to take a job at half the salary and unless I could walk to work within 30 minutes, I think the london transport network is very hard to beat.

I live in near London Bridge for just a bit more than double that, in a two bed, sharing with partner and daughter.

The prices on the edges have gone up much faster than the middle, it's worth considering living centrally.

On the outskirts I don't feel like you get the benefits of living in the city, I may as well live actually outside.

Just to expand, to live and commute it's more like: £995 + £200 (council tax, utilities and Internet) + £216 (monthly travel card) = £1,411?

The data would strongly suggest he's an outlier (as are those fortunate enough to be employed in extremely lucrative jobs that don't exist outside of London, or where London-based firms have specialisms or connections which justify charging clients much higher fees than their regional counterparts) Major employers with fixed pay scales, for example, tend to pay a "London weighting" of £1-7k[1] which doesn't get close to covering housing cost differences and don't have trouble hiring for London positions.

There might be more interesting work and work far more specialised to your skillset than that available in most cities outside of London, but there's also more competition for it from a workforce that doesn't mind renting rooms rather than buying houses and not even considering owning a car.

[1] e.g. http://www.lboro.ac.uk/news-events/news/2016/july/london-wei...

As someone who lives in Liverpool and works in London, I can see a lot of what you are saying but I don't think it is solely related to tech it's the entire economy working off the idea that they can have a cost advantage over London and the broader southern region.

My personal preference for a re-balancing is to make travel faster and more economical across the entire country, I live in Liverpool and spend 2 nights in London, it's a pain but the salary offsets the frustration, and I'd love to see people be able to make that choice and bring more competition to the regions; and to expand a fibre network so that remote work can be seen to be more feasible.

> My personal preference for a re-balancing is to make travel faster and more economical across the entire country, I live in Liverpool and spend 2 nights in London, it's a pain but the salary offsets the frustration

You appear to be an example out of HS2's marketing literature!

Out of interest, what are the attitudes to HS2 in Liverpool? Do people talk about it at all.

People talk about it thinking that it will come to Liverpool and it's not, as far as I understand it.

The entire hs2 thing will probably bring hour commutes to London (not from Liverpool) but I full expect to have to pay a premium which means the value becomes questionable imo.

Ah, yes, I just read about it, as you say HS2 doesn't connect directly into the city centre, that would require HS3, or the '20 miles more' link (http://www.20milesmore.com)

The ultimate time saving would be to reduce Liverpool to London travel from about 2h 10m to about 1h 10m, with the standard HS2 'classic compatible' network (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#/media/File:HS2_c...) doing about half of that, and the HS3/20MM link the rest.

The extra link also would provide much greater capacity improvements, whereas HS2 on its own wouldn't do too much on that account.

Still, the HS2 improvement is worth having, and it seems inevitable that once that is built, the extra link will follow. Personally I think they should be building HS3 right now, in parallel.

That sounds simple enough but I don't think you've factored in the long term state this transition would converge to in terms of effect on the local population.

Talent pull drives up prices, predictably displacing the local population. London to an extent already has seen this with the result now spreading to neighbouring areas (Milton Keynes, Beds, Slough).

Geographically, northern and midland cities tend to have far smaller centres with satellite villages linked by bus systems.

>If you want to catch up to California, steal their people by paying them at least the same salaries. If you want to catch up to London, do the same.

Salary is probably the prime component that people use in their interpretation of quality of life. It's a raw number so you can make trivial comparisons. But you can probably steal people away from London and the Bay Area if you offer a better QoL across the board.

Manchester can never do this because of the shitty weather. Barcelona, Amsterdam, and Côte d'Azur are probably the only places in Europe suited to take over.

Manchester weather must be pretty bad then, because I looked into Amsterdam and the weather is worse than London.

I'd prefer to see better jobs than QoL - me and my girlfriend have been looking to move out of London and we'd love to go to Amsterdam. It would mean taking a more rudimentary position in both our professions (front end and data scientist) than what we get in London.

>I'd prefer to see better jobs than QoL

Job satisfaction is a factor in QoL, I guess.

Manchester weather is better than you'd think, and within an hour you can be in the Lake District, Snowdonia, Pennines/Yorkshire Dales or Peak District depending on which direction you head.

Yes, it's not as sunny as Barcelona. But it's not the torrential hole that most people imagine. It actually rains more in the Bay Area, particularly in San Francisco as a total rainfall, it's just that in Manchester the number of days it rains are higher.

It's not just the rain and the spit that just hangs in the air. It's also the depressing overcast skies.

http://www.manchester.climatemps.com/precipitation.php http://www.san-francisco.climatemps.com/precipitation.php

Hours of sun vs cloud for Manchester is a big deal. In the winter you only have 8 hour of possible light and the ~90% of it is covered by clouds.

I'm not sure how to reply because you've come off a bit aggressive in other posts. We of course agree it worked out for you and probably for other CTOs!

You may be able to earn 2x-3x, but I can not believe most people can. Indeed lists the average Senior Software Engineer salary in London at £59.5k and Manchester £46k.

Are you suggesting most jobs in Manchester paying £40k pay £80-120k in London?

I don't think indeed is representative.

https://www.cwjobs.co.uk/salary-checker/average-tech-salary

Lists average salary for central London as £77k vs £58k for Manchester — still not 2-3x though. However these figures aren't representative of the actual market.

Due to the UK's peculiar tax laws developers exist here in two classes: the contractors and the permies. A contractor typically makes 1.5-2x the equivalent full-time salary.

There's contractors in both cities but from experience I bet London has a much higher % who are contractors. Furthermore while the median contractor rate within London might only be 20-30% higher than outside, there's a whole market at the top end (the £500-1000/day folk) that doesn't exist or is very rare elsewhere.

Didn't mean to imply Indeed was representative (but I can see how my wording suggests so), it was just the first thing I checked. Thanks for the other data points.

And yes, contractors vs non-contractors, finance vs other sectors. This is why detail is useful when talking about salaries.

> Pay. People. More. Money.

The problem is that this has really bad social consequences. People look at the new high-tech economy as invasive. In the beginning, it's not a big deal - a few unfamiliar faces, and the town treasury finally has a surplus year, so everybody wins, right? But when the higher salaries start to pull up the cost of living, pretty soon everybody who grew up there starts to feel squeezed, and resentment grows. The town's no longer recognizable.

The global economy's been throwing money at the Gulf States for decades now. And the wealth is pretty evident in places like Dubai. But when the oil money dries up, Dubai will turn into a ghost town, because the underlying social drivers of underdevelopment were never addressed. "My grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel." -Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum

If you want to catch up to California, you have to nurture local talent. For sure, you have to give it not just the proper funding, but also the proper human resources from abroad, to give the benefit of their experience. But the growth must always have a local flavor, taking from and giving back to the local community, if it's going to be sustainable. Otherwise, it'll all just brain drain when the global economy changes course and faraway opportunity calls.

The problem is, nothing pays other than IT in the modern world. So it's either stagnation or invasion by IT. I'm not sure how the given town will no longer be recognizable - there's not enough people who do IT for that.

Who said California was sustainable? I think it never was. It was always fueled by brain drain. Never by local talent.

If you're building somethind sustainable you're playing a different game and you'll never catch up.

> Who said California was sustainable? I think it never was. It was always fueled by brain drain. Never by local talent.

It's important to note though how/why California's growth was fueled by brain drain. Why did all these brains come to the Bay Area? If you think historically, where most of the incumbent money and players were, you would think that the talent would've gone to Seattle, Detroit, or New York, maybe Research Triangle Park.

The brain drain flowed to Northern California because of the area's openness and counter-culture. That's what allowed people to challenge the status quo through entrepreneurship and find like-minded people willing to get on board with that vision. And that's why, even as money becomes more readily available world-wide for IT entrepreneurship, and the Bay Area becomes less and less affordable, people will still keep coming out to the Bay. What sustained the flow of brain drain fuel to the Bay Area was the local culture, not the money - the money just sought that culture.

I'm not sure about that. Bay Area had Shockley Semiconductor and then eventually Intel. If you don't have something like that, counterculture won't help.

And Intel came out of Fairchild Semiconductor, which also had roots in Shockley Semiconductor, and William Shockley came out to the Bay Area from Bell Labs to be closer to his ailing mother, being that he grew up in Palo Alto, the son of a mining engineer father and a Midwestern transplant mother who came to Stanford to study and became a mining surveyor. Which makes William Shockley not just home-grown talent, but talent that brought the benefit of decades of research out in New York back with him. Further to the point, Shockley couldn't convince any of his colleagues out in Bell Labs to join him, since they didn't have the same roots in the Bay Area and the Bay Area didn't have the same draw then as it does now. But Shockley put in the leg work and recruited from the experience-less - the rest is history.

The point is that money didn't bring Shockley back to the Bay Area, and Shockley/Fairchild/Intel didn't spring out of nothing.

It's not just economics, it's quality of life, the commute, the noise, for yourself and family. That's not the same as living standards though. Is London more like SV in that it's okay for younger developers, but struggles to attract when the developer gets older and has more of a life?

That's the main thing I've heard - living in London has a worse quality of life than in other cities, it appears. I've heard young developers who love the vibrant city of London and I've met older developers who moved from London for this reason.

There are some great parts of London to raise a family. It is a huge city with something for everyone after all. Admittedly the family friendly areas are at the top end of the price range, but the hope is that if you've been on a good technology salary for a while and have saved and invested wisely then they shouldn't be completely out of reach when the time comes.

I very much agree.

The salaries in most of the UK are a total joke. The best people gravitate to London, leave the country or head out of technical roles for a decent salary.

The state of tech hiring in the UK is abysmal - low pay, low skill and low productivity all add up to poorly performing, mediocre companies that barely survive.

The whole culture needs a change - valuing and rewarding talented and productive developers is a necessary first step.

As you say, there's a virtuous cycle, a highly productive location can pay higher wages, that attracts more talent, which makes the companies more productive and more able to pay higher salaries.

But there's also a chicken and egg situation, in the sense that London became highly productive in the first place for a variety of reasons, not just the mechanism we're talking about. It has good access to talent simply because of its large population, with 2-3x the labour market of any other UK city. That population is also highly educated because of the effects of wider economic productivity. It also is a global financial centre, so has significant access to capital. And a major corporate centre, so has a lot of high paying clients for software.

The mechanism you're talking about is there, but ultimately you could make the same point for any city in the world. You surely could not make any town or city an amazing software centre just by all the companies doubling wages. The specific mechanisms for software productivity are various, and they rest on top of a general base level of wider economic productivity. If a city's going to be a major software centre it has to act on all fronts, specific and general.

So you get these kind of proposals like linking together Leeds, Manchester, Sheffield and Liverpool to try to create one labour market, which I think we all should support.

As a developer in London I take issue with "skilled workers who would be paid relatively well wherever they live".

Yes, I could do python contracting outside of London, but there aren't nearly as many.

Most of them pay less and would need to take ones further away (so need a car).

While I like London, I would love to move out but there isn't enough well paid work for my skillset to justify it.

I'm a US citizen freelance developer living in the UK (not London) and freelance is the only way I can justify living here. It seems like tech jobs in the UK (and EU generally) pay almost half as much as in the US, so by taking a job here I'd be leaving money on the table. From what I can see, the tech jobs all pay £45k on the high end, whereas similar roles in the US would be $110-120k. I haven't done all the calculations of differences in living costs / etc, but it seems like a stark difference in pay.

What is your experience with this apparent discrepancy?

As a UK contractor who has worked in Australia and the US - yeah what the hell?

The money for permanent staff here is derisory, it's terrible.

I contract, consult and freelance wherever I can because that is the only way I can come close to what I earned in Aus.

It seems like developers here are really undervalued. Though given how god-awful some of the permanent staff I've worked with recently seem to be, maybe it's a case of low pay and low expectations in much of the industry.

I've heard this magical number of 45k for software engineers a lot since I came to London. I'm on 60k, without being overly specialised and not working for the financial industry either. Most of the jobs that are being sent to me by recruiters say 60k-80k so I really don't know where these 45k jobs are? I'd really like to know. Having said that, being Swiss, the salaries in London still make me angry. At home I'll get 90k-100k (GBP) and taxes in Zurich are half of what they are in London. All things considered I made twice as much as here. On the plus side you get to live in a pretty cool city which is nice while you are still young and don't have any responsibilities.

Really? You think you can "easily" get 90-100k and also pay less taxes than in the UK? Sounds exciting. Can you point me to those jobs?

( I'm seriously asking, want to know where to go after I leave the UK )

Also, look at contracting in the UK. Tax is less than 20%, and day rates can go pretty high if you learn how and where to look.

If you have a degree and 3+ years of experience, you'll find a lot of these. Just check on Glassdoor, it lists the average as 90k GBP. From the top of my head the following should pay above average

Finance: UBS, Credit Suisse, Swiss Re

Consulting/Services providers: Deloite, IPT, TI&M, Even Accenture pays decent if you have a few years of experience, Stemford Consultants (that's more contracting though, but pay is certainly more than 100k)

Tech: Google, Microsoft, Swisscom, Avaloq (the last two are arguably not tech :p)

My problem with contracting is that it's often not too interesting and I also really appreciate a good social work environment. If I can have both, I'm in.

Sites like glassdoor are a bit misleading in my experience.

Is there any website to look for Swiss tech jobs specifically?

And what's the tax story there in a few words?

To be honest I never had to actively look for a job so I don't know where to look. I grew up, studied and worked there until I moved to London so I was always approached for jobs.

If you have an income of 120k you can deduct something like 10k so you'll be taxed on 110k which would lead to 20k taxes (in Zurich... other places have lower/higher taxes) Mind you, health insurance is not included and will be another 3k-4k (for a young male). If you have kids taxes will be lower. (all in CHF)

Out of interest, what makes you think UBS is above average? I interviewed there recently and the emphasis was "our benefits are remote working and life work balance" - which is HR speak for low salary (though I do appreciate both).

I really don't like UBS, but my friends there all make +/- 120k CHF (might be that my conception is wrong though and that is average). In addition to that they get to "buy" up to two weeks of vacation which means they can go away for 7 weeks a year (plus whatever overtime they can compensate).

To be clear, I meant UBS in London - I assume you're referring to UBS Zurich. It's quite common for Zurich offices to have a +20% cost of living adjustment vs London, so that figure equates about 80k GBP adjusted which is about in line with what most IB perm devs will make.

Can you share your thoughts on where and how to look?

I don't know where to look since I never had to. Personally I would stay away from the financial industry. Most jobs include politics, frequent restructuring, mediocre tech, etc... the ususal. (They have their perks too, see above answer).

There are some companies that came out of ETH/UZH like Scandid or Teralytics. Lately there have been quite a few fintech and blockchain startups but you never know how long they're around for. And then there is Google, of course. But generally I have to say that one of the reasons I came to London is because there is A LOT more tech here. The majority of the software engineering jobs in Zurich are in some way or another connected to the financial industry.

Tax is only "less than 20%" if you pay yourself less than 40k. You can easily end up paying 40%+ with the dividend tax, unless you're less than honest with your expenses.

Outside of London £45k is towards the higher end. I do see posts in Hampshire at the 60-70 level, but then I also see people trying to hire 'senior' staff for 30k.

I have no doubt that those posts get filled too, and that the company gets someone poorly skilled with low output. And then they think that's what development staff are and never raise their expectations or salaries...

45k is high end not in London.

£45k seems way off to me. Starting out of university in London is around £30-35. With a couple years experience you can be on £45k quite easily. Also worth noting there are a huge number of contract positions in London paying £300-500 per day. There is a difference in salary between US/UK but I think it's that way for every industry here.

As mentioned in the other comments. Switzerland is the only place where salaries are on par with the US. But you can't just work here if you are not a EU passport holder or married to one.

I contract in hampshire. I'm more of a C/C++ guy, with some Java and Python thrown in.

While I could probably make a fair amount more in London, and I do have to commute (often 45 minutes-ish), I've made in the region of £400 a day for the last few years, less in some contracts, more in others. Given the relative cost of living, and the relative quality of life (I'm no longer a fan of huge cities) I think I'm ahead of the game.

I guess it's same with Paris in France, Buenos Aires in Argentina and Moscow in Russia. With notable exceptions of Germany and Italy to lesser extent.

Of course you would want people and jobs to be spread more fairly, but it's just not what happens in a post-industrial market economy.

The claim that public transport investment is relatively even across the UK doesn't seem right. Anecdotally it has always seemed that London has had a lot more investment in infrastructure, and figures from the IPPR think-tank say that the spend is about £1,500 greater per capita in London compared to the rest of the country.

Is there any evidence to backup this claim within the article or have I misinterpreted?

Yeah I also find that hard to believe, crossrail alone is more investment other cities would get combined. I guessing they're not taking into account investment from TFL, grants and private entities. I could be wrong though

The IPPR figures come from a limited dataset, most of the difference is down to Crossrail (£15bn over 10 years), but for instance Network Rail has a £3bn a year infrastructure budget, Highways England another £3bn, plus the other strategic road authorities in other parts of the UK, the local authorities that manage all local roads, most of that spending is not covered.

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