Comment by erdo | Hacker News Reader

Comment by erdo | Hacker News Reader

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Personally speaking (and I say this as a Brit who really likes the US, and Americans in general whenever I meet them). I haven't tried to move to the US because of the slightly distasteful situation in terms of education, healthcare and social security, car dependence, weirdly low holiday allowance, Foxnews, QAnon, an alarming gun lobby, and the current republican party in general is quite quite shocking to me in it's transparent gaslighting, racism and anti-democratic (small d) tendencies. The UK has its fair share of opportunistic charlatans too of course, ahem. That's why I now live in mainland Europe, get great health care, fast trains, fast internet, good work life balance etc though I probably earn less than I would if I was in the US

There are plenty of good reasons to move [to the US] too of course, and I do know quite a few who have (including my sister who loves it, and I suspect is never going to move back to rainy Britain)

There might be another reason you don't see many brit developers in the US though, we probably just don't produce that many of them. I worked in London for 20 years and the typical dev team had less than 50% Brits in it even there. Looking at Hollywood we seem to produce a lot more actors that can do a passable American accent than developers.

I moved from the UK to the US 32 years ago (as a developer).

The most important thing to understand about actual life here is that while all the things you mention are true, real aspects of the USA, they are not necessarily notable aspects of your own day to day life here.

The US is enormously varied in terms of climate, geography, political inclinations, cost of living, and public provisioning. By choosing somewhat carefully, you can find yourself in a situation that either stares your list in the face, or makes it seem like a distant roar somewhere far over the horizon. A couple of years ago, I moved from Philadelphia (after 23 years there) to a small village in NM. This is a far greater change in my way of life and my experience of life than moving from the UK to the US ever was.

It is true that in the US you are essentially forced into more self-reliance for a number of aspects of your own well-being in a way that seems crazy from a UK/EU perspective. Most developers will do well enough to not suffer dramatically from this "design", but the question of other's suffering under it may come up, as might bad luck.

Hmm...I've worked in silicon valley (either there, or remote) for 25 years and have constantly run into brits.

The holiday thing isn't quite what it seems because while brits will write down the 1/2 day they took off to go to the dentist, Americans do not.

The racist/fascist thing is concerning, but the UK doesn't look so good these days either (Brexit, Boris, ...)

US seems to be doing like Churchill said : Always Do the Right Thing — After Exhausting All the Alternatives

Brits in white collar jobs don't take holiday to go to the dentist.

Brexit is neither fascist nor (intrinsically) racist. Boris certainly has some racist ministers working for him, and I don't doubt that he's casually racist; but then most people are, to some extent.

I worked in the US for a year. I'll never go back. I saw too many black kids lying on their faces by the side of the highway, with cops standing over them pointing pistols at them. I never saw a carload of white kids getting that treatment. This was a daily experience (and I was only on the highway for about 10 minutes daily). It's completely normal. I was regularly told that when I leave my home, I shouldn't walk past Nth St., because that's a "bad neighbourhood" (i.e. black).

My experience of living in US was restricted to Richmond, VA. I've been to other parts, but not lived in them.

Sure, UK cops are racist too. But somehow the US cops seem to get a free pass - it's almost as if they're hired to be racists and bullies.

Methinks your view of the US is way too based on what you read/watch on the internet.

It’s no different than the UK. I could say I don’t want to live there because of rampant alcohol abuse, random crime in London, racial strife from refugees, crazy politicians, insane media who focus too much on some old family with crowns.

But I know that’s not an accurate representation of the UK.

> I know that’s not an accurate representation of the UK.

Actually that's pretty accurate, from someone that lives here. There are some good points though, like basic human rights (e.g. abortion), which one cannot take for granted.

Or maybe you're not paying close enough attention.

A few tiny examples: Texas, a state larger than the UK, just became a state where any resident can sue anyone else that helps someone access an abortion after about 6 weeks of pregnancy (before a lot of people know they are pregnant) regardless of rape or incest and win up to $10,000 for doing so.

States all over the country are busy banning voting on a Sunday because after church is when a lot of black people vote.

The looser of the last election, is still claiming to have won it, and millions of people genuinely believe him.

No different to the UK? Maybe try Bolsanaro's Brazil but with a larger GDP

Edit: that Brazil comparison is hyperbole, I don't know enough about Brazil to say that anyway

If you think what you read online or see in the media isn't filtered to get the exact response you're demonstrating now, you're being fooled.

I'd invite you to turn off the computer, put down your phone and go out and enjoy life.

I don't really know what you mean, those are just facts, among many that exist whether I read about them or not. And American politics is fascinating to me, so I enjoy it.

American democracy is not out of the woods just because Bidden won, he has a healthy popular vote majority, but wafer thin control of the Senate. The two Democrat senators currently blocking reforms are from Republican leaning states so they're motivations are not typical for straight Democrats. Things very much hang in the balance at the moment. Republicans are busy gerrymandering their districts, so we could soon be back to Republican control of the House despite solid popular vote majorities for Democrats, at which point we can probably kiss goodbye to the US leading the world against climate change regardless of who's president.

Can I assume, that you don't know any of this because you enjoy "turning off your computer"? Then why comment about something you deliberately avoid learning about?

Your “facts” are actually carefully shaped narratives that come out of the shouting on social media and are based on a typically shallow understanding of the key issues and more based on sound bites than a carefully thought out belief structure.

The US seems like it’s unstable because that’s what gets clicks.

You can go back to any decade in the past 200 years and find outrageous “the sky is falling narratives”. Now is no different.

You dont want to live in the UK because the media obsession with the Royal Family?! That's hardly in the same category as the GP's concerns.

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