On Journeys
lcamtuf.blogspot.com
lcamtuf.blogspot.com
I'm very happy to hear he has accomplished his goal of becoming an American.
Fast forward 19 years, and the impression still stands.
When I first read his blog post I added an item to my todo list to write a lengthy reply. I never did, and now I think it is time to do so — but it will be in Polish, as it is mostly Polish people who might be interested.
I think Michał has an extreme view of both the United States (which is not the paradise he paints it to be) and Poland (which isn't nearly as bad as he describes). As someone who has lived both in Poland and the US, I came to opposite conclusions: I would much rather live in Poland. I could live anywhere (I don't have the visa problem like he did), but my choice is to live in Poland.
I am puzzled by his extremely negative experiences. People all around me get paid good money for doing extremely interesting work. The money isn't necessarily the same as in the Silicon Valley, but it goes a long way here: living in Poland (even in the largest cities) still isn't as expensive as in Western Europe. All in all, as a young person entering adult life, you will be much better off here than in the US, assuming you are a highly-skilled professional (which he is the extreme definition of!).
I also find it disconcerting that he begins with a historical note, describing Poland's struggle for independence, and then follows with a description of how he basically said "I don't care" and moved out. It is worth considering what happens to countries where most people make a similar decision.
But most importantly, I don't understand Michał's negative viewpoint. My experiences have been very different: my standard of living here in Poland is really good. I don't want to describe what I dislike about the US, especially since Michał does not seem to even consider criticism ("no matter how smug the critics are"), so I'll just say that it can look very, very different from a different person's point of view.
Would you mind exchanging views and advice on the matter? I have some questions :). Probably off-thread is better, a starting point could be contacting me at m8r-6hvvy11@mailinator.com, i can give you a real email address from there. No pressure though, i understand if you don't feel like it.
I'm still a few months away from the actual plunge, though.
If you travel to Poland with a pile of money, the living is far from difficult. It's quite a great place to go on vacation. (Especially if you already know the language like myself.) But taxes there are high and many people find themselves in poverty.
I agree that it's worth betting on Poland's future. CD Projekt RED is leading the pack in bringing new tech industry to Poland, for instance. I can only see a brighter future.
At the same time, I don't want to live there. Not yet.
As for taxes and iPhones, I pay 19% income tax, and when I buy an iPhone I deduct a) 23% VAT, b) 19%, because that is a business expense. So, I don't see how one could say "taxes there are high".
It's difficult to argue about the merit of subjective experiences, but I think that two things are worth emphasizing.
First of all, my experiences are colored by growing up in relative poverty in the 80s and 90s; I explicitly acknowledge that the Poland I left behind many years ago is not the Poland of today. I think that you are painting a rather rosy picture by implying purchasing power parity between Poland and the US - but I don't think I would be unhappy still living there.
Secondly, the appeal to some sort of a patriotic duty to stay in your country of birth is an interesting conversation that I had with several folks before. In essence, my take on this is that the allegiance you have to your children is much stronger than that to your ancestors and the historical circumstances of the place where you were born. It's a complex topic, but I think there are many equally defensible views.
Finally, as for your comment about "not considering criticism" - I think you may be reading too much into this sentence; some of the social critiques of the US that are prevalent in Europe are quite valid; many others are based on smug oversimplifications. The only thing I'm saying in the quoted sentence is that I wanted to find out for myself =)
Anyway, we won't have a very meaningful discussion on HN, but if you'd like to chat, please do drop me a mail :-) I think our views are probably more aligned than it may seem.
I posted a reply, because I wanted people to see that there is another viewpoint — and one quite different from yours.
I will only pick up two things to discuss here:
* "Purchasing power parity" is something everybody understands differently. Even reading the reples in this thread, people talk of things like "weaker economy". Economy doesn't matter. What matters is how you (the reader, personally) will be able to live. And most people reading HN would be able to live here very well indeed. It is not very likely that you'll become a millionaire by founding a startup (though it's not unheard of), but it is quite likely that you will live in a nice, clean and safe city with lots of green around you, you will be able to afford good education for your kids, if you have a medical problem it will be taken care of without you going bankrupt, and that you'll be able to work on interesting problems.
* I specifically avoided mentioning the word "patriotism", but yes, that does play a part. And I do agree about the allegiance to your children. But even if you only think about the children — will you be raising them as Americans or Poles? Will you try to teach them Polish? I'm not saying you should, just pointing out that these are things to carefully consider. I certainly did.
I am looking forward to discussing this in the future — for now, Dear Deaders, please just remember that opinions are quite different on the subject!
Considering the not-so-well status of his family I think Michał like many from our country swallowed this "American dream" whole -- hook, line and sinker. These people are willing to defend it even if they are burned by it -- the "temporarily embarrassed millionaires" syndrome.
Yes, being brought up on the east side of Warsaw in a crime-ridden neighborhood with a family struggling from paycheck to paycheck can easily make a man jaded and grim. Here he is right.
But you, jwr, are right, he's grossly exaggerating. Poland has moved really far and really fast over last 11 years -- thanks to all the EU money. I fear the times the money would run out.
Still, it's a bit foolish (no offence intended) to even attempt praising it over Western Europe. Poland is still at the beginning on the road to a real democratic, prosperous country. Most of all we need to finally shed this conservative clot that's holding us back and sometimes even making us and object of ridicule in Europe.
To come back to the original topic, for me personally it has been really worrying for years that we look towards US with these dreamy, hungry eyes. Ever since the big transformation of the 90's we blindly copy and import wholesome their ideas never asking if we should.
We should really look more to our Western European friends or even more successful countries from our "bloc" (Slovenia, Czech Republic). There's still much to be done to improve our workers' rights, health care, social security, etc.
It's a false dichotomy between the US and Poland as we're basically gravitating to their end with the EU actually being on the opposite one.
While I don't want to debate my mindset or the motivations for the original blog post, I do want draw the attention to the closing comments at the bottom of the article :-)
In essence, I very much acknowledge that the Poland I left 15 years ago was not the same country it is today, and that it has changed in profound ways. Ultimately, the post is not an attempt to contrast the modern-day Poland and the modern-day United States; it is a personal story of getting out of the 90s Poland and finding happiness elsewhere.
Cheers!
But to be fair, the risk is not minuscule - for example the murder rate is 4-5 times higher in the US than it is in Europe. The only two times in my life I was close to being beaten up was during my few months visit to California.
As a matter of fact, I did, many years ago. Ultimately, I didn't go for it, but it was more a matter of circumstance than conviction. I think I would have been happy there.
The US is hardly the violent crime dystopia that some Europeans make it out to be (the overall crime stats don't really stand out compared to the rest of OECD), so this was never a compelling argument; healthcare, more so - although thankfully, the US is now getting a bit smarter about that, too.