I live in the bay area, and like it here, but am starting to think it would be smart to get things lined up so that it would be possible to leave fairly quickly and establish a life in another country if necessary.
I'm looking for insights into what complications are likely to come up if I'm trying to flee at the same time as a large number of others. For example, that might make it a very bad time to try to sell your home.
Don't get me wrong: It's not because the situation isn't serious. However you're in "the bay area", as opposed to some backwater white-supremacy proto-ethnostate. You already have neighbors and state legislators that are opposed to whatever is coming down the dumbest-timeline pipe, make your stand with them.
Not only will locally organizing give better results, it'll cost you a lot less in time, energy, and money than trying to emigrate in a panic.
Also if the US collapses into several states, you no longer have a passport. There is a precedent for this (Soviet Union) where "russians" found themselves essentially stateless. So unless you have a second nationality, your best bet is to stay where you are to ensure the new nationality stick to you (hopefully).
If you have a second passport, residence and home, you probably wouldn't be asking this question anyway. Preparing such an infrastructure is out of reach for most people, unfortunately.
Or upon reflection are you fleeing because your general anxiety is high (totally get it) and the flight or fight response is all consuming ? Because there is no way to flee that.
* Political speech starts getting monitored and targeted for detention/arrest
* Immigration into other countries gets backlogged
* Other countries stop letting Americans in entirely as a sanction
* Border controls become a lot more restrictive
Is any of this actually going to happen in the next few years? Who the fuck knows. But the likelihood just increased substantially.
LMAO!
If you have not yet found a country that suits you, make time to travel now to explore some options based on your criteria, residency, and work visa constraints (digital nomad visa vs non lucrative passive income, for example).
Depending on your means, there are many countries you can purchase outright for under $200k. Mortgages can usually be had with 40% down. Renting is almost always an option.
Line up housing (rent or own), income, and residency. Have a plan what you’ll sell, ship or store, travel plans to move, etc. Execute plan when your risk appetite is exceeded.
Canada: https://www.jobbank.gc.ca/findajob/foreign-candidates
Estonia: https://workinestonia.com/
Germany: https://make-it-in-germany.com/
Denmark: https://workindenmark.dk/
Finland: https://workinfinland.com/
UK: https://findajob.dwp.gov.uk/
Sweden: https://arbetsformedlingen.se/
New Zealand: https://www.live-work.immigration.govt.nz/work-in-new-zealan...
https://old.reddit.com/r/AmerExit/
I have made a few preparations since then.
I always keep a few thousand euros in cash at home, enough to keep me going with a frozen bank account. Even when all goes well, ATM limits can be restrictive. In a worse situation, money can be hard to access.
I keep a bit of money with my family abroad. Enough to soften the landing even if I arrive with just the clothes on my back.
I have citizenship on another continent. I refused to become a EU citizen until I was guaranteed dual citizenship.
I keep a lot more liquid assets than most. I would prefer to keep more of it out of Europe but that is not so easy.
My pension is not tied to any country. This was an important feature for me.
I can work from anywhere. I can leave early while most people would wait until things get really bad.
That being said, I try not to worry too much. These things are set up precisely so I don't have to. They're a sort of insurance policy.
I am supportive of my friend and sympathetic to their concerns, yet even if things got much worse my inclination would be to stay and engage with friends and family who have ideas that I strongly disagree with.
The problem is that I’m both too rich and too poor to do it. If I had nothing, no problem. If I were rich, I could afford the attorneys and other professionals needed to live abroad without getting jammed up.
Some people pull off the nomad lifestyle. That’s cool, but it really depends on stability here in the United States. You could be living your best life in Bali, but living at the whim of policy in Washington.