Ask HN: Is there a business for extracting US tech talent?

So exactly why would I want to go anywhere else where the compensation is much lower without the cost of living being lower and have higher taxes?

nativeit · 6 months ago

Better public services, free college, free healthcare, better urban planning, more robust protections for privacy, civil liberties, cleaner air and water, less caustic sociopolitical atmosphere, better quality-of-life metrics, better economic mobility, longer life expectancy, more cohesive communities, greater representation in the democratic process, more equitable pay standards, increased paid time off, literally any kind of standard maternal/paternal leave, better medical services, greater scores of general happiness and fulfillment, more stable economic policies, more stable legal frameworks, more like-minded cultural communities, increased freedom to travel to more diverse places with less costs and administrative burdens, stronger social safety nets, better retirement plans, nicer weather with fewer natural disasters, greater diversity in populations, expanded access to rich cultural experiences, more aesthetically pleasing architecture, greater access to "third places", more educated populations, less religious populations, less political polarization, and that's just the off-the-cuff obvious items. Some more subjective than others.

nativeit · 6 months ago

Lower violent crime rates, lower property crime rates, lower drug addiction rates, lower homeless rates, literally any kind of standard mental healthcare, better retirement facilities, subsidized childcare, subsidized geriatric care, less expensive medication, fewer guns, more EV infrastructure, literally any kind of broadly complete passenger rail network, even partially functional immigration systems, better K-12 education outcomes, lower housing costs, more progressive tax systems, and last (for this list) but absolutely not the least for this context: even a vague whiff of the sort of dynamism that made the Bay Area such an exciting place to live in the 1970s-90s, that has since been eroded into a self-satirizing caricature of itself, currently grappling with the loss of 0% interest rates by reverting to creative accounting, layoffs, rent-seeking from users and customers, shameless AI feature-bloat, and increasingly astounding levels of brazen monopolizing, corruption, and fraud.

Why, indeed?

scarface_74 · 6 months ago

And it’s “free” only because I would pay more in taxes and probably would take home a third of what I make now and I’m not even at FAANG (been there done that)…

And by stable economic policies do you mean “stagnant”? The EU couldn’t innovate its way out of wet paper bag.

We are talking about software developers. If you make and save enough money - you can create your own safety net.

And many countries in Europe are very much polarized if you are a Black person (https://fra.europa.eu/en/news/2023/black-people-eu-face-ever...)

And you 2/3rds consider themselves Christian - about the same as the US.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not rah rah rah America at all, I think the countries policies suck on a lot of levels and much of the population is overly religious, bigoted, and naive and cheering as their Dear Leader is taking away services they need just because he “owns the libs”. My still living parents grew up in the segregated South and my 6 foot 3 225 pound step son got crazy looks every time he stepped out of the house in our former home when we lived in what was a “sun down town” as recently as the mid 80s (yes this one https://youtu.be/WErjPmFulQ0?si=NN797D4aDsCGaItb).

But me personally and many of the people who post on HN and are in tech would be far worse off in any other country than here.

Actual US to EU transplant here, although not one who needed a visa. God bless Irish ancestry.

The most efficient way would be to simply let US citizens post a bounty for e.g. a successful job offer being extended their way from the European Union. When I think about the requisite legwork involved from my end, I come up with a rough goal of about $25,000 per job offer floated, not contingent on the person on the other end actually accepting the offer. (This is not a serious offer, please do not email me asking me to help you find a job.)

The reason the number is so high is because, frankly, it takes a lot of work to unearth opportunities like this which aren't already on the clearnet and inundated with applicants already. The dropping of the language barrier alone raises the competitive pressure on any job offer in Europe by an order of magnitude, in both salary and applicant quality.

Uniquely, US citizens get paid much more in almost every category than their European counterparts, so job offerers also have to factor in an exit risk they don't normally have to with applicants from e.g. Laos: the very real possibility that the starry-eyed rich kid shows up, spends 3 months living the way the Romans do, and then leaves because Rome kind of sucks compared to having a 401(k).

$25k doesn't seem that expensive when compared to, say, the opportunity cost of first learning e.g. passable professional German, which by itself takes about 1-2000 hours of one's free time. Someone getting paid even $50/hour = $100,000/year in the US would quickly eat way more cost going about getting here in such a roundabout way, and then they still have to find the visa grantor.

Again: This is not a serious offer. Please do not email me asking me to help you find a job. This was a thought experiment for curiosity's sake only.

dmitrygr · 6 months ago

> somewhere more stable and in line with their own values

Where else other than USA does tech pay such a multiple of median salary?

“Huff puff I’m going to leave” is easy. Finding somewhere to actually go isn’t.

Exactly and it’s not as if every other country and company in the world doesn’t value profits over everything else. They aren’t going to go on missionary trips feeding starving children.

Ocerge · 6 months ago

Not sure why you're being downvoted, we in the US are certainly not special in that regard.

drdunce · 6 months ago

Unfortunately, there isn't demand and there's no such thing as a high demand tech professional anymore. The EU is way over saturated with tech talent and that's unlikely to change.

0xfaded · 6 months ago

There are straightforward immigration paths to most of the desirable countries within Europe if you can land a job that pays a standard deviation above the mean, which most tech workers can. However, you're still looking at 1/4 of a silicon valley salary.

The game plan should really be more centered around making your money in the US and then moving for the better quality of life or to do something that aligns with your values. I'd say it's the moving wealth part where people are more likely to fall into traps (ever heard of an exit tax?), but even then you're probably still better off hiring a local account (cost me 2k when I first moved to Denmark, and another 2k when I left :facepalm:).

akg_67 · 6 months ago

There are subreddits dedicated to these kind of topics, for example /r/AmerExit /r/movingtojapan /r/expats (that I know of) with wealth of info. I am sure there are dedicated Facebook groups too. You most likely will find people and orgs that can help with migration in such targeted groups. As I understand, most desirable countries have seen multi-fold increase in inquiries and applications from US.

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muzani · 6 months ago

Singapore seems to be a "proxy" between east and west, specifically a way for Chinese companies like Bytedance to get American labor, and a way for American companies to get Chinese labor. Per capita, income is higher than the US. I don't know if tech itself pays better, but they seem to be able to match.

hiAndrewQuinn · 5 months ago