I was shocked when I received the call that my application for citizenship under the holocaust reparation program was accepted and they’re ready to give me aa full EU passport within a couple weeks.
This has been a dream of mine for quite some time but I had never really taken the time to think of the short, medium and long-term implications for all this.
I am not married and have friends spread through both continents. I work with software so working in Europe wouldn’t be too hard.
I’m not just got to pick up all my stuff and hop on a plane next month but I need to start planning some scenarios, maybe involving spending 3-6 months over there at first to see how I like it then going from there.
I used to work for a software company in Houston. They asked me to work from the UK office for a few months and sorted out the work permit. After that I started the procedures needed to move here full time and I’ve now been here over 25 years.
One thing to note is that since Brexit your EU passport won’t automatically let you work in the UK. If an English speaking country is a requirement then you’ve still got Ireland. All the European IT people I work with have good Engish but I don’t know if companies would want to take on someone with no local language skills.
Not tried it personally, but there’s certainly places that would be fine with it; I have friends in Berlin, the Netherlands, and assorted Nordic countries who moved there either for work -mostly in IT- or moved with a partner who was local, and had no trouble getting work, despite initially not speaking the local language. It does vary a lot by area though.
My experiences are more like @kferr 's— accept the job first (assuming you have decided it is a good move), then remove. The only difference seems to be that if you already have citizenship, there is no need to sort out a work permit first.
People do hire foreigners (can a bit by industry), so I suppose they would not necessarily expect you to arrive speaking completely fluent German (or whatever), but I would budget quite a bit of time for language classes.
Congratulations! With passports, the more you have, the better. Legitimate ones are the best.
Concerning the language, learning a language in the country they speak it is fun, and you get to know people. There are many sectors where you can work in English but you will feel better if you don’t feel lost going out after work. Speaking the local language makes everything easier.
I did not just mean at work—imagine trying to sort out your gas bill, or a problem with your bank account, if you do not speak Italian (mutatis mutandis)
I live in the UK, but have worked on several software projects in continental Europe. Being an English-only speaker won’t be an issue workwise, unless you’re in a role where you frequently interact with end users.
If you try to go fully local, you’ll probably want to learn the language. But if you’re only planning for 3-6 months, at least initially, you’ll probably just want to adopt an expatriate lifestyle. How easy that will be will really depend on which country you’re looking to go to.
I currently live in the US and have done so for 4 years, but I still have to file and pay taxes in Norway. I’m considered resident in both countries for tax purposes, but the main one is the US, so I only have to pay Norwegian taxes on income made in Norway. If I’d sold my apartment there when I moved, instead of renting it out, I could have stopped filing last year (I think). Once I’m no longer consider resident in Norway for tax purposes I cannot stay in Norway more than 61 days total in a calendar year or I’ll have to pay taxes in Norway again.
Now Norway is not a EU country, but it is in the EEC, and this is still the kind of stuff you should look into and figure out ahead of time. Though if it was Norway you would be going to, as you had less than 10 years of residency your residency for tax purposes would end immediately once you left again. I don’t know if that is true of all EU countries
Nitpick: The EEC no longer exists - it has become the EU - and, when it did exist, Norway was never in it. Norway is in the EEA. I make this nitpick not to be nitpicky but because, if the OP or anyone else is doing their own research, confusing the EEC and the EEA could lead them down an awful lot of blind alleys.
As for tax residency, income tax is a competency of the Member States, not of the EU or the EEA, so each EU/EEA country has its own rules about who is, and who is not, a tax resident. Then there’s a network of double taxation agreements to sort out the issues that arise when somebody has income or other financial issues in more than one country. But a US person contemplating a stint in Europe won’t generally need to worry about double taxation agreements between different European countries; just about the double taxation agreement between the US and the country they contemplate living in.
That’s a completely correct correction. I’ve had so little reason to discuss the EEA in English that I forget the appropriate TLA and the Norwegian name would translate directly to "European Economic Cooperation-area.
They do - Austria does, and I believe Spain too. I remember chatter about Poland and Greece doing something similar, but this was years ago and I’m not sure what came of it.
Bear in mind that the EU isn’t like the Federal government in the US - there are many areas of competence that are simply not the business of the EU institutions.
You need to check the expectations and requirements of its citizens of the country whose citizen you now are, and those any other member state you want to work in has of workers from other member states. They may well differ in various ways.
It would be worth looking for websites and forums for expatriates in each country.
Yeah, but the passport will identify you as a citizen of the Union and enable you to exercise your rights as such throughout the Union. “EU Passport” is a common shorthand for “passport of a Member State of the European Union”.
In addition to the countries already mentioned, I think Hungary does, for the descendants of Hungarian Jews who were made stateless when stripped of citizenship in (I think) 1944.
EU citizens have a right of free movement throughout the Union, and in regard to residence, employment, taxation, etc a Member State can’t treat citizens of other Member States who exercise that right less favourably than it treats its own citizens.
So, if you’re a citizen of (say) France living in (say) Germany,. you are not entitled to the treatment that France accords to French citizens; you are (broadly speaking) entitled to the treatment that Germany accords to German citizens. There may be a registration process you have go through in order to secure that treatment. And there may be certain areas where EU law provides minimum standards that must be afforded to citizens exercising free movement rights; in those areas it is possible that you would be entitled to more favourable treatment than German citizens get.
Indeed. But being a citizen of the EU doesn’t mean that everything will be the same in all EU member states, in, say, working conditions, or medical care, and no doubt many another aspect of daily life.
Indeed. Not everything will be the same. But a lot of things will be, or will be similar. Separately from the question of citizenship, the EU does have common regulations (or common regulatory “floors”) that apply in all member states and, if you live or work in a member state - citizen or not - you will be covered by these. They will often result in common standards across member states - e.g. the Working Time Directive regulates minimum daily and weekly periods of rest, adequate breaks, night work, annual leave, and a maximum limit on weekly working hours across the EU.
