p.s. – When I say “the same is true everywhere”, I didn’t mean that all governments cause the same level of misery. I think the U.S. has a huge impact on other areas of the world (for better or worse, mostly lately for worse). Smaller governments may be just as bad but without the far-reaching global effects.
Something really extreme, like a targeted genocidal movement. My job and education is too tied to where I live for me to move to a foreign country at the drop of a hat.
So realistically, nothing could convince me to move. OTOH, I’ll take foreign vacations in a heartbeat.
I ll go virtually anywhere to work if the moneys right but if I HAD to emigrate permamently, of all the countries Ive been to it would be Canada,preferably Vancouver.
I got married.
Cheers,
G
I’m an expat who’s been living in the US for 7 years now. No, I don’t like the current administration, but I don’t like the Australian government either.
(On a side note, my youngest son is now 21. Back about 9 years ago when he was in primary school, he went on a school trip to Canberra. Because there was a family connection between his school and John Howard, his group got to stand in the same room as the then and now PM. So he got to ask a question about why Howard had put me out of work – as he had, in a very indirect sort of way. Of course, as it got reported back to me, the PM evaded the question.)
So I’m here in the US because I got made redundant in middle age, couldn’t find a job at the right level for me in Australia, but had enogh contacts in the US to apply for and get a job here. That’s what it took for me to become an expat in Bush’s America.
I am going in for internal migration.
It took a job loss and the fact that our children were about to enter school in my case.
However, long before we married (in the US), Dearly Beloved made clear that he planned to go home – though his plan was more like “to europe”, not so much “to the south of Holland” – and take his family with him so I was already down with that. When he lost his job, we decided now was the time because of the age of the kids.
Then we got here and he remembered how much he likes the south of holland and specifically his hometown and changed careers entirely to be able to stay. It really is a marvelous place to raise children and that certainly makes it worthwhile.
I also am one. Mostly for tax reasons.
Exotic midwestern Americans? China for sure, Vietnam, most of Africa.
I’d love to live in Europe for a few years again, only not in uniform this time. But I’d want to come back.
If, however, you mean leaving the U.S. and never coming back – I guess if the real freedoms that I’ve grown so fond of were being truncated in the name of safety, say, along the lines of “Nineteen Eighty-Four” or “A Handmaid’s Tale,” or if it was clear that our government’s policies were making it too dangerous to live here any more, and there wasn’t much hope of things changing – maybe then I’d emigrate. I don’t know about the “expat” idea, though. If things ever got so bad I had to forsake my country, I think I’d have to renounce citizenship – so things would have to be REALLY bad!
I always roll my eyes at the total lack of perspective most people exhibit when they talk about how ‘oppressive’ their government is. Here’s a hint: wait 4 years and it will likely change. Most people in the world don’t have that hope to look forward to.
I spend 6 months out of Canada a year to get the tax break of working overseas. I’d move overseas, but the resident not-working in Canada tax rate of ~10% I’m paying now seems fair for the government services I use. If that tax rate went higher, I’d move in a heartbeat. My wife and I have talked of moving to Hong Kong, but the weather would be detrimental to her MS. I’d move to Dubai if I wasn’t married. Hong Kong has a max rate of 15%, Dubai 0%. Canada’s max tax rate is close to 50%.
Yeah, it is all economics to me, but when you realize that your income from working overseas for a year is like working at home for 2-3 years, it isn’t a hard decision to make. When you can plan to retire by 50 vs. having to slave away at your job until you are 65, why wouldn’t you? If you make good money almost anywhere in the world can be a good place to live. If you don’t then it sucks most everywhere. Making good money in countries where the cost of living is low is the ideal mix. So, given a choice, why stay in places that have high taxes and high costs of living?
I am one because of marriage at my current location, and left my birth country (England) for Canada because of better opportunities and weather and it was cleaner.
We would leave America for UAE easily if we can find the right job to do there for economic reasons and working on something cool.
If I could get a job in Canada, I’d be on the next plane.
As it is, being a firearms historian isn’t a full-time job and I doubt there’s a shortage of Electronics Store Management People in Canada at the moment…
[hijack] Do you really consider the entire midwest and south some big “cultural backwater”? Both of those regions have major cities and excellent universities. There are also little pockets of progressivism in smaller towns–such as Oberlin or Yellow Springs in Ohio, or Savannah in Georgia. The midwest and the south have a lot of variety, and the cultures or subcultures of these regions are pretty complex and nuanced. I get the feeling that a lot of people don’t realize that. [/hijack]
But, to get back on topic–
I’d love to move abroad. I’d just need a good job and/or a significant other to make me happy there. And I don’t feel that way just because I don’t like the present administration. I love to travel, and I think it could be a great experience to live and work in another country.
I’d like to say that I’d leave if a regime like the Nazis took over and jackboots were starting to kick in doors. But I know that I wouldn’t. I’d probably wind up in big trouble, but I wouldn’t leave the ship like the proverbial rat. I’m very comfortable here, and this is my America too. I’m not going anywhere.
Though I have to admit, a zombie apocalypse might do the trick.
I already am. I wasn’t born in the US.
But if we’re pretending I was…
all it would take to get me to leave would be the means to do it. the USA is nice, but there are other nice countries too… I wouldn’t mind living in England, certainly. I don’t know for sure about other places because I don’t remember being there (except Mexico. I wouldn’t move to Mexico.) but if I had the means to live in, say, Australia or Italy or France, I’d certainly give it a try.
I am a temporary expatriate at the moment. I don’t consider myself a particularly patriotic American…I don’t go around waving flags or anything like that. I live in the US because it’s where I was born and it’s where my family is and you can get good food and there are lots of bookstores and I speak the language and all that. All it would take for me to leave would be an offer of an interesting job somewhere else. (Preferably in an English-speaking country.)
For me to simply forsake the country because it has passed the point of no return, politically, would take a lot. I am deeply unhappy with the current state of American political life, but I still think it’s worth fighting for.
An interesting job was enough to do it. I’ve been a US expatriate for over 20 years total, 17+ in Panama and 3+ in New Zealand.
Of course, being out of the country during much of the Reagan and Bush II administrations has also been a considerable additional perk. 
My wife was offered a position within her company in Switzerland for a multi-year stint a while back. It would have meant finding English-speaking schools for the boys at university tuition prices, giving up my salary, and trying to live frugally in what would be on her salary, a very expensive country. It really wasn’t worth it to us (although I’ll be the first to say Switzerland is very beautiful).
My father had Irish citizenship and it’s possible that I could apply for and receive the same. There was a job fair in Manhattan this summer to recruit ‘Irish Citizens’ to the ROI for various jobs, as the economy is doing quite well there. There is no language barrier (stop laughing, Europe!) but I’m not sure that my skill set would transition effectively there (I know that my wife’s would not; all her certifications would be a useless waste).
Besides, all our family is here. I couldn’t leave the US permanently; but I’d consider a 2-5 year assignment in another country if both our jobs & our kids could handle it. I think that it would be a good growing experience.
My darling Marcie’s retirement is all it will take; we’re narrowing our choices now.