People are not going to move. After every single election in France people say they will move to the US, or to germany, or to... I've never seen anyone moved anywhere.
ps: parts of my family moved out of Hong Kong when it became Chinese again. But that was quite a different situation.
Things mostly have not become bad enough to move. I think Trump will be more Berlusconi than Mussolini. I hope so at least. I also wonder what it'd take to make us grab what we can and get out. If things start heading that way, it's a decision you really, really don't want to put off too long.
I hope so. Berlusconi "only" contributed to Italy's economy stagnating for 20 years and loss of standing in the eyes of the world. He wasn't really a fascist, much as some on the left tried to label him one.
> I can't believe this is the first time I've seen someone NOT compare Trump to Hitler.
What those two have in common is they fit the definition of the word 'demagogue' 100%, point by point. Along with many, many others (numerous political figures in Europe in the '30s, Huey Long, senator McCarthy, etc).
Hitler, however, was far more effective than everyone on that list.
Well, at least so far. But even so, Hitler's charisma and ability to emotionally be a puppet master to enormous masses while spewing bullshit appears to be unparalleled in history.
Based on what we've seen so far, the Berlusconi comparison seems best. Knock on wood.
I have always felt that Mussolini was a more apt comparison. For one thing, nobody's ever heard of Trump shout himself hoarse about Lebensraum. (And without Hitler's aggression, it's highly doubtful that Mussolini would have gotten himself involved in a European war.)
For what it's worth I find the Mussolinian architecture extremely modernist and quite interesting (https://www.google.ro/search?q=architettura+fascista+italia&...). Whenever I visit Italy I always find some interesting building or public-works structure from the Mussolini era which I photograph.
I moved to Canada from the US because of the G.W. Bush presidency. I'm not claiming it's statistically important, but my family moved. I'm lucky enough to be employable wherever I choose to live, so I exercised that power. Maybe you can too.
I live in Vancouver. Cost of living looks bad. Quality of life is good. I look out of the window of the window of my smallish condo at the beautiful mountains and all seems well.
It's tough to live in this town on the median local income. Get a very good job before you move here. There are much more affordable Canadian cities with the same social deal and without the Vancouver housing crisis. But if you can make it work, this is a nice place.
I'd add "don't plan on living in Vancouver itself". Vancouver is like San Francisco: A relatively small and frequently dysfunctional city surrounded by a much superior metropolitan area. I'd suggest Burnaby or Coquitlam as places with a better lifestyle at a lower cost.
I'm from the Coquitlam/Burnaby area (Burquitlam they call it). It's where you go when you want to live close to vancouver but also have a detached house, although in recent years that has also become unattainable.
It's a suburban area though, which is great if you're into that. If you want an urban car-free experience there's only a very tiny part of downtown, yaletown and maybe olympic village that will accomodate that.
Stay away from Vancouver. Between the cost of living, low wages, and (What passes in Canada as an) extreme right-wing provincial government, it's a horror show.
Agreed. You have to deal with unbelievable weather much of the year. Then there's those oppressive mountains just to the north and the incredible skiing within an hours drive. Next you have to deal with the all the beautiful scenery, awesome hiking and biking. It's just horrible. Don't move to Vancouver.
Not sure about wages. I feel I'm paid a fair salary.
> You have to deal with unbelievable weather much of the year.
As the saying goes - "It rains only once, but for seven months (October through April)."
> oppressive mountains
Actually, said mountains limit traveling northbound (there's a single road that goes to Whistler), there's an ocean to the west, farmlands to the east and the US border with few hour wait crossing times to the south. So you are basically stuck in the city. It is a big city and lots to do, granted, but after a while it gets stale.
> incredible skiing, biking, hiking
... which don't move a needle unless you are a hardcore outdoorsman.
Not to forget the real estate chokeful of Chinese money and priced out of reach. School system that is focused on producing tolerant citizens rather than someone how knows what an integral is, etc.
On the plus side - a mild climate, very good restaurant scene, nice people and nearly free medicine (which is too not without its headaches).
I was out walking around in shorts and a t-shirt yesterday, comfortably. High of 17 degrees. I've never done that in Canada, and I used to be much less of a wuss about the cold. The climate in Vancouver really is hard to beat in Canada.
Yes. Be wary. I lived in Vancouver for 3 years, 2012-2015. Those mountains sucked. As did the ocean. And the ability to walk everywhere downtown. Total pain being able to walk to work, shop, dine, etc.
kidding aside ... Yes ... I earned less $ ... But was ok with it.
That's kind of funny. French people is the single biggest source of expats (if we ignore domestic helpers) in Hong Kong. Seems to be very common for French people to emigrate.
I remember seeing some article about French brain drain being extremely systematic now, especially among the better schools. Get free schooling in France, then leave.
Obviously I'm in a bit of a bubble (having done this myself) but a lot of my college friends left the country too.
Advice from a french expat in the US: do not. The image of France you have in mind does not exist. Go in vacation in Paris or in the south. It is a beautiful country. But do not move there.
Schooling in France is definitely not free. Public schools (the ones that are free) represent very little amount of the Masters Degree. Most are private schools and cost ~7-10k euros per year.
"Virtually free" can mean somewhere around 2000 Euros a year. A lot of people get aid (I didn't have to pay for my last year thanks to this). Plus most engineering schools don't really use textbooks, so you don't have much in extra expenses apart from a laptop.
Yes, taxes pay for this, but that was my out-of-pocket for schooling.
Seems unlikely that migrating from France to Hong Kong would be motivated by political reasons (unless you want less democracy). I'm guessing financial motivations dominate.
French tourists are very common in Japan, although I think it might be because of exposure to pop culture rather than emigration. They have an unfortunate habit of strip-mining retro video game stores and reselling everything at ten times the price back home.
I think that's incredibly naive. For one thing, moving from France to Germany is a huge cultural and linguistic leap. Moving from the US to Canada is really not.
I recently moved from France to Germany, and the biggest cultural gap so far is that people in here respect traffic lights and using a qwerty keyboard. Otherwise, most people speak English and the lifestyle is similar.
You did not look close enough. French and German culture are very different. How work is done, how meetings are held, being on time, eating, restaurants in general and the food and the drink. Also how friendships work. I'd say french and german culture is one of the most distant in all of (western?) europe.
You have more english speakers in Germany, and the lifestyle is similar, but the lifestyle is similar in all of Europe and even in Europe and USA. But that does not make the culture the same.
> How work is done, how meetings are held, being on time, eating, restaurants in general and the food and the drink. Also how friendships work. I'd say french and german culture is one of the most distant in all of (western?) europe.
Would love to know more. I like to think I know a little about French culture (or could make a guess at it) but I've never been to Germany.
When talking about culture like this, it is always easy to venture into the ordinary, meaningless differences. But I will provide some examples. Together they maybe form a picture.
Germans have that klischee about being punctual and organized, no? Well, it is true, and it is very different in France. Meetings don't start on time, even in the workplace. But also when you meet up with friends, you don't have to be there on time, and it is seldom expected. It is not as crazy as in Africa or latin america, but if you meet in a bar at 7pm people will arrive 7:15 or 7:30. That was difficult in the beginning. Of course, also happens in Germany, but to a lesser extent.
This translates to other things: I was the first PhD student of my french professor who actually finished his thesis before the deadline. We made a plan, I sticked to it. She fully expected we would run late and was quite surprised. Also, in the international project I was working on, our french colleagues had the tendency to not fully respect the deadlines. That was actually a positive thing, because the deadlines were crazy and instead work was always done when needed, not when the plan saw it fit, leading to a better work distribution.
Food. The coffee is different in France. Meals take longer, also the lunch break does. Entrée, main course, dessert – way more common to have it all. There is a whole restaurant culture in France that is way different than in Germany, with people of the middle class eating in restaurants every week at least once, and with many many more restaurant than in an equally sized german town.
There is also a difference in how people dress. Depends on the place and setting of course, and you can't easily compare Berlin and Paris anyway. But still, it is noticeable also in other cities. There is another standard.
The thing with friends is hard to describe and it also changes anyway depending on age and setting, no matter where you are probably. And I won't go into the topic of women. Something else then: You have in France these really friendly french men who really talk a lot. Very easy to talk to, as they will just start the conversation and help you along, which is quite nice when you meet new colleagues. But in Germany that would mean that someone is really interested in becoming a friend. Here it is just the default for some, it means nothing special.
For having moved to quite a bunch of places in my life (and also had a german girlfriend), France and Germany have a pretty similar culture. There is a lot of influence between the two countries.
Yes, we use QWERTZ in Germany, but it's muuuch closer to QWERTY than France's AZERTY (needs shift for numbers!). The difference between QWERT{Y,Z} is those two keys (Y and Z are swapped), the shape of the enter key (necessitated by an additional key), and basically all of the special keys. Many of those moves are due to ä/ö/ü/ß. Meanwhile, AZERTY is very different, and even typing alphanumerical things requires paying serious attention to key placement if not used to it.
Having lived in France I'd say switching from the French keyboard to most other western layouts is especially brutal (or making the switch in the other direction). Took me a good while to readjust to the numbers being on shift and the special characters being the default. Very brutal for passwords :D
Moving from France to Belgium (in Wallonia where they speak Franch) is not a huge cultural or linguistic leap. As both countries are in the EU, it's very easy to emigrate; no visa needed. But as far as I know, there was no sudden emigration to Belgium after elections in France.
It all depends on individuum. I moved two countries to-date that couldn't be more culturaly and language different. I did learn languages before I moved though. Both me and my wife adapted within a week.
The difference in culture may be there, but it is as big and sometimes much bigger between citys and countryside, regions and social classes. It may be a factor but the as I think main reason most people do not move is not any barrier in the different style of life but more so the fact of moving, getting a way from your sorroundings, friends, family etc. altogether
I moved UK->DK a year ago, ahead of the rush. I said I would, if UKIP got too many votes in the European election.
Since then, two friends have moved from London to Berlin, two others are planning to move to Frankfurt, two others have job offers in Stockholm or Malmø. (This is three couples.) Another friend has applied for a position in Lund.
Only 3/7 of these people are British, so the other 4 have already made a similar move.
Campaign promises are made to get elected, not to be kept. Given Trump's tendency to speak, shall we say, "freely", he is likely to be a much more moderate president than his campaign promises would suggest. Not that that is saying very much, but I think much of the panic and disbelief surrounding a Trump win arises from taking his words too seriously and too literally.
All I can say is that if your hope for a politician hinges on him not doing what he's expressly said he plans to do many times, that's a terrifying situation to be in.
It will be interesting to see if people leave specially if announcements were made on FB/Twitter. The convenience of online medium and harshness of offline life can't be beat.
If Le Pen manage to be president in May 2017, I'll seriously consider moving from the country. But to go where? Maybe Luxembourg, they've got a shit ton of work in my field (web dev), they pay way more than in France but life is a bit more expensive and foreign workers aren't apprecieted in the whole country.
With Trump elected today, the right wings movement in France will get bigger :(
I myself moved from Switzerland to Colombia. Among other reasons because I wanted a break from the Swiss cultural and political climate.
But for me, emigrating isn't a definite thing. At least as long as I don't have children. Maybe I'll stay, maybe go back, maybe move somewhere else after a while.
As someone who spent ten years in Panama and working for a Swiss company, that must have been a culture shock after Switzerland. Did you speak Spanish before you moved?
Added up, I have spent almost two years in Latin America prior to moving here. Just traveling the first time and traveling plus working remotely the second time. So I already spoke the language quite well and roughly knew what to expect. I didn't expect the grass to be greener. Just greener in some parts, browner in others.
Also I like being culture shocked – it tends to widen my horizon :)
Yeah definitely greener in some places and browner in other, I couldn't agree more. But it was a good experience for me too, I married a Panamanian. Plus no income or property tax was just an incredible benefit, I miss that a lot! I'll go back there when I can, just for the taxes.
Those who have not lived outside of the US (or NA) don't realize how hard life is for the rest of the world; most will just move right back within months.
Been there myself. Life ain't easy out there.
Edit - A little bit of context here: I am speaking as someone who was born and raised in a developing country rife with racial and political problems. My point is, a lot of people who are yelling about immigrating due to the election result are overly naive with their outlook. It takes an incredible amount of effort to adjust to a new environment, not to speak of giving up the connections and comfort they have in the US. It's not as easy as just "moving to another country".
Canada and the US are virtually equivalent in most respect for jobs, standard of living etc... I'm from Canada, and now live in the US, I lived in north Florida and have seen people struggle incredibly compared to anyone I can think of in Canada. Even the poorest in Canada can at least see a doctor when they really need it. I know many people who are about to lose their only option to healthcare if ACA is repelled. They'd be better off in Canada.
Some of them are truly shocking. My mind is consistently blown when I go because I don't get that remote more than a few times a year but they are unbelievable.
I still don't understand your comment. People who are thinking about emigrating because of Trump are thinking about Canada, New Zealand, Australia, etc., not a third world country.
'I didn't "flee" America. What I fled are tribalistic homo-apes who have reverted back to simply responding to their instincts. Just a bunch of reactionary emotions without rational thought.'
Getting across the border is the easy part - getting healthcare, a drivers license, a job etc would be the hard part. Those are much easier to pull off sneaking in to the US than Canada.
ps: parts of my family moved out of Hong Kong when it became Chinese again. But that was quite a different situation.