I'm an industrial engineer and while Mein deutsch ist scheiß, I'm still learning in the hopes that if I get to go to Europe as a brain drain or as a refugee (listen, if shit gets bad enough it'll still be shocking if we're let in) that I won't just be some dumb monolingual American.
this post was submitted on 06 Apr 2025
336 points (97.7% liked)
Europe
5340 readers
1587 users here now
News and information from Europe 🇪🇺
(Current banner: La Mancha, Spain. Feel free to post submissions for banner images.)
Rules (2024-08-30)
- This is an English-language community. Comments should be in English. Posts can link to non-English news sources when providing a full-text translation in the post description. Automated translations are fine, as long as they don't overly distort the content.
- No links to misinformation or commercial advertising. When you post outdated/historic articles, add the year of publication to the post title. Infographics must include a source and a year of creation; if possible, also provide a link to the source.
- Be kind to each other, and argue in good faith. Don't post direct insults nor disrespectful and condescending comments. Don't troll nor incite hatred. Don't look for novel argumentation strategies at Wikipedia's List of fallacies.
- No bigotry, sexism, racism, antisemitism, dehumanization of minorities, or glorification of National Socialism.
- Be the signal, not the noise: Strive to post insightful comments. Add "/s" when you're being sarcastic (and don't use it to break rule no. 3).
- If you link to paywalled information, please provide also a link to a freely available archived version. Alternatively, try to find a different source.
- Light-hearted content, memes, and posts about your European everyday belong in !yurop@lemm.ee. (They're cool, you should subscribe there too!)
- Don't evade bans. If we notice ban evasion, that will result in a permanent ban for all the accounts we can associate with you.
- No posts linking to speculative reporting about ongoing events with unclear backgrounds. Please wait at least 12 hours. (E.g., do not post breathless reporting on an ongoing terror attack.)
(This list may get expanded when necessary.)
We will use some leeway to decide whether to remove a comment.
If need be, there are also bans: 3 days for lighter offenses, 14 days for bigger offenses, and permanent bans for people who don't show any willingness to participate productively. If we think the ban reason is obvious, we may not specifically write to you.
If you want to protest a removal or ban, feel free to write privately to the mods: @federalreverse@feddit.org, @poVoq@slrpnk.net, or @anzo@programming.dev.
founded 9 months ago
MODERATORS
Ich spreche nicht für alle, aber ein "dummer einsprachiger Amerikaner" der nach Europa abhaut verliert (meiner Meinung nach) zumindest das erste Attribut und mit dem zweiten kann ich ganz gut leben.
I don't speak for everyone, but a "dumb monolingual American" that to Europe runs off loses (in my opinion) at least the first attribute and with the second I can quite well live.
The awkward word order of the translation is intentional to more closely mirror the German word order. I promise you, I can also good English speak ;-)
load more comments
(2 replies)
My employer offers visa sponsorship to employees wanting to migrate to the Netherlands. Once I meet the tenure requirements (a little over a month left), I intend to start the process. My spouse and kid are onboard. We've already started learning Dutch and made a week-long trip there a couple weeks ago to make sure we would like it.
Everyone likes the Netherlands, the Netherlands is fuckin awesome. Good choice!
I'm a senior software engineer interested in moving to the Netherlands. Can you tell me more?
I'll be in a German Consulate soon to submit the last paperwork for my immigration paperwork. Our family is taking 2x STEM Phds, and kids going into engineering, computer science, healthcare, and education with us. This is a generational loss, but I'm doing it to protect my children, as well as myself.
I'm performing a short fuse wedding next weekend for a prior student so they can seek asylum in Canada as a couple soon. The number of students/prior students who have been reaching out about how to emigrate to anywhere else is very high.
Wow that's interesting. Why did you choose Germany? Was it difficult to find a position?
There's plenty of story behind it. The key parts are that I've been visiting Germany off and on for 30 years now, ever since high school. I like the feel of the cities and the culture. Their engineering schools have room for people with my skills and interests (I'm more engineer than academic).
I didn't limit myself to Germany. I've applied and interviewed across Europe, though it mostly centered around Germany. I had a good offer in Finland last year that I couldn't get the ex wife to let me take the kids to.
Was it difficult? Plenty of work to keep applying, but there's work to be had.
Germany may have real concerns about immigration, but the country needs skilled people, and just plain and hard workers, to fill roles. The alternative is to have major economic collapse, so the government is opening doors even if the populace isn't always totally on board.
Good luck in Germany. There is a lot to dislike, but so much more to enjoy.
Thank you!
Every field has some green grass and some brown grass. No place is perfect.
Our plan is to move and never come back, but who knows what the future holds?
load more comments
(11 replies)
Ah yes, let the filthy and bad migrants on one side of Europe literally drown in the ocean (maybe help a bit, if their skiffs seem too robust) and open the doors for the good and awesome ExPaTs on the other side.
Immigrating to Europe isn't the easy process a lot of people think it is. At least for the countries I tried (Germany, Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands)...but I do know some things have changed recently, at least for Germany.
My efforts were about ten years ago thought. Despite having a graduate degree from a European institution I still found it impossible.
For Germany, though I had spent the previous 10 years as a software developer (which is classified as an Engpassberuf), I was told that the regulations would only allow me to seek work based on the skills from that degree (Berufsqualifikation). My Master's degree was in a different technical field (European development planning), and my BAs were in europe-related areas and German. I also studied at the Goethe Institute and completed the Oberstufe C2 exam. But none of that was sufficient.
Now I am middle aged, have a wife and kids, chronic health issues...and though I would love to emigrate, I can't imagine uprooting them all, even if I could find a European country willing to take us.
The trick is to tell them what they want to hear, otherwise you won't get the required permits and paperwork.
load more comments
(1 replies)
Why would they prefer Europe to Canada?
Europe is further from the US.
Exactly. Canada is also facing a decent chance at an invasion
load more comments
(2 replies)
There's already a brain drain going in the US Government, as they replace experienced leaders and workers with blind loyalists.
The silver lining is that they have given their opposition the gift of competence. By firing all their competent, knowledgable people, they have driven them straight into the enemy camp.
load more comments
(1 replies)
A big problem with many people moving out is that they will be missing as opposition and reason. To a degree, it reduces the chances of the US to reform itself.
I would not see it so strictly.
Academics for the most part contribute "thought". They are much better at doing so living in freedom outside the US than rotting in a prison cell inside the US, or in one of the crowny countries doing the dirty work for the US.
They are missing in doing the ground work of course. On the other hand they stop contributing to the system with their work, their taxes, their presence giving legitimacy... So it makes the system unstable faster and result in it falling apart, leaving space for something new, faster.
In authoritarian regimes it is very rare that they reform themselves. Usually they collapse, mostly in an ugly way. In the case of the US i don't think that there is currently any hope to be set into reform from inside the system. For every crazed Republican in power we see a Democrat in power who wants to maintain the system, maintain the systemic issues that lead to Trump not once but twice and last but not least is enjoying many of the oppressive and racist policies that were implemented by Trump during his first term. Looking at mass deportations, "the wall", violent crackdowns on peaceful protestors, or looking a bit longer running the continued operation of Guantanamo Bay, continuing the illegal occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq...
So in the case of the US there isn't just the extreme-right, there is also the complicit "center" that opposes changing the system and is in part happy with the further pushes to the extreme-right. This complicit block won't change their attitude and they wont stop keeping progressives in check for the regime until they are personally suffering. It is the Bidens and Harrises the Schumers and Fettermans that prevented a proper response and structural change after Trumps first term and now embrace cooperation with Trump and enjoying that he does some dirty work for them, like continuing the genocide in Palestine.
By staying in the US academics, some of whom have been beaten up by Cops during peaceful protests under the Democrats administration, the academics would give the very same people legitimacy as an "opposition" to the Republican administration that were complicit in bringing this administration into power and are complicit in keeping it in power.
The Immigration dilemma. When a country starts going wrong the people most fit to fix the country are usually the ones who left and go to another country, precipitating the downfall of the country of origin. Making more and more people want to emigrate and leaving the country in worse and worse shape to fix itself.
You don't give up your right to vote by moving abroad. Your vote in state and local politics is lost. How much of a real impact that has depends on where you live.
This assumes voting continues to function more or less as it has in the past.
load more comments
(1 replies)
Fair point but if the US insists on being run like a business, then I'm going to treat it like one.
If I go to a restaurant with shitty food and shitty service, I'm paying my tab, leaving, and never coming back.
I'm not going to waste my time going home and writing yelp reviews so that the manager can offer me a free appetizer the next time I come in.
Place sucks.
load more comments
(1 replies)
I fear that Europe, as is tradition, will fail to capitalise on this moment due to internal division, with China reaping most of the benefits as a result.
I would love to be wrong. I hope I am. I feel like an EU at the centre of global trade and geopolitics is the least awful option at this point in history. Although with the continued rise of the far right in France and Germany that may not be the case for much longer.
I fear that Europe, as is tradition, will fail to capitalise on this moment due to internal division, with China reaping most of the benefits as a result.
I doubt that people who dislike US authoritarianism are gonna move to China, a literal dictatorship straight out of 1984.
It's also basically impossible to learn Mandarin for the average European or North American. Especially if they're already in their 30s or 40s.
For real. To me it seems everyone is sleeping on that, but some deep EU reform seems one of the most important things to me (maybe even the most important thing?). We will never be able to get stuff done if hungary can just block everything even remotely good
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(4 replies)
I wish I had a brain to drain. I don't have any valuable skills, nor a lot of money. Nobody wants to take me. I'm going to be at the mercy of the Nazis.
That would require to create a lot of new jobs for scientists coming from there. Otherwise it would just increase competition for unattractive jobs and lead more people to quit science (which I did).
And speaking of MINT professionals, we have a lot of stupid processes and bad working conditions here. Yes, for example in German industrial engineering, a lot of experienced software developers are sought for - but honestly, most managers do not have an idea what a requirement specification or an API really is. If you don't believe me, ask for the API docs of the thing you should work on in their interview.
load more comments
(2 replies)
Is it ready for a 'brain drain'?
My guess is: We are. Auto-translated:
Acting Education Minister Cem Özdemir has called for the admission of US academics to Germany and Europe. This would require a European concept
The acting Federal Minister of Education and Research, Cem Özdemir, wants to recruit scientists from the USA. ‘If researchers from the USA - but also from all over the world - are interested in working in Germany, we see this as an opportunity for our excellent centre of research and innovation, which we want to take advantage of,’ the Green politician told Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND). The German university and science system offers numerous research programmes and scholarships.
Leading scientists in Germany had previously called for the targeted recruitment of researchers from the USA, where they are suffering under President Donald Trump's government policy. The so-called Meitner-Einstein Programme is aimed at scientists whose work cannot be continued in the USA, or only to a limited extent.
European concept for the admission of researchers
Özdemir said that there is "a broad understanding that Germany and Europe need to be strengthened now". This would require ‘a broad concept, preferably a European one’. He had already exchanged ideas with his French counterpart and signalled to the EU Commission ‘that the EU should use existing measures to support talented scientists from countries suffering from political and financial influence’. The future German government could follow on directly from this.
In the USA, hundreds of leading scientists from the fields of engineering and medicine recently accused the US government of a ‘major attack on American science’ in an open letter. This could set back research by decades and threaten the health and safety of Americans, it said.
view more: next ›