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Don't do it. I grew up there. Parochial, small-minded, cliquey people, all the money is in construction and farming rather than tech, poor range of jobs, low wa

Don't do it. I grew up there. Parochial, small-minded, cliquey people, all the money is in construction and farming rather than tech, poor range of jobs, low wages, and relatively expensive real estate. I moved to Australia, found more interesting work at more than double the salary. Nicer weather and more genuine people, and real multicultural culture due to truly international big cities.

deleted 8y ago
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unknown_apostle 8y ago
But also 30% tax rate, totally open for business, common law, beautiful nature, forced by their difficult geographic location "to try harder" and be more open. I would also say that being a small country puts a limit to having big political ambitions. Many safe, wealthy, stable countries are small and sovereign (or were at least originally based on "small-minded" localist politics). I can see NZ become some kind of Pacific Switzerland -- which arguably is also built on a substrate of conservative or "parochial" people. And is NZ not just as multicultural as Australia? And finally: another commenter here responded "New Zealand's software industry is significantly more mature than it was 2+ decades ago." Can you understand what he means by that? When did you leave NZ? I hope you care to elaborate, we have to decide next week so any opinion is welcome, especially if you grew up there :-)
- nathan_f77 8y ago
  I also grew up in New Zealand, and it's not for me. It's great if you want to start a family and have a very quiet life. I think I might retire there if I can somehow afford a house. One of the main reasons I left is that I could never afford a house, or even the down-payment on a mortgage. If I had lots of money then New Zealand would probably be more appealing to me, but it's not a good place to earn it. I don't know if you'll be able to get a very competitive salary, but it might be worth it if you're really excited about the company, and you'll be working on some really interesting things. One thing to mention is that most shops will close at 5pm, and many cafes even close at 3pm. I think once a week, the shopping malls will stay open until 10pm. The streets are completely quiet at night, and you won't see anyone walking around. After living in bigger cities for a while, I'm always really shocked when I go back for a visit. It's like a ghost town. It's an important factor for me because I work remotely, so I hated being stuck at home and having nowhere to go at 8pm. Another very important point: You will probably have to cook almost all of your own food at home. Going out to eat at cafes and restaurant is extremely expensive, and it's probably not something that you can afford to do every day (especially not on a NZ salary.) I'm used to living in cities where it's normal to eat out at restaurants most of the time. But you can't do that in New Zealand unless you're very wealthy. Anyway, it's great if you want to live somewhere quiet and raise a family. You can also spend lots of time at the beach, and go for walks in nature. But you can do that in lots of other countries, too. Personally, I prefer to live somewhere a bit more vibrant, where there's a lot of opportunities and things to do.
  - toomanybeersies 8y ago
    I think you've really hit the nail on the head there. I also grew up in New Zealand and left for Australia for the reasons that you specified. Cost of living is the same or higher than Australia, but with lower wages. My grocery bill is almost half of what it was in New Zealand, my rent is about the same, and my salary is double what it was back home. New Zealand is a great country if you want what it offers. If I did want to settle down and raise a family I'd sail back across the ditch in a heartbeat.
    - unknown_apostle 8y ago
      Even if they're paying you half your current salary? :-)
      - toomanybeersies 8y ago
        Yes, money isn't everything, it's a means to an end. A lot of Kiwis move over to Australia for 5 years or so to make a pile of savings, then move back to NZ and settle down. If you get a decent job and don't blow all your money living the big city lifestyle you can save $15-20k per year. The trades pay a lot better in Australia than New Zealand, and if you live outside central Melbourne or Sydney cost of living is fairly low.
    - indemnity 8y ago
      When you say double, are we talking for lower/mid-range career levels? At the upper levels, I think it's quite comparable (living & working in Auckland atm, but for a multi-national, so being paid a bit above market due to rolling RSUs). I can't see myself earning 500k p.a. in Australia doing software PM, if so, I'm moving tomorrow :)
  - unknown_apostle 8y ago
    Thx for your reply! Housing is problematic in Auckland... half of the offered income would go to rent. About family & excitement: we have little kids, so cooking at home and not going out much will be normal for us, regardless of where we live, for many years to come :-) The wage thing is correct. Moving to NZ will cut my income by quite a bit more than 50%. But I'm fascinated with the rugged "wanting it more" vibes of NZ vs my native country. Vibes which I'm either picking correctly or just imagining. Care to comment on that?
toomanybeersies 8y ago
> Parochial, small-minded, cliquey people, all the money is in construction and farming rather than tech, poor range of jobs, low wages, and relatively expensive real estate It's funny that you moved to Australia and complain that NZ is parochial and small minded. I've found Australia to be even worse, although Sydney and Melbourne are large enough that you can self select into groups of people where you avoid that. Australia is multicultural, sure, but not in an inclusionary way. When was the last time New Zealand had race riots? Real estate in Melbourne and Sydney aren't exactly affordable either, unless you enjoy a 1 hour commute each direction daily. Australia has great pay, and Melbourne and Sydney are great for the big city life if that's what you enjoy (which I do). Remember as well that if you're a New Zealand citizen in Australia you're essentially treated as a guest worker, you get minimal government benefits, regardless of how long you've lived here, and technically your visa is subject to cancelation at any time (although if you're not a criminal that's not a particular issue).
- dwd 8y ago
  Agreed, you could have been talking about Brisbane/SE Qld as well. Just swap farming for mining. Real estate prices relative to wages have been in the extremely unaffordable range for a decade and construction continues to be propped up to protect years of misguided investment in what is a ponzi scheme in all but name.
peterashford 8y ago
"Parochial, small-minded, cliquey people" and so you moved to Australia? I don't believe you have ever met any Australians. Or New Zealanders. One or the other.
- djrobstep 8y ago
  There is a small town mentality in NZ which is happily absent in the Australian big cities. For instance, nobody in Oz has ever asked me what school I went to. I got asked that regularly in NZ by status-insecure middlebrow white people.
  - dwd 8y ago
    The question you're more likely to get is what school do your kids go to. Asking a New Zealander about their school back in NZ would be meaningless. You could say Raupo primary school and no one would know.

deleted 8y ago

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unknown_apostle 8y ago

But also 30% tax rate, totally open for business, common law, beautiful nature, forced by their difficult geographic location "to try harder" and be more open. I would also say that being a small country puts a limit to having big political ambitions. Many safe, wealthy, stable countries are small and sovereign (or were at least originally based on "small-minded" localist politics). I can see NZ become some kind of Pacific Switzerland -- which arguably is also built on a substrate of conservative or "parochial" people. And is NZ not just as multicultural as Australia? And finally: another commenter here responded "New Zealand's software industry is significantly more mature than it was 2+ decades ago." Can you understand what he means by that? When did you leave NZ? I hope you care to elaborate, we have to decide next week so any opinion is welcome, especially if you grew up there :-)

nathan_f77 8y ago
I also grew up in New Zealand, and it's not for me. It's great if you want to start a family and have a very quiet life. I think I might retire there if I can somehow afford a house. One of the main reasons I left is that I could never afford a house, or even the down-payment on a mortgage. If I had lots of money then New Zealand would probably be more appealing to me, but it's not a good place to earn it. I don't know if you'll be able to get a very competitive salary, but it might be worth it if you're really excited about the company, and you'll be working on some really interesting things. One thing to mention is that most shops will close at 5pm, and many cafes even close at 3pm. I think once a week, the shopping malls will stay open until 10pm. The streets are completely quiet at night, and you won't see anyone walking around. After living in bigger cities for a while, I'm always really shocked when I go back for a visit. It's like a ghost town. It's an important factor for me because I work remotely, so I hated being stuck at home and having nowhere to go at 8pm. Another very important point: You will probably have to cook almost all of your own food at home. Going out to eat at cafes and restaurant is extremely expensive, and it's probably not something that you can afford to do every day (especially not on a NZ salary.) I'm used to living in cities where it's normal to eat out at restaurants most of the time. But you can't do that in New Zealand unless you're very wealthy. Anyway, it's great if you want to live somewhere quiet and raise a family. You can also spend lots of time at the beach, and go for walks in nature. But you can do that in lots of other countries, too. Personally, I prefer to live somewhere a bit more vibrant, where there's a lot of opportunities and things to do.
- toomanybeersies 8y ago
  I think you've really hit the nail on the head there. I also grew up in New Zealand and left for Australia for the reasons that you specified. Cost of living is the same or higher than Australia, but with lower wages. My grocery bill is almost half of what it was in New Zealand, my rent is about the same, and my salary is double what it was back home. New Zealand is a great country if you want what it offers. If I did want to settle down and raise a family I'd sail back across the ditch in a heartbeat.
  - unknown_apostle 8y ago
    Even if they're paying you half your current salary? :-)
    - toomanybeersies 8y ago
      Yes, money isn't everything, it's a means to an end. A lot of Kiwis move over to Australia for 5 years or so to make a pile of savings, then move back to NZ and settle down. If you get a decent job and don't blow all your money living the big city lifestyle you can save $15-20k per year. The trades pay a lot better in Australia than New Zealand, and if you live outside central Melbourne or Sydney cost of living is fairly low.
  - indemnity 8y ago
    When you say double, are we talking for lower/mid-range career levels? At the upper levels, I think it's quite comparable (living & working in Auckland atm, but for a multi-national, so being paid a bit above market due to rolling RSUs). I can't see myself earning 500k p.a. in Australia doing software PM, if so, I'm moving tomorrow :)
- unknown_apostle 8y ago
  Thx for your reply! Housing is problematic in Auckland... half of the offered income would go to rent. About family & excitement: we have little kids, so cooking at home and not going out much will be normal for us, regardless of where we live, for many years to come :-) The wage thing is correct. Moving to NZ will cut my income by quite a bit more than 50%. But I'm fascinated with the rugged "wanting it more" vibes of NZ vs my native country. Vibes which I'm either picking correctly or just imagining. Care to comment on that?

toomanybeersies 8y ago

> Parochial, small-minded, cliquey people, all the money is in construction and farming rather than tech, poor range of jobs, low wages, and relatively expensive real estate It's funny that you moved to Australia and complain that NZ is parochial and small minded. I've found Australia to be even worse, although Sydney and Melbourne are large enough that you can self select into groups of people where you avoid that. Australia is multicultural, sure, but not in an inclusionary way. When was the last time New Zealand had race riots? Real estate in Melbourne and Sydney aren't exactly affordable either, unless you enjoy a 1 hour commute each direction daily. Australia has great pay, and Melbourne and Sydney are great for the big city life if that's what you enjoy (which I do). Remember as well that if you're a New Zealand citizen in Australia you're essentially treated as a guest worker, you get minimal government benefits, regardless of how long you've lived here, and technically your visa is subject to cancelation at any time (although if you're not a criminal that's not a particular issue).

dwd 8y ago
Agreed, you could have been talking about Brisbane/SE Qld as well. Just swap farming for mining. Real estate prices relative to wages have been in the extremely unaffordable range for a decade and construction continues to be propped up to protect years of misguided investment in what is a ponzi scheme in all but name.

peterashford 8y ago

"Parochial, small-minded, cliquey people" and so you moved to Australia? I don't believe you have ever met any Australians. Or New Zealanders. One or the other.

djrobstep 8y ago
There is a small town mentality in NZ which is happily absent in the Australian big cities. For instance, nobody in Oz has ever asked me what school I went to. I got asked that regularly in NZ by status-insecure middlebrow white people.
- dwd 8y ago
  The question you're more likely to get is what school do your kids go to. Asking a New Zealander about their school back in NZ would be meaningless. You could say Raupo primary school and no one would know.