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I'm a software engineer and have given considerable thought to leaving the US because I am struggling to come to terms with how my taxes are spent and politics

I'm a software engineer and have given considerable thought to leaving the US because I am struggling to come to terms with how my taxes are spent and politics in general here. It's universally bad. I'm considering Finland, Sweden, Norway, or Switzerland. They all rank high in happiness, high in democratic representation, and low in corruption. All are difficult to immigrate to but I basically feel a moral obligation to explore the option

s5300 6y ago
The only issue I do have with leaving is the war thing. The past few years, I've really been telling myself we're probably at the point that China really does have the U.S. militarily beat if it comes down to it... but despite how many of us HN'ers are aware of some frivolous military budget spending (like literally doing something, tearing it down, and doing it again to spend the budget) - some of those hundreds of billions of dollars are definitely going into tech capable of destroying human life in ways really can't imagine. Plus, if it would somehow come down to large amount of humans actually fighting... the arrogance many Americans have is quite helpful for that. Moving to a smaller country, I don't know how I would feel in World War just because of population numbers and physical location. Given the arguments we can see between humans in U.S. states, and knowing how trivial it truly is to something like the ideologies of the CCP... I fully expect serious global conflict within my lifetime. That's the one thing I do atleast think I feel safer with being in the slightly rural MidWest than a smaller country.... Maybe this is getting away from the point of things. But fuck. I've experienced a lot of physical pain in life from my body falling apart, but in my mind, the horrors that could be experienced in war makes it seem like nothing. I'd just not like to die in a horrible way because of dumb fucking shit. However, that's probably stupid of me seeing as how that's how most of human history has been.
- swampthing 6y ago
  In what way does China have the U.S. beat from a military standpoint? I am no expert, but as far as I know, the U.S. military is still far stronger.
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    The only reason we've had relative peace since WW2 (75 years) is because of the strength of the US military. Prof. Hanson has argued that America's isolationist policy before WW2 actually caused it. China generally doesn't start foreign wars, because they're too busy waging them on their own people. :) About the only way the US could lose a war is by total surprise. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Davis_Hanson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Davis_Hanson AMA.
    - novok 6y ago
      China starts wars, what do you think the entire conquering of tibet was? Now they are slowly inching into south east asia's oceans and islands.
    - onion2k 6y ago
      The only reason we've had relative peace since WW2... I would question that assertion. The number of large scale wars between countries has certainly fallen in the past 75 years (and was falling before then too), and the number of deaths from war has also fallen dramatically, but the number of wars and state-based conflicts has gone up significantly - https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-conflicts-and-incidences-of-one-sided-violence https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-conflicts-and-i... - and back in 2014 there were only 11 countries on Earth not officially involved in at least one war - https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/world-peace-these-are-the-only-11-countries-in-the-world-that-are-actually-free-from-conflict-9669623.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/world-peac... Globally, the conflicts we have are smaller and less visible, and kill fewer people, but we have less peace now than we've ever had.
  - T-A 6y ago
    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-army-navy-specialreport/special-report-chinas-vast-fleet-is-tipping-the-balance-in-the-pacific-idUSKCN1S612W https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-army-navy-specialre... https://www.usip.org/publications/2018/11/providing-common-defense https://www.usip.org/publications/2018/11/providing-common-d...
- jacobush 6y ago
  Don't you have the missile silos in rural Midwest. A truly global conflict with existential fear in major powers, will get hot. But currently the US could absolutely devastate China atomically, but China would only be able to take swings at major US cities. Everyone will be losers but as things currently stand, China would loose the most.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
    Do we really know that? Maybe they have developed some form of working SDI. Furthermore: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_Great_Wall_of_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_Great_Wall_of_Chin...
    - jacobush 6y ago
      Oh yeah, someone will technically "win" a full exchange, I'm sure. The brass may see high survival rates. But the infrastructure will be bombed away. It will take decades to rebuild. One can't even compare to anything before and extrapolate. There have been local disasters and rebuilding, but we have never seen a complete national system bombed away and what will come after. (A variant of a worst case I haven't even considered before is a full nuclear Armageddon, and then Command and Control survives to take nuclear potshots for years afterwards. For instance if one party has still substantial conventional forces but the other manages to from time to time scrounge up another nuke and launch it.) I could see them have more ICBMs than apparent, but successful SDI I don't think is possible, not against nuclear strike submarines in any case.
piva00 6y ago
Switzerland is difficult to immigrate to, wouldn't say the same about Finland, Sweden and Norway though, quite the contrary if you are a software engineer.

s5300 6y ago

The only issue I do have with leaving is the war thing. The past few years, I've really been telling myself we're probably at the point that China really does have the U.S. militarily beat if it comes down to it... but despite how many of us HN'ers are aware of some frivolous military budget spending (like literally doing something, tearing it down, and doing it again to spend the budget) - some of those hundreds of billions of dollars are definitely going into tech capable of destroying human life in ways really can't imagine. Plus, if it would somehow come down to large amount of humans actually fighting... the arrogance many Americans have is quite helpful for that. Moving to a smaller country, I don't know how I would feel in World War just because of population numbers and physical location. Given the arguments we can see between humans in U.S. states, and knowing how trivial it truly is to something like the ideologies of the CCP... I fully expect serious global conflict within my lifetime. That's the one thing I do atleast think I feel safer with being in the slightly rural MidWest than a smaller country.... Maybe this is getting away from the point of things. But fuck. I've experienced a lot of physical pain in life from my body falling apart, but in my mind, the horrors that could be experienced in war makes it seem like nothing. I'd just not like to die in a horrible way because of dumb fucking shit. However, that's probably stupid of me seeing as how that's how most of human history has been.

swampthing 6y ago
In what way does China have the U.S. beat from a military standpoint? I am no expert, but as far as I know, the U.S. military is still far stronger.
- redis_mlc 6y ago
  The only reason we've had relative peace since WW2 (75 years) is because of the strength of the US military. Prof. Hanson has argued that America's isolationist policy before WW2 actually caused it. China generally doesn't start foreign wars, because they're too busy waging them on their own people. :) About the only way the US could lose a war is by total surprise. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Davis_Hanson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Davis_Hanson AMA.
  - novok 6y ago
    China starts wars, what do you think the entire conquering of tibet was? Now they are slowly inching into south east asia's oceans and islands.
  - onion2k 6y ago
    The only reason we've had relative peace since WW2... I would question that assertion. The number of large scale wars between countries has certainly fallen in the past 75 years (and was falling before then too), and the number of deaths from war has also fallen dramatically, but the number of wars and state-based conflicts has gone up significantly - https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-conflicts-and-incidences-of-one-sided-violence https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/number-of-conflicts-and-i... - and back in 2014 there were only 11 countries on Earth not officially involved in at least one war - https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/world-peace-these-are-the-only-11-countries-in-the-world-that-are-actually-free-from-conflict-9669623.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/politics/world-peac... Globally, the conflicts we have are smaller and less visible, and kill fewer people, but we have less peace now than we've ever had.
- T-A 6y ago
  https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-army-navy-specialreport/special-report-chinas-vast-fleet-is-tipping-the-balance-in-the-pacific-idUSKCN1S612W https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-army-navy-specialre... https://www.usip.org/publications/2018/11/providing-common-defense https://www.usip.org/publications/2018/11/providing-common-d...
jacobush 6y ago
Don't you have the missile silos in rural Midwest. A truly global conflict with existential fear in major powers, will get hot. But currently the US could absolutely devastate China atomically, but China would only be able to take swings at major US cities. Everyone will be losers but as things currently stand, China would loose the most.
- LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
  Do we really know that? Maybe they have developed some form of working SDI. Furthermore: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_Great_Wall_of_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_Great_Wall_of_Chin...
  - jacobush 6y ago
    Oh yeah, someone will technically "win" a full exchange, I'm sure. The brass may see high survival rates. But the infrastructure will be bombed away. It will take decades to rebuild. One can't even compare to anything before and extrapolate. There have been local disasters and rebuilding, but we have never seen a complete national system bombed away and what will come after. (A variant of a worst case I haven't even considered before is a full nuclear Armageddon, and then Command and Control survives to take nuclear potshots for years afterwards. For instance if one party has still substantial conventional forces but the other manages to from time to time scrounge up another nuke and launch it.) I could see them have more ICBMs than apparent, but successful SDI I don't think is possible, not against nuclear strike submarines in any case.

piva00 6y ago

Switzerland is difficult to immigrate to, wouldn't say the same about Finland, Sweden and Norway though, quite the contrary if you are a software engineer.