5 ms·

Ask HN: Is there a business for extracting US tech talent?

29 points by Arubis 1y ago

As both the economy and policy of the US shift rapidly and show signs of accelerating, I hear more and more of my colleagues voicing the desire to up stakes and relocate to somewhere more stable and in line with their own values--an opinion that I share. But getting visa sponsorship in much of the developed world is a scattershot effort; best I can tell, it's almost something you have to track down on a per-company basis, prioritizing the larger ones for access. This feels like a hole in a quickly growing market--are there firms or orgs that help consolidate visa-sponsoring job info for high-demand professions, particularly in tech? Most of what I've seen out there is generic guidance and https://relocate.me, or is EU-focused for folks already in the EEU.

throwawaysleep 1y ago
There is a bigger one for research talent. Nothing really exists because until this year, people flowed the other way.
ldjkfkdsjnv 1y ago
Yeah its called wipro/infosys/cognizant
- mamonster 1y ago
  They aren't really extracting tech talent. Their dream gig is getting a S4HANA project at a pharma company that keeps getting renewed and expanded, not actually building something.
dmitrygr 1y ago
> somewhere more stable and in line with their own values Where else other than USA does tech pay such a multiple of median salary? “Huff puff I’m going to leave” is easy. Finding somewhere to actually go isn’t.
- scarface_74 1y ago
  Exactly and it’s not as if every other country and company in the world doesn’t value profits over everything else. They aren’t going to go on missionary trips feeding starving children.
  - Ocerge 1y ago
    Not sure why you're being downvoted, we in the US are certainly not special in that regard.
j7ake 1y ago
Why particularly in tech? Find an industry where EU salaries are better than USA and you’ll have much better traction.
scarface_74 1y ago
So exactly why would I want to go anywhere else where the compensation is much lower without the cost of living being lower and have higher taxes?
- nativeit 1y ago
  Better public services, free college, free healthcare, better urban planning, more robust protections for privacy, civil liberties, cleaner air and water, less caustic sociopolitical atmosphere, better quality-of-life metrics, better economic mobility, longer life expectancy, more cohesive communities, greater representation in the democratic process, more equitable pay standards, increased paid time off, literally any kind of standard maternal/paternal leave, better medical services, greater scores of general happiness and fulfillment, more stable economic policies, more stable legal frameworks, more like-minded cultural communities, increased freedom to travel to more diverse places with less costs and administrative burdens, stronger social safety nets, better retirement plans, nicer weather with fewer natural disasters, greater diversity in populations, expanded access to rich cultural experiences, more aesthetically pleasing architecture, greater access to "third places", more educated populations, less religious populations, less political polarization, and that's just the off-the-cuff obvious items. Some more subjective than others.
  - nativeit 1y ago
    Lower violent crime rates, lower property crime rates, lower drug addiction rates, lower homeless rates, literally any kind of standard mental healthcare, better retirement facilities, subsidized childcare, subsidized geriatric care, less expensive medication, fewer guns, more EV infrastructure, literally any kind of broadly complete passenger rail network, even partially functional immigration systems, better K-12 education outcomes, lower housing costs, more progressive tax systems, and last (for this list) but absolutely not the least for this context: even a vague whiff of the sort of dynamism that made the Bay Area such an exciting place to live in the 1970s-90s, that has since been eroded into a self-satirizing caricature of itself, currently grappling with the loss of 0% interest rates by reverting to creative accounting, layoffs, rent-seeking from users and customers, shameless AI feature-bloat, and increasingly astounding levels of brazen monopolizing, corruption, and fraud. Why, indeed?
keiferski 1y ago
The Nomad Capitalist guy is basically doing this.
android521 1y ago
well, only if they are willing to lose 1/3 to 1/4 of US salary and willing to work on boring work.
drdunce 1y ago
Unfortunately, there isn't demand and there's no such thing as a high demand tech professional anymore. The EU is way over saturated with tech talent and that's unlikely to change.
0xfaded 1y ago
There are straightforward immigration paths to most of the desirable countries within Europe if you can land a job that pays a standard deviation above the mean, which most tech workers can. However, you're still looking at 1/4 of a silicon valley salary. The game plan should really be more centered around making your money in the US and then moving for the better quality of life or to do something that aligns with your values. I'd say it's the moving wealth part where people are more likely to fall into traps (ever heard of an exit tax?), but even then you're probably still better off hiring a local account (cost me 2k when I first moved to Denmark, and another 2k when I left :facepalm:).
aristofun 1y ago
EU generally speaking is dying out (in terms of tech). There are no system factors in place that would suggest any significant growth of innovation, entrepreneurship or hi tech advancements. Isn’t it obvious? Only military industry will get budgets and attention. But only until the war is over.
- RestartKernel 1y ago
  There are plenty of opportunities for entrepreneurship in the EU if you don't mind implementing boring, existing tech for more "physical" business owners. It's more that the world of risky VC-funded tech start-ups is somewhat foreign to us. Such ventures are certainly still out there if you know where to look, but they feel native to the U.S. tech industry in all their facets — for better or worse, I suppose.
  - aristofun 1y ago
    How many companies did you open in EU vs north america? How do you enjoy EU bureaucracy?
- archagon 1y ago
  No, it's not obvious.
  - aristofun 1y ago
    Open your eyes, look for stats about innovative companies, check out the level of socialism, bureaucracy and tax in different countries. For starters.
muzani 1y ago
Singapore seems to be a "proxy" between east and west, specifically a way for Chinese companies like Bytedance to get American labor, and a way for American companies to get Chinese labor. Per capita, income is higher than the US. I don't know if tech itself pays better, but they seem to be able to match.
akg_67 1y ago
There are subreddits dedicated to these kind of topics, for example /r/AmerExit /r/movingtojapan /r/expats (that I know of) with wealth of info. I am sure there are dedicated Facebook groups too. You most likely will find people and orgs that can help with migration in such targeted groups. As I understand, most desirable countries have seen multi-fold increase in inquiries and applications from US.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
hiAndrewQuinn 1y ago
Actual US to EU transplant here, although not one who needed a visa. God bless Irish ancestry. The most efficient way would be to simply let US citizens post a bounty for e.g. a successful job offer being extended their way from the European Union. When I think about the requisite legwork involved from my end, I come up with a rough goal of about $25,000 per job offer floated, not contingent on the person on the other end actually accepting the offer. (This is not a serious offer, please do not email me asking me to help you find a job.) The reason the number is so high is because, frankly, it takes a lot of work to unearth opportunities like this which aren't already on the clearnet and inundated with applicants already. The dropping of the language barrier alone raises the competitive pressure on any job offer in Europe by an order of magnitude, in both salary and applicant quality. Uniquely, US citizens get paid much more in almost every category than their European counterparts, so job offerers also have to factor in an exit risk they don't normally have to with applicants from e.g. Laos: the very real possibility that the starry-eyed rich kid shows up, spends 3 months living the way the Romans do, and then leaves because Rome kind of sucks compared to having a 401(k). $25k doesn't seem that expensive when compared to, say, the opportunity cost of first learning e.g. passable professional German, which by itself takes about 1-2000 hours of one's free time. Someone getting paid even $50/hour = $100,000/year in the US would quickly eat way more cost going about getting here in such a roundabout way, and then they still have to find the visa grantor. Again: This is not a serious offer. Please do not email me asking me to help you find a job. This was a thought experiment for curiosity's sake only.

scarface_74 1y ago
You seem to not understand how far racism goes in America. Right now the government is screwing over the poorer part of the population by taking away health care in more Rural Republican areas, Medicaid when the rural areas needs it most and Florida (where I live now) is cheering the government on while they kill FEMA even though this state is hit by a hurricane every year (slight exaggeration). There won’t be a revolution because poor rural America is happy as long as Trump mistreats immigrants and non straight (and especially trans) people and as long as he protects Jews because they believe if Isreal doesn’t exist, Jesus won’t have a place to come back to (no exaggeration). No I don’t have any opinion one way or the other about Isreal vs Palestine. The American people and especially the poor who overwhelmingly voted for Trump this time are going to get exactly what they voted for. I would be more than happy for my taxes to support education, universal healthcare, fully funded pre-K, a better safety net etc. I wouldn’t have a problem if my stock returns decreased slightly because corporations paid more taxes to help a better safety net. But on the other hand I did move to state tax free (and warm) Florida when I started working remotely post 2020 and save a good chunk each year. Why wouldn’t I take advantage of the arbitrage of being on the other side of inequality and make as much money as possible, keep 12 months expenses in savings outside of retirement savings and stack money? I vote for politicians who probably wouldn’t treat me as favorably as far as taxes to help pull others up. The only people who believe America is the objectively best country are those who are on the other side of income gap like me and those who haven’t actually been anywhere else for any length of time and don’t realize how ridiculous for instance the American health care system is. My wife and I have done the digital nomad thing domestically from late 2022-late 2023 only coming home to Florida for Jan-February. Starting next year, we are going to spend a few months in Costa Rica and/or Panama City every year. I know how good and affordable the public health care system is there (caja) and even paying out of pocket is feasible for many things for health tourism. We are really leaning toward retiring there permanently or at least become legal residents.
- palata 1y ago
  > You seem to not understand how far racism goes in America. Well, I said it was probably worse than in Europe, I did not bound it :). > Why wouldn’t I take advantage of the arbitrage of being on the other side of inequality and make as much money as possible If you're in the US it seems like you definitely should, because that's how it works there. My point was that if you're not part of those benefitting from that, or if you don't actually want to live in a country that values this lifestyle, then that's a reason to move to another country. And many many countries are better than the US if you "don't mostly care about money", if I can say it like that. On HN I often see messages from US people saying that "Europe is dying" and "Europe cannot innovate". My point is that a large part of the people in Europe would not want to live in the US, and there are reasons for that. And those US people seem to not realise it.