American who’s lived and worked in Europe for a decade. Were I returning to the U.S., I would brace myself for:
Bogus management cargo cult culture. All of those junk books you see at Hudson News and similar when traveling, a lot of people try out that pseudoscience stuff or talk about it.
Cover-your-ass (CYA) decision making policies. CYA runs deep in the decision making process whether you know it or not.
At-will employment. Look that up.
Extreme asymmetric rights and obligations tilted strongly in favor of the employer over employee.
Equal amounts of inefficiency and ineptitude as in Europe, though some of the most tyrannical business leads I met were Americans.
They won’t understand nor care about time zone realities. In fact, a lot of aspects of your life will be alien to them. Americans have a poor substantive understanding of life outside their country.
There can be massive regional variations in work culture and dress code. I found the Midwest and East Coast to have required a modicum of shitty business attire and the West Coast to eschew it. I know you say remote, but don’t forget this for in-person should it arise.
Lastly among American men there is often a strange communications dynamic: calling people “buddy” or “bro”. Sorry. This faux camaraderie is out of place.
Good luck. I aim to not have to ever be dependent on a full-time American job again. FIRE if it all possible. My experience left me scarred.
From your friendly shills at the American Enterprise Institute. You know they’re scared if they feel the need to ignore clear and present dangers to write this distraction.
Don't forget bankrupting municipalities and states by misallocating untold sums of money toward road construction and maintenance and not investment in human capital: schools, healthcare, and other high-ROI public goods.
Entirely. Credential signaling leads to mediocrity. In my opinion internal mobility between departments and roles improved in the last four years, except for the untouchables.
I didn’t even go to that great of a university nor study engineering. I learned years later that apparently my university was on some recruiting shortlist on account of it being a renowned engineer’s alma mater. I suspect that was the only reason I was even hired to clean the metaphorical toilets. It took most of my career to overcome the attendant imposter syndrome. Breaking the L6 ceiling put that to rest, but I don’t forget my roots.
Back in the mid-2000s at Google, there was some degree for advancement from data center roles, even as contractors, to full-time jobs — even up to fully-fledged engineering jobs (SWE and SRE and NetOps) — if you were extremely talented, dedicated, networked well, and had the right degree of luck. Note all the qualifiers: it was tantamount to impossible.
I rose up through the ranks as one of these, as did a medium-sized cohort of colleagues who became life-long friends. Many of us busted our asses (hard). These days, I reckon the glass ceiling has turned into a cement thanks to managerial cowardice, which was bad at the time, and further desire to segment the workforce/roles. We often said we came into Google through the backdoor.
The degree of disparaging remarks about the folks in the data centers was unreal. It would be foolish to say there wasn't a de facto caste system (SWE > SRE > SETI > SysAdmin > NetOps > Data Center Tech > Facilities). After a couple of promotions from an extinct job ladder and level below L0, I ended up exceeding L6 in my career and became SWE.
In short, the disappointment from the folks in the article resonates deeply. Each time I encounter someone in this position, I try to lend as much of a hand as I can.
Indeed. FATCA is an extreme annoyance and makes Americans persona non grata in a lot of countries. Try getting a bank account or opening a mortgage as an American permanently abroad or an accidental one.
(I wish beyond FATCA that taxation on Americans domiciled outside of the country would be ended. Such a waste, and I say this as someone who supports taxation for public goods.)
> You're correct, this is America. You can work hard and build something. America is intentionally setup NOT to give you anything, but to make as many opportunities as possible open to you. That's why people brave deserts to come here.
I am an American who emigrated to another country about a decade ago. I have a six-year-old and have twins due any day now. I don't know what planet you're living on, but the United States has been the textbook definition of a poor rich country. I refuse to raise my children in a place of destitution and precarity that can happen on-a-whim. We're safer in our new country as immigrants with a moderate safety net than we ever were back home.
A turning point in leaving the country: the rise of illiberal democracy (yes, this was evident well over a decade ago) and having to set up a medical fee fundraiser for an impoverished friend whom insurance denied life-saving medical care.
The day the naturalization clock rolls over, you bet I'm executing on that. I don't want a future in that joke country.