Why don't a lot of English people live abroad?

[Booneymil]

Hi! I was just thinking about something. I am Irish originally. I have lived and worked in around seven different countries at my age. I am 40. I love moving around and living in different places. I have been working in england now for two years.

At my large workplace, there are a lot of English people and a lot foreign people working there. So we have people from Spain, Poland, Italy, Australia, and Lithuania working there. Every one of the foreign people there have lived all over the world. I was chatting to the lithuanian woman, she has lived in Indonesia, in Sweden, Switzerland and in Italy.

I was chatting to the Spanish woman - she has lived in Italy, Spain, Germany and Norway. She told me she was from a wealthy family in spain so she had no need to move, she just had a desire to see the rest of the world. I was the same, I always wanted to see more of the world.

The English people in my workplace, there are about thirty of them.

Not one of them has ever lived abroad. A lot of them are old enough that they could have moved around the EU before Brexit happened. But they didnt.

I was thinking about it. Why? Why is it so different in England.

They do? About 5.5 million British people live abroad apparently (I didn't see figures for English specifically). That seems like a lot to me. (I am English living in Germany).

I have English friends and family who now live in Canada, Dubai, Australia, Hong Kong, Spain, Greece and the US. I find it to be more common than you think

I've lived in Hong Kong for 15 years. I have no intention of returning to the UK for work or any other purpose.
I have met plenty of British people who share the same mindset.
+852 is home.
Expats don't seek citizenship (where it is offered and legally possible) and will eventually return./
Immigrants intend to stay.
Hong Kong has British international schools and a British Chamber of Commerce, among other institutions.

You’ve managed to speak to every single person in your very large workplace about this exact topic? Define large because I find that really hard to believe.
I work for a very large company and I’ve worked there a long time. I’ve still not spoken to every single employee about one very specific topic.

While you say it’s not an issue you’re making some huge assumptions about those people. You’ve suggested they are scared and won’t see the world.

You don’t have to live abroad to be well travelled. And fear isn’t why most people don’t do it.

@DeeKitch

england is amazing”…Is it?? How so?

I agree. The sample OP is using are non English people living abroad and English people living in England!

We have beautiful historical places, villages, cities

thats why everyone wants to come here

I agree with a pp about the faux naivety from the OP and I don't think it is very thinly veiled tbh.

It's more of the same on MN - yes the English are all knuckle dragging peasants, especially those who live outside London.

I assume the same applies to French, German, Italian, Dutch etc etc who live in the country of their birth.

Makes a change from the usual posts about the English lack of culture etc.

Abroad is for holidays, you know the saying, it’s a lovely place to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there!

I love England and think it’s an amazing place to live. It’s not perfect but nowhere is.

I love our seasons, our landscape, our multi cultural cities and quintessentially English villages and seasides. I love our history, heritage and traditions.

I really enjoy travelling and I’m very fortunate that I have a job that allows me to travel the world and visit countries my parents and grandparents could have only dreamed of visiting. But I’m always happy to get home.

Yes of course I have spoken to them all.

Well its not the largest workplace in the UK. But it is big.

And yes i have spoken to them all about it.

Travel has been a very popular topic of conversation in the last three months obviously, as we are in the summer period.

So an example of a conversation would go like this:

English worker: I am going on holiday to Milan, Italy next week.

Spanish worker: oh lovely. Great city, I lived in Milan for a year.

Me: Me too! I also lived in Milan for a year
.
English worker: Oh I'd love to live in Italy for a year. I have never lived outside of England.

I recently met an old friend I hadn't seen since the 90s. Theres not many places on the planet she hasnt been , even Easter Island. She's not in great health now alas and doesnt get out much. Watches TV all day and voted Reform at the last election. I can't help wondering why she bothered tbh.

No that isn't the sample. As I have also talked about living in other countries, and that the people there had travelled a lot.

"Everyone" wants to come to England?

That is a ridiculous statement

No they don't.

Agreed OP, I love the culture, the self depreciation, the seasons, the shops, the humour, the lack of deadly animals etc. agreed not perfect, have thought lots before about where would live as an alternative but couldnt come up with many places I would prefer. Also it’s really difficult to get visas to live in a foreign country, a lot of people struggle to get accepted (depending on where of course). As English we aren’t taught languages from a young enough age, and to move to a country like France, you need to speak the language. Majority of English can’t speak eg French so it puts them off moving, BUT, English speaking countries are an attractive option but most people can’t get into the US, Canada, Aus etc for love nor money

England is "abroad" to every other country

You don't really need to speak French to move to France. My friend only speaks English, she is in a good job in Paris. There are lots of English speaking jobs.

I think OP might actually be a bit naive. It doesn't take much brains to see that her sample of "English working in their own country" and "Non English people working abroad" is not going to give you a very fair picture of whether English people work abroad or not! 😁

I think you are the one who is showing yourself to be a bit silly, as you obviously didnt read the thread before you commented. Did you?

A significant number of people do though, I work in international student recruitment and the UK is a desirable destination for many, many reasons.

And revenue from overseas tourists is worth billions to the UK economy.

Students come and study here in the U.K. of course. On a student visa. It doesn't mean that they will live here after University.

Of course lots of people come to study and work in the UK. Lots of peoole go and study and work in the republic of Ireland aswell

That poster wrote that "EVERYONE" wants to come to the UK. Which is a stupid statement. No they don't.

Do you think that every single person in tbe world wants to live in the U.K?

Define big… cos if you’re managing those conversations with every employee it’s clearly not that big and therefore not representative of the English population as a whole.

The definition of a large employer is 250 employees. Where I work there are over 3000 people employed. What’s your definition of big?

They do though - England is THE place to visit

No English person in my very large workplace has ever lived abroad even for a year.

It seems improbable that you could know this.