Husband wants to leave the uk post budget….

[Maryaliceyoungx]

husband wants to leave and don’t get me wrong - I do see why. We are being hammered in the budget, we drive shitty cars, the rain is shit… life in the UK can be pretty shitty right now. he works for a US based company and I am a US citizen as I was born there and spent my life until my early teens there (parents are British and were working out there) so I see why he wants to go -it would be good for his career and would be potential to make money without the huge tax burden of the UK (company based in low state tax state)

but I don’t want to go… I love my life here. I love our village and my kids lovely village school. My family is here and I worry my parents don’t have so much time left.

however i do have to recognise the money aspect- my husbands job could be impacted by AI so i think he is right in thinking we should max out our earning potential while we can and we just won’t be able to do that here as it will just be taxed away.

aibu for sacrificing potentially huge earnings just because I love village life? Would it even be cheaper? I would insist upon private school in the US(went to state school in the us and have a lot of trauma from that!) and we wouldnt sell our house here so would need to rent. Most recent trip to thr us - over a year ago and cost of living was sky high.

I’ll be honest - couldn’t care about the politics. Politics are shit whereever you go!!

Yes, it's a zero sum game. Any 'savings' through lower tax will be wiped out in health care and insurance fees. So no benefit.

Add in less public holidays, less annual leave, working much longer in life than in the UK, lower salaries, and a greater risk of violence and being shot, the loss side of the ledger becomes much bigger than if they stay in the UK. They'll be making, over all, a huge financial loss by going to the US.

PS You can look at house listings at any estate agent’s ( real estate office) and see either the current property tax or the predicted property tax at the asking price for the house, I think the former.

The ‘assessed value’ is often 50% of what the local authority deems the property to be worth. I have no idea how this came to be used. Assessed value is recalibrated frequently.

OP, I see a lot of friends' husbands making unilateral decisions about moving very far away because it benefits the mens' careers. Because they aren't doing the hard yards on building relationships and community, they rarely value the work and importance of village-type relationships, whether it's school gates friendships with other mums or other adult cross-generational relationships with staff at your favourite coffee shop, members of a church, class members at your gym etc. These are the people whose bonds are key to how much you enjoy life; research has shown the more of these you have, the higher your rating of happiness.

It's great to consider long term financial security for you and your children, but bear in mind that plenty of men completely devalue these bonds, how hard they can be to build (and start from scratch again somewhere else), and what the bonds add to the lives of you and your children. Financial security rarely cancels out the loss of this community from your lives. Good luck!

Well I don’t disagree in part , however the very people who created this scenario of people not being able to get by and not enough tax take are not the current gvt - anytime a non Tory gvt want to do anything progressive that actually betters life for many, the British attitude of I don’t want to be paying for what I don’t need or use creeps in - we have people pleading hard done by on here but sticking £30k each away in pensions ( with gvt tax top ups on top) if you can do that you aren’t on the bread line - I have a business, I’m all for making money but Brexit certainly has affected our business, EU isa big market for us and has just made our stuff way more expensive and partly killed mail order due to admin charges at the doorsteps - it’s hit and miss whether it happens but enough to put people off buying direct . So we ourselves are looking at moving ( we did 20 months in Copenhagen around Covid but came back due to elderly parent) - we may well go to Sweden , long winded route these days and not easy if working for yourself no matter what money you have - tax is high, but services are decent, housing way cheaper in good areas and better, lots of space and more of a feeling of all contributing towards a good society ( old and not so old) - maybe the Netherlands - similar situation but housing is more and not as good.so plenty will leave not because of tax etc but because they don’t want to live somewhere where Farage type attitudes dominate . We would all like low tax and good services, it just doesn’t happen . You either get hammered for tax or you get hammered on goods and services , so no overall gain.

Totally agree with that too - a lot of men don’t value it at all -

You almost lost me with that old chestnut, we drive shitty cars, we have shitty rain, life is shitty in the UK right now, because I am SICK of the UK bashing on these boards. It's usually from privileged middle class people/upper working class people who have NO intention of leaving because they known where they're well off.

But I can see you're not one of those irksome posters! 😬 I still resent the bashing of the UK from anyone though, as I think people should be grateful to live in the UK, and it doesn't rain all the time as many people imply. We've just had one of the most amazing springs and summers ever, and most summers are either good or fair. Awful ones are rare.

Anyway, I'll shut up now. I would never leave the UK, but if I HAD to - and I had to live in the U.SA.. I wouldn't want to live there unless I was very well off/solvent/quite rich. I wouldn't want to be a poor person in the U.S.A.

If you don't want to go, then don't go, you may well regret it if you do. No-one can help you on this, as it's your choice, but it sounds like you don't want to go.

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What a drama queen! I'm betting he won't actually bother due to the admin involved.

I work with a colleague who's just come back to the UK from the US. Her reasons being better quality of life and bringing up her children in a safer, healthier environment.

Current system of a few people paying for everything and majority paying for nothing and now getting even more free stuff is a joke. So, wishing to luck to the payers who want to get out of this mess of a country.

He thinks a government asking those with broader shoulders to contribute a bit more is so bad he's rather live in a state run by a fascist government? What a position to adopt.

Honestly I’m incredibly disappointed in both countries governments at the moment and if we are talking facism then I actually am very disappointed in Labour in that they are in acting out a lot things I did not see in their manifesto therefore I did not vote for (yes I voted Labour in the last election… hope that shuts up the horror show of a poster who said she could smell me out as a Tory whatever the hell that means) as I said i don’t want to leave, but doesn’t stop my disappointment in this government who promised more money in my pocket but actually there will be less. I am well aware it is maybe pot kettle black which is why I came on here. A genuine thank you to the posters who have offered some good points to the think about - especially things like home insurance, co pays ect and who have helped me form my argument of loving village life isn’t a silly position but genuinely one of privilege.

Ive also been taken aback by the posters telling me to ‘fuck off to America’ are people genuinely not allowed to think through the pros and cons of making a move without receiving vitriol?

I have never and still don’t want to move!

That's your answer.
Don't move.

This!

There are two people in my marriage. One of us wants to move one of us doesn’t

And the one who wants to move is in part having a knee jerk reaction to the budget so at least needs to let the dust settle and also look at it sensibly both positives and negatives

but I have to say if the children are also settled the default here is always the status quo

"Ive also been taken aback by the posters telling me to ‘fuck off to America’ are people genuinely not allowed to think through the pros and cons of making a move without receiving vitriol?"

Me too...and this attitude is getting worse both here and most definately in the US also. We're living in far more dangerous times than we realise. Budgets and taxes are the least of it.

You're perfectly reasonable to consider your options, but I wouldn't be willing to walk away from a pleasant village life right now.

Yes I do feel it’s knee jerk. I am definitely someone who is more considered so that’s why I came here and it has been very helpful seeing different sides

So what you need OP is some really good arguments to counter your DH's reasons for moving.
The worst case scenario is probably the best to hit him with.
What if he loses his job and then one of the family needs expensive health care? (Accident, serious illness requiring hospitalisation).
How will you afford it? You may not be in a position to move back to the UK in those circumstances.
Don't know how old the children are but how do they feel about moving? How do you think they'll take the move?
Also how will your own mental health be affected by being the sahm with no support network?

I don’t disagree , far too many people doing not a not/if anything by choice and not contributing ( and I don’t mean those who genuinely are physically unable to work ) but I do think the underlying issues here are more about costs rather than tax - and more acute in certain areas, taxes are actually much lower than most of EU -problem is the country’s with low tax often have it loaded the other way on goods and services-or are places I simply wouldn’t want to live for all kinds of reasons.

my H was at an Xmas lunch yesterday and met up with an old acquaintance who has been working out in the states for last 6 years ( back a year now) corporate company, good package , LA based, they were saying they had a good time but it was stressful in many ways, less time off, lots of co payments needed on health, even basic things like inhalers , housing expensive, food of any quality very expensive and tax not that low either , they feel better off on £40k a year less joint income and that’s living in Home Counties in a nice 3 bed house rental . So it really can be swings and roundabouts. I’m pro the scandi system having lived there but realistic enough to know it’s not for everyone unless you are of that mindset - high tax, high services, certain socially funded/subsidised things available to all regardless of income -

Yes and you should never do anything as a knee jerk - instinct yes knee jerk no.

so tell him that you will not be doing anything as a knee jerk reaction that the grass is often not greener on the other side and usually it replaces one set of issues with another.

You are not saying no because you are a team and it is important to discuss but it needs to be a realistic discussion of the pros and cons (education being a big one coming back into the UK education system isn’t easy) and what you want for the longer term

how old are your children because they count you are a FAMILY not just a couple

children are early primary

I think you need to make a real list. And if you actually are moving overseas it’s a bit crazy to rent there and keep paying your mortgage here. Would you be renting out your house here?

Write down all the costs of being there - private school (could be a lot depending on where you are), double or triple the food bill, copays, insurance (his company can give you that information, it’s totally normal to ask), flights back to the uk once or twice a year, etc etc. Remember the workweek is much longer days so you might need some sort of paid help as you won’t have a support system and your husband will be working a lot.

For information my mum’s copay is $100 but my dad’s is $50 - it can be quite varied (so she had to pay $400 last time for the doctor visit, a test and two medications).

Yes, do, do let the dust settle after the Budget!
Whatever about any specific problematic sections therein, any budget which increases tax always gets the populace up in arms and queuing at ferryports.

But consider the years of fed-upness and anger felt by people living with governments who didn't much alter their tax take, but who buggered things up in other areas, such as crime control, social welfare and housing provision,
public transport, health care access, decent education etc etc: was the overall quality of life worth the saving in take home pay?

Just saying that he needs to weigh up calmly just how important a tax increase will be to his overall satisfaction if you remained in GB (as I’d want to do, in your place!).
Would everything, not just his net salary, be very much better in the States, for a young family?

Totally understand his reaction.

One question to answer if it's USA. Are you OK to subject your kids to School Shooter Drills?

Neither will Trump, he will die soon and his popularity is in the toilet. The political landscape isn't permanent and can change anywhere. That being said, UK is def heading towards reform (pun intended) so that's something to consider. It's def something we are considering.