Do you regret moving abroad?

[Flumux]

Do you think life would have been better in the UK?

We love London but hate paying an effective 50% tax rate. So we are looking at doing a few years in Cayman.

It should be good experience professionally but may be seen as a slight step back in terms of quality.

Why so much anger and bile?
Do you have the same venom for people who emigrate to the UK for a better life?
Doubt it.

Are you directing that to me, @Lovethatforyouhun? If so, then I must correct your assumption that what I said was motivated by 'anger' and 'bile'. The main emotions are relief and gratitude. There is no 'venom' at all. If people are happy to live in the UK, good for them. My personal opinion, based on what I have now, would be that it would take wild horses to drag me back to live there!!!!

@Passiflora2 We made a conscious decision when the children were young to move out of the UK for the experience. Both of us had had short periods of living outside the UK previously, and we wanted our children to experience other ways of living and other cultures. We took the first opportunity that presented itself and in the years since have both changed jobs a few times. It's easier now we've learned the language and integrated, but at the beginning it was a steep learning curve. I'm so glad we spent the time and stuck it out. I couldn't imagine living anywhere else now. I recently travelled back to the UK over the summer and on our return to Denmark I felt a huge sense of relief as the plane flew over our lovely, peaceful, little land. I'll stop now, before folk start vomiting!

The lifetime allowance cut is stupid. It is disincentivising saving towards pension.
I am with you. Ignore the MN who are jealous. We pay so much, but for what? I love London too. A stint aboard has set us up for life and made us realise how pathetic the attitude in Britain is, they want everyone to suffer. They don't celebrate success. They want to put everyone who achieve something down. £100k is seen as a lot, so you can taxed to death for it. You don't get rewarded for being responsible for your own retirement provision.

Instead of going after the real rich people like Amazon and the Grosvenor Estate beneficiary, they go after the squeezed middle who are on a salaried wage.

The inconvenient truth is, the top 1% PAYE people pays well over a third of all income tax. Most of the jobs, like mine, can be done outside the UK. When leave, our jobs go with us. People naively think the job will go to someone who is willing to pay the high taxes.

Race to the bottom seems to be what the majority of the population want.
If you get paid well, MN and other Brits would say how much you get paid make them sick.😑

Healthcare in the UK is not great tbh, we are abroad, we have private health care but Dh also has a clinic at work, he popped in to see them about something that wasn’t a problem but 24 hours later he had a full panel of bloodwork which showed something that needs to be fixed and was referred within 24 hours for a quick abdominal check. None of this stuff was urgent. I had an obstetrician instead of a midwife which turned out to be very useful (she worked in the NHS for a bit and is still traumatised by being called too late to various emergencies). My birth experience was vastly different to friends and family in the UK.

People don’t move abroad for just a little bit more money, sometimes it is so that overall life doesn’t feel as crushing. When you work stupid hours but are still juggling bills (for some it’s not a little bit of tax for some it’s an astronomical difference) when the environment doesn’t feel safe anymore etc. No-one is obliged to stay anywhere and as long as the country you are going to is happy to have you why shouldn’t you move? My obligation is to my family first and foremost.

Instead of getting sniffy that people leave to have a better life the question is how do we get people to want to stay.

I’m also hearing more people talking about wanting to move. There are higher rate tax payers, not on humongous money but in a the crappy band where have to pay for everything, have zero entitlements but are also highly taxed. It’s different if you feel like all the hours you are putting in juggling kids and work feels like it’s worth it because you are progressing but if you are running to stand still then of course people get fed up.

Totally echo this…and laughably what doesn’t help is the utter doomongering of the govt saying how bad the economic situation is…..yes we’ll get a grip on expenditure and part of NHS reform is stopping waste of money because a fair few NHS managers have not a clue over effective spending, ie spending 4 times the going rate on agency workers instead of their own bank.
The fact that many trusts still roster doctors using paper or spreadsheets instead of electronic rostering systems is beyond incredulous. They have no idea of what they actually spend their money on, just that it has gone on additional work.
This friends is what this wonderful NHS is like and hence why I would support partial privatisation as I have no faith in existing home grown managers. There are small numbers recruited from outside which are a different breed but get crushed by the long standing “we have a,ways done it this way”

A fair few of our friends have relocated using digital visas and loving it. Lower tax and a sunnier climate as a bonus

@coxesorangepippin , whereabouts are you? We have heard so many horror stories about Canada being extortionate and difficult to get a dentist, doctor etc before permanent residency. There maybe a work project on the cards, but we would have to consider all factors with 3 children under 12. I'd love to hear your experience.

Also in cayman and have been here almost 6 years. I'm financially better off than if I was in the UK. The weather is better and it's a good lifestyle but I definitely miss lots of things about home. Swings and roundabouts really.
I've got a 10 minute commute, healthcare is much better (but you have to pay for it), but it is expensive, can be very small minded and it's expensive to get a flight anywhere - even to Miami.