If you had the choice, would you stay in the UK or move to the US?

25 comments

1. Have lived in both and the UK is my choice. I found living in the US exhausting, like dining in a tourist trap restaurant, nothing is straightforward and you are nickel and dimed on everything.

2. Had a few reasons to need the NHS over the last year or two, can’t begin to imagine how much that would have cost me in the US. Despite the cost of living and other things about the UK at the moment that aren’t great that I probably can’t go into without breaking the sub’s rules, I think I’m better off here and if I were to move abroad, the US wouldn’t be near the top of the list.

3. I would stay here. I’ve lived in the US, and its not all its cracked up to be. Ironically I found the food in general, while more plentiful, to be lower quality than the UK.

4. I normally get downvoted into oblivion if I ever say this but for me personally it would have been cheaper to be in the US for my personal medical needs, I’ve been on a waiting list for 5 years and when they got back to me the other day they said there’s no current plans to see new people, and so I have spent thousands on private healthcare and treatment in the last few years. In America my prescription is both cheaper and easier to access, I would have only needed a single appointment that I could make myself without referral and would not have needed to wait.

   I do still get to use the NHS if say I ever end up in a&e without having to worry about insurance which is obviously a good thing. However the treatment that you do get is often incompetent and you can end up being sent away anyway, countless people have been left to suffer for no reason because they can’t be spared the time and effort to be properly examined and looked after. Doctors also can use their own biases to mistreat you but that’s likely an issue everywhere.

   There are good things here, our food is generally cheaper and we have more annual leave so I’d likely always choose to stay here, but there are definite advantages to being in the US for some.

5. I like the US but above all else the NHS swings it for me. Other factors are definitely in there but I couldn’t contemplate jumping into that medical system.

6. I do have the choice: I’m married to an American and therefore could get a spousal green card without any issues.

   Much as I love visiting the US, and of course my wife’s family are there, neither of us particularly wants to live there. It’s too fractured a society, even compared to the shitshow that is modern Britain.

   Another factor is despite the fact that we’re two professionals so both could earn significantly more in the States, that standard of living is highly precarious in the US. All it takes is one spell of bad luck, e.g. getting laid off with minimal redundancy payment and then shortly after being diagnosed with a serious illness, and everything you’ve worked your entire life for disappears. In the UK we still have various safety nets which, while far from perfect, generally mean it’s harder to go from a happy middle-class existence to bankruptcy and hoemlessness in the blink of an eye.

7. UK. Mainly because of the NHS but workers rights are also a bonus.

8. Nothing will ever convince me to leave the Highlands

9. Dunno. I’d make like 4x in the US.. But it’s the US..

10. Money isn’t the same as quality of life.

    There are good reasons to think twice about the us: Lack of holidays – seriously 2 weeks a year ? Crazy working hours. No security of employment. Access to healthcare dependent on your employer.

11. I work in banking, if I worked in the US, my expected pay could double or even triple. But I will get 14 days annual leave instead of 29 days, work 12-14 hours days compared to 10 hours. This is compared to our colleagues in the same team in NY.

    I get paid enough to live comfortably in London, so no thank you for more stress but higher pay.

12. My husband and I have lived in the UK for 3 years now and we are planning to move back to the US. We don’t like the weather here. We don’t like the houses. My husband hates his job here, but enjoyed it in the states. We have other more personal reasons for leaving. Overall, our stay here has been okay but we are looking forward to going back.

13. I have lived in both, UK all the way. I am from Britain, father married an American, which meant I could get some form of citizenship at the time as I was below 18. Didn’t go at the time and stayed in the UK. Moved there for a few years in my mid to late 20s.

    Whilst we British live in a capitalist society, they’re on a whole other level. To put it bluntly, I just don’t like how money works in the USA. You can go from hero to zero in the blink of an eye. I’d actually live most places in Europe over America, lived in Berlin for 6 month and Barcelona for a year. I miss both of those places more than the US and more than Britain.

14. It would depend where in the states and what the offer was.

    No way would I live in a deep red, screaming Christian, gun totin’, open carry, 300lb is normal weight, hell hole state

15. Many states are busy becoming The Handmaid’s Tale. I’ve no wish to live somewhere like that, especially with added gun fanaticism.

    I’m very unhappy with the direction the UK is heading in, but the USA is this x1000.

16. I do have the choice.

    Career wise the US would be a far better choice but…

    There are too many guns

    There are too many morons

    Everything costs too much

    ​

    I like the UK and I never want to leave, I’m willing to sacrifice to stay here.

17. I want to start by taking health off the table. Two very different systems that, depending on individual circumstances, produce different winners and losers (if that is even the appropriate phrase when talking about healthcare).

    Every country has social structures and social norms. But for me, as a Brit, I find society in the US increasingly, irrevocably, deeply fractured. On literally every subject Americans are either in Camp A or Camp B; there is no grey area, no room for discussion, no middle ground. And the echo chambers that each Camp’s believers inhabit in get louder and more insistent every day.

    I have no issue travelling to or working in the US, but as a long term residence my values European, there are always shades of grey.

18. I lived in the US for three years as a young teen. It was exciting at first but, once the novelty wore off, I didn’t like it at all. Have had several holidays out there as an adult, to visit relatives, and seen nothing that would make me want to live there. It’s very low on my list of places to even go on holiday, let alone live.

19. I have lived all over the world. But not, north America. We nearly did twice but decided against. Once in the USA and once in Canada. We also hold more than one nationality, so have options.

    We returned to live in the UK in 2016 and are very happy with the decision. Every country has its negatives, but overall, we find the UK ones are a lot less than others.

    Yes, there are issues with cost of living, but so does most of the world. For example, inflation is high, but it is is in the USA as well. In fact higher and in most parts of the US housing is climbing higher than the UK. For example, we live in a picture postcard village in Scotland, 25 minutes from Glasgow and my rent has increased, but from £525 to £550 for a lovely cottage.

    You will also read stories about the NHS. But, while it certainly has issues, it is still a fantastic service. For example, I have had half a dozen different health issues in the last two years and have had all of them dealt with by excellent consultants in very good time – longest wait was a month. I also needed help for a very serious chronic issue – alcoholism – and the care and help I have had is beyond amazing. Including treatments that are not available in places like the USA regardless of insurance.

20. I’d remain in the UK. I don’t want to bash the US, I’m sure there are upsides to living there (some of their natural spaces are sublime, and I know that there’s a whole load of museums that I’d love to visit), but there aren’t enough to convince me that it’d be a good idea, and the negatives are really severe; worse food standards, worse workers rights and access to annual/sick/parental leave, obviously the healthcare system, the prevalence & intensity of religion and patriotism, more dangerous wildlife, a far greater variety of natural disasters to worry about, potentially more overt racism than anything I’ve had to deal with in the UK, etc etc. The UK is very far from perfect, but I think in a lot of ways that matter to me and my family we’re much better off staying in the UK.

21. America has the life expectancy of Albania (World Bank), the murder rate of Sudan (World Bank), the working hours of Nigeria (OWD), the minimum wage (PPP) of Turkey (OECD), the IHDI of Slovakia (UNDP), a bit over the median net wealth of Greece (Credit Suisse), the healthcare coverage of Algeria (OECD) and the (peer reviewed) healthcare quality of Lebanon (HAQE).

    For a median case relative to the UK, based on the stats, you’re talking about the same net wages at ppp, half of the median net wealth, living a shorter life with far longer working hours and lower self reported happiness, in an exponentially more dangerous country, with far poorer healthcare coverage and affordability, lower social mobility and poorer travel infrastructure etc.

    Unless you’re going to be a top 10% earner, for whom America is lucrative, why the fuck would anyone want to move?

22. I’d never move to a country where my children would have to learn how to hide from people who want to shoot them in their place of learning. Fuck that.

23. Well I has Asthma, Depression, Arthritis, a heart condition… I think I’ll stay in the UK.

24. I just moved back to the UK after 12 years in the US. I’m so thankful for the experiences I had living there – the opportunities to travel, the diversity, etc but ultimately I don’t want to live the rest of my life constantly on edge about the potential fall out of one thing goes wrong.

    Over simplified, but: on a scale of 1-10, life in America is a 1 if you’re poor and a 10 if you’re rich. In England it’s a 4-6 no matter what. I’ll take the security of that.

25. American who has lived 30 years in the UK. When I retired from the military my family and I moved back to the USA in 2012. We did like where we lived but decided to come back to UK in 2013. We are never going back if we can help it. Quality of living here in UK so much better.