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Very sad that so many young people have to find work elsewhere. Heartbreaking for the poor guy in the video who is in the process of losing all his children to Canada and Australia. Still, that's just the way of the world I guess - all part of life. You can't force industry to stay or set up in Ireland. Also opportunity abroad may be a good thing at some point in the future, bringing back experience in other fields when the economy picks up.
The same has been happening in the rest of the UK.
This report earlier in the year:
I wondered if things have improved any since then?
It is difficult to get a sense of what is happening with the economy back home. How do people feel things are going at the moment? Any signs of improvement? There is a definite sense that the economy is improving here in the US, at least where I live here in the Bay Area. House prices have soared in the last year and are back up to pre -crash (2007) prices. The housing market always seems to be an indication of how much confidence people have in the economy. What's happening in the US seems to be intimately linked with what is happening in the UK. Are people seeing signs of a moving housing market yet?
It would be much more sad if young people didn't have the opportunity to go abroad and work wherever they want, but instead were stuck in Britain (or any other country they didn't like or couldn't find work in) forever.
Based in London and Paris, to be honest I don't really see the economic crisis. London particularly is a global city and somewhat detached from the rest of the UK economy. I noticed a moderate downturn here in 2008-2010 in terms of jobs and building projects being stalled but London now feels like a boomtown again. People continue to pour in from the rest of the UK and the world, and the bars and restaurants are packed. Lower-income and people not educated enough to get jobs in the booming knowledge economy are shut out however, so there's a huge level of poverty in London.
The rest of the UK is still suffering hugely however, it's a depression rather than a recession. The economy has barely grown at all for nearly 6 years now, wages are stagnant or falling, but the cost of living remains high. It means that provincial Britain has seen a huge fall in living standards in recent years. The poorest areas (the North of England, Wales, the far south west) are the worst effected - and now have the sky-high unemployment and shuttered high streets with vacant shops that they last saw in the 1980s. You also have to remember that these areas are among the poorest in western Europe on a GDP per capita basis. Emigration - whether abroad or to the rich south-east of England - is your only option to earn more money and improve your life.
This - combined with the fact that countries that share our language and culture like Australia are currently booming economically - explains the current boom in emigration from the UK.
However, you have to remember than Britain has always been - and continues to this day - to be an enormous exporter of people. There are massive British migrant populations in Australia, Spain, France and the US. It gets crowded out of the headlines because of the far more raucous debate surrounding immigration, but the fact is that more people emigrate from Britian than any other large developed country. I think it largely unnoticed though, a British migrant 'blends in' much more than an Italian or Greek in Melborne or New York and Brits do not form ethnic enclaves. Usually the word "migrant" or "immigrant" is not even used - they are "expatriates". But its the same thing.
This economic depression has only increased the incentive to up sticks to traditional emigration destinations like Canada, Australia, the US - and now places like the UAE or Singapore are an option - where the wages are higher, taxes are lower, the weather is better, and the general standard of living is far higher than in Britain. Even Spain - mired in a depression worse than our own - continues to be a destination - as Brits there tend to be self-employed and somewhat detached from the mainstream Spanish economy, and there's no need for visas etc because of the EU.
I predict that this will only increase. I read recently there are 100,000 Britons now living in the UAE - the largest immigrant community there from any Western Nation. 10% of the city of Perth's population was born in the UK! I'd be interested to know whether you see a lot of us in the Bay Area... I have one friend in LA...but I've heard a lot of people saying they'd want to live in SF... ?!
I predict that this will only increase. I read recently there are 100,000 Britons now living in the UAE - the largest immigrant community there from any Western Nation. 10% of the city of Perth's population was born in the UK! I'd be interested to know whether you see a lot of us in the Bay Area... I have one friend in LA...but I've heard a lot of people saying they'd want to live in SF... ?!
Yes there are a fair few. There is a big British meet up group that I joined when I moved here, but have never actually taken part in. I have a few British friends here that I met by accident over time.
Some love it, some loath it. It's nothing like you imagine as a tourist. The cost of living is ridiculously high. People pay millions of dollars to buy tiny little crappy apartments, or spend thousands a month on rent. The average rent for a 1 bedroom apartment in SF is $2700 a month. According to some reports its the least affordable place to live in America! Most Expensive City In America: San Francisco Most Unaffordable City For Home Ownership (PHOTOS)
Having lived here almost 2 years now I would not live in SF proper - l live across the bridge in the East Bay. Every time I go into SF its foggy and cold - especially in the summer when the warm inland draws in the fog from the Pacific. There is also very high crime (here in the East Bay too). Still that doesn't seem to stop people from wanting to live in the Bay Area. Competition to buy housing has gone mad in the last year, fed partly by the still low interest rates. Reports of 40 offers on many houses, with many offers being all cash. A house in the next street to me went last week for half a million above asking! Which is getting to be a common thing here. It's crazy. We were exceptionally lucky to have bought here while the market was still in a dip and there was not so much competition. I don't think we'd get a look in now.
Thanks for the update on the UK. I'm not hearing much on the news here. My mother in law says she thinks the stock market seems to have taken a decided upturn? Have you heard this? Do you have any inkling of an upturn other than in London?
The rest of the UK is still suffering hugely however, it's a depression rather than a recession. The economy has barely grown at all for nearly 6 years now, wages are stagnant or falling, but the cost of living remains high. It means that provincial Britain has seen a huge fall in living standards in recent years. The poorest areas (the North of England, Wales, the far south west) are the worst effected - and now have the sky-high unemployment and shuttered high streets with vacant shops that they last saw in the 1980s. You also have to remember that these areas are among the poorest in western Europe on a GDP per capita basis. Emigration - whether abroad or to the rich south-east of England - is your only option to earn more money and improve your life.
There is some truth to this, London, and its commuter hinterland, were barely scathed by the downturn, London in particular is booming and has a skyline full of towering cranes end erecting skyscrapers, but you don't need to move to the South East to earn more money or improve your life - regional cities like Manchester and Leeds are performing well, and have been routinely named as one of the few economic bright spots outside of the SE with rising house prices, sky-high rents and a massive tick-up in construction, as well as investment in certain industries such as studying graphene at Manchester and creating one of Europe's largest centres of medical research in Leeds (which is also home to NHS England). It's not just the cities themselves, either, but their commuter hinterland - North Yorks and Cheshire are both full of seriously rich people and millionaires - Harrogate, Ilkley, Alderley Edge, Knutsford etc.
Of course, many still move to London because it offers something nowhere else can, but there are alternatives within the UK, and our big cities, especially the two I mentioned, are performing pretty well and are rebounding solidly, and both have seen a lot of construction during the downturn and have bustling city centres with hardly any vacant units (I live in Leeds, any vacant unit is quickly taken up, we're at the centre of a catchment area of nearly 5 million people after all).
regional cities like Manchester and Leeds are performing well, and have been routinely named as one of the few economic bright spots outside of the SE with rising house prices, sky-high rents and a massive tick-up in construction,
I take what you're saying I visited Manchester the other day and it did feel buzzy and relatively prosperous in the centre. However, I wouldn't say the rents are "sky high". My mate rents a very large one bedroom flat (bedroom, seperate kitchen and living room) BANG in the centre of Manchester (2 mins from Piccadilly Gardens) for about £700 per month. A similar flat in zone 1 of London would be pushing £2,750 a month. Even in zone 2 (Islington, Camden etc) it'd be at least £1,800.
I would also say Manchester and Leeds etc, while relatively affluent in the centre, do not share the real booming economy London has, and it shows. Even the centres of these cities have derelict buildings and vacant brownfield space a plenty, among the new office developments and bars and nightclubs. It seems like they are really trying to encourage gentrification, but it's not quite taking off. Whereas in London gentrification is an unstoppable tidal wave that is affecting even the most (historically) impoverished and slumlike areas.
Just my thoughts anyway! I may be wrong, don't really know the north that well.
Thanks for the update on the UK. I'm not hearing much on the news here. My mother in law says she thinks the stock market seems to have taken a decided upturn? Have you heard this? Do you have any inkling of an upturn other than in London?
Interesting what you say about how expensive SF is - I didn't realise that. Are salaries comparatively high enough to deal with it though? The problem in London (and the rest of the UK) is that salaries just don't keep up with rising prices. Average salary in the UK is only about £25,000 yet house prices are dozens of times this. £750,000 for a decent (not extravagent) family home is not unusual in the south east.
Yeah I did hear about the stockmarket upturn and they are saying in the last few weeks there are green shoots. But it's just the press talking for now. My general impression is that outside London people are really struggling, and many are considering emigration. In the London region there are still jobs a plenty but people worry constantly about the rocketing cost of living (even the bus/tube fares go up by about 20% a year a the moment!) - this creats a very competitive culture where people are always stressing about work and their salary. Buying a flat - even a nasty one in a sh*t area - is out of reach for anyone without weathly parents, as banks now demand a 30% deposit for a mortgage!
Interesting what you say about how expensive SF is - I didn't realise that. Are salaries comparatively high enough to deal with it though? The problem in London (and the rest of the UK) is that salaries just don't keep up with rising prices. Average salary in the UK is only about £25,000 yet house prices are dozens of times this. £750,000 for a decent (not extravagent) family home is not unusual in the south east.
Yeah I did hear about the stockmarket upturn and they are saying in the last few weeks there are green shoots. But it's just the press talking for now. My general impression is that outside London people are really struggling, and many are considering emigration. In the London region there are still jobs a plenty but people worry constantly about the rocketing cost of living (even the bus/tube fares go up by about 20% a year a the moment!) - this creats a very competitive culture where people are always stressing about work and their salary. Buying a flat - even a nasty one in a sh*t area - is out of reach for anyone without weathly parents, as banks now demand a 30% deposit for a mortgage!
Yes I'd say salaries here are high enough to deal with the rising cost of living. In fact it is the high salaried jobs that are pushing up the market. The Bay Area, bear in mind, is the home of Google, The Apple Corporation, Facebook, Adobe, Hewlett Packard etc (Silicon Valley), Pixar is also based here are are many big bio-tech / pharma firms. Many homes are paid for with all cash offers.
Good to hear there seem to be signs of growth back home. Speaking from a purely selfish point of view it would be nice to think there may be job opportunities to go back to, once we are done with our time here in the US. Interesting that some of the big cities seem to be doing ok - you can only hope that this will in time spread out to the smaller surrounding towns.
Thanks for the input guys.
I take what you're saying I visited Manchester the other day and it did feel buzzy and relatively prosperous in the centre. However, I wouldn't say the rents are "sky high". My mate rents a very large one bedroom flat (bedroom, seperate kitchen and living room) BANG in the centre of Manchester (2 mins from Piccadilly Gardens) for about £700 per month. A similar flat in zone 1 of London would be pushing £2,750 a month. Even in zone 2 (Islington, Camden etc) it'd be at least £1,800.
I would also say Manchester and Leeds etc, while relatively affluent in the centre, do not share the real booming economy London has, and it shows. Even the centres of these cities have derelict buildings and vacant brownfield space a plenty, among the new office developments and bars and nightclubs. It seems like they are really trying to encourage gentrification, but it's not quite taking off. Whereas in London gentrification is an unstoppable tidal wave that is affecting even the most (historically) impoverished and slumlike areas.
Just my thoughts anyway! I may be wrong, don't really know the north that well.
I can't vouch for Manchester but rents in Leeds are in the top 50 nationwide and on average eat up half of your income, so yes, sky high is an accurate description. London is of course bonkers, but it's an unfair comparison because London is so far removed from the rest of the UK.
As for brownfield sites - they exist in London too, they exist everywhere, many lay empty because developers refuse to let go of them - they want to inflate the price as much as possible. A real booming economy like London? Of course not, but still in okay shape relatively speaking, gentrification is a slower process but it's occurring, even in the deprived districts (only recently though).
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