Comment by slau | Hacker News Reader

Comment by slau | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Sure, but it's not just that. The quality of life could be argued to be significantly higher than in other places.

The job security once you land a decent gig is not something to be discarded. This being said, Macron does plan on making it easier for people to be fired, in order to make it easier for companies to hire. This is a big topic that I could rant for hours about.

You do get all-inclusive health care. In addition to what the government provides, most 40k€ jobs will come with an extra private insurance ("mutuelle"), which will effectively reduce health costs for you and your family to 0. Depending on how nice your company is, you might be _taxed_ on an extra 20-40€ of monthly income, which gives mutuelle rights to you and your family. If you're unlucky, 20-40€ will be deducted from your pay for every family member on the mutuelle. This is usually not negotiable as it is managed/negotiated by the employee representatives/unions.

You also get fairly decent rents. 600€/month will get you a flat in any city, except Paris/Lyon. 1000-1400€ will get you a nice place in most cities.

You also get access to a decent transportation network to most Europe, and a very good internet connectivity, at the consumer level.

I moved from France to Denmark. I would say my wealth has increased (2-3x salary increase), but my overall stress has massively increased. France has a lot of good things going for it.

I'm French and I moved to San Diego, so....

My health insurance is paid by my company and I don't really care about free education.

Yet, after all my bills, groceries for the month and rent (which is around $2k/month) is paid, I still have almost $2k / month in my pocket to do whatever I want. Good luck to have that in France.

The quality of life in Southern California is miles ahead from what I could have in France. My only regret is about food.

I am jealous, it is a nice place.

I'm French and I'm curious as to how you moved and got a job in SD ? Thanks

SD is "South Dakota" as abbreviated in US-English. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Dakota

There are more people in San Diego (~1.2M) than all of South Dakota (~800k). Even absent the context of replying to a comment about having moved to San Diego, I think it would be reasonable to assume that "SD" stands for San Diego instead of South Dakota.

I went to an engineering school in France. In France it takes 5 years to get a master degree.

Each year we must do an internship that varies in length between 1 month in first year to 6 months in the final year.

While I was in school, one of my friend and me, created a small game server hosting company (Minecraft, counter strike, ...). We started with 0€ and ended up with ~2k/month each, more than the minimal salary, while being students. We were working on that after school and during the week ends. It was technically challenging and we both learned a lot quickly (Rails, how to manage and promote a company, how to handle customer service, ...) .I remember we even used the first versions of Docker to create game server containers.

Thanks to that, I got an internship in Switzerland during my 2nd year.

That school requires that during your 3rd year of study you have to do a 3 months minimum internship (up to 9 months using your 4th year) in an english speaking coutry.

Most of the students go to the UK or Australia, because they are cheap options, but thanks to my job in Switzerland I had tons of money and I wanted to go to New York so I sent hundreds of resume to companies in New York. I finally got contacted for an internship offer but in San Diego. I had no better option so I accepted. I didn't even know where was San Diego.

I worked during 9 months and I loved this city. I went back to France to get my degree and instead of doing my final internship in France, like everyone does to get a job, I sent a couple of resume to companies in San Diego.

It was way more easy this time due to my first experience and I was able to get an offer from one of the best company in San Diego.

I worked well and after I got my degree the company wanted to switch me full time, so they applied for an H1B. I did not get it the first year but got it the second time. I had to work remotely for ~9 months because my intern visa (J1) expired but I finally went back to San Diego. Now I'm waiting on my green card (EB2).

"Good luck to have that in France."

It's not as hard as you seem to think. Earning ~3500 euros/month (net of taxes) is definitely doable as a software developer if you have good skills.

I should have said "Good luck to have that in France, when you are fresh out of school".

I know you can have the same salary in Paris than in the US but it requires 20 years of experience and two degrees from X and Normal Sup.

My friends make on average ~1800€/month after tax and most of them still need to live with their parents. A majority of them want to move out of France. I understand them, no way you study so hard to make 600€ more than the minimum wage (~1200€/month).

>> The job security once you land a decent gig is not something to be discarded.

The thing is that most young people without connections are not employed in "CDI" anymore. 80% of recruitments are done in "CDD", which becomes the norm.

An what means "job security"? if your company wants to fire you it can easily, it just has to do it a decent way.

Every year I work in the US I save enough to take 1.5 years off work.

France is a beautiful place. Can I earn (in year equivalents) a similar or better amount as a senior developer?

Probably not.

To what do you attribute the rise in stress - you only gave details on France and the salary change. Also did you already speak Danish?

I don't speak Danish, although I can read it fairly well---Dutch helps a lot.

Language isn't much of a barrier. English works in 90% of cases, and broken Danish works in the other 10%. The first two modules of Danish classes are sufficient to survive anything given a proficient level of English (for context, there are around 6 or 7 modules, and they're all free, sponsored by the local government).

The main sources of stress are lodging, weather, and social life.

Finding a place to live is ridiculously difficult. As a foreigner, you will be forced to pay 12-15k DKK to get anything decent (think 2k€). Having to deal with short term rentals, visiting places daily for 2-3 months on end to find something you both like and can afford, etc. Dealing with landlords who abuse the terms of the contract, openly cheat and game the system, outright lie and manipulate. I currently pay 15k for a 110m2 flat, 20 minutes bike distance from the city center. My Danish friends tell me I'm overpaying and should get on waiting lists (which take anywhere from 1 to 10 years to come to fruition), my immigrant friends tell me how lucky I am.

The weather might sound like a frivolous point, but the lack of sunlight during the winter, and the overabundance of it during the summer will strain your body. At least it did mine. Random chocolate cravings in the winter. Insomnia during the summer.

The last point, social life, is an interesting one. Although I know a lot more people, and have more "friends" than I did when I lived in the UK, France, or Australia, they are a lot more difficult. Drinking is a real problem, and the fact that I don't is even moreso. There's such a social pressure to drink, that I often have to give in. I often have to order a beer not to be laughed at, interrogated, etc. There's also a lot more pressure to become a parent. Maybe this is due to my age, but it is a topic that has come up a lot more than anywhere else. Heck, when I interviewed here before moving, it was one of the selling points ("You know, Denmark is a _great_ place to have kids.")

In fairness: I'm working in startups now, which probably also accounts for a good portion of the increased stress.

15k for 110m2 is not unreasonable if you are 20 min bike from city center. I feel ya though with regards to accommodation, but that is honestly mostly a problem in Copenhagen/Aarhus, and not so much in smaller cities, like say Vejle. For the larger cities to go cheap, you have to know a guy that knows a guy, or be related to someone with an apartment :(

Those aforementioned cities are University cities, and also the central hub for a lot of companies, making it a quite big problem. If you think you have it hard with a full paying job, imagine what the students go through, that pay ~5k DKK for just a room.

The weather I’ll grant you, if honestly hate summers because of the light and heat, since air conditioning is not really a common thing in DK.

And heh, if you don’t drink in Denmark, you are automatically gonna miss out on a lot of things, it’s such an ingrained part of the culture. That said, it has definitely become more acceptable to say no in recent years, but it works best if you are consistent, because else people will know they can nudge you into it and get you on board. If you are consistent, it will get respected (eventually at least).

Reply on news.ycombinator.com