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Comment by mellosouls | Hacker News Reader

almost everyone I know is eyeing the exit

Anecdotal only. I don't know many eyeing the exit. Not everybody is so money focused.

I am. My children are the only things keeping me here. It's not about the money it's about quality of life. Healthcare is rapidly becoming non-existent, schools operate off the back of teachers, roads are falling apart, the level of corruption is embarrassing, housing market is ridiculous, childcare is expensive and/or non-existent etc. In general any service provided by the state is deteriorating.

It's not about the money it's about quality of life

My response was to a post about money.

Wrt quality of life, I can definitely see that as an argument for leaving the UK (though obviously less useful than staying to try and change it), but you only have to look at international quality of life indexes to see that social happiness is pretty much inversely related to materialist excess within the developed nations.

You don't have to be money focused. Maybe you just want an appointment with your dentist without waiting for over 2 months for it.

There's plenty wrong with the UK but the pursuit of materialism and short-term I'm-alright-Jack priorities is responsible for a lot of it.

I understand what you were saying in your original comment having seen this now. Completely agree the level of selfish short term-ism is a joke.

Thanks, yes, and I agree the UK has been on a downward path for a considerable time; I don't blame anybody for trying to find somewhere they will be happier - and warmer :) - it's the materialistic worship at the centre of a lot of our problems (reflected in the values of empty salary-chasing) that bothers me.

If the services are around you are deteriorating, then by definition you need more money to access the type of services that used to exist at the level you are used to.

So I'm not sure empty salary-chasing is as empty as you make it seem. Sometimes salary chasing is just trying to keep up with inflation in order to make sure your family maintains a decent standard of living.

Unless I completely misunderstood your post, in which case disregard everything I said.

I got a letter saying I was due an appointment, emailed them to book me in at the start of this month, my appointment is in the middle of July over four months later. And I am one of the luckier ones in that I actually have a dentist. A lot of people in the country can't even access one. This country is an absolute joke and I am also getting out.

Maybe I'm spoilt, but I've been able to get a next-day dentist appointment basically forever. Usually private, because I get insurance through work though.

The UK is notorious for having a persistently large proportion of the population insisting they're about to emigrate any moment now. It's a long-standing and weird phenomenon.

My bet (being British) is that Brits have lots of culturally-close New World countries to pick from. The US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, all culturally close and English-speaking. Someone from Germany or France have far fewer, if any options, especially if you count out bordering countries.

That, and the weather.

But this is a recurring theme to the point where I think it's not so much that the opportunity is there (non-English speaking countries are also high on the list of places British people want to emigrate) but a cultural idea where there seems to be that mild level of discontent that in the UK is expressed by talking about (but rarely following through) on moving to Australia in particular as a kind of hyperbole. It's a bit of a favourite of mine to explore, as it's such an weird peculiarity of British culture.

As a result, UK media as well as political groups all know that if they want a reliable way of writing a "the UK is going to hell" article, all they need to do is do a survey on people wanting to leave.

Because if you can't get more than about half of the population to say they're at least pondering leaving the UK, you're doing something very wrong and/or people are unusually happy.

Some examples:

2023: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11768729/Half-want-...

2022: https://hrnews.co.uk/two-thirds-of-british-workers-dream-of-...

2022: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/people-...

I think this one was what first made me aware of this phenomenon:

2012: https://www.aol.co.uk/2012/04/15/almost-half-of-brits-want-t...

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