For my youth, I always thought the tide would break and things would get better in the U.S., I am now 32 and the re-election of Donald Trump has caused me to completely give up on The United States politically. The U.S. seems hell bent on hanging on to global hegemony even at the cost of collapse rather than bring it down for a soft landing. I believe fascism is here, and it’s only going to get worse as material conditions deteriorate and elites divert the rage of the masses against scapegoats such as immigrants and trans people.
Nursing is an in demand job on just about any government’s web site. After the re-election of Donald Trump I enrolled in college in order to get a degree in nursing and leave this hell hole permanently. I am half way towards getting my associates degree.
I don’t want my tax dollars to continue to be used for genocide, imperialism, mass surveillance, police brutality and corporate subsidies.
Part of me feels like I should stay and resist but I don’t think I can stop the rising tide. I’ve watched friends and family become monsters despite my best efforts.
I do not feel safe in The United States and I believe that I need to leave as soon as possible for my family’s as well as my own material well being.
As a compromise to my husband and mother I have chosen Canada, which I’m not happy about. But me and my husband have agreed that it is not forever, we chose Canada because of their ease of immigration and quick recognition of U.S. credentials, as well as there being no language barrier. From there we will search for our forever home. Right now escape and survival are our main concerns.
In my heart I would love to move to China, or Vietnam, but with the information I have it seems basically impossible as a U.S. citizen to do so.
I’m curious what your guy’s thoughts are?
i mean, that’s a pretty personal decision, some people want to fight the power in subtle ways, some people want to go full luigi or paper mario, some people use their knowledge to teach people more enthusiastic or with more connections to get things done
you could stay in your country, because that’s the place you know the most, and you kinda know the laws and the kind of people you can identify as fascist
leaving the country is another option, but you’ll need to learn another language, probably getting more info about local politics, culture, and starting from scratch
anyways, it all depends of what’s more convenient, how risky is staying vs leaving and how different would be the culture of your potential new home and the possibility of that place falling in fascist hands
First thing to check is the visa requirements of any country under consideration. Some countries are welcoming of emigres, some are not. Many have financial requirements and thresholds for a visa or residence permits that may be beyond your means. If you plan to work, then further investigation will be required on any restriction that might prevent you from doing so in your chosen destination. Many countries are welcoming of retirees, but not working age people. Establish “can I” move there, before investigating “do I want to” move there.
I’m already making preparations to leave the
since I am actually being persecuted for political views, with a possible prison sentence or R100,000 ZAR “fine” on the horizon. Going to another EU country isn’t an option due to language barrier, cost of living and the EU-Feds are all collaborators. Even in Barcelona or Dublin, there would be a citation in the mail (probably also signed with “Slava Ukraini”) demanding to pay up. This of course depends on the verdict on the 3rd of July.This is more of a reason to leave tbh, but in case you didn’t know, you’re obligated to pay income taxes to the US even when you’re not living there. Probably nothing’s gonna happen unless you’re making big bucks, but yeah, all US citizens are supposed to pay the feds taxes regardless of where in the world they live.
That only begins at 140,000 dollars or more of income. Plus, if you pay taxes overseas you credit the amount on your us taxes. I highly doubt OP is making more than 140,000 dollars while paying taxes abroad.
The IRS essentially doesn’t charge you unless you’re extraordinarily wealthy by working class standards.
So you don’t pay taxes to the US if living abroad, but you need to file them anyway because tax records are used for social security, verifying a person is alive, and where the person resides.
Yup and to add onto this, the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion only applies to “earned income” which is wages, salaries, tips, and other payments you get from working. The exclusion doesn’t cover “unearned income” which you’ll still have to pay taxes on even if you’ve been unemployed all year. So interest, capital gains, scholarships, alimony, pensions, etc. are still taxed normally. OP probably doesn’t have any of those right now but a lifetime is a long time and unless they revoke their citizenship, this tax burden will follow them to the grave.
Also they might owe state taxes too because sometimes just having a valid driver’s license or being registered to vote is enough to count as having ties to a state.
I’m not their advisor, but if I were, I’d recommend tax evasion.
They’re going to have to come and lock me up or kill me or something because I won’t be scared out of my home, I won’t be demoralized into giving up on my home. My hope will never die.
America has been fascist for more or less it’s entire history, crimes worse than the Nazis all throughout. This isn’t some new development, it’s an unmasking, an unraveling of everything they hide behind. Rather than backing off now is the time to ramp up the pressure.
Sometimes in order to win a fight you have to put yourself in a position where you get rocked in the face really hard. I’m not scared to get hit because I see more to gain than there is to lose.
My confidence will never waver; I’m not going to roll over and give them my country just because they’ve barred their teeth at me.
I think there’s a strong argument to be made about moving to an existing socialist state and using your skills to help advance it instead of using them to make a living under capitalism that’s rapidly devolving into fascism. While taking yourself out of the labour pool and going to contribute in China or Vietnam doesn’t directly help change the situation, it still makes a small positive difference.
Also, the reality is that it’s highly unlikely that there will be any sort of a socialist revolution in the US, or that things will get better in the near term. A Soviet style collapse and descent into open fascism seems like the most likely scenario. This is not something that any single individual can affect. The class consciousness and organization for any sort of a serious labour movement simply aren’t present in the US. A labour movement will form in response to the change in material conditions eventually, but my expectation is that things are going to get a lot worse before that happens. Anybody who has a choice and decides to stay has to be realistic that the US is headed for very dark times.
Well shit. Someone told me “revolution is like the rapture, it will never come” in an attempt to get me to vote for Kamala. I still wouldn’t have done it, but I wonder if they’re right. We haven’t had a socialist revolution in the world in a long time, I know that’s because the US does everything possible to prevent them but I also wonder if the world has just changed. Maybe people nowadays really would rather amuse and distract themselves to death than risk their life on a future they’ll never see for future generations that may not even happen. Or if drone warfare will become the overwhelming norm considering how things are going for Iran.
People tend to have a hard time imagining things outside their own lived experience. It’s not so much that a revolution will never come, but rather that they haven’t seen one in their life time. The living memory for people in the west is that nothing much changes. You have crises and economic meltdowns, but the system manages to right itself in the end and keep going.
But what people miss is that things never quite get back to the same level they were at before each crisis. The mechanics of the system ensure that more and more wealth is funnelled away from the working majority to the oligarchs at the top. And that means that people are less and less able to absorb each successive crisis. So, eventually you do hit an inflection point where the whole system starts coming apart.
As Lenin put it, every society is three hot meals away from chaos. People will distract themselves and ignore problems as long as they can find ways to meet their basic needs. Once there’s a critical mass of people that are no longer able to, then all bets are off.
Everyone is entitled to their own choice. I’m going to stay in the US and continue to try and make it better. This is my home. I’m willing to fight for a brighter future, however grim the situation gets.
Preach. I am standing my ground as well. Although I have the utmost respect for those who wish to leave.
I’m leaving this dump too for exactly the same reasons. The trajectory here is profoundly and intractably negative and its only a matter of time before it breaks completely. A lot of people are gonna die.
I’m just glad I’m not going to be here for the fucking 4th I want to puke just thinking about it
Hell Yeah! Leave! I am going to go to China when I save up enough.
Hi, certified US born chinese mixed working to get their chinese citizenship here. Unless you marry into China and get permanent spousal residency, or you have close family members and can claim heritage properly, or you do something so amazing for the people of China specifically that you essentially earn your place amongst the Maos and Xis of the world, you probably aren’t getting a Chinese citizenship. And it can be a real hassle getting any kind of residency beyond a couple-year at a time work visa.
That being said get some years of nursing under your belt, get your four-year nursing degree/license, and there’s a decent chance you can get to Vietnam if not China at least for a long while. You won’t have a forever home in China unless, again, you impress the CPC so much they just give you one, but it’s a pretty good life for foreigners on work visas while you’re here. You pretty much save 80-90% of all income (seriously, most companies you work for pay for a fully furnished apartment for you [because it’s also really difficult to find landlords to rent to foreigners, china isn’t as bad as Japan but there’s still racists]) you make, and they pay pretty close (within 30%) of what you’d make in the US for the same role. So you can save up quite a bit of money before moving back.
I’m currently in the Choctaw nation after a stint in China since I need to exit and renter for my next visa, and I just live off the savings of what I made over there.
To answer your direct question though… Yes, escape the imperial core if you have any possible ability to do so. If you can even just get to the outer edges of the imperial core you’re going to be much better off than staying within a dying empire that has spent the last hundred years destroying not only its foundational classes but the ability for said classes to ever organize sans empire.
or you have close family members
Like how close, in your observations?
I can tell you from personal experience 4 generations is too far out without a pretty lengthy legal fight, hence why I’m not in China right now. From the groups I’m in, generally speaking, within 3 generations of direct family lineage is fine, especially if they were high up enough in society to have documentation. If they’re that far out without documentation (statistically were poor rural that fled at some point) then you’ll be in the same legal fight and have to hope someone in your extended family A) Stayed, B) still has your direct family members land and C) can legally testify your family members were Chinese citizens… and at that point it’s still a court decision that can be denied.
Edit: Your mileage will also vary greatly if your ancestors were enemies of the People’s Republic at any point, you’ll have so much harder of a time in general but especially trying to claim citizenship
Although it’s worth noting that getting PR in Hong Kong is a lot easier.
With respect, it doesn’t matter what anyone thinks, in-laws included. What matters is what you and your spouse think, and can agree what you will and won’t sacrifice to achieve agreed upon objectives.
In the past, I commented that organising in the USA is hopeless and that the best thing to do for those who live there would be to move to the global south to counteract the brain drain. On the other hand, I don’t really know. I’m not from the west, and people in my own country are now violently xenophobic and our own movements have had challenges of their own in terms of building class conciousness and dual structures.
Personally, I think AES are the only places that won’t be falling into catastrophe.
its not impossible to move to china or vietnam but it would take effort and sacrifice
I’ve been back and forth on this for some time. My partner and I have discussed leaving, but we both seem to always waffle on it because we don’t want to leave our family and friends.
Wish I could move out of this shithole. Unfortunately I’m not white
That part
