A lot of the Europeans left although that's a bit of a different thing really - them going home rather than Brits leaving. I know a few Brits who have left although it's not especially down to Brexit, more it just being a bit dreary here these days. Though Brexit has contributed to the dreariness.
This is the exact reason why I left London. It's fine and good if you are by yourself or your partner. But once you have kids, it's very difficult to live in the capital. A lot of stabbing and anti-social behaviour. You'd need to live in the rich parts of London (Chelsea..etc) and even then it's not very safe.
I’d rather be poor in the UK
I’d rather be chronically sick in the UK, that is if I’m not already wealthy and insured
I’d rather be in the US and middle class - particularly with inherited wealth
I choose to live in the UK as an high level (middle) manager with my similar status American wife
Yeah, ours don't either (yet) in large part since radiators are more common. Though at least in NL there's a lot of hybrid systems. You keep your gas boiler and attach a heat pump as well. The heat pump handles house heating and the gas boiler still heats domestic hot water.
I don't remember the exact timeline but I think SMS became free (bundled with mobile phone plan) in the US before WhatsApp became popular. And most of us don't interact via chat very much internationally. So (probably) most people just default to SMS/iMessage unless there's a reason to do something differently. And even the one person I regularly communicate with chat in Europe, we default to Facebook Messenger.
"doing ok" or "barely keeping head above water". Is not a good look, when you have people doing demanding engineering jobs that require skill and years of education, that they have to keep themselves up to date learning past 9-5. I know married senior developer with two kids, 20 years of experience, still saving for deposit for a flat (as house is now out of reach). Rents are going up and so the property prices so they can't catch up. His wife can't work full time, because of children and nursery etc is unaffordable. They have not been on holidays since Covid and employer is talking about downsizing. Man is 40 and looks like 50 due to stress.
I know a couple of developers who are single, yes they do "okay", but they are nowhere near in a position to start a family. It's grim.
Then you have wage compression where really doing warehouse job doesn't get you much worse living standard than typical developer. You will have shittier flat, maybe extra housemate and you will shop in Aldi instead of Waitrose. That's very much the difference right now.
