[CleanSlate]

America has its plusses and minuses. Wouldn’t be fair to call it a total dump because the US is a BIG place. Some cities and towns are complete 3rd world shitholes, and others are decent places to live.

With that said, I still feel a lot of guys here have a too rosy view of 2019 America. Things have changed noticeably for the worse even through 2016 when I last lived there. I am far happier abroad than when I lived there.

And finally... I’m surprised no one has mentioned this:

Why can I STILL not find a bum gun in any of the bathrooms in a country that’s been a #1 superpower since 1945? Now THAT is shitty. Literally!

[Sidney Crosby]

America the dump, but probably 3/4 of the worlds population dream of living there.

[Kurgan]

It depends where you go.

[puckerman]

You have to get away from touristy areas to see what any country really looks like.

[Waqqle]

America was the future 100 years ago. Now though, our infrastructure has not been upgraded or even seriously maintained since the 70s and everything else, economically speaking, has been imploding since the same time period. Real wages haven’t increased since the 70s, the traditional family unit as a concept was pretty much obliterated in the 70s, the last time anyone was able to pay their own way through college or buy a house without a massive loan before they turned 30 was around that time, etc.

Having lived years in Asia and spent time in Latin America, I can say that developing countries often have more impressive infrastructure than we do because our stuff was all built in the 70s whereas their stuff is new and shiny. They are also growing rapidly and the people are mostly hopeful for the future whereas America has been in a slow depressing decline economically and culturally for at least half a century and the most popular tv shows and movies typically revolve around some catastrophe bringing the whole sad mess to an end somehow and leaving a few scrappy survivors to rebuild from the ashes and rubble or some kind of autocratic dystopian future in which a few scrappy survivors must bring the whole sad mess to an end somehow.

Culturally, we have nothing noteworthy to offer the world anymore that is not utterly toxic and destructive to the health and longevity of a civilization which hopes to do right by its children and perpetuate itself into the next century.

As for healthcare, safety, and all that, we already have tons of people buying their medications in Canada and Mexico and seeking medical treatment abroad (“medical tourism”) because healthcare is so expensive that the only way I myself can afford any measure of it is through my special VA (Veterans Administration) insurance that only people who were in the military can get (this is probably less than 1% of the population). The safety situation is messed up as we all know with entire major cities like Detroit, St Louis, the southern half of Chicago, etc. which used to be economic and cultural hubs basically being uninhabitable no go zones for the most part.

Basically, everyone knows that the US is not getting better. This is the decline of greatness leading toward the sad but inevitable end, like watching Muhammad Ali deteriorate from Parkinson’s until he eventually died, shaking and barely able to speak. The bouncy house has a big huge tear in it and everyone is just trying to extract as many bounces from it as possible before it deflates entirely.

It is true that other places are worse. But how much longer will they be worse? That’s the question. We know that many places which are not great now will be great in 10-20 years but we also know that the US will only decline further in that time.

In my experience and observation, most of the foreigners I’ve met who want to move to the US and bet their futures on it do not understand much about the country at all. They are nice people and they have decent intentions much of the time but they just do not understand what is really involved in living in the US as a normal person with no real connections, wealth, or significant ties to any other part of the world from which they might be able to draw a community or to which they might be able to move should things go sideways. These individuals tend to also be idealistic and highly misinformed about what life for normal people in the US is really like day to day.

What I’m getting at is that the answer to the question “is the US a dump?” depends on who is asking the question, whether they are considering the future, and what their objectives are. If, for example, you are from a developing country and you want to come in, make some quick cash by working a few years, and then return to your home country where all the real estate is cheap (and you can own it since you, unlike most Americans, are a citizen there) and buy a house or two in cash, then it can be great for you. If, however, you are a normal American with no remarkable talents, wealthy connected background, or dual citizenship in another country where you can buy cheap property and you want to buy a house in your homeland or safely raise a family in a traditional fashion without being divorce courted, you may find yourself wishing that you were from somewhere else and that you had some other country where you could legally flee to and have a life in without need of a visa.

It’s certainly not the worst country in Earth but it’s not #1 either. The situation for a wealthy immigrant with solid qualifications is also going to be vastly different from a native-born normal guy who is not really remarkable in any way and is stuck in some area he can scarcely afford to live in where he is unqualified for any job that offers more than minimum wage and hasn’t been outsourced to illegal migrants who don’t pay taxes and so can afford to work for less and where he is surrounded by fat single moms and fentanyl addicts.

Such a fortunate immigrant’s situation would also be quite different from that of a black inner city son of an obese single mom with a misspelled, made-up job repellant name like Shakkwawndiq@ who has PTSD from watching two of his friends die in drive-by shootings and who has to walk through metal detectors and police dog checkpoints to enter his underfunded and frankly hopeless school to sit in a classroom with all his other peers whose lives are also going nowhere positive to listen to hafhearted lectures being given by jaded teachers who gave up years ago because their hearts just couldn’t take the disappointment anymore and pretend that he believes he is going to live to be 50 or ever know what it’s like to not worry if he will be able to make rent on his drafty apartment on the south-side of a city where 70% of murders go unsolved in which a syphilitic hooker was beaten to death with a jeweled scepter by a one-eyed pimp named Skeeze two weeks before he moved in.

[durangotang]

@Waqqle

Epic rant bro. I like your style.

[BlueMark]

I have a friend from India who moved to the USA (suburban California) when he was in college and now lives in Tokyo, Japan, after working for a few years in the US.

He says Japan is a lot closer than America to what he imagined America would be like before he moved there.

[Brahman]

i mean, this clip from (6 years ago?) basically summarizes it…

Jump to 4:50 mark

[porscheguy]

(01-16-2019 03:46 AM)Waqqle Wrote:  

Such a fortunate immigrant’s situation would also be quite different from that of a black inner city son of an obese single mom with a misspelled, made-up job repellant name like Shakkwawndiq@ who has PTSD from watching two of his friends die in drive-by shootings and who has to walk through metal detectors and police dog checkpoints to enter his underfunded and frankly hopeless school to sit in a classroom with all his other peers whose lives are also going nowhere positive to listen to hafhearted lectures being given by jaded teachers who gave up years ago because their hearts just couldn’t take the disappointment anymore and pretend that he believes he is going to live to be 50 or ever know what it’s like to not worry if he will be able to make rent on his drafty apartment on the south-side of a city where 70% of murders go unsolved in which a syphilitic hooker was beaten to death with a jeweled scepter by a one-eyed pimp named Skeeze two weeks before he moved in.

“Job repellent name” is worth a rep. Kudos to one of the longest, funniest, and most poignant run on sentences I’ve ever read.

[Denver Nuggets fan]

(01-15-2019 10:12 PM)Kurgan Wrote:  

It depends where you go.

Yup, I'm from Denver and its from what I would call a "dump" or third world. One of the best big cities in America. The city has a population of 700k and the metro area is almost 3 million.

My only complaints about Denver is the traffic (getting worse by the day) and public transport could be improved.

[Winston Wolfe]

I encourage everyone to pick any country they want and to go live there like a local on an average monthly salary for that country, for a year. Come on now, have a little adventure, don't pick Western Europe or Australia.

Let's hear opinions on whether the US is a dump after that.

And yes, that includes living in a shack with your entire family if you have to, in the scorching heat, without airconditioning and without personal space.

Yes, it also includes having no decent healthcare to speak of (unless you want to pay your annual salary for it), no state benefits, corrupt police, shit public transport, shitty roads; the lot.

The point I'm trying to make is, we view everything through a Western lens, and however much I hate the word, I am going to use it anyway: we are very privileged to be able to even have a choice of where to live. If you can go somewhere and live like a king for $1500 per month, of course your lifestyle is going to make the US look like a dump in comparison.

For the record, I am not from the US myself but am used to similar economic opportunities and benefits (Western Europe), thus consider myself qualified to chime in on this.

[Scorpio Rising]

(01-16-2019 03:46 AM)Waqqle Wrote:  

America was the future 100 years ago. Now though, our infrastructure has not been upgraded or even seriously maintained since the 70s and everything else, economically speaking, has been imploding since the same time period. Real wages haven’t increased since the 70s, the traditional family unit as a concept was pretty much obliterated in the 70s, the last time anyone was able to pay their own way through college or buy a house without a massive loan before they turned 30 was around that time, etc.

Having lived years in Asia and spent time in Latin America, I can say that developing countries often have more impressive infrastructure than we do because our stuff was all built in the 70s whereas their stuff is new and shiny. They are also growing rapidly and the people are mostly hopeful for the future whereas America has been in a slow depressing decline economically and culturally for at least half a century and the most popular tv shows and movies typically revolve around some catastrophe bringing the whole sad mess to an end somehow and leaving a few scrappy survivors to rebuild from the ashes and rubble or some kind of autocratic dystopian future in which a few scrappy survivors must bring the whole sad mess to an end somehow.

Culturally, we have nothing noteworthy to offer the world anymore that is not utterly toxic and destructive to the health and longevity of a civilization which hopes to do right by its children and perpetuate itself into the next century.

As for healthcare, safety, and all that, we already have tons of people buying their medications in Canada and Mexico and seeking medical treatment abroad (“medical tourism”) because healthcare is so expensive that the only way I myself can afford any measure of it is through my special VA (Veterans Administration) insurance that only people who were in the military can get (this is probably less than 1% of the population). The safety situation is messed up as we all know with entire major cities like Detroit, St Louis, the southern half of Chicago, etc. which used to be economic and cultural hubs basically being uninhabitable no go zones for the most part.

Basically, everyone knows that the US is not getting better. This is the decline of greatness leading toward the sad but inevitable end, like watching Muhammad Ali deteriorate from Parkinson’s until he eventually died, shaking and barely able to speak. The bouncy house has a big huge tear in it and everyone is just trying to extract as many bounces from it as possible before it deflates entirely.

It is true that other places are worse. But how much longer will they be worse? That’s the question. We know that many places which are not great now will be great in 10-20 years but we also know that the US will only decline further in that time.

In my experience and observation, most of the foreigners I’ve met who want to move to the US and bet their futures on it do not understand much about the country at all. They are nice people and they have decent intentions much of the time but they just do not understand what is really involved in living in the US as a normal person with no real connections, wealth, or significant ties to any other part of the world from which they might be able to draw a community or to which they might be able to move should things go sideways. These individuals tend to also be idealistic and highly misinformed about what life for normal people in the US is really like day to day.

What I’m getting at is that the answer to the question “is the US a dump?” depends on who is asking the question, whether they are considering the future, and what their objectives are. If, for example, you are from a developing country and you want to come in, make some quick cash by working a few years, and then return to your home country where all the real estate is cheap (and you can own it since you, unlike most Americans, are a citizen there) and buy a house or two in cash, then it can be great for you. If, however, you are a normal American with no remarkable talents, wealthy connected background, or dual citizenship in another country where you can buy cheap property and you want to buy a house in your homeland or safely raise a family in a traditional fashion without being divorce courted, you may find yourself wishing that you were from somewhere else and that you had some other country where you could legally flee to and have a life in without need of a visa.

It’s certainly not the worst country in Earth but it’s not #1 either. The situation for a wealthy immigrant with solid qualifications is also going to be vastly different from a native-born normal guy who is not really remarkable in any way and is stuck in some area he can scarcely afford to live in where he is unqualified for any job that offers more than minimum wage and hasn’t been outsourced to illegal migrants who don’t pay taxes and so can afford to work for less and where he is surrounded by fat single moms and fentanyl addicts.

Such a fortunate immigrant’s situation would also be quite different from that of a black inner city son of an obese single mom with a misspelled, made-up job repellant name like Shakkwawndiq@ who has PTSD from watching two of his friends die in drive-by shootings and who has to walk through metal detectors and police dog checkpoints to enter his underfunded and frankly hopeless school to sit in a classroom with all his other peers whose lives are also going nowhere positive to listen to hafhearted lectures being given by jaded teachers who gave up years ago because their hearts just couldn’t take the disappointment anymore and pretend that he believes he is going to live to be 50 or ever know what it’s like to not worry if he will be able to make rent on his drafty apartment on the south-side of a city where 70% of murders go unsolved in which a syphilitic hooker was beaten to death with a jeweled scepter by a one-eyed pimp named Skeeze two weeks before he moved in.

I was going to leave this alone. I found the majority of the posts here to be naive if not pollyanna like. Now that you have given me back my bravery just let me say great post and for the most part I concur. I can just look at my two hometowns and see how much they have regressed in my lifetime. City and suburbs alike. In Chicago, where my family migrated to in the 50's dozens of neighborhoods in the city that were viable then are now certifiably dumps. Dangerous dumps at that. Anybody read exit polls these days? The suburbs of Chicago, once bastions of rock ribbed Republicans are now bluer than an incels balls. In Pittsburgh, where I was born, the area has not had anything resembling a strong economy since the 1950's, when my mom, dad and aunt decided it was time to get out. I mean I could make this the longest post in the history of the internet. We're in the midst of a long term decline that did not start yesterday. I don't pretend to know if we will continue to die the drip drip death of a thousand cuts or if there will be a sudden and violent collapse. I just know the matrix is winning here and winning big I might add. Trump was supposed to be the death of PC but it has only gotten worse exponentially since he took office. Socially, economically and culturally we are in decline. Yes many millions are and can still live a great life here. It doesn't mean we aren't becoming dumpified a little more each year.

[Solitaire]

(01-16-2019 03:46 AM)Waqqle Wrote:  

America was the future 100 years ago. Now though, our infrastructure has not been upgraded or even seriously maintained since the 70s and everything else, economically speaking, has been imploding since the same time period. Real wages haven’t increased since the 70s, the traditional family unit as a concept was pretty much obliterated in the 70s, the last time anyone was able to pay their own way through college or buy a house without a massive loan before they turned 30 was around that time, etc.

This all feels right on the money, Mr. W. It's disheartening, for sure.

Quote:

Culturally, we have nothing noteworthy to offer the world anymore that is not utterly toxic and destructive to the health and longevity of a civilization which hopes to do right by its children and perpetuate itself into the next century.

I put much blame on MTV for this, honestly. It seems to me that they started this "reality tv" BS that unfortunately blew up into what amounts to culture in our country coinciding with social media. What we offer now to the rest of the world is just as you say: toxic, destructive, narcissistic nonsense. I remember going to Russia twenty years ago, ended up getting married to the pick of the litter; beautiful girls everywhere, and guess what? They still had to work for a living. Now I'm seeing Instagram flooded with tattoo'd Russian and Ukrainian bimbos - being celebrated by beta idiots liking every pic. I suppose a girl's gotta do what she gotta do, but damn.

Quote:

It is true that other places are worse. But how much longer will they be worse? That’s the question. We know that many places which are not great now will be great in 10-20 years but we also know that the US will only decline further in that time.

Mind telling me what other places you think will be great in 10 or 20? I'm wanting to make a plan

Great post, thanks.

[Waqqle]

(01-16-2019 01:30 PM)Solitaire Wrote:  

Mind telling me what other places you think will be great in 10 or 20? I'm wanting to make a plan

Great post, thanks.

I can't predict the future with absolute certainty of course but I personally plan to pursue dual citizenship, most probably in a developing country, within the next 10 years so this is a question that I have given a lot of thought to in my own life.

Personally, I tend to lean more towards countries which have oceanic coastlines because I just like to see the ocean and know that I'm not far away from it but I could also see myself in a landlocked country because, if nothing else, I could always just take a vacation to a neighboring coastal country if I really want to see the ocean.

When narrowing my list of countries down, I consider things like business opportunities, the procedures and costs required to own and operate a legitimate small business, naturalization procedures for immigrants who do not have ethnic or familial ties to the country, taxes, national GDP growth and personal income growth over the past 10-15 years (growth slows at a certain point so it's good to get in while GDP growth is still more than 4-5% per year if you can) demographic composition of the population on both the national level as well as in the particular locality where I intend to spend the majority of my time, cost of living relative to economic opportunities, violent crime rates both on a national level as well as in the particular locality I tend to live in, government corruption, cost and ease of traveling to other interesting places which may or may not be nearby, lifestyle, my own levels of qualification and status relative to the majority of the population (this will change as a country becomes more prosperous and developed so it is good to get an early), natural beauty, opportunity to pursue my personal hobbies and interests, social and friendship culture, gender roles, and things of that sort.

Given all of those things, some countries which I am personally considering at the moment are (in no particular order):

- Cabo Verde
- São Tomé and Principe
- Colombia
- Russia
- Republic of Georgia
- Portugal (I don't see the EU lasting much longer; also, the Azores)
- Montenegro
- South Korea (I just like living here for reasons unrelated to economics)
- Japan
- Philippines (I just like living there but unfortunately, citizenship is difficult)
- Peru
- Taiwan
- Indonesia
- Brazil
- Vanuatu
- Mauritius
- Cambodia
- Poland
- Romania
- Bulgaria
- Croatia

Some solid landlocked options that I am also giving though to are:

- Kazakhstan
- Kyrgyzstan
- Zambia (already growing and likely to grow more once South Africa tanks)
- Rwanda (known to be very low in crime and corruption - read Rwanda Inc.)
- Paraguay
- Ethiopia (best food in Africa, nice people, and stellar GDP growth)
- Mongolia
- Nepal (citizenship may need to come from some sort of connection)
- Macedonia
- Hungary (maybe you can get refugee status from fleeing the West?)
- Serbia
- Kosovo (dirt cheap, strategically located, and open for business)

This is not an exhaustive list and I encourage you to look into it for yourself if immigrating to another country is something that interests you.

It is not about finding the country which is going to be the next global superpower. It is about finding the country you will enjoy living in and which will provide you the best opportunities to pursue those things which are priorities for you. Some guys prioritize leisure and nature over urban life and high salaries for example. Some guys would rather be an investment banker living in a penthouse downtown in a global metropolis whereas others would rather run a surf shop or small musical instrument workshop in a beach town where they own their own house and can put their feet in the water every day. It depends on what you prefer. Some guys prefer to look like most of the natives and other guys prefer girls of a different ethnic/racial background.

It's also not about what most people in that country are doing but about what you personally can do there.

Have you got any particular countries in mind or any on this list which pique your interest?

[Solitaire]

Hey Waqqle, thanks for the detailed response. I don't really want to derail the thread here, but wanted to make sure to reply to you quickly. São Tomé and Principe look really nice, actually - I'd consider visiting. [Quick Edit: I also love being near the coast so that's my goal.] I'm going to copy your response into my docs folder and look more closely. My brother bought a place in Mexico three years ago, in Playa del Carmen, and he seems pretty happy. However he doesn't speak Spanish, it's a gated, secure community away from everything else, and he's already found himself a young Mexican wife that's harping about his money constantly . . . anyway, seems like you're doing a thorough search. Keep us updated, maybe in a new thread? Thanks again.