-
create instability
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profit from said instability
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run from said instability
- get gov’t contracts to rebuild after instability
- The project gets canceled due to incompetent government, and you keep the money
-
They’re afraid of instability so they go to Greece?!
If you have a Greek passport you can live anywhere in the eu right?
Yup, the same works for passports from other countries like Malta and Cyprus which iirc literally just sell citizenship.
How much? Asking for a friend.
Google golden passport. Portugal and Spain were at it but I think many countries have shut down the programme.
Do not know the current programs but usually need half a million euros and up. Portugal at one time I believe was as cheap as 160k euro (hence the popularity) but I believe that is over.
If you have to ask…
Not quite so simple, but makes things certainly easier.
"As an EU citizen, you have the right to move to any EU country to live, work, study, look for a job or retire.
You can stay in another EU country for up to 3 months without registering there but you may need to report your presence. The only requirement is to hold a valid national identity card or passport. If you want to stay longer than 3 months, you may need to register your residence.
In many EU countries, you need to carry an identity card or passport with you at all times. In these countries, you could be fined or temporarily detained if you leave your identity documents at home - but you cannot be forced to return to your home country for this reason alone. "
https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/residence/residence-rights/index_en.htm#eu-citizen
It absolutelly is as simple a travelling there and finding a place to stay.
I’ve moved, lived and worked in 3 foreign EU countries just like that.
Those rules about identity documents and registration apply also to the locals: some countries want people to be registered with the city hall of were they live and (supposedly, though in 2 decades I was never asked for it) carry identity papers (though if you have an identity card from your home country that’s valid all over the EU), others couldn’t care less.
You don’t need any kind of visa or even have a job: as long as you can support yourself (i.e. aren’t there to leech of social security) it’s all fine.
That residency status is all conditional in many ways:
As an EU citizen, you have the right to move to any EU country for a period of up to 3 months as long as you have a valid identity card or passport. If you want to settle in another EU country but you have no intention to take up any work or education there, you need to prove that you:
have sufficient resources for you and your family during the time you want to stay in your new country have comprehensive health insuranceReporting your presence and registering your residence
During the first 3 months of your stay in your new country, as an EU citizen, you cannot be required to apply for a residence document confirming your right to live there - although in some countries you may have to report your presence upon arrival.
After 3 months in your new country, you may be required to register your residence with the relevant authority (often the town hall or local police station), and to be issued with a registration certificate.
You will need a valid identity card or passport and:
proof of comprehensive health insurance proof you can support yourself without needing social assistance benefits: resources may come from any source, including from a third person.Can you be requested to leave or be deported?
You may live in the other EU country as long as you continue to meet the conditions for residence. If you no longer do so, the national authorities may require you to leave.
In exceptional cases, your host country can deport you on grounds of public policy or public security - but only if it can prove you represent a genuine, present and sufficiently serious threat affecting one of the fundamental interests of society.
The deportation decision or the request to leave must be given to you in writing. It must state all the reasons for your deportation and specify how you can appeal and by when. Permanent residence
If you have lived legally, meeting the conditions to stay in another EU country for a continuous period of 5 years, you automatically acquire the right of permanent residence there. This means that you can stay in the country as long as you want, you are entitled to be treated as a national of that country and you enjoy more protection against deportation. You can apply for a document certifying permanent residence.
Your continuity of residence is not affected by:
temporary absences (less than 6 months per year) longer absences for compulsory military service one absence of 12 consecutive months, for important reasons such as pregnancy and childbirth, serious illness, work, vocational training or a posting to another country.You can lose your right to permanent residence if you live outside the country for more than 2 consecutive years.
https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/residence/residence-rights/index_en.htm#inactive-citizens-1
Going with a non chalant attitude of ‘lel I think I’m just gonna go live on the other side of EU now’ will land you in some trouble in most cases, what ever your personal alleged experience is.
Better be prepared with the proper info than leave it to luck and feels.
Considering that I’ve personally went and lived in other EU countries 3 times by now, you’re way overcomplicating it.
Residence is only important for stuff like tax purposes (to avoid that people spend a week in a low tax country and claim they’re resident there for tax evasion purposes) and to avoid Health Tourism in countries with a national health service (were people might otherwise come over for a week just to get free/better treatment).
Your right to live in an EU nation as an EU citizen are not affected by “residence status” as they would be if you’re in a foreign country with a visa system because it’s not the same kind of residence - it’s for tax purposes not for employment or access to services as it would be in the US (or for a non-EU citizen in the EU).
That “residence document confirming your right to live there” is not required by anybody for providing you goods or services (they’re not even allowed to make anything for EU citizens conditional on “residence status”). You can get the document and then the 3 months apply, but it’s only ever needed when you’re filling taxes in the country you were living in before to prove to them you’re a resident elsewhere and hence will be paying taxes elsewhere (so, for example, when I left The Netherlands to go live in Britain I had to inform the authorities in The Netherlands that I was now resident in Britain for tax purposes, though I think I didn’t even need to provide them any document as these systems are integrated across the EU).
Health insurance is only for some countries. In my home country - Portugal - we have a National Health Service so any EU citizen over here who is not a Portuguse can just use it for free like everybody else. Again any such 3 months rules would only apply (if this country actually applied it) to try and avoid Health Tourism and if you’re an EU citizen just get a European Health Card (which is free) and you’re covered by your home country even whilst abroad for those first 3 months (supposedly your country of residence is the one that covers the costs of your health treatment in another EU country). It’s actually a good idea to get that card even if only going on vacations in another EU country since, for example, if you have an accident there and end up in Hospital you’re covered by whatever healthcare arrangements you have in your country of residence.
Deportation is for things like one having murdered somebody in the host country, serving a sentence and then getting deported. It really has to be this extreme and is incredibly rare to happen. EU countries can’t just deport EU citiziens without quite a heavy reason they can justify - it was actually part of the bitching and moaning of the Brexiters in Britain that they couldn’t just deport EU Citizens.
The general rule in the EU at a treaty level is that citizens from other EU countries cannot be discriminated against compared to citizens of the host country. Yeah, you found the details related to avoiding that people evade tax by gaming the residence status for the purpose of paying less or no tax, do Health Tourism or just come over and start living of the Social Security in a rich country.
You absolutelly can just get on a plane and go stay on an EU country pretty much unprepared and then you have 3 months to figure out if you want to stay and only by then do you need to do stuff like register (only for some countries) and get health insurance (again, only for some countries: those where health insurance is mandatory by law for everybody). Further, you can get a job there on day 1, since you have the right to do so anywhere in the EU and your residence status is irrelevant (and in fact plenty of freelancers working in a Services domain will just go to some country, do some work there, and then come back and it’s actually the intention of the EU treaties that they can do so: it’s the Freedom Of Movement required for the Freedom Of Trade part to apply to Services, not just Products).
I’ve done it like that twice, first when moving to the UK (hopped on a plane, stayed in a hotel for 3 weeks whilst I looked for a job, ended up staying there for over a decade) and latter to Germany (where I left before the 3 months were up as I could to the work I was doing elsewhere with lower living costs and knew I would need to start paying health insurance in Germany after those 3 months).
I also have family members that do the Freelance thing of just going to another country in Europe, working there for a couple of months and then coming back.
Agree with you that people should be informed (which is why I knew when I went to Germany that I had 3 month to decide if I would stay or not and that if I did I would need to register and get Health Insurance), just disagree that is in any way a significant bump in the freedom to just go to another EU country to live and work there - the biggest bumps are cultural, linguistic and having the money to pay for a place to stay whilst you find your first job.
PS: Oh yeah, and taxes are also a bit of a bumb since you have to figure out which country you’re supposed to filled them with and pay them to based on how long you’ve live where and most people really aren’t used to it. If I remember it correctly in some cases you might have to fill and pay taxes in multiple countries depending on how long you worked in each during the tax year, plus different countries have different tax year ends, which adds to the mess.
Just to add to this, and hammer it home, you actually get to vote in municipal elections the moment you registered your move.
And also for the European Parliament, were you are voting for the EU MPs of the country you’re living in rather than of the country you’re a national of.
When living abroad I usually voted in both.
To be fair the same British who voted forn Brexit were already living in Spain (the awful individuals in the US and UK are related because of terrible media groups such as Fox and Sun).
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A rapid change, you say?
To be fair Greece is pretty stable when you’re living on your mega yacht
they get to fuck us over then scram to somewhere not as fucked over.
Was going to say it but my version was less concise.
Dear blue and white collar workers, please consider coming to Germany. We need a FUCKTON of People.
Last time I checked, even most IT jobs required you to speak German. I’m not saying this is unreasonable in Germany, but I think it might make it harder to attract a fuckton of people.
A lot of Germans speak English, depending on the region. Also, I’ve found that some job postings tend to over state their standards, in other words, please consider my Duolingo subscription when reviewing my application.
NGL, you will get more Jobs if you speak German but I looked on https://englishjobs.de/ and apparently there are many IT Jobs which you can do in English.
I can sing all the lyrics to Dicke Titten. Does that count?
If it were only so easy. We tried. You might get a work visa, but getting citizenship is damn near impossible.
I’ll go but how? What do I need to move there?
https://www.germany.info/us-en/service/visa/residence-visa/922288
"Persons holding a US passport may apply for their residence permit at the local immigration office (Ausländerbehörde) after arrival in Germany and without having obtained a visa prior to travelling to Germany. Please note that you need to register your new residence (Anmeldung) with the authorities (Meldebehörde) within 2 weeks of having moved to Germany. You also need to apply for your residence permit at the local immigration office (Ausländerbehörde) within the first 90 days of your stay in Germany. (…) We strongly recommend contacting the local immigration office as soon as possible after your arrival in Germany in order to secure a timely appointment.
Please note that you may only take up employment once you have been issued a residence permit explicitly authorizing such employment. You may also choose to apply for a visa prior to travel, effectively permitting employment from the first day of visa validity"
Basically you just have to find a company that will sponsor you? I work in IT. Where can I start looking? I’ve been to Berlin and loved it.
(Berlin is quite expensive tho)
Berlin is the cheapest of all the large cities. Munich and Frankfurt are insane, but especially Munich has a lot of IT jobs.
Wait shit, really? I’ve heard amazing things about Berlin’s nightlife at least of the sort of nightlife I like
Just say the country you’re arriving from is run by global terrorists who are destabilising the world in pursuit of money, you’d probably get asylum 😂
The day another country gives asylum to USians is the day the CIA starts brain storming coup plots.
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We have literally a left wing Government at the moment. Stop surrendering to something which does not even happened yet… And might not even happen at all.
For the biggest part of the 1930s Germans didn’t even have contested elections where they could vote if I’m not mistaken.
I tried. Even got a degree in German Language & Literature. Took additional language courses through the Goethe Institute in DE, etc.
Though I’ve spent the last twenty years as a software developer (which is classified as an Engpassberuf), I was told that the regulations would only allow me to seek work based on the skills from that degree (Berufsqualifikation).
“We already know how to speak German.”
You could check on the new requirements. There are some massive changes this year to the work visa programs. One such change is that you don’t have to work in your field of education anymore.
Y’all need engineers? Also y’all deal with that AfD problem yet?
Seriously though, my family left Germany a generation too soon for me to claim citizenship. I would be a dual citizen otherwise
Did any cousins stay behind? If you had cousins that either survived WWII or died in WWII in Germany, that counts. My great great great grandfather came to the US from Bavaria in between the world wars, but since his brothers stayed behind, I was able to claim German citizenship, though I don’t speak a word of German.
If the pay for engineers wasn’t shit I’d genuinely consider it, but getting 1/3 of my current pay to leave San Francisco ain’t worth it. Especially given all my friends are here and I don’t need a car.
You’re forgetting all the things you don’t need to pay for in Germany. Healthcare, massive insurances and rent, could even forgo a car with the great public transport and work from home. Might even have more left over at the end of the day than if you were to live where you live now.
An engineer living in Germany really doesn’t have it bad at all.
I’m not saying it’s a bad life at all, but I do not have to think about money at all in my day to day life because I make so much in the US. I’m really not trying to flex and genuinely live my life pretty frugally, but to drive the point I’m trying to make I bought $2500 worth of snowboarding shit and didn’t even have to think about it. This was after donating $5k to my childhood elementary school for a yearly scholarship I started, maxing out a traditional IRA ($6.5k) and nearly maxing out my 401k ($18k). There’s absolutely no way I’d break even in Germany given I’d have an after tax income of ~50k euros of which the above is over half and it’s only April.
To go a bit deeper, I work for a healthcare data company so my healthcare is some of the best in the country with premiums 100% covered by my employer. My yearly out of pocket for deductibles is under $200 and my max out of pocket is $2500 in the absolute worst case scenario. I spend $40/month between life, dental, and renter’s insurance.
Rent seems to be equivalent, maybe slightly cheaper, as I’d want to live in a big city and my current share of rent is $2000/month for a 148 sq meter apartment I share with my partner.
Then there’s the much higher tax burden through things like VAT and extremely high income taxes in Germany.
The unfortunate part about the US is it is an amazing place to have a lot of money, and an awful place to be if you’re poor. It would definitely make sense for someone in a lower income bracket, but once you clear $150k/year here most of the problems of the country no longer apply to you. I still very much want things to get better for the less fortunate, but I have no incentive or desire to leave given my current situation.
Edit: Someone mentioned kids. We don’t plan on ever having any, but my partner and I have a combined income of over $400k per year so kids are more than feasible. Even just on one of our incomes it would be a comfortable life.
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You should compare by salary minus cost of living instead of just by salary alone, almost most places will be way lower than SF in terms of salary.
Another thing to consider is work policies and overall lifestyle of the people there and see if you are compatible. For instance it’s generally not ok to talk about work outside of work in the Netherlands, so if you are a workaholic it would cause some issues.
I went into this deeper in another response and having triple the salary while having a much lower effective tax rate is almost impossible to make up for. Not to mention I’d want to live in a big city if I did move which would make the cost of living a lot closer.
A lot of places put SF at 40% higher cost of living than Berlin, but the prices they list for things here are way too high. Assuming the numbers are high for Berlin too triple the salary with lower taxes easily beats the measly 40% cost of living increase. I’m sure engineers in Germany have a comfortable life, but the math doesn’t work out in my favor.
As for lifestyles my friends and I almost never talk about work either as we very much want to leave work at work. I probably average 30 hours as do many of my friends so it’s not like we’re grinding. Just trying to do our time and leave.
Wife and I are moving to Frankfurt am Main next month from the USA. Hopefully it goes well for us.
Parts of Germany are very unfriendly to non white Christians that speak fluent German.
Some friends and family left to Germany, they all got better life economics wise. They found friends, had good jobs, etc… but then most of them left Germany.
They really like the public transport, functioning health system, food availability, access to nature and more.
But they all had constant encounters with neu-nazis. It didn’t get to physical assault, they felt physically safe, but it did create highly hostile environments, either at work, the supermarket or the streets.
There are countries in the EU that will allow you to enjoy the same benefits without suffering harrasment by neu-nazis.
Parts of Germany
Sigh. Yeah that’s sadly true but I can’t Imagine there is any country without such shitheads.
But at least our civil society is fighting these pricks.
And yet, they all found better life in other countries. In my opinion, and it very much a not very educated opinion, the German shame about the shitier parts of society makes it harder for foreigners to understand the level of shityness in different regions of Germany before setting living there.
The general route of people that moved was find a jon from a far, move to the area of the job, handle 10 metric tons of paperwork, better their German just to understand more and more just how mistreated and undesirable they are.
Some chose to stay anyway, some left, tried their luck in a different place and encountered less shitiness and some came back.
just how mistreated and undesirable they are.
Okay now you getting ridiculously Dramatic 😂
AfD
This is near the top of my list if I do emigrate. Hoping being a developer makes the process easier.
It’s VERY TRUE, but no body will take that invitation, job ads in Germany DEMAND that you speak fluent German to work here. I mean you are not even considered if you you tell them you will start learning the language. This happened to 3, highly qualified , experienced colleges of mine plus with me so multiple cases. I know at least 2 cases , where People who are living in Germany are afraid to change jobs within DE because they been rejected due to lack of German language.
I agree one might need to local languages, but no talent from outside is coming pre learned German in droves. There will be change in this before Germany REALLY NEEDS people. Till then one must talk DE or work with junior/inexperienced person leading to inefficiencies ( see FOR EXAMPLE: DB and multiple of your companies)
But don’t move to nazi states
Nah I’m non-white and support Palestine, so I’ll take my skilled labor to countries where I won’t be harassed by regular citizens and beaten by police for protesting.
Okay, thanks for sharing I guess? If you haven’t noticed I’m neither the Police nor a politician so why are you telling me?😅
Just pointing out a reason why you might not see a vast influx of workers anytime soon, regardless of needs. Hope you’re well and sorry for being rude in how I expressed such.
Germany taxes too much.
Found the unpatriotic loyalist.
Remember that most Americans have been taught to fear living outside America just sobthat they dont leave.
I was referring to the taxes. I’m a veteran and as far as I am concerned the most patriotic things anyone can do are in this order:
- Vote
\2) Pay Your Taxes
\3) Serve in local government
\4) Serve in the military.
And yes, I think more people are fit for politics than military service.
Remember Patriots fought the Loyalists. The Loyalists wanted to remain part of the English empire.
It gives a lot more back though
There’s no downside if you can do it and extreme wealth is only a requirement if some of the many offers don’t apply to you. Spain was basically giving away citizenship a few years back. Bulgaria is pretty open.
I’ve lived in the US for quite a few decades, but I’m still a German citizen. When asked why I don’t take US citizenship, I give a three-part answer:
- I don’t believe you can owe allegiance to two different entities at the same time.
- Between a German EU passport and a US Green Card, I can travel almost anywhere in the world.
- I f I ever run into legal troubles, first call is to the wife, second goes to the embassy.
This is a personal decision but I think it’s better to be pragmatic about it. If your country of origin permits dual citizenship I’d do the naturalization simply because it gives you more flexibility. It’s a more secure status, no need to worry about renewing or spending longer periods abroad. And you get to vote of course.
Citizenships and passports are bureaucracy and they don’t define who you are, that comes from your heart. I’d look at it as a practical matter.
My understanding is that Germany is looking to start permitting dual citizenship later this year.
Citizenships and passports are bureaucracy and they don’t define who you are, that comes from your heart. I’d look at it as a practical matter.
You sound like my wife before I gave in and we got a marriage license. I don’t need a fucking shaman or some civil servant in a black weird dress to legitimize our relationship.
I felt/feel the same way. Still got married to my wife for legal reasons. Her mother is insane and if something happened to my wife, we don’t want her getting power of attorney, nor do we even want her in the hospital if it can be avoided.
That’s fair, I did however need some shaman to give my wife healthcare. Thankfully anyone can be one these days
Can I ask why you live in the US when you could live in Europe?
It’s a long story for another time.
Ok no worries. I just can’t help but be curious about someone living there when they don’t have to.
Just so you know, you may get fucked financially if your wife dies (or vice versa). I would look into it.
It’s Friday. We’ve got time to kill.
Is that a personal belief, or a legal one? Because the US does recognize dual citizenship. Germany does too, in certain conditions.
Citizenship is one thing, but allegiance is another.
So if you believe they’re separate, I don’t see how believing you can only have one allegiance affects your citizenship(s).
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There is a downside to US Citizenship for some though, as one of the only countries on earth yo demand you pay taxes on income earned outside the country
demand you pay taxes on income earned outside the country
Good thing the super wealthy don’t have legally-defined income to be taxed!
…No, wait. Not good. The opposite of good.
FEIE has an exclusion limit. But then again, this is about rich people.
True, but iirc also some banks outside the US refuse to open an account for you if you’re a US citizen due to some weird compliance rules that the US requires
I think Portugal will basically sell you a passport for a €250,000 investment. I don’t know about Spain. I had Spanish residency years ago but moved away and let it slip, residency was pretty easy to get back then. I’d fuckin love to have an EU passport.
These are all lame countries anyways, now I would love to have a Denmark or Sweden passport or something but last I looked it was pretty hard (For us lowly plebs anyways…)
Schengen is Schengen.
Spain is a lame country?
Yeah, because it’s full of British ex-pats complaining about all the Spaniards and how much the Brexit they voted for is kicking their dicks.
Brexit was sold using lies and lots of us (especially expats) didn’t vote for brexit. It was close to 50-50 vote.
They are if they’re just giving it passports to rich ppl. Imagine welcoming in ppl who are collectively fucking up the world and somehow thinking you’ll be exempt if you let them into your country?
It isn’t like they are supervillains. The system allows bad actors. Look at all the issues these companies have had trying to branch outside the US and slamming into labor laws, regulations, culture, taxes, etc.
Worried about the increasing instability that they fucking created with their sociopathic levels of wealth seeking.
Speaking of instability, I’m actually baffled at Canadian government.
They didn’t try to attract US and UK companies to set up offices in Canada when many people in those countries were worried about Trump presidency and Brexit, respectively.
From what I remember, Canada did implement a digital nomad program aimed at tech workers at the start of the Trump presidency. I’m not sure how successful it was though
I’m gonna go on a limb and say ‘not very’.
Yeah, fair. I haven’t met a single American tech worker here 😅
I’m sure of my 200 new Indian coworkers at least one of them came here from America right? Right?
I tried to get a job at LCBO, but apparently “taste tester” isn’t an actual job there, but they were incredibly apologetic that it didn’t exist, and said they would call me if anything changed.
The Americans make it almost impossible to get citizenship so I’m not sure they were trying very hard.
The instability they funded politically so they could get more tax breaks, profits and suppress labor.
They got theirs. Set the place on fire while they run off to wherever like Ted Cruz when things get a little uncomfortable.
Super weird to read this having emigrated right after RBG died. Like, I’m not rich I just read the room.
I visited her grave in Arlington. Nothing crude, just a low, under my breath “god dammit ruth…”
That’s quite fair.
Where to?
By an accident of birth, UK. I’d have been just as happy in loads of other places. At least here some of the post-imperial dust has settled.
Honest question, can someone buy a house with land there? Also, do you need to get the approval of your local committee there (lile the hoa)?
I’m noticing that the difference is ownership rights. Some land is a “freehold” which is essentially outright ownership, others are more limited in scope or duration.
I’m not quite there yet, still renting. But yes, it’s a whole subject and you’d need to do some homework to know what you’re signing up for.
Ironic given they all bankrolled and fought for what is creating said instability…
God forbid the rich have to live in the world they made.
Causing the house fires by supporting republicans then fleeing when it gets too hot.
As I’ve said for a while, anyone with more than two brain cells and the means, is leaving the USA or planning to leave quickly right at the edge of disaster.
The top destinations for supplemental passports among Americans are Portugal, Malta, Greece and Italy, according to Henley & Partners.
Duly noted.
Wall of text about things I learned while trying to leave the US incoming:
Passports to Spain/Portugal/Netherlands/Malta/Greece/Cyprus are buyable but incredibly expensive, you basically have to spend a few hundred thousand to a million or so Euros in property investments in the country. Obviously most people don’t have the means to just buy expensive overseas property/business.
Italy is just a popular second passport destinstion because it’s one of the most likely for Americans to qualify for and it’s relatively easy compared to the rest of Europe, since anyone descended from an Italian citizen (i.e. anyone anyone who resided in Italy in the 1860s or was a citizen afterwords) is also a citizen, with no generational limit. The chain is technically broken by mothers, but you can sue for discrimination and win to get it anyways (this is pretty common).
Something similar also applies for Hungary, except past your grandparents or so you have to actually at least be conversational in Hungarian. But the thing with Hungary is that a Hungarian citizen counts as anyone who has ever been a citizen of a Hungarian state or lived in Hungarian-controlled territory throughout the entire country’s history, even if it was 1000 years ago. So if you can reasonably establish that you’re descended from anyone who has ever been “Hungarian” and you can speak Hungarian reasonably well, you can get a passport.
I think Lithuania also has similar rules to Hungary but I’m not sure.
Poland is any Polish citizen born since 1920.
Germany is extremely finnicky and can even vary by region, but in general any German citizen until 1904 lost their citizenship after 10 years out of the country so for the most part descendants of Germans who left the country 1914 or afterwards have a decent case for citizenship by descent. But I’ve seen people successfully gain citizenship from ancestors born in the 1890s. It all really depends on the luck of the draw for your embassy agents and the amount of good documents you can muster up. The good thing about Germany is their bureaucracy is extremely quick and I’ve gotten responses in less than a day of sending questions and requests. Technically they don’t allow dual citizenship, but the law is changing soon and they have been making exceptions (something not very common in immigration, mind you) for that for a while now, for US citizens at least.
Slovakia is generally pretty lenient, if you have a grandfather or great-grandfather from the Slovak portion of Czechoslovak territory since like 1900 (maybe even before) then you might qualify for citizenship by descent. This is actually what I’m going through right now (since my non-biological great grandparent came here from Slovakia), and while it’s very time consuming and relatively expensive (I’ll probably end up spending more than a few hundred dollars, probably a few thousand, over the next year or two before it’s over) it is possible to do without hiring an immigration lawyer (which cost thousands to tens of thousands of dollars). Be warned that Slovak bureaucracy is well-known for… not being so quick.
There’s also the “Slovak Living Abroad” certificate to which you can get residence without actually having Slovak citizenship by descent, it’s provided if you can prove considerable cultural ties to Slovakia and that you’ve helped contribute to Slovak culture abroad (you have to have Slovaks and others holding the SLA vouch for you too).
Czechia is less forgiving than Slovakia in this regard but it’s still likely you qualify if you’re a Czech citizen.
For Ireland and UK, it’s if you have grandparents from Ireland/UK or parents who are Irish/British citizens.
For Switzerland I think only Switzerland-born citizens pass it down.
For Netherlands, grandparents born in the country pass it down.
Nordic countries are very strict on citizenship by descent and only allow you to claim citizenship before your 21st birthday if you have a citizen parent from the country.
Dual citizenship is completely illegal under any and all circumstances in Austria, but those with Austrian parents qualify for citizenship (you must renounce all other citizenships).
For Ukraine, dual citizenship is completely illegal (but the enforcement of that is complicated), those with immediatle family (including siblings) who were born in or lived in Ukraine between 1917 and 1991 qualify.
Spain and Portugal allow those with grandparents who are citizens to pass down citizenship. They used to accept anyone descended from Sephardic Jews who left the country in the 1500s, but I think they met a quota or something and then stopped accepting those applications recently.
You can technically gain citizenship to France if you’re recommended by a higher-up after serving a few years in the French Foreign Legion, but you don’t want to do this. I highly advise staying as far away as possible from the FFL, and on the off-chance that you even get past training, the odds aren’t in your favor for applying to citizenship even after years of service.
Having residence or citizenship in an EU country makes you a resident or citizen of the EU, and allows free travel and work throughout the Schengen zone, and you get almost all of the benefits of being a citizen of all EU countries you are in.
Other than buying citizenship or going through the process of citizenship by descent, the only realistic way to get permanent residence in a European country is by having years of experience in a highly valued field and getting a work visa / blue card (or in Germany’s case, just find an employer willing to hire you and the government will allow you to stay) and work in the country continuously for a few years (usually 5 years). You may have to contact an embassy or look up the jobs the government of the particular country values, but in general they want: engineers, software developers, other STEM, medical professionals, tradesmen. And you’ll probably only have a chance of being considered if you have at least around 3 years of experience working in the field.
Another option if you’re young and have the proper credits is college, although this is usually pretty expensive – but it can be very cheap in most of Germany, Finland, even LatAm countries like Panama, since they have free tuition for foreigners and very low-cost housing for students. Norway/Denmark used to have free tuition for foreigners, but last year they stopped doing that and now only allow EU citizens to go to have no tuition costs. This is an option for people who did very well in high school or who have already completed a Bachelors (sometimes even an Associate’s is enough), but if you didn’t then you’re out of luck and only qualify after you get a degree.
I have ADHD which was completely untreated all throughout highschool so I did pretty terrible there, I wasn’t exactly rich, etc. etc. so my only realistic option at the time I began searching other than acquiring my Bachelor’s degree as soon as possible was to try to find some way I could get citizenship by descent. I had no physical genealogical records so I had to do all my searching just by working my magic with internet tools and Google search using the names of the family members I knew. Apparently I’m generically Anglo as fuck and all my ancestors were the first motherfuckers to land on this continent, so the only foreign ancestors I had were English/Welsh/Irish/French/German/Dutch/Swiss/Swedish/Austrian people from 150 to 300 years ago and there wasn’t a hint of an ancestor that’d actually qualify me. Well until recently where I found Hungarians who I can trace with birth certificates all the way to the Habsburgs, but I don’t want to be the one to have to acquire and pay for all of those records/certificates so that’s a last resort…
But I also figured out that the grandparent who raised me and who I’ve lived with my entire life, who I’m not biologically related to and complicatingly didn’t actually adopt me or gain guardianship of me (instead being married to my biological grandparent who gained guardianship of/adopted me) had Hungarian, Slovak, and German parents who moved to the US right after the 20th century began. Obviously the weird legal situation complicates things, but I was able to obtain documents from the Slovak government and all that’s really left is to go through the slodge of getting all my documents certified/apostled/translated, getting a shit ton of documents from the US government, basically just slow, tedious, and expensive stuff. But I have the means to do it now and it’s just a waiting game now, and I’m confident that it’ll end with me gaining citizenship (even if it takes 3 to 5 years). And I plan to still do all of it without a lawyer.
Honestly though it’d be easier if I just gained the work experience I needed (software developer here) or finished my degree and did my Master’s in the EU (Computational Linguistics) and applied after that, but at least this way I definitely have permanent residence/citizenship and I’m not subject to change of rules/attitudes and instability during a hypothetical work visa residence.
Honestly though it’d be easier if I just gained the work experience I needed (software developer here) or finished my degree and did my Master’s in the EU (Computational Linguistics) and applied after that, but at least this way I definitely have permanent residence/citizenship and I’m not subject to change of rules/attitudes and instability during a hypothetical work visa residence.
Adding onto the statement about working in a foreign country for citizenship, you can actually gain a self-employment visa to many countries on the condition that you have enough money to sustain yourself without government assistance, or make enough money to do so from your own business. It’s not allowed to work for someone else under this type of visa, and you can’t change it into a normal work visa, so you have to make all the money by yourself or already have it saved up. Plus you generally have to have like €10K-15K deposited in a government bank account that you’re not allowed to withdraw from, as a guarantee that you won’t be a liability to the government in case you can no longer sustain yourself – in that case your visa won’t get renewed. After a few years of this you can apply for permanent residence. But realistically you could just apply for DAFT in the Netherlands, a self-employment visa in Portugal or Germany, etc. and as long as you have like 5 years of living costs saved up, on top of the required deposit, you might be able to just live your life until you eventually qualify for permanent residence. But that’s only really an option if you have a ton of money, most people need to actually be able to sustain their own business.
If you have enough money you didn’t need a passport…
