| ▲ | phkahler 9 days ago | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
>> The issue is that American media/discourse paints a very distorted view of what life under authoritarian rule is like. The truth is in many countries, unless you’re some kind of minority, politically active, or in legal trouble, day-to-day life is mostly similar to life in the west. Short term maybe. But there are reasons people want(ed) to move to the USA, and I don't mean refugees. A lot of college educated well-to-do folks have always wanted to come here. Also, the innovation, economic strength, and military strength of the USA will all suffer if the level of corruption increases - because corruption is a burden on the systems that produce those results. You can't get rid of it, but you can't let it run rampant either. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ▲ | nanliu 9 days ago | parent | next [-] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The desire to come and immigrate to the US has greatly diminished. This use to be a easy decision for foreign students to stay in the US for work opportunities. Nowadays, a US degree isn't considered prestigious outside of a few elite schools and the cost has completely spiraled out of control. I've talked to numerous colleagues who abandoned waiting for a green card because it's no longer a clear cut decision. Opportunities and quality of life in other countries have either caught up or surpassed the US in certain areas. This would of been unthinkable 10-20 years ago. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| ▲ | potsandpans 9 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
> But there are reasons people want(ed) to move to the USA Yes, primarily because its the richest country in the world and it's "easy" to make money. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ▲ | close04 9 days ago | parent | prev [-] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
> But there are reasons people want(ed) to move to the USA, and I don't mean refugees I think overall you are correct but probably still not safe to generalize. If you're moving to escape persecution then just being "on the other side" achieved this. If you are economically motivated then just leaving doesn't guarantee anything, you can be worse off. This circles back to the idea that the people who are persecuted by a regime paint the public opinion of that regime. I have friends from Eastern Europe who emigrated to North America (mostly Canada) in the early '90s only to move back shortly after when the reality didn't live up to the hype and their expectations. They had a better life back home. The move was economically motivated, not escaping persecution. Many families under authoritarian regimes had the option to move to a Western country but not being actively persecuted meant they had no hard push and decided for the "comfort of familiarity". East Berlin slipping into authoritarianism is a good showcase for this. Most people chose to stay in place for long enough to build a wall. We're talking years in which they saw the reality around them but only the ones who actively suffered from persecution chose to leave. Today plenty of East Germans still look back fondly at those times because they didn't feel the objective pain of persecution, only the subjective general suffering of "I could have better but don't". | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||