• Aceticon@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    As an EU immigrant, left the UK after the Leave vote but before Brexit and Covid.

    It’s not a bullet but more like a whole lot of bullets.

    Mind you, most of it was entirely predictable back then.

    • FrustratedArtist
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      3 days ago

      I moved to UK after school to get a university degree. Graduated in 2014, and despite having multiple interviews, had to move back home due to not being able to land a job. Eventually got employed elsewhere, and boy did it turn out pretty well compared to what would have happened if I stayed.

    • Wahots@pawb.social
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      2 days ago

      Can you elaborate on some of the bullets dodged? Not from that part of the world and I’ve only heard of the economic ramifications. I’d be curious to hear about it in greater detail, if you have the time!

      • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        The country moved to the far-right, the Industry I was working in - Finance - lost 40,000 jobs, Britain got general Economic stagnation worse than the EU, the value of the British Pound fell significantly against the Euro after the vote (fortunatelly I moved all my savings out of Pound-denominated assets evern before the Leave vote, so I personally was alright) all of the sudden as an EU immigrant you became a second class citizen with lots of extra hassle for living there (inside the EU, EU immigrants have the same rights as the locals, so when Britain left, they lost that), significant decay and problems with their National Health Service, really bad mishandling of COVID (especially in the beginning) and so on.

        In some ways the place turned into a mini Trump’s-America, only with the extra nastiness of already being very classist country with very low social mobility from the start and a heavy “know your place” mindset - which is extra hard for immigrants because Britons see themselves as superior to all foreigners but Americans, so “Immigrant” is the lowest “social class” for them - and without the upsides that American has (mainly space and scale, natural resources and at least in some places good weather).

        Mind you, most of those things are trends predating Brexit which were heavilly accelerated by it.