
Brexit fuels brain drain as skilled Britons head to the EU - BerislavLopac
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/02/brexit-fuels-brain-drain-as-skilled-britons-head-to-the-eu
======
michaelt
_> In the four years since the Brexit referendum, 31,600 Brits have been
granted dual British/German citizenship: 2019 saw 14,600 naturalisations
compared to 622 in 2015._

While I agree there's cause for concern in general, a fair portion of these
are people's citizenship catching up with where they've built their lives.

After all, pre-Brexit you could have lived in Germany since childhood, been
educated there, got a job, got married to a German and started a family of
German kids - all while holding a UK passport yourself. For someone in that
situation, Brexit makes getting that German citizenship a lot more urgent.

~~~
readarticle
Precisely. Until they begin moving for purely economic reasons rather than
personal/political, it’ll continue resembling the USA -> CAN trickle, not the
deluge the other way around.

EU -> UK numbers should prove interesting.

~~~
oblio
Well, the numbers for Western Europeans should decline because a lot of people
won't bother anymore, considering the harsher residence requirements and the
numbers for Eastern Europeans will go down because in many cases they won't
even qualify for visas at all (just like they don't qualify for US visas now,
in many cases).

The real question is: will blocking this immigration also make the powers that
be redistribute wealth more to the poor natives? Time will tell :-)

------
reqres
I'm a British software developer and SaaS business owner

I left the UK in 2017 because of Brexit. My company generates about GBP150k
per employee. Prior to leaving this was 100% UK workforce. Following my
relocation this is <50% and falling as we move to contract-based + remote.
That's my n=1 experience with the "brain drain"

When I left the UK, there was a large & growing political/economic divide,
unaffordable housing and poor/declining public services. It gave me a lot of
stress and anxiety. Having left, I feel more disinvested from how things are
turning out in the UK and it's helped greatly with my wellbeing

I've met other brits in my host country that share my n=1 experience. We're
all just trying to quietly get along with it really - stay working and raising
families

~~~
dijit
Piggybacking here because you stated a sentiment that really resonates with
me.

I left the UK in 2014 for a “1-2yr Max!” Period as my girlfriend was getting
her masters degree in Sweden.

The echoes of the Ivestigatory Powers Act and the threat of a looming
referendum gave me a little pause on my desire to return, but we both thought
it was political posturing so we put aside our worries and continued the plans
to return, albeit more apprehensively.

After the result was announced I was upset, a whole bloc was going to close to
me, the ruling party (whom I fundamentally disagree with) was going to remove
a lot of the checks which kept it accountable, lots of uncertainty- my family
suddenly became openly racist (that’s just anecdotal though, certainly not all
those who chose leave are racist but my family apparently was) — which is
ironic as my mother and I have polish surnames from my great-grandfather who
fought in the war and was exiled from Poland for it.

The longer I stayed away the more “detached” I became, the more coldly I
looked at the situation and dispassionately assessed statistics and debates.
You can’t know from the inside how farcical this whole thing looks.

I naturalised to become a Swedish citizen as soon as the option was available
to me, I have no personal stake in the future of my home country anymore.

I’m still “pro-remain” but only because I still think it’s best for the
country. I don’t really care that much any longer.

------
pjc50
See previously [https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/26/number-
brit...](https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/oct/26/number-britons-
going-to-europe-at-10-year-high)

The article is however quite bad at distinguishing between:

\- British nationals moving their place of residence from the UK to the EU

\- British nationals already resident in the EU changing their nationality so
they can stay there after free movement is taken away from them

And doesn't mention the third category: EU nationals normally resident in the
UK deciding to return, and whether being deemed ineligable for "settled
status" or indefinite leave to remain is a factor in that.

People who I have spoken to about this tend to be pragmatic; even a damaged UK
provides more economic and social freedom than many parts of eastern Europe.
Especially compared to rapidly de-liberalising Poland. However, we've yet to
see how badly the government copes with the end of the transition period.

~~~
scaryclam
It also appears to omit that a lot of skilled workers from EU countries are
doing the exact same but in reverse. I always liked the Guardian, but their
stories on brexit have been terrible, to the point that you can't trust them
at all.

~~~
bennysonething
Yep, nearly everyone on my team is from outside UK. Mostly EU, brexit hasn't
affected them at all.

~~~
moystard
That's not my experience; a lot of friends and colleagues have left the UK to
go back to the EU since the referendum vote.

Also, in terms of recruitment, very few people are now interested in coming
over to the UK for engineering positions. We used to have a lot of talented
candidates from EU countries (especially Portugal, Spain, France, Italy,
etc.); we have not had a single applicant from these countries since the vote.

------
fxtentacle
Banks kind of had to move their headquarters out of London, to avoid the risk
of being cut off from most of their customers.

But now if your employer changes from being an UK to a German company, then
suddenly that means that they might not be able to keep employing you, thanks
to "your" British politicians trying to keep a hard stance against cross
border employment.

So then suddenly your choices are:

\- keep your passport, but you'll likely lose your job and be forced to move
out of your house

\- change your passport and keep your job and your house

To me, that explains why now so many Britons choose option B.

The article doesn't really explain it, but many of those asking for a passport
now are already living in Germany, so they merely want to stay where they are.

And as someone living in Germany, I'd like to add that the government handling
of Covid, unemployment support, and free access to healthcare will really
sweeten the deal. Would you want to move from Berlin (almost no restrictions
apart from wearing face masks) to London at this time?

~~~
Nursie
> Banks kind of had to move their headquarters out of London

Which ones have done this?

IIRC JPMC have increased their office capacity in Ireland, but I haven't heard
of multiple banks moving headquarters (though I heard lots of rumours that
they would)

~~~
fxtentacle
"Goldman Sachs is pushing ahead with making Frankfurt, Germany, its key
European base. This week, the Wall Street giant agreed to lease multiple
floors for offices in a 38-storey building, as part of its Brexit contingency
plans."

"The US investment bank, Goldman Sachs is to trial its Brexit contingency
plans by making senior position transfers to Frankfurt, following concerns
that the UK will lose it’s ‘passporting rights’."

"Last month, Credit Suisse revealed it was planning to move about 250 of its
5,500 London banking jobs in the first phase its Brexit contingency plans.
Bloomberg reported employees in areas such as trading and mergers and
acquisitions were likely to be relocated to Frankfurt or Madrid, ..."

[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/brexit-latest-
ba...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/brexit-latest-banks-commit-
frankfurt-germany-eu-london-goldman-sachs-a8294651.html)

[https://qz.com/1095155/brexit-contingency-plan-goldman-
sachs...](https://qz.com/1095155/brexit-contingency-plan-goldman-sachs-leases-
floors-in-marienturm-tower-frankfurt-germany/)

[https://www.relocatemagazine.com/news/brexit-goldman-
sachs-t...](https://www.relocatemagazine.com/news/brexit-goldman-sachs-
triggers-first-staff-moves-to-frankfurt-dsapsted)

~~~
Nursie
That Goldman Sachs article from 2017 is looking a little bit outdated in light
of Goldman Sachs own press release about their new European HQ in London in
2019 - [https://www.goldmansachs.com/careers/blog/posts/goldman-
sach...](https://www.goldmansachs.com/careers/blog/posts/goldman-sachs-london-
plumtree-court.html)

So GS haven't moved headquarters, even though they have moved a small number
of personnel.

Some others appear to be increasing capacity in Frankfurt and other European
centres, or at least they were two years ago. All very predictable and
sensible given what may happen.

But this still doesn't add up to "Banks kind of had to move their headquarters
out of London". In fact so far there hasn't been a single example (here, in
the thread) of a bank that has actually done that. Just a lot of speculation.

(I'm not making any strong claims that it won't happen, by the way, I just
wanted to challenge the trope that it already has happened)

------
benlumen
I don't know the current numbers but prior to Brexit, more British people
expatriated to countries like Australia, Canada and America than the EU
combined (with the exception of Spain, which is high on the list due to
retirees moving to the English enclaves in the Costa del Sol).

[https://www.qropsspecialists.com/the-top-100-british-
expat-d...](https://www.qropsspecialists.com/the-top-100-british-expat-
destinations/)

Leaving the European Union is going to allow the UK to make the kinds of trade
and visa arrangements with these countries that reflect the interests of the
majority of expats, the kind that it should already have had.

It seems clear from noises in the government that the UK's also likely to
create a low tax, deregulated environment for technology companies while the
EU seems more interested in passing regulations that stifle them. As for
public services and infrastructure, there's an eye-watering spending plan for
this parliament to rebuild the UK.

Fair enough to anyone that had enough and left for the EU, I understand that
completely. But I think long term, some of those same people are going to be
quite surprised by how this plays out. I don't think that the UK is circling
the drain as per the non-stop media assessment over recent years.

~~~
moystard
The regions of the UK that voted for Brexit will probably be hit the hardest
because a deregulated environment for technology companies will not benefit
them. The loss of the single market and JIT manufacturing will, most
certainly, lead to the closures of manufacturing sites. We could also imagine
the downfall of some industries in the UK (aeronautics for example).

The eye-watering spending plan will require cash, a lot of it, and the COVID +
Hard Brexit that's currently looming could very well prevent it from
happening. The government has not been great so far at following up on their
promises.

The EU was scapegoat that the government and tabloids used for a lot of issues
that were mostly national (including the infamous immigration laws). Even
after leaving the EU, the blame game is still in full play; never is anyone
taking responsibilities for their actions, it's always the others' fault.

------
garyclarke27
I moved to Portugal in 2017, mainly because of Brexit, though sun, sea, surf &
lifestyle also played a part. In this area Cascais-Lisbon, I’ve met umpteeen
very wealthy entrepreneurs and professionals who have moved from the UK
including many South Africans and Australians who were in London but had
enough of the miserable weather. I don’t miss the UK lifestyle is so much
better here.

~~~
clappski
What's the language barrier and job market like there? Portugal seems more
appealing to myself than Spain for some reason, perhaps because I've never
been to Portugal...

~~~
kmlx
poor country, no jobs, no money, great food, great weather.

~~~
blaser-waffle
Not a terrible deal if you're working for an international firm remotely and
can be anywhere. Some job security issues -- e.g. lining up a new one if you
get fired or something -- but that can be worked around.

------
sparsely
I think almost everyone involved would have already been resident, if they are
measuring it by passport issuance. I am moving (officially in the next few
months, in practice already) to an EU country but won't qualify for a passport
for 5 years. The deadline for most people to make a move like this is the end
of this year, and in fact some countries (e.g. France) haven't even made the
official process for changing residency available yet.

------
LatteLazy
One of the reasons this is important is that it's quite hard to get a visa for
many EU Countries. If Germany opened a skilled\tech\finance visa program,
you'd easily see double the current number. I'm not sure whether they've held
off because they don't want to do it or as a show of goodwill for the
"negotiations" but they would be doing themselves and many decent people a
favour if they pulled the trigger. Brexiteers won't be reasoned with and being
reasonable is seen as weakness by them.

~~~
goatinaboat
_Brexiteers won 't be reasoned with and being reasonable is seen as weakness
by them._

But that's not true at all. If you asked a Brexiteer, they would say Article
50 could have been invoked the day after the referendum, and instead they
spent 2 whole years trying to find an accommodation that would satisfy
Remainers too, you can't ask for any more "reasoning with" than that. But
Remainers wouldn't budge from the position of ignoring the referendum result
completely, they had no regard whatsoever for the wishes of Brexiteers. None
at all. We could have had such a soft Brexit that it would have been
indistinguishable from remaining, but hardline Remainers made that all but
impossible with their intransigence.

Eventually the entire country grew tired of those antics and delivered Boris
an 80-seat majority on his single mantra of "get Brexit done". I know this is
off-narrative but the Brexiteers bent over backwards to be reasonable.

~~~
ben_w
That’s not what it looked like from the outside.

From the outside, Leavers ran the government. Leavers insisted that May was a
great negotiator by holding her cards close to her chest (and then fired her
ASAP when they saw her cards).

From the outside, Leavers openly told Remainers that Leavers had no reason to
compromise with _anyone_ — not the EU, not Remainers, and not each other.

Every time I discussed anything with a Leaver, my concerns were always and
without fail dismissed as “Project Fear” — the other party would even say that
about the _possibility_ of no deal _while saying no deal was their negotiating
tactic_.

Now, I don’t doubt that you’ve seen some idiots promoting Remain just as I’ve
seen idiots promoting Leave — but can you give any example of Leave trying to
compromise with Remain?

Not with each other (basically everyone hates what May came up with, Remain
and Leave alike), not with the EU, but with Remain?

~~~
disgruntledphd2
May's deal was the worst possible Brexit deal, except for all the others :)

It would have been about as good as Brexit could have been, conditional on
reducing immigration bring the primary goal.

------
Animats
Brexit hasn't really hit the UK yet. That happens at the end of 2020.

~~~
jgrahamc
Whilst technically true Brexit has been happening since 2016, and people and
companies have been making decisions based on it.

~~~
growlist
The economy held up pretty well, all things considered, and apparently much to
the chagrin of the prophets of doom (not saying you are one or anything).

~~~
nicoburns
Wouldn't we expect the bulk of the economic effects to hit at the end of the
year (when the transition agreement expires)?

~~~
growlist
Remember when we were told by George Osborne there would be an immediate
recession the _day after_ a Leave vote?

Edit:

'Brexit could plunge Britain into an instant recession, the Prime Minister and
the Chancellor have said in the starkest economic warning yet of the
consequences of Britain leaving the European Union.'

'he Treasury said unemployment would be 520,000 higher, wages 2.8 per cent
lower and house prices 10 per cent down. In a severe shock joblessness would
be 820,000 higher, wages down by 4 per cent and house prices 18 per cent
lower.'

[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/brexit-
to-c...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/brexit-to-create-
instant-diy-recession-warns-george-osborne-a7042886.html)

Edit: downvoting facts now? ok HN.

~~~
nicoburns
As I said in my original comment: wouldn't you expect the majority of the
economic effects to hit after the economic situation changes? i.e. when
British companies are suddenly subject to tariffs when exporting to Europe at
the end of the year.

The fact that George Osbourne said that they would happen immediately is
neither here nor there really.

------
globular-toast
In my experience knowing and working with foreign people in the UK, most of
them long to go home. I'm not sure if that's the case for Brits working
abroad, but I'm sure it is. I remember after the first time I went abroad it
was little things like the font on the road signs that made me feel glad to be
back in Britain. The only places I've felt even remotely "at home" while
abroad are colonies, like South Africa, even though on paper it would seem
much more "foreign" than anywhere in Europe.

So I don't think Brexit will fuel anything here. If anything it will make
Britain seem more like home and make people less likely to leave. Uncontrolled
immigration means your home is less like your home every day. That's what will
force people to leave. And unless those people find themselves in a colony,
they're doomed to be forever foreign.

~~~
meheleventyone
As a Brit who has been living and working abroad for ten years I don’t agree
with your take. I love the country I’m living in and feel totally at home
here.

~~~
globular-toast
Where do you live?

~~~
meheleventyone
Iceland.

------
bobosha
Hopefully Americans take some heed from this experience.

------
azalemeth
Another n=1 anecdote here: I am a relatively junior academic in one of the
UK's formerly-excellent universities, and I will be moving my lab and leaving
the country ahead of Brexit in 2021, starting a new professorship on the last
day of December.

This is for many different reasons – but the loss of EU citizenship brings
with it loss to EURATOM, significantly affecting the availability of medical
isotopes; the loss of access to Erasmus exchange-student funding; the loss of
access to the ERC; and the loss of regulatory oversight of the European
medicines agency, the EMA. All of these things could be retained with
political will, but no will is forthcoming.

Why does this matter? Well, I am a medical physicist / engineer, and I make
things for quantifying biology. The US FDA requirements and the EU EMA
requirements define what is feasible. They are often at odds. The EMA is, as a
rule, stricter, and in my experience in trying to conduct multinational
clinical trials, the EU regulations are the "it must be _sterile_ "
counterpart to the FDA "it must be _clean_ ". Our QPs have large arguments
with US FDA pharmacists about no evidence of harm vs no evidence of safety
(the "precautionary principle"). Without getting into specifics, when it comes
to dealing with cancer patients, who have compromised immunity and often die
of infection, I think it is only acceptable to be utterly paranoid.

Some US sites that I will not name explicitly think that "we", the European
sites, are paranoid. They think that by having regulations that require an
estimated probability of infection as being ≤1e-6 or ≤1e-9 in a clinical trial
with ~1k people in it is "overkill", and their "reasonable approach" that is
far cheaper, quicker, and easier, is appropriate. I think, and our QPs think,
that their approach is quantitatively worse -- but it is very hard to estimate
these probabilities; perhaps using a laminar flow hood as opposed to a
cleanroom & isolator reduces that probability from 1e-6 to 1e-5 -- but it
could well be 1e-3 and we don't know. Yet.

At any rate, the only reason that "we are listened to" as a bloc against the
huge, multinational factors at play, is because of EMA rules, as implemented
in the UK by the Medicines and Healthcare Regulatory Authority, the MHRA,
which publishes a many-thousand-page guide to EU EMA rules. Although
frustrated by them, I am very glad that these rules exist. They protect
patients, and my backside. They are written in blood, from Thalidomide to
deaths that have arisen as a result of industrial autoclaves in Britain owned
by the pharmaceutical industry being loaded unevenly, leading to "sterile"
saline not being sterile. Post-Brexit, I am sure that they are exactly an
example of "Brussels red tape" that is to be "streamlined". Similar examples
exist in food standards, consumer electronics, and many other areas. Freedom
and deregulation come with a very real cost. Can you drink the water in Flint,
Michigan yet?

The removal of other agencies hamper my ability to recruit students, get grant
funding, actually buy isotopes to order -- particularly important as a lot of
them come from nuclear reactors on the continent that we do not have
equivalents for -- and otherwise function as an academic.

The UK's spending on scientific research is, as a function of GDP, far lower
than other equivalent nations, particularly Germany and the US. Much of it
comes from the charitable sector. In the post-covid world, this has taken a
_huge_ hit. Cancer Research UK is down £300m, for example [1], leading to,
say, The University of Oxford cutting 40% of its oncology research staff [2]
including professors and PIs who have faced the double-whammy of falling ERC
funding and CRUK funding. Before you ask, UK governmental funding rules
prohibit applications for specific diseases if an equivalent charitable
organisation exists, meaning, for example, that you cannot easily apply to the
MRC (the Medical Research Council) if it is work that would be fundable by
CRUK. Similar stories exist for other charitable funders -- e.g. the British
Heart Foundation plans to fire 300 staff following a 50% drop in income [3].
Other universities have started consultations on staff pay-cuts as well as
redundancies, following a terrible fall in income both from grants and student
fees. I was previously shortlisted for a professorship at another UK
university; literally days after the lockdown started, hiring at essentially
every university stopped.

Now is not a good time to be a UK academic. Universities elsewhere in the
world, however, have weathered the coronavirus storm far better, and
benefitted from national leadership that has explicitly protected them.

The TV ads have started telling us to "Get ready for Brexit". I have to turn
the TV off every time they come on. I cannot think of a worse time in history
for the nation to do something so monumentally stupid to itself.

It is for these reasons that I am moving my research group and escaping pre-
Brexit, forgoing seeing my mother at Christmas. Other nations are more
civilised. I will be paid more, and, crucially, valued more. Dominic Cummings
and Boris Johnson may think that I am a moaning leftie-liberal to whom they
can say "good riddance". I would like to think that I am trying to build a
better future for humanity as a whole in an imperfect world, and hold no
romantic ideas of national pride to get in the way. Brexit is about racism and
a deluded notion of history for an imperial past. I want no part of it.

\---- [1] [https://fundraising.co.uk/2020/07/16/cancer-research-uk-
anti...](https://fundraising.co.uk/2020/07/16/cancer-research-uk-
anticipates-300m-drop-in-income-over-three-years/)

[2] [https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/18612973.oxford-
university...](https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/18612973.oxford-university-
cut-81-cancer-research-jobs-christmas/)

[3] [https://www.bhf.org.uk/what-we-do/news-from-the-bhf/news-
arc...](https://www.bhf.org.uk/what-we-do/news-from-the-bhf/news-
archive/2020/july/bhf-announces-consultation-and-warns-of-job-losses)

------
m0zg
Wouldn't it make sense, as a part of the same study, to answer the question of
how many EU citizens are getting the _UK_ citizenship? The fact that this is
not even discussed suggests that the study is designed to confirm an
underlying agenda.

