Long-time member, but throwaway for anonymity.
I've been living and working in the UK capital for a bit over 6 years as a senior software engineer. My partner was accepted to a top public university that most of you recognize (the one just over the Bay Bridge), for a 1 year graduate degree. She will be starting this summer/fall.
TLDR: Is it stupid to quit my job and try to accompany my partner on an F2 visa, spending a year looking for a job in the Bay Area?
The details:
* I am in the unique position of holding Australian citizenship, thus eligible for an E3 visa: I'd only need a solid job offer to be able to work legally, no lottery uncertainty or legal costs to the employer.
* Unfortunately my understanding is that employers are not really aware of this visa, thus tend to ignore/filter out resumes that look like needing "proper" sponsorship.
* The tech downturn is brutal and I am not an exceptional candidate. I have solid chops (backend/infra side), my work experience is modern, relevant and varied, but didn't study at a prestigious university, don't have FAANG experience, and not a DSA/Leetcode prodigy.
* On the plus side, I can spend the months leading to the departure plus my time in the US to grind DSA/Leetcode (although unsure of my maximum potential) and trying to secure interviews. But even getting interviews seems extremely hard from what I see in Reddit/Blind/HN.
* No professional network in the US to get referrals. I could try to rooftop slushie my way around that, but probably wouldn't be very effective.
* I've held 3 jobs over the past 2 years, so probably labelled as a job hopper, making getting past the resume filtering stage even harder. I had good reasons for each move and no gaps: 10 mo redundancy, 10 mo toxic environment, then got my current job which is great and fully remote. But I would need to resign to move with my partner to the US.
* Financially, I can afford being without a job for a year or maybe more but it would be a blow to savings.
Last but not least, I am a bit of a romantic, and living/working in the Bay or Silicon Valley has been a dream of mine. Even with the current situation in SF not being ideal wrt homelessness and general collapse of downtown, I'm still very much attracted to the idea and my partner is onboard. We've both been in and around the area and would be able to navigate the situation.
Should I take this risk? What are my chances in this climate? What would you do?
Whether or not you should take the risk comes down to one question: will you regret it if you don't?
Regret never leaves you, so try to live your life with as little of it as possible.