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First, a Money Rant
Nov. 30th, 2017 01:05 pmUp to this point, my basic plan for longterm financial security has been about trying to vest in a retirement system so that I can get a monthly allotment of money to pay for old age. I could either go back to Georgia to work two years and then buy all the service years in Alabama, or I could make it to ten years in Alabama and then buy all the service years in Georgia. Or I could stay in Alabama for ten years, go back to Georgia for two years, and get two smaller pots of money. In theory, these funds plus social security will get me enough of an income that I could maintain my current standard of living, assuming that cost of living doesn't drastically increase.
At the moment, I make $35k. That's ridiculously bad for what my skills actually are, probably even for being in Academia. Up to this point, the rationalization for accepting this has been that no one can afford to pay me to do what I want to do, so being employed at a low payrate is better than being unemployed.
Well, a year of living in a U.S. that has Trump in the role of presidency and the GOP in control of every other part of government has seriously shifted my perspective.
First, even with vesting in the teachers' retirement systems for those modest pots of monthly money, I'm not going to end up with much. Meanwhile I'm stuck working in specific states that I don't actually like all that much, for years. Why am I doing this for the pittance that I'm going to end up with, especially since cost of living is highly likely to go up. AND, since I will never make more than $75k, my taxes are also going to go up under that new Tax Scam they're about to pass. Which means that I might as well be an indentured servant to "earn" the tiny amounts of money I'm going to get, which is then just going to get much more easily taken back away from me by various corporations related to health care, housing, etc.
(I mean, it's not like anyone seems to have any control over what gets charged for things anymore. Healthcare is ridiculous. They can charge $1000 for something that would cost $100 in another country and everyone just unquestioningly pays it because they assume that's how much it actually costs. Or they hold GoFundMe drives to get the funds to cover it if they can't cover it themselves, from their fellow regular people, all the while never questioning why it costs that much in the first place, who is setting the prices, who is getting rich off of bilking every last penny out of people who can do nothing about it and don't even ask.
What's worse, the health insurance industry does its best to not pay for things that they're supposed to; right now I'm in the middle of disentangling a snafu about my latest pair of glasses between the corporation that my eye doctor works for, and the health insurance provider. Guess who gets stuck with the actual bill for their inability to get their paperwork act together? This is not the first time it has happened to me, and it has become something of a tipping point for me to finally stop just thinking about what I can do and actually Do Something.
And rent? Who comes up with *that*? In this past year, a single corporation has apparently bought nearly every apartment complex in Mobile, and I don't see how this can possibly be good for any of the renters.)
The more I think about it all, the less sensible it all sounds. I should just cut my losses at this point and go do something else. I'll end up with four pots of retirement money that I can combine in some way, and maybe those will pay out enough interest by themselves. Or not. But they're such small pots of money anyway that working hard to invest in them the way I'm doing is stupid.
Meanwhile, neither of the two big proposals I mentioned the last time I talked about money were funded. The state government is still dragging things out on that Giant Chunk of Change that we were supposed to get two years ago, that's supposed to cover my salary and give me a hefty raise (...that is still going to be low for what it ought to be). Which means I'm still in employment limbo. The current story is that the money will finally start rolling in early next year. They've been saying this for the last two years though - just six months from now it'll start, we swear.
(As a tangential aside, that database I'm supposed to make has also stalled out. It turns out that Microsoft makes things a lot more complicated than they really ought to be, and every time I try to look at Visual Studio and MVC, my head explodes. It really doesn't help when stuff that should work that has nothing to do with the coding suddenly stop working with "Exception: something hexadecimally coded" and I don't know how to fix those, either, and don't want to have to look them up to learn it, because it's all stupid. :p So I made a pretty good database design, but now I'm stuck when it comes to making the web interface. Fortunately(?) for me, ADCNR was expecting it to take a year longer than DISL thinks it will, and they are planning to extend the contract to cover it, so I'll have more time to dicker around trying to figure it out.)
ANYWAY.
So. I have no real ties to Mobile, once I ditch the retirement plan. I like DISL, but they can't afford to pay me, and I don't love them so much that I want to keep my life on hold indefinitely. The only other reason I would've stayed here has left for Seattle and shows no signs of ever wanting to come back ( :p). I am not real happy about moving to any other part of the U.S. at this point either, because it would still be in the U.S. (I suppose on the bright side, a drastic jump to elsewhere would at least mean I'm not represented by a child molester; it's alarming how many here are still planning to vote for him).
So now I want to move to a different country. And I've narrowed it down to New Zealand, in particular North Island for weather/climate reasons if I can manage it. I've looked in detail at my options to try to get there.
1. I could apply for jobs. According to their Immigration website, it's easier to get a work visa if I aim for somewhere other than Auckland, if my skills are on their High Demand lists (they aren't, but someone else's are, actually...), and if I'm as much younger from 55 as possible (this, as well, would make someone else's chances higher than mine).
The whole "younger than 55" thing does mean that there are actual time limits on when I can make a jump. I'm 44 now. So, yet another reason to not wait another 4 years to get 10 years of work in AL.
2. I could get a PhD in something that they will want to keep. They seriously want people to go there for PhDs. The tuition for international PhD students is the same as the domestic rate, while for any other type of degree is astronomically bad (as much as a domestic U.S. higher education :p). There are also scholarships, including a government scholarship to cover certain topics; if I went in for something fisheries related, I'd fit under their economics option.
I haven't actually done anything committed yet, but have prepped up some paperwork.
1. I've prepped an application for a data manager job in Wellington, which is at the south end of North Island and thus sort of centrally located for all of New Zealand. The area sounds like it has about the same population size as Mobile or Savannah or Wilmington (aka everywhere else I've lived since leaving Indiana), which is a comfortable size for me. They emphasize their many small restaurants and coffee shops and festivals. It also seems to be very windy there, and the winters sound like they are probably cold and dark and wet, so, just like Seattle in a lot of ways other than population.
It would be cool if they offered me the job, but I don't really expect they will. I don't have the educational qualification they're looking for, plus, it doesn't seem like the sort of job that they couldn't find someone domestic to fill. The immigration rules require them to hire domestic people first if they can.
2. I've written up a letter to a professor at the University of Auckland, detailing my idea for a PhD program that I want to do. There's one other professor at the same university I could also try.
Auckland is New Zealand's big city. It's at the north end of North Island, where the weather is warmer. Lots of diversity and international residents. Lots of plans to build more housing over the next couple decades to keep up with their expected growth (so, you know, lots of construction industry work, which is on the Immigration High Demand lists...). Plus they have a big airport that can do direct flights back to the U.S.
This is likely the better and more realistic option, at least in the short run. It would take me a bit longer to set up for getting there, but then, there's a ton of logistics details I'd need time to work out anyway.
I guess I will probably end up trying both and see what sticks first.
(...and then maybe Someone Else would be willing to follow me there, where we can at least be roommates, or maybe duplex-mates, or even just regular next door neighbors, or at least be in the same city again, and live happily ever after. :) )
At the moment, I make $35k. That's ridiculously bad for what my skills actually are, probably even for being in Academia. Up to this point, the rationalization for accepting this has been that no one can afford to pay me to do what I want to do, so being employed at a low payrate is better than being unemployed.
Well, a year of living in a U.S. that has Trump in the role of presidency and the GOP in control of every other part of government has seriously shifted my perspective.
First, even with vesting in the teachers' retirement systems for those modest pots of monthly money, I'm not going to end up with much. Meanwhile I'm stuck working in specific states that I don't actually like all that much, for years. Why am I doing this for the pittance that I'm going to end up with, especially since cost of living is highly likely to go up. AND, since I will never make more than $75k, my taxes are also going to go up under that new Tax Scam they're about to pass. Which means that I might as well be an indentured servant to "earn" the tiny amounts of money I'm going to get, which is then just going to get much more easily taken back away from me by various corporations related to health care, housing, etc.
(I mean, it's not like anyone seems to have any control over what gets charged for things anymore. Healthcare is ridiculous. They can charge $1000 for something that would cost $100 in another country and everyone just unquestioningly pays it because they assume that's how much it actually costs. Or they hold GoFundMe drives to get the funds to cover it if they can't cover it themselves, from their fellow regular people, all the while never questioning why it costs that much in the first place, who is setting the prices, who is getting rich off of bilking every last penny out of people who can do nothing about it and don't even ask.
What's worse, the health insurance industry does its best to not pay for things that they're supposed to; right now I'm in the middle of disentangling a snafu about my latest pair of glasses between the corporation that my eye doctor works for, and the health insurance provider. Guess who gets stuck with the actual bill for their inability to get their paperwork act together? This is not the first time it has happened to me, and it has become something of a tipping point for me to finally stop just thinking about what I can do and actually Do Something.
And rent? Who comes up with *that*? In this past year, a single corporation has apparently bought nearly every apartment complex in Mobile, and I don't see how this can possibly be good for any of the renters.)
The more I think about it all, the less sensible it all sounds. I should just cut my losses at this point and go do something else. I'll end up with four pots of retirement money that I can combine in some way, and maybe those will pay out enough interest by themselves. Or not. But they're such small pots of money anyway that working hard to invest in them the way I'm doing is stupid.
Meanwhile, neither of the two big proposals I mentioned the last time I talked about money were funded. The state government is still dragging things out on that Giant Chunk of Change that we were supposed to get two years ago, that's supposed to cover my salary and give me a hefty raise (...that is still going to be low for what it ought to be). Which means I'm still in employment limbo. The current story is that the money will finally start rolling in early next year. They've been saying this for the last two years though - just six months from now it'll start, we swear.
(As a tangential aside, that database I'm supposed to make has also stalled out. It turns out that Microsoft makes things a lot more complicated than they really ought to be, and every time I try to look at Visual Studio and MVC, my head explodes. It really doesn't help when stuff that should work that has nothing to do with the coding suddenly stop working with "Exception: something hexadecimally coded" and I don't know how to fix those, either, and don't want to have to look them up to learn it, because it's all stupid. :p So I made a pretty good database design, but now I'm stuck when it comes to making the web interface. Fortunately(?) for me, ADCNR was expecting it to take a year longer than DISL thinks it will, and they are planning to extend the contract to cover it, so I'll have more time to dicker around trying to figure it out.)
ANYWAY.
So. I have no real ties to Mobile, once I ditch the retirement plan. I like DISL, but they can't afford to pay me, and I don't love them so much that I want to keep my life on hold indefinitely. The only other reason I would've stayed here has left for Seattle and shows no signs of ever wanting to come back ( :p). I am not real happy about moving to any other part of the U.S. at this point either, because it would still be in the U.S. (I suppose on the bright side, a drastic jump to elsewhere would at least mean I'm not represented by a child molester; it's alarming how many here are still planning to vote for him).
So now I want to move to a different country. And I've narrowed it down to New Zealand, in particular North Island for weather/climate reasons if I can manage it. I've looked in detail at my options to try to get there.
1. I could apply for jobs. According to their Immigration website, it's easier to get a work visa if I aim for somewhere other than Auckland, if my skills are on their High Demand lists (they aren't, but someone else's are, actually...), and if I'm as much younger from 55 as possible (this, as well, would make someone else's chances higher than mine).
The whole "younger than 55" thing does mean that there are actual time limits on when I can make a jump. I'm 44 now. So, yet another reason to not wait another 4 years to get 10 years of work in AL.
2. I could get a PhD in something that they will want to keep. They seriously want people to go there for PhDs. The tuition for international PhD students is the same as the domestic rate, while for any other type of degree is astronomically bad (as much as a domestic U.S. higher education :p). There are also scholarships, including a government scholarship to cover certain topics; if I went in for something fisheries related, I'd fit under their economics option.
I haven't actually done anything committed yet, but have prepped up some paperwork.
1. I've prepped an application for a data manager job in Wellington, which is at the south end of North Island and thus sort of centrally located for all of New Zealand. The area sounds like it has about the same population size as Mobile or Savannah or Wilmington (aka everywhere else I've lived since leaving Indiana), which is a comfortable size for me. They emphasize their many small restaurants and coffee shops and festivals. It also seems to be very windy there, and the winters sound like they are probably cold and dark and wet, so, just like Seattle in a lot of ways other than population.
It would be cool if they offered me the job, but I don't really expect they will. I don't have the educational qualification they're looking for, plus, it doesn't seem like the sort of job that they couldn't find someone domestic to fill. The immigration rules require them to hire domestic people first if they can.
2. I've written up a letter to a professor at the University of Auckland, detailing my idea for a PhD program that I want to do. There's one other professor at the same university I could also try.
Auckland is New Zealand's big city. It's at the north end of North Island, where the weather is warmer. Lots of diversity and international residents. Lots of plans to build more housing over the next couple decades to keep up with their expected growth (so, you know, lots of construction industry work, which is on the Immigration High Demand lists...). Plus they have a big airport that can do direct flights back to the U.S.
This is likely the better and more realistic option, at least in the short run. It would take me a bit longer to set up for getting there, but then, there's a ton of logistics details I'd need time to work out anyway.
I guess I will probably end up trying both and see what sticks first.
(...and then maybe Someone Else would be willing to follow me there, where we can at least be roommates, or maybe duplex-mates, or even just regular next door neighbors, or at least be in the same city again, and live happily ever after. :) )
