alt Hacker NewsI think people generally vastly underestimate the negative effect of "nativism"/anti-immigration rethoric on desirable foreign workers. Even if those desirable foreigners are completely unaffected by actual policy.
I personally know at least two highly qualified STEM workers that went back to Europe after Brexit/Trump2 and from what I can tell this was at least 70% pure "spite" (instead of being affected by actual anti-foreign regulation or somesuch).
Indeed.
I used to live in Cambridge. Only one person I knew there was pro-Brexit, call him C. In the run-up to the referendum, I'd already told C I was looking to move out of the UK due to the entirely native political choices of the UK. The domestic political nonsense was necessarily only going to get less constrained by a policy decision (Brexit) specifically about getting less constrained.
One of my last memories of C was that a group of us were in a local pub discussing it, one said they were worried Brexit would make Cambridge smaller. C shouted "Good!".
Given my plans, obviously when C shouted "Good!" at the idea of Cambridge shrinking, I was shocked, took it somewhat personally. Then the referendum came, and I was both angry with him and far too busy, so I stopped talking to C entirely.
Other people report that C was very confused by this, did not understand at all.