Every election seems to feature some group of people–often celebrities–who swear that they will leave the country if one candidate or another is elected. It’s become a kind of American election tradition. But how many people actually follow through on their promises to hit the road and live abroad due to election results?
The Washington Post recently published an interesting article that tried to reach conclusions about American expatriates by crunching through some actual data. It found that, to be sure, there have been big spikes in Google searches about moving to Canada in connection with elections and, more recently, the Supreme Court’s decision to overrule Roe v. Wade. There was an especially big spike in such searches in 2016, when Donald Trump was elected, that constitutes the all-time peak in such search requests.
The Post article also notes, however, that only a tiny fraction of Americans actually leave the U.S.A., and an even smaller number do it for political reasons. In fact, the United States is the number one destination for immigrants, by a considerable margin, but only 26th in the number of emigrants. Americans are far less likely to emigrate than citizens of some other countries–but because of our size, that still means millions of Americans have moved overseas. Data from the United Nations and the World Bank indicates that about 2.8 million Americans now live abroad, although there is some dispute about exactly who to count in that category. The data analysis also shows that Americans who do emigrate go to a lot of different countries, with the top ten list being Mexico, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, Israel, South Korea, Japan, France, and Italy.
The data also suggest that very few Americans leave because of election results. Instead, there are a range of reasons for the departures. For example, Mexico is number one on the list of relocations because many of the Americans who relocate to Mexico are children who were born in America and then returned to Mexico with their parents. For other emigrants, ending up in another country often is just the result of a series of circumstances that the article describes as emigration by accident, with a typical scenario being an American who goes abroad to study or work, meets and marries a native of the country of their destination, and ends up staying there. For those Americans who are making conscious decisions to move abroad, the other big reasons include retirement and a simple desire to explore.
In short, there really aren’t many “political emigrants” from the U.S., despite the fervent promises that we hear during election season–probably because promises made during the heat of the moment end up going by the wayside when passions cool, careful analysis of possible destinations occurs, and Americans realize that staying here beats the alternative for a lot of reasons. But if you do go abroad and become one of those accidental emigrants, you’ll probably find a community of other accidental American emigrants wherever you go.
The movie that encapsulates this phenomenon, for me, was Out of Africa. It was a slow, dreary, unwatchable piece of crap. It was a “chick flick” of sorts, but one so ponderous that even women who want to revel in the arched eyebrow/heavy sigh/”the intense drama of real human relationships” school of cinema would find it an absolute snoozefest. Yet somehow this leaden dud won the Best Picture Oscar, beating out the likes of Witness — a great and touching movie about an injured cop who finds sanctuary among the Amish in Pennsylvania. As yourself now: if you turned on the TV and had this choice, which movie would you rather watch: Out of Africa, or Witness? Does anyone seriously doubt that everybody except members of the Meryl Streep Fan Club would choose Witness? For that matter, would any network even broadcast Out of Africa? It’s probably the least requested Netflix movie in history.
But really, can we call limiting consumers to three cartons of eggs “rationing”? Technically, it’s an accurate use of the word, because H-E-B is limiting the quantity people can purchase. But you tend to associate rationing with much more stringent limits on supply — like getting one pair of shoes for the entirety of World War II. Telling people they can only buy 36 eggs during one visit to the grocery store doesn’t really seem impose limits that will affect many people. Other than kids intent on mischief on a Friday night and the members of the Duggar clan, how many people buy more than 36 eggs at one time, anyway?
This year the National Football League has empowered referees to penalize teams whose players use the n-word. It’s the NFL’s response to several recent incidents with racial overtones — but the decision to penalize the use of the word has been criticized by many players as out of touch with the common use of the word among younger people of different races. Indeed, internet search engines indicate that, in its a-ending form, the n-word is used 500,000 times a day on Twitter. The resurgence of the n-word among young people is often attributed to hip-hop culture, where the word is commonly used in the lyrics, and even the titles, of popular songs. The Post article recounts a story about a recent Kanye West concert where the performer gave white concertgoers permission to say the word as they sang along with his songs, and they did so.
The New York Post has done a review and gives Obamacare an overall grade of “F,” because it has cost a lot of money, hasn’t really made a huge dent in the mass of uninsured people, has messed with a lot of people’s plans, and is affecting full-time job creation by businesses because of the costs it imposes
A dysfunctional, overly bureaucratic federal agency — who could imagine such a thing? It may be the norm, but in the case of the DHS the constant turnover, unfilled positions, and bureaucratic gamesmanship could easily have real world consequences. The Post article notes, for example, that recent testing has shown that the blue-uniformed TSA employees at who operate all of those scanners are increasingly missing weapons or explosives being brought through security. What is the point of spending billions for high-tech scanners at airports if the TSA employees can’t properly interpret the scanning data? In the modern world where so many terrorist groups are looking to launch another deadly operation, we simply cannot afford security agencies who aren’t properly performing their jobs.
Ultimately, they realized that scooters and motorized wheelchairs were perfect. The need for them was plausible, and there was a huge gap between the actual cost of the devices and the inflated amount Medicare would pay. The fraudsters created elaborate schemes that included “recruiters” who identified seniors to receive the scooters and bogus medical supply companies — and seniors who willingly participated because they thought there were getting a freebie, even if it was something that they didn’t need. When Medicare changed the rules to require in-person doctor visits to try to stop the fraud, the crooks recruited doctors who were willing to participate in the fraud in exchange for a cut.
The woman recounts embarrassing anecdotes. She’s got to answer a lot of questions before she gets the aid. She’s afraid an apparently well-meaning older man will give her money, but instead he makes a friendly religious pitch and she takes off to avoid further contact. A busybody woman questions her purchase of root beer using food stamps, and the check-out girl stands up for her. And finally, one day, she has to take her husband’s Mercedes — a 2003 Mercedes Kompressor — to pick up her food stamps. No one said anything, but they did stare at her . . . and to this day it’s the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened to her.
This is no surprise from the Clinton standpoint. 
The story, by reporter David Fahrenthold, is about how the Office of Personnel Management — the main agency charged with human resources function for federal employees — processes the retirement paperwork of those federal employees. And “paperwork” is apt, because even though it is March 2014, the process is done almost entirely by hand and almost entirely on paper. Imagine! And to make it even weirder, it all happens underground, in a remote abandoned mine in Pennsylvania that received paper forms by the truckload and is filled with filing cabinets. That’s right — filing cabinets.
Second, I think the piece was a carefully crafted bit of propaganda from a foreign leader who is following his own agenda. So what? There is still value in being exposed to the views of other actors on the world stage. I’m also not troubled by the criticism of American policy. We’re big boys, and we — and our leaders — should be hardened to the rough and tumble of a world where others are pursuing different agendas. If there are members of the Obama Administration who are feeling bruised by the criticisms of Vladimir Putin, they really need to get over it.
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