Why? This comment is not about Berlin or Paris, it is mentioning then as examples of non English speaking cities. Is the author supposed to mention every city in Europe?
The Netherlands has the highest English proficiency in the world [0] (among non-native speaking countries) so I imagine it would be a compelling choice.
But I mean… Ireland has a higher English proficiency?
There are of course a lot of things doable fully in English. But when running a company not mastering the native language (even when all of the people you talk to speak English!) can be a big drawback.
Having lived in the Netherlands (Eindhoven - not even Amsterdam) I can confirm that the English spoken there was superior to the English I was raised in in rural Ontario where my teachers said "warshing" instead of washing. The Dutch have an incredibly faculty for language and I admire it.
I will have to mention that this varies all over, especially the bit older generation (not exclusively though) also has some weird quirks language wise. So while they might speak and understand the English language quite well the are some parts missing. As an example I like to mention the phrasing of Bolkenstein (a Dutch National/EU politician) of economic handouts to people as "Golden showers". So while proficiency might be high, it's not always ... perfect.
Even among native speakers, there are often inter-generational shifts: to my father’s generation (1939) “gay” meant “festive, joyous” rather than a sexual preference; my mother used the term “glory hole” to mean “a cupboard used for storage”[0]; and her mother used “Irish” as an insult, and lived just long enough for “wireless” to start to refer to WiFi instead of longwave radio.
[0] admittedly she was starting to develop signs of Alzheimer’s at the point she called it that around me, but that was a legitimate use of the phrase when she was young.
I'm from the UK and whilst working with a handful of dutch, I was blown away not only by their extremely good english but also their ability to understand and the subitle aspects of english - eg comedy/ sarcasium/ passive aggresstion etc..
Part of that is probably because we have (grandfathered) access to BBC1 and BBC2 here, so ample opportunity to learn British mannerisms and expressions.
But the US company in Europe would have far more (big majority) of non-US employees. Those employees have far better understanding of Dutch English than Irish English in every day and in corporate life
There are some workers that would relocate with the whole family.
This means the significant other has to find a job and fit it, kids have to go to school.
While many countries have a very decent proficiency in English, you're whole family must fully invest in learning the local language. And that in addition to using English in the office of at least one of the adults (since many big companies use English officially)
There are some workers that would relocate with the whole family. This means the significant other has to find a job and fit it, kids have to go to school.
Like e.g. Berlin, the large Dutch cities are very much internationally-oriented and usually it's not problem to get a job and integrate if you don't speak Dutch. Sometimes the issue is quite the opposite -- my wife wanted to learn Dutch, but people would just switch to English or German and she would have to ask them explicitly to speak Dutch.
This means the significant other has to find a job and fit it, kids have to go to school.
Kids pick up other languages in no time. A lot of friends/colleagues moved between countries (academia) and the kids would usually pick up a language in 2-3 months. I have lived in Australia for six months when I was four. When we returned, I spoke English with an aussie accent (though that's gone now ;)).
Living in Berlin if you don't speak German you are limited in employment, in healthcare, and possibly socially depending on your bubbles. Short time you may not notice it but long term you are probably best learning German. A friend of mine is struggling to find a job right now and lack of German is a big problem for them. Another friend started dating someone who's not herself in the anglophone tech bubble and can't hang out with her friends. Have translated for a friend in hospital for a operation.
Some people can deal with this, even long term, but it's definitely not for me.
Maybe? A Polish colleague happened to spend some time with, IIRC, a Scott and an Aussie. The two native speakers would resort occasionally to use him as an interpreter, because the native English tends to diverge out of bounds of their tolerances.
As someone who recently moved from the UK to Switzerland, I can attest that "English proficiency" isn't the main issue - it probably helps (it would be even harder to move to Japan where I couldn't talk to pretty much anyone, nor read anything), but the main issue is bureaucracy - everything is in German - forms, contracts, etc. - and some foreign documents have to be translated (they sometimes accept English documents, at least).
There's a lot of weird accents here in the UK. Even cockney sounds odd, and that's local to London. In the same place you'll meet people from Liverpool, Newcastle, Birmingham, Scotland and so on, all with distinctive accents that are not so easy for your ordinary American or second language speaker.
Weird? Nah, but there is a lot of variation, and some of them can be difficult even for locals to understand.
However most of us naturally switch to some variation of RP (or as heard on the BBC) while interacting with non locals. It has often been said that there is more variation in the way that English is spoken within the UK, than there is in the rest of the world.
I once had an experience in the USA while sitting at a Restaurant bar and conversing with the barman. He eventually asked where I was from, presumably due to my manner of speech (in English).
I then went through the rigmarole of asking him if he believed I was a native speaker, or knew it as a second language. He picked native, but was unable to enumerate the short list of countries where I was possibly from, and could not guess the answer.
At no point did he try England. He was surprised when I eventually told him I was British, and from England.
It seems too many folk in the US expect that all of us sound like Hugh Grant.
Another Irish resident confirming that this statement is not true.
Most schools teach in English and teach Irish as a second language. Irish is rarely used in normal day to day interactions and never at work unless you work in an Irish language related area or government department that supports Irish as an official language.
There are some niche exceptions:
- "All Irish" schools where you optionally learn through Irish
- "Gaeltachts" which are pockets of Ireland where Irish is promoted and spoken. Even here the locals will happily switch to English if you prefer.
I like Irish and wish it was more widely spoken as an everyday language but in reality you have to make an explicit effort to experience it.
Indeed I was living in the Gaeltacht (West of Galway). I didn't realise the number of Irish-spoken schools was so low in the rest of the country.
My colleagues all said that all the good schools were Irish spoken (as in everything taught through Irish). I extrapolated this to the rest of the country which is clearly incorrect. Sorry. But I wasn't too much into this as I don't have any kids myself.
If I did have kids I would have left Ireland anyway... At least in the area where I lived most schools were Catholic and I would never accept my child being raised with religious values. I wouldn't want to constantly have to deprogram them.
In fact one of my colleagues had a child who was giving a presentation about the dinosaurs. His parents were called to the school and told off because this was a subject that could not be discussed because evolution was "unscientific" and they shouldn't spread this kind of "nonsense" to the other pupils. Another colleague was shunned for being a "lone parent".
And this was actually a colleague who was living in Athlone, not in the Gaeltacht at all. So forgive me if I hold the Irish education system in low esteem :) Perhaps in Dublin it's better but I've only lived in the more remote areas.
You must be thinking of an area with an unusually high number of Gaelscoils!
Speaking as a former Irish language teacher in a English speaking school in Ireland (now a software engineer in a tech multinational), I don't think most schools teach in Irish, not English. Perhaps you meant it the other way round?
2019 Irish Times: "Number of primary school pupils taught through Irish at record level". Article notes that Irish as primary language of education has risen from 6.4% in 2000 to 8.1% in 2018/19. https://www.irishtimes.com/news/education/number-of-primary-...
Repeated surveys have shown that secondary students taught through Irish have higher Irish language exam results, but not significantly lower English (or French, German, or Spanish) results. The vast majority of adults in Ireland cannot speak Irish fluently, or at all except for some school-learned phrases. It is not the common language of commerce.
For anyone thinking of relocating to Ireland and confused by my comment or the school system, there is a difference between 'Irish is a subject everyone does in primary/secondary school' to 'Every subject is taught through Irish in schools'. In over 90% of schools, Irish is just one subject across 7 curriculum areas in primary: https://www.curriculumonline.ie/Primary/Curriculum/ and one of 3 mandatory subjects at secondary (with English and Maths).
Oh ok, all my friends with kids had them in Irish-spoken schools. There were some English-spoken schools in the area I lived (Galway) but according to my friends all the good schools were in Irish.
But indeed Galway is exceptionally focused on Irish. I didn't know the rest of the country was different. Sorry for that.
I did notice that most Irish people have almost no grasp of the Irish language at all, which I found very weird because everyone is forced to learn it for many years (12 even according to one colleague)
I think Sweden and Denmark has the same level. They seem to take turn on which is the highest with 0 1% or so difference. Of course, they are further to the north end of Europe and may as such be a less suitable choice.
If language fluency would be the most important criterium - which it isn't-, the Dutch speaking 60% of Belgium are an even more logical choice. They're buried in that ranking below the less stellar English in the French speaking part of Belgium.
Flemish people might be an even more logical choice for the EU. Similar English, Dutch and basic German fluency, plus with most uni educated people there, pretty decent French.
And if you recruit me, you'll get fluent Latvian on top :-)
Are Latvians still learning Russian these days as well? In Georgia I noticed a big difference between the older (Russian) and younger (English) in their second language skills.
This is getting fairly off topic, but since you ask... My impressions about people born in Latvia post-1991 are numerous, but obviously anecdotal:
- Most native Latvian language speakers born in Latvia post-1991 will have low or non-existent Russian language skills, especially in the west (Kurzeme) or north. Very few native Russian speakers there. The situation in and around Riga is a little bit different. Try getting a customer-facing job in the private sector around Riga if you don't speak any Russian...
My significant other is young and speaks Russian fluently by accident. Native Latvian language, but raised in a "Khrushchevka" (Soviet apartment block) full of native Russian speaking families. Playing with the other kids meant learning Russian...
- Very very large differences amongst native Russian speaking youths in Latvia's three largest cities. A significant number hardly speak any Latvian. I've asked kids for directions that had trouble finding the words for "left" or "right". Which is somewhat surprising, given that officially, they're taking a significant part of their school in Latvian. Another group speaks both languages fluently. I've had chats over lunch with people I could hardly detect their native Russian background.
- Surprisingly, _a lot_ of young people in both groups speak abysmally bad English too.
I would guess that India is too large to meaningfully include in such a statistic. On average in the country English literacy could be quite poor while in the relevant tech hubs it is quite good. But that's just a hypothesis.
I believe the reason they mentioned it is that they have very large english speaking populations, famously a german conservative said he doesn't know if a person in a shop in Berlin can speak German or "only English".
A big difference between the larger and smaller EU countries though is unrelated. The smallest countries don't have the budget for dubbing movies and TV series. This really helps with English proficiency in the smaller countries such as the Netherlands.
The Dutch are extremely proficient in English because they teach their children in it from 8 years old. And have been doing it since at least the 80s.
So while what you're saying is technically true, a lot of shows were only subtitled instead of being dubbed, it is also factually false, that is not the main reason for the proficiency.
No we haven't. I'm Dutch, I was in primary school in the 80s and I definitely didn't get English until I went to secondary school around the age of 12.
I do think the subtitling really helps with proficiency though. School can only teach you so much. Consider Ireland where people get taught the Irish language for 12 years and hardly speak it.
The understanding of different accents, slang, drunken conversation etc can only happen with exposure to native speakers. Content in the original language really helps with that.
[0] https://www.ef.com/wwen/epi/