[sho_hn]

> It seems like most of the US has this problem.

The US still benefits from latent good marketing/rep in the 80s/90s, and projection of military power in decades past. For example, until relatively recently (the Trump era and especially how it ended disillusioned many), South Koreans still looked to the US as their model of the developed world. If you'd send your children anywhere to get educated or marry, it would be there. Inner benchmarks were done against the US. The rose-tinted glasses were enough to convince many to move without checking too carefully what the place they'd be moving to would actually be like.

This is changing, and more recently more attention is being paid to Europe, partially because the national conversation has shifted more toward quality of life, birthrate problems, aging population, etc. and there's more interest in social systems, healthcare, family planning support and so on.

Still, Koreans have a lot of memes about this or that place in Europe being racist in this or that way (and of course, quite lot of it is true), so it remains a big impediment.