[gumballindie]

If you look into the job market a lot have moved to the Netherlands. The UK is gradually becoming irrelevant. A 1 bil $ investment is negligible in the grand scheme of things. If you spoke with people in finance then you’ll learn things are bad. Really bad.

[blibble]

in terms of employment: more people are employed in UK financial services than before brexit

https://www.standard.co.uk/business/city-jobs-boom-brexit-ex...

the simple fact is most of these jobs serve the domestic market and were never at risk

[FirmwareBurner]

Netherlands which has an acute housing shortage? And not just in Amsterdam.

Maybe not the best idea to crowd the Eu's tech sector in an already crowded county. Why not a country with more free space, like France?

[azalemeth]

The OP is right – at least according to Ernst and Young [1], who wrote in 2022 that:

> Since the UK’s EU referendum, 44% (97 out of 222) of the largest UK financial services firms have announced plans to move some UK operations and/or staff to the EU – a figure that nearly doubled between March 2017 (53 out of 222, 24%) and March 2021 (95 out of 222, 43%)

> Since the referendum, 24 firms have publicly declared they will transfer just over £1.3trn of UK assets to the EU – a figure which has remained broadly flat over the past 18 months

> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016

> While many worst-case-scenario contingency plans have not been enacted, EY anticipates ongoing operational and staff moves from financial services firms across Europe as Brexit increasingly becomes part of a broader conversation about strategic business drivers and operating models

There has been no post-Brexit boom in financial services [2], with a variety of "business friendly deregulation" changes either "yet to be implemented" [as of Dec 2023] and with "none so far having a substantial impact".

[1] https://www.ey.com/en_uk/news/2022/03/ey-financial-services-...

[2] https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/post-brexit-big-bang-reform...

[blibble]

> The OP is right – at least according to Ernst and Young [1], who wrote in 2022 that:

> Since the UK’s EU referendum, 44% (97 out of 222) of the largest UK financial services firms have announced plans to move some UK operations and/or staff to the EU – a figure that nearly doubled between March 2017 (53 out of 222, 24%) and March 2021 (95 out of 222, 43%)

> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016

the number of people employed in UK FS is 2.2 million, so that's 0.3%

for comparison: last year 87,000 new UK jobs were added

structually most of these 2.2 million serve the UK domestic market and were never at risk of going to the EU

[kmlx]

> In the last quarter [i.e. Q1 2022], the number of Brexit-related staff relocations to the EU has been further revised down, from 7,400 in December 2021 to just over 7,000 as March 2022 closes – significantly down from the peak of 12,500 announced in 2016

it’s interesting that there was no mass relocation of jobs out of London:

https://www.morganmckinley.com/uk/article/london-employment-...

https://www.statista.com/statistics/385366/uk-finance-insura...

[adhesive_wombat]

There's a fairly large advanced hi-tech industry hub in the Netherlands. Philips and ASML are big names, but there are very many more. As they're all fairly near each other on the scale of things (often near Eindhoven, with more "non-physical" tech in Amsterdam), there's some Silicon Valley-style network effects at play.

Also French labour laws and norms are probably frightening to union-phobic Big Tech companies.

[FirmwareBurner]

Philips is irelevant in tech today other than medical devices. All they make today is rebadging Chinese white goods.

[adhesive_wombat]

Plenty of things that used to be Philips are still in Eindhoven, like NXP (semiconductors) and Signify (lighting, including Hue). Philips has been a huge part of what made the Eindhoven area a high-tech industry hub, even if much of it is under new ownership structures.

[FirmwareBurner]

Yes, in the past. That's what I said Philips is irelevant today. You're not contradicting me.

[adhesive_wombat]

It's not irrelevant to why Eindhoven is how it is today, in the same way that HP is a split-up shadow of what is former influential self, but it's partly why Google now is in Silicon Valley.

[phil21]

> Why not a country with more free space, like France?

I can't speak for everyone, but in my case it's laws, regulation, and general friendliness to business enterprises that bring income to the country.

Amsterdam is likely also the best connected area in Europe, the European equivalent of Ashburn, VA.

[FirmwareBurner]

>Amsterdam is likely also the best connected area in Europe, the European equivalent of Ashburn, VA.

Best connected to what exactly? If you ask most people, Vienna is a lot better connected with the rest of europe. Amsterdam is at an edge of the continent.

[phil21]

Fair. I am US-centric, so I care most about trans-Atlantic access. From a peering standpoint we still do more traffic out of Amsterdam than Vienna by quite a far margin.

[FirmwareBurner]

But then Ireland is even closer to the US than Netherlands.

[candiodari]

Not to the internet: https://www.submarinecablemap.com/

Ireland is a satellite, not a hub. The bulk of traffic goes to UK landing stations, then to London.

[gumballindie]

I am not the decision maker, unfortunately. The UK is on track to solving the cost of housing, by tanking the economy, but people still won't afford said housing since they won't afford the mortgages. Hope the NL finds a better way to solve its issues.

[eastbound]

Please stop using France as a trashbin. We already bulldoze enough agricultural land every year and make life impossible for farmers (wtf are we doing with our own food producers in an age of ecology), if we want to remain sustainable, we should not stay as overpopulated as we already are and we should not overexploit our resources. What do you expect, “just build 56 more nucular reactors”?

If anything, we should decrease in population.

[password54321]

We just invested £2.5b into Ukraine, all while following the lead of the US into Israel and Yemen and trying to make deportation deals with Rwanda. All while we watch the news on Japan and India building (rather than destroying) and landing rovers on the moon for the first time.

Remember when the UK looked down on India? Now it even relies heavily on hiring people from there.

[gumballindie]

Whoa. What’s so bad about “hiring people from there”? Now that east european skills have left it takes two to three locals to get the same job done, if they even figure out how. Have to bring people with expertise from somewhere. Only issue is that Indians are visa bound and underpaid, unlike east europeans that companies competed for and drove wages up - contrary to what the clay of the land thought.

[password54321]

You highlight a problem with talking about politics online. It seems very easy for people to become emotional with responses like "Whoa. What’s so bad about “hiring people from there”?" and assume a comment is racist rather than assuming the best intentions.

My intention was to highlight how the dynamics between other countries have changed and how the UK seems less independent and less interested in progress all while spending money on war (while aimlessly following the US).

[gumballindie]

My apologies - it was a knee jerk reaction on my part. I am sorry.

[dtornabene]

you have not in anyway cleared up why "hiring people from there" is somehow a bad thing, which, yes, is a deeply racist attitude.

[password54321]

Seems like the other commenter was smart enough to understand, if you aren't, that is your problem.

[tptacek]

"Deportation deals with Rwanda"?

[likpok]

The UK is redirecting a number of asylum seekers to Rwanda rather than letting them settle locally.

[tptacek]

Ah. Thanks!

[petesergeant]

> The UK is gradually becoming irrelevant

I don’t think this is supported by the facts, as much as Brexit was a dumb idea.

[ben_w]

I'm umming and erring on this one — "irrelevant" feels much too strong (even NK isn't "irrelevant"), but OTOH "becoming" implies a direction of travel rather than a state, and every impression I have is that the UK doesn't matter as much as it used to.

[petesergeant]

This has been true since the early 1900s, so one’d need to show a markèd increase in the rate of derelervance

[ben_w]

Yeah, that's fair.

[tucnak]

Wow, FUD again on Hacker News! So impressive. Colour me surprised.