Some blame the cost of health care. Others are worried about gun violence in schools. Many are fed up with the politics, or just want to experience something new.
Whatever the reason, increasing numbers of Americans are voting with their feet and choosing to build new lives overseas.
According to Census Bureau data, emigration from the US increased significantly last year, a trend that appears set to grow in 2026. While the numbers are small compared to the US's population of about 340 million, the departure of people from America US has contributed to a significant drop in net migration.
For Mike Hogan and his wife Mary, the decision to leave the US was helped by a few simple calculations. The former congressional staff member and government relations consultant, 61, has just retired from the Washington area to southern Spain.
They had visited France and Portugal, but after several trips to Spain they fell in love with Estepona, a picturesque Costa del Sol town of whitewashed Andalusian houses and flower-filled streets and plazas.
Aside from the vibe and the prospect of a calmer pace of life, something else caught Mr Hogan's attention: health care.
The Hogans had been paying about $2,500 a month for a US health insurance plan with a $6,000 excess. In Spain, they found private cover costing about $100 a month, with no deductible or co-payment.
“I don't know why we can't figure it out here,” Mr Hogan said, shortly before leaving for Spain. He said his decision was “not overtly political”. He and his wife had started thinking of making the move about five years ago, around the time of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The number of Americans leaving the US is difficult to measure, but data collected by The Wall Street Journal from 15 countries found that at least 180,000 Americans moved to those nations in 2025. The total figure is probably far higher than that.
President Donald Trump's return to the White House did not factor too much into Mr Hogan's plans, although he said it made some aspects of leaving easier to explain. “We're not moving because of politics, but it is embarrassing to try to defend some of the craziness,” he said.
There are plenty of anecdotal signs of the trend elsewhere in Europe, where Americans can secure residency through retirement or investment visas, ancestry claims or job offers. Jamal, a taxi driver in Sete in the South of France, told The National that he frequently picks up suitcase-laden Americans at Montpellier Airport who are moving to Europe permanently.
A Gallup poll last year found that 21 per cent of Americans said they would like to leave the US and permanently move to another country if they could. That rose to 40 per cent among women aged 15 to 44 – four times the proportion who said the same in a similar poll in 2014.
Cynthia Aceituno, 30, a freelance digital marketer from New York, moved to Barcelona last year. She had been considering El Salvador, where her family is from, but after visiting Spain she decided she wanted to stay.
Ms Aceituno says the political climate in the US, the cost of living and the pace of life in New York all contributed to the decision. She also feels safer in Spain.
“I can walk at night alone and I don't feel like I'm in danger,” she said. She added that she appreciates the way people choose to spend their time in Spain. “They work to live,” Ms Aceituno said – in New York, she feels, they “live to work”.
She still works for New York clients remotely, and her hours have shifted because of the six-hour time difference. But the arrangement has allowed her to build a life that she says feels less stressful.
Even visiting the doctor was a revelation. When Ms Aceituno went for the first time, she asked how much she owed. “They were like, ‘Oh no, you live here, it's fine, have a nice day,’” she said. “I walked out in shock.”
A common perception is that working life can feel a lot less hectic in parts of Europe than in the US. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development figures back this up, showing that US employees worked an average of 1,800 hours in 2025, compared with 1,633 in Spain.
But people who live in Europe often complain about a frustrating job market or being burdened by bureaucracy and taxes.
For Ms Aceituno, the trade-off has been worth it. She said she does not contemplate moving back to New York, although she still considers it home and wants to visit her family. “I don't have to stay here if I don't want to,” she said.
Meredith Thomas, owner and lead travel writer for the Two Packs And A Pup blog, left the US two years ago with her partner and their dog to travel full-time. She said the US's high cost of living was a major factor in their decision.
“Nearly every country we've lived in has been dramatically cheaper than the States,” she said, noting that her family's costs would easily exceed $10,000 a month at home. “Now, even with frequent travel and tourism spending, we average around half that. It's hard to imagine moving back to $50 brunch bills when we can sip a cocktail on the beaches of Vietnam for only $6.”
The US-based research firm Dataframe LLC surveyed 1,869 Americans this year to discover why people are leaving the US. For 61 per cent of respondents, the top motivator was looking for a better quality of life, while 58 per cent cited the cost of living in the US as the primary push factor.
The survey also found that 38 per cent of American respondents think the country is declining and 50 per cent had been touched by job loss in the last two years, meaning either themselves or someone close to them had lost a job.
For Christopher Mannino, concerns over the safety of his children made the decision to leave the US easy. He and his wife had already lived abroad and had been interested in the idea of travelling with their children when the pandemic made them rethink what they wanted from family life.
They eventually settled in Malta, where they could work remotely and send their children to school. The decision was not initially political, but the turning point came when their school district introduced active-shooter drills, an almost uniquely American phenomenon in which children as young as four are taught to hide and stay quiet if a gunman bursts into their school.
Mr Mannino, a former teacher, remembers seeing the drills when he returned to substitute teaching. He questioned whether that was an environment in which he wanted his children to grow up. His son, who is nine, told him he liked practising the drills because “he knew how to sacrifice himself to save his friends”.
“To hear this nine-year-old talking like that … it's just heartbreaking,” Mr Mannino said. “That's not how kids should be growing up. They shouldn't have to worry about any of that.”
He said his kids are now thriving at local schools in Malta, and are involved in sports and theatre, learning about another culture and picking up some Maltese.
“The kids are doing so much better,” he said. “I feel like they are safer and they are experiencing the world.”
