Since I moved, I've only been able to find work about 50% of the time. Getting a work permit in Europe basically isn't possible without a degree.
I've been unemployed since Covid began. It was quite humbling going from complaining about recruiters to spending my days staring blankly at job sites for 10 hours per day.
Going back to the USA is out of the question, but nobody in Europe will do a work permit for somebody without a college degree.
Finding consulting has proven impossible due to the timezone difference. Upwork and other similar sites are worthless, unless you're a guy with 30 years experience (I am) who is willing to work for $10/hour (I am not).
I'm done with working in this part of tech. Which other realms might be more conducive to remote work with minimal interaction? Maybe it's time to give up and become a landlord instead?
EDIT: Clarified that I do not live in the EU.
Is it an EU country? In every European country I've had direct experience with (DK, DE, IT, PT, FR, BE), you can get a residence permit with the right to work by applying as an accompanying spouse, or under a family reunification scheme. Of course, in some countries this can take time, but certainly not 8 years.
Additionally, under the 'Directive on the status of non-EU nationals who are long-term residents'[1], you have the right to obtain permanent residence in any EU country you have lived in legally for 5 years. Unless you've been living in the EU illegally (e.g. on a tourist visa for 8 years) or not reporting your income/paying social contributions, you should be eligible for that. As with all/most EU directives, the specific implementation can vary between countries, but the immigration authorities are obliged to have some kind of process for implementation.
[1] https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/policies/migration-and-asy...
1. Get a degree. Sign up for something like Western Governor's University or anything you can complete at quickly as possible. Burn the the curriculum by working your ass off to get that degree. This path makes sense if getting a degree is, as you state, the only thing from preventing you from working locally.
2. Get a USA job. Update your CV to make it look like you've been doing something over the past two years (which could be going to school). Set your LinkedIn location to an East Coast USA city (e.g. NYC or DC). Interview for remote only positions. Get hired. Don't tell them you're working from Europe. Have them ship work laptop to some place in the USA where you can fly to pick it up. Fly home. Set your laptop timezone to be timezone of local office so you don't have to explain why you're 7 hours ahead all the time. Say you like to work early & simply avoid companies that have a lot of later afternoon meetings. Budget for flying back to get a replacement laptop if you have to. Make sure you pay your taxes in Europe. You don't want to get busted. Hire a tax professional to help you navigate the European tax system.
3. Fight to establish yourself on sites like Upwork & TopTal. Kind of a race to the bottom, but obviously people do it.
I didn't suggest becoming a self employed consultant because if you were wired to do that, you'd have already done it. You can of course develop this skill, but it takes time & isn't for everyone.
Consult an attorney in Turkiye. Never heard of university diploma being a requirement for a work permit. There are hundreds of thousands of refugees in Turkiye which do not have any diplomas.
Join a sweatshop (an agency) in upwork: they take care of finding customers in exchange for a portion of your income. DevOps with fluent English is a limited resource.
You can always create an LLC in the US and work for it remotely. So your employer pays a contractor (your LLC), LLC pays you dividends. Talk to an accountant in Turkiye, but I doubt there will be any taxation difficulties with the foreign income. You can get an LLC in Turkiye as well, by the way.
Search for a job in Dubai: English is the main language there, no taxes, adjacent timezone.
Give a slightly different spin to your story: give employers your US address, say you are a digital nomad which happens to be living in TR temporarily.
We do care (and check) that you’re legally allowed to work where you live, but other than that, I’d expect there are high hundreds (likely thousands) of companies hiring remotely who are in a similar boat.
You might want to consider self-employment - no need for a work permit to do that. This is a legitimate case for this and companies appreciate when the only accounting they have to do is a monthly invoice.
At the very least it makes for a decent temporary measure.
Most places have at least a couple hours of overlap with the US. What time zone are you in?
What is your criteria for remote jobs? Perhaps the criteria is too limiting?
E.g. are you refusing jobs that require joining any meetings whatsoever? (Not saying you are, just speculating what the problem might be)
In the meantime, reaching out the the thirty years of coworkers, bosses, and subordinates might also provide job leads related to your direct experience.
Good luck.
The main issue that I see is that you don't have a degree. I can't speak much for outside the US, but within the US it's also difficult to have a long-term tech career without a degree. If you stayed in the US, you might also have similar troubles. (And eventually got a degree, perhaps by doing an online degree during COVID.)
Thus, I would suggest figuring out how to get a degree.
Having been on both sides of the table, (job seeker and resume reviewer,) I can tell you that the degree means more than you think. Assuming that any job you're applying for gets 100+ applicants, anyone without a degree will be filtered out without due consideration.
Even something like an online degree will get your resume past the checkbox.
Again, the goal is to get your resume its due consideration. (Because, to repeat myself, when a job opening has 100+ applicants, there are simple filters like "degree required" that get you filtered out before anyone is really reading your resume.)
This is not correct; of the Member States which participate in the Blue Card system (almost all of them), almost all of those accept 5 years of relevant experience instead of a degree. One or two exceptions are 10 years.
Some Member States do not apply a labour market test, making the process even simpler.
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/eu-blue-card...
Otherwise you may want to try contacting - search for a place through an agent and specify full remote only.
And for US devs who have gotten work visas in the EU - does this distinction matter for having your work permit approved? I have lots of work experience but I'm self taught with a BA, wonder if that would hold me back.
Most of your claims are false.
And I know plenty of people who are consulting successfully from pretty much any part of the world.
And I know a guy who lives in Turkey and is a massively successful international consultant.
I average ~40$/hr spend on Upwork for intermediate to highly skilled engineers, I think you need to market yourself better.
Our company, and others in the Amsterdam area, often hire from Turkey and take care of immigration afaik.