About Spain
Do you need a visa or working permit to work in Spain?
One of the challenges of living and working in another country is that you will almost always need to have a visa and a work permit to be able to do so. For most people this will be true of Spain as well. The process of getting a work permit and visa is really no different than it would be for any other country but it can be a challenge.
Americans who want to work in Spain will need to get both a visa and a work permit. The visa is what allows you to live in the country and this is fairly easy to get. In most cases you will be able to get a visitors visa just by showing up, if you are planning to stay for longer than would be allowed with the visa you can usually extend this fairly easily, provided you can support yourself without a job. If you are going to be working in Spain and you intend to stay for longer than allowed by the visitors visa you are going to have to get a permanent resident visa. This requires you to have a work permit.
If you are going to be working in Spain as an American you are going to have to get a work permit. These are not easy to get. If you are being transferred to Spain by your current employer they will take care of this for you and the process is pretty simple. For almost everybody else things are not that easy. In general if you are going to get a work permit for Spain you are going to have to be able to show that no Spaniard is available to do the job. Actually you will have to be able to show that no citizen of the EU is available to do it.
While it is not easy to get a work permit for Spain there are ways that it can be done. The best chance will be if you have skills that are in short supply in the country. This used to be easy for Americans as there was a huge demand for people with English language skills. The EU has brought an end to that however as Britons can work in Spain without a permit and have pretty much filled the market for English speakers.
The actual process of getting a work permit is to find an employer who is willing to sponsor you and have him fill out the required paperwork to get you the permit. If it can be established that there is no Spaniard available for the job you will be granted a work permit. The process can be quite slow so you should plan on it taking several months before you are able to work in Spain.