Comment by CalRobert
Indeed those are the rules but on a practical level it seems pretty simple to get a visa if the company had an even reasonably competitive process. Though I moved to Europe 12 years ago (and went through getting work permits twice), maybe it's gotten harder.
Nah it's still very easy. The logic is pretty simple. Europe could really use more talent... and the bar is quite low. Any developer/engineer of any grade will easily get a visa. Any retiree will also easily get a non-work long-term visa with just 1 year worth of minimum wage (around 20k in most of Western Europe) as savings to prove self-sufficiency. So it's extremely easy and almost a non-issue compared to the other side of the pond.