Slashdot Mirror
India Becoming a Major Hub for Western Job Seekers
MaximusTheGreat writes: "IHT and Financial Express report that many qualified Western professionals are moving to India for jobs. Two of the most common reasons mentioned are adding the Indian experience to the CV and search of better opportunities in a booming Indian economy. According to a Mumbai based head hunting firm, "A lot of the highly qualified talent has traditionally been mobile and attracted to centers of excellence globally. This was true of the US in the early 80s when top flight talent from India migrated in search of better opportunities. Today, the same is happening to economies such as India and China" This should also bust the myth that foreigners are not allowed work in India."
The task of getting first post has been outsourced to India.
This is why I got out of computer science to be an electrical engineer. My advisor always encouraged me to study abroad in India because that's where everything is shifting. I did not want to do this. I hope that this trend does not continue :(
Hey, free movement of labor is required for fairness of free movement of capital.
Depending on what sort of world you want, I guess.
What we call folk wisdom is often no more than a kind of expedient stupidity.-Edward Abbey
I fear that OSS is soon going to force all programming jobs to move to India. Since OSS companies typically make far less profit than real commercial software companies do, they cannot afford to hire decent programmers. So they'll outsource to India, for 10 dollars an hour. Furthermore, by using underhanded tactics like "borrowing" Unix code, they'll beat their commercial competitors -- and the commercial companies will either be forced to open source, or go out of business. I'm not trying to say that OSS is bad, or it should be banned, but some kind of regulation should be put in place to ensure that the majority of software in use is still good old fashioned commercial software.
Have you ever wondered why all the IT jobs are being outsourced to India? Really, I find it hard to believe why people question this growing trend. Is it not obvious?
Indians are by nature better programmers. For one, they never have to deal with type casting erros -- they never forget to caste!
...if the jobs can go to India, it would make sense that the workers can too.
;)
Someone told someone whose job was outsourced to "think outside the box", and look what happened.
libertarianswag.com
It seems this would be something that would have been up and coming. With so many tech jobs being outsourced to India. Hopefully their booming economy will help give us a run for our money. Historically good things seem to happen when we have competition. At least I hope it will be friendlier and with at least as comparable results as the technology boosts during WWII and The Cold War. :)
( o ) one could say I'm rather baked
Maybe Northern India, where its not so hot;
but Southern India... where it gets up to 45'C...
My brain, like any normal supercomputer, functions best at low temperature.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
Good to see that particular myth busted. The reality seems to be that India is simply embracing software development, and given the lower cost of living over there, are making huge gains in that sector - in the end software is just bits, and it's very easy to ship them anywhere in the world.
If you don't fancy working in India, just pick somewhere else with a lower cost of living than the US, and set up shop there. You could try New Zealand or Australia - both fairly western countries with a notably lower cost of living (depending on where you go) than the US. Still not as low as India, but then it would provide less of a language barrier (depending on exactly how uninterpretable you consider the austrialian accent), which many here claim is a significant problem with Indian outsourcing.
So, why not set up your own outsourcing company?
Jedidiah
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
It will all balance out in the end.
I think anything that gets more people out of their own territories and out into a different part of the world where they have the opportunity to see what it's like in other places can only help in the long run. Sure, a fluid labor force is a "good thing", but people who have experienced different cultures, laws, religions, biases and viewpoints is even more valuable.
What needs to be done to get job visa in India? Should I post my resume in Indian newspaper? Will my 10 years of experience in US count? Should I speak any Indian languages?
*Foreigners desiring to work in India are welcome only if they locate in Andhra Pradesh .
(Source: HotJobs.com)
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
Unless someone wants to move to India forever, it doesnt make financial sense. Indian software companies are not going to pay more for an American working in India just because he is American (or whatever country he comes from). And so people moving there will have to work at the going salaries of that market. And with those salaries, you cant retire very comfortably in the United States, for example. So, anyone interested in a permanent move?
Quiznos (like Starbucks) only thrives because of the corporate-type jobs that exist here. As the jobs decrease, chains like this will also begin to decrease.
"Teachers leave us kids alone
Whatever you say, Mr. Eau de Rancid Big Mac.
KFG
I'm about to go onto college. I planned on majoring in CompSci, but I don't want to move aboard to get a job.
Are Electrical Engineers having any similar problems with jobs being outsourced?
Which degree should I get?
Indian Culture is much different from the American one. Such migration might not help at all.. considering that the Americans will have tough time adjusting to the culture in the first place. Moreover, given India is such a big country, many companies would rather do with a talented Indian who understands the work culture and how businesses are run rather than a foreigner.
This is pretty clearly a PR puff piece. An obvious part of the trend of the Indian IT lobby to stem the growing US backlash.
This is just my opinion and all, but I don't think people from the US should have to go to India in order to chase jobs that emigrated from here.
I know that's against the principles of free trade and all, but we invented this technology, we are the ones who built it, we supported it, and now the corporations we built it for are selling our jobs for pennies on the dollar to third world countries.
What I'm doing is changing my field, after around 14 years, because the way technical people in this country have been treated is utterly reprehensible.
Intolerance for ambiguity is the mark of the authoritarian personality.
Who's with me?
We start a hippie commune in India, we would be self sufficient in terms of agriculture and utlities, living by LGPL (we do need to be able to make a living) ideals, religion tolerant, and we could try and land a lot of the US outsoursed contracts...
Sigs? We don't need no stinking sigs!
I can honestly say it was the first I'd heard of a 'Myth that you can't go to work in India'.
I've had a couple of friends go to work in India from the UK in the last couple of years and their work visas and in one case naturalisation was all worked out in a timely manner.
Does this myth only pertain to the United States perhaps?
I can see that moving to work in India could have some instant financial benefits in that the cost of living (and therefore making a home) in India is presumably less than western nations and I understand that income tax is quite reasonable.
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
Yes, you may have a job. But you have to reconcile yourself to a lower quality of life in India. It may cost less to live there, but at the same time, there are a few things that are taken for granted in the West, which aren't as easy to get there. The standards for judging things are far different from life in the West.
PhD and MSc workers are relatively thick on the ground there, especially in Engineering disciplines. The way things are in India, a lot of people (yes, I have many indian friends) want to move out due to competition from their peers, and difficulty in finding jobs. With this in mind, it's easy to understand why one article openly states that a main reason for hiring Europeans is to "represent their interests" in the home country.
When you go work in India, you may save some cash, for sure.. but if you don't plan on living there for the rest of your life, when you come back to your own country, you will find that the savings don't necessarily translate to much in your local currency.
Does all this sound like I am against people moving to India ? not at all. Just that, as the title of my post suggests, I doubt we're ever going to see a vast inrush of Europeans/Americans working in India at low level positions. Indian companies may be savvy enough to snap up a few qualified and experienced personnel, but for the greater majority of those out of work, India isn't the answer. There is a reason why there are STILL so many Indian workers in Silicon Valley and other technology hubs.
And yes, they are doing it. I know one in particular, who was laid off here in America and then rehired to work in India as the head of the outsourced division. Certainly he's not making what he made here, but when, for example, a haircut and head massage are mere (US) pennies, it doesn't matter much.
Were you by any chance raised by wolves?
You know, what they get paid in India is relatively speaking most likely very nice amount? Purchasing parity is nice; one can live like a king there... so in some ways they'll be better off there. One can not really afford servants with programmer salary in USA; but can most definitely do that in India. It's not like they go there to starve; quite the opposite. It's even possible that the salaries are getting closer to those of, say, southern Europe ones; and trend is likely to continue. In couple of years high quartile of programmers in India earn more than low quartile in, say, mid-west.
Furthermore, the article did mention that it may be considered a good career move; working in India helps in managing teams in India, even if one works in USA (assuming there'll be managing jobs remaining in USA). So, it can also be thought of as sort of extreme internship. :-)
I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
There oughtta be a law! To stop bad laws. An antilaw if you will.
Laws to restrict the actions of legislatures are called "constitutions." They do so by having a much more difficult amendment process than ordinary statutes. However, courts seem to have been ignoring the ninth and tenth articles of amendment to the U.S. Constitution recently by considering nearly every act that the Congress passes "necessary and proper" "to regulate commerce ... among the several States".
They will come in card form.
Here's such a card.
Won't argue with the job opportunities available in places like India and China, but careers aside, are those really suitable places to live for people who've grown up in western environments like the US?
Last I heard India is still a developing country in many aspects. How may are prepared to share the road with not only automobiles and pedestrians but elephants, sacred bovines, and pack animals which all produce fair shares of manure? Depending on where in india one might relocate to, problems with roaming bands of monkeys and the ocassional wild tiger, rare as they are, would still be unsettling for one who only see beasts in zoos.
Though China has come a long way from the 60s and 70's, My parents still carry lasting scars from the exesses of the Cultural Revolution. There are still many things that should/could not be addressed in public without considerable risks to the speaker and the listeners. Despite the incredable westernization/commercialization of the general population, China is still very ethnocentric in some regards. In short, American $$$$$ == good, dragonboats, home-grown rockets & national astronauts == better. I'm optimistic about the direction China is headed but I highly doubt it is a suitable place for a western job seeker unless (s)he is willing to make considerable lifestyle and mental adjustments.
just my 2 cents.
Stay sentient. Don't drink bad milk.
So you move to India, taking your $40k in savings with you, and live like a king for a year or two, making $8k in salary, tops.
Then the market in India raises a bit in a few years, and competition increases, making it unfeasible to stay there any longer.
You decide to move back to the US, with your $2k in savings and... live in a cardboard box, with frequent bathroom trips to the sewer grate on the corner, and the food at the soup kitchen.
Seriously, if you move there, and live like a king, and ever want to move back, you're screwed.
I've been a tech for a little over 15 years now and have many friends in the industry. Often when we talk the subject of outsourcing to India comes up. I doubt if many will move because of the following : 1) Programmers don't really need to be at the facility. (video conferencing, email, etc.). 2) it's safest for an American to be in America (This is the biggest concern to all I talked to). 3) Wages are WAY to low. 3)
I think "work culture" is a universal - get to work!
As for the software culture, you have to serve your market. You can bet your bottom dollar that an Indian firm that specializes in US software is going to be happy to have US culture on board.
Company politics can play a role too and can be used as a quick quality guide. A company writing really bad code for Microsft will probaly not want any US programmers on. Why import a lack of talent when there's plenty everywhere? When you don't care, you just don't bother. Free software companies will take input from anywhere without moving boddies because they have adequate colaboration tools. A company that goes to the trouble of importing talent is likely to make a good piece of software. Indians hired at Netscape were not there simply because they were willing to slave away like everyone else, they were GOOD and so was Netscape.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It should be noted that the Indian jobs starting to be filled by foreigners are middle- and upper-level management jobs--not software or hardware engineers!
HCG 50a = 2MASX J11170638+5455016
11h17m06.4s +54d55m02s
Do we really want this?
Do we want our lives to be traded as commodities to be moved and shuffled about at the whim of the free market? I'm just going to state a few opinions here. Markets should serve people, not the other way around. When freedom of choice (in this case, where to live), is superceded by the freedom of markets we have a problem. Markets are in theory, supposed to maximize freedom. I don't see how forcing a bunch of people to travel across the world just to eat is an example of "freedom". Instead, it's the commoditizing of humanity. I'd be curious, if we were to interview these travelling workers, what their response would be if they were given a choice between working that job over in India vs America. I'd imagine that they would choose to work closer to home. Imagine if we had a choice, any at all. Imagine if democracy (in other words, allowing those who are affected most by a decision, to make that decision) were placed above capitalism. Instead, what we have is the market being rigged to serve a priveledged few, at the expense of everyone else. There is nothing "free" about being forced to transplant oneself every few years just to eat. Freedom from means nothing without freedom to.
Perhaps you meant Kinkos?
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
ya really who can afford a $10 sub. they opened one nearby me and i dont know why. its good food but college students cant afford eating there often
Calafornia isn't the only place tech jobs are available, they it certianly is one of the most expensive. There are plenty of other states with tech industries, many on the rise, where cost of living is much lower. Now with this generally comes lower pay, but it tends to balance out.
Friend, the rest of the world has been commodities of global capital for years. That it is happening to people from the source of neoliberalism, the US, is merely ironic. Personally, I would like to live in Kerala: a nice socialist run state with great food and beaches. See you there!
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
I fail to see how the idea of moving abroad can be so upsetting. Academics pretty much have to do it as a matter of course; after your PhD, you typically need 4-10 years of post-doc positions to qualify for a permanent position somewhere (and even longer periods are becoming more common). It means staying 1-3 years at one place, then relocate to wherever you find a new position. And the way the market is looking now, you may well look forward to never having a permanent job anywhere.
Point is, academics can move to where the jobs are, and have for many many years; what is so horrible about other professionals doing so?
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
But isn't the current trend to move the offshore jobs from India to even crappier places in South America? It's not like the people in a lot of these jobs actually have to speak English, that's just a nicety. As long as a few local management are bilingual everything generally works out. Sure, India will keep the tech support jobs. Until computer voice recognition can run down the scripts then tell you it's someone else's fault.
Top that with the cost of relocation, the fact that the Indian market already provides fairly ample amounts of trained labor, and the fact that as an American you are going to be at a significant disadvantage trying to work within the social framework there, and you've got a very unattractive option. Oh, and don't forget that you won't be earning enough to ever move back and not be pitifully poor.
I think using my master's degree to shill cars for a living in the States sounds a tad better.
Yeah....working for peanuts in India would suck, especially when you get trampled by an elephan stampede on payday
I guess you need to check this Indian embassy web site
e .h tm
http://www.indianembassy.org/consular/visa_guid
EMPLOYMENT VISA: An appointment letter, contract letter, applicant's resume and proof that the organization is registered in India are required. Duration of visa would depend on the period of the contract.
First, WIRED predicts all our jobs are going overseas.
Then, IHT parrots the story, and adds that Americans are chasing the jobs.
Pheeeewwwwwwwww! My worries are over.
Here's the deal:
1. Americans will not move to India. It's too smelly. Plus, the Indians don't worship us.
2. In the last few year, every time WIRED reports a "The Sky is Falling" trend, the sky is soon thereafter observed to be remaining in place, and the trend goes into a death spiral.
The worst thing that could be happening is that the opportunists who got into Java development during the 90's are realizing that they should have stayed in merchant banking - where Daddy is placing them now - and the rest of us are waiting on the end of the upheaval to continue making more and more money.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
like maybe having your parents ship you a burger in the mail once in a while
Or, you could just take a vacation to Bangladesh, where the large Muslim population means you can find beef. My brother's been living in India as a researcher for the past few years, and he gets his beef fix when he occassionally goes to Bangladesh, or goes on vacation to Thailand.
Eagles may soar, but weasles don't get sucked into jet engines...
Okie Doke Kentucky Fried Goat.
:-)
(just the first thing I thought of and I don't eat at McRancid's either
[John]
Shit better not happen!
An economist could explain it better, but to me it seems that cost of living and standard of living aren't directly correlated. (I know it's not exactly what you're saying, but it's worth adding.) Lower quality of living may be true for India, but it isn't true everywhere. If it was, I might be able to travel from New Zealand to the US without paying twice as much for everything once I arrived.
In short, we have a relatively western culture here. There's good employment doing information-sector types of work, good quality education (although there's now a student loan scheme to get people through higher education), relatively good health care (probably better than the US if what I hear is correct), and so on.
It's expensive to travel away from here considering a good starting IT wage might be equivalent to about US$30,000, and IT wages are on the high side. It would have been much less than that a year ago, except US currency is doing so much worse on international markets at the moment. That starting amount will get you a reasonable quality of life here, though.
The lower cost of living and higher quality of education and living is one of the big reasons that, for example, it was so economical for Newline to have the Lord of the Rings films made here, because it's cheap yet there's enough of a technical infrastructure to support it. The other big export industry is tourism, because it's comparitively so cheap for people from high cost-of-living countries to travel here.
If concern about quality of life is more of an issue than saving up money to take back to the US, then there are other options around the world besides India.
Nuf sed
Table-ized A.I.
How is that obvious?
More money that will never be re-invested in the American economy.
You should google on KFG. Really.
KFG
You're saying that they're just trying to curry favor?
Why not get the WTO to bulldoze India into opening up the labour market for free trade !
Truth prevails.......
"Financial Express"?
whois financialexpress.com displays:
Registrant:
The Indian Express Online Media Ltd (JYXCIDMQMD)
Express Towers, 2nd Floor,
Nariman Point
Mumbai, Maharashtra 400021
IN
Domain Name: FINANCIALEXPRESS.COM
Administrative Contact, Technical Contact:
The Indian Express Online Media Ltd (KYYHDIAZUO) hostmaster@bombaybiz.com
Express Towers, 2nd Floor,
Nariman Point
Mumbai, Maharashtra 400021
IN
91-022-22884113 fax: 91-022-22044654
Record expires on 03-Jan-2005.
Record created on 02-Jan-1998.
Database last updated on 31-Jan-2004 23:31:58 EST.
Domain servers in listed order:
NS1.RILINFO.NET 202.138.96.2
NS2.RILINFO.NET 202.138.103.100
surely their views must be impartial!
It seems like every second week there's a story on the rise of India in the global economy and its cost to us in the Western world. But I am worried that our thinking is being dominated by anecdotal evidence as opposed to solid data. I'm no expert but in the last hour I spent looking at the situation I've found some things that give me reason to be skeptical.
For example, if one looks at the ISI Highly Cited website we see that researchers from Western economies still dominate research journals. Suggesting that these countries will countinue to lead the world in technological development in the near future. This of course probably means jobs for those in the industry of researching and developing technology. Just how great the desparity is, is illustrated with a few numbers:
United States - 2830 highly cited researchers
United Kingdom - 306 highly cited researchers
Australia/New Zealand - 78 highly cited researchers
Switzerland - 60 highly cited researchers
India - 8 highly cited researchers
China - 5 highly cited researchers
Also if we look at the CIA World Fact Book we see Western Economies still appear to have a significantly greater GDP per capita which means there is more money to invest in industry:
United States - $36,300
Switzerland - $32,000
Australia - $26,900
United Kingdom - $25,500
China - $4,700
India - $2,600
Indeed, I can't help but feel that we're overemphasizing India. That they are really the IT sweat-shops of the 21st century and while they may be master code-monkeys the chief beneficiaries of their work will be the Western world. Who will get cheap labor and services but still carry out most of the research, design, marketing and retail. This article mentions specifically significantly reduced operating costs and 500,000 jobs moving overseas, but the latter statistic is useless unless we know how many other jobs are (or are not) going to crop up to replace them and where. My post isn't really an informed opinion on the matter, but what I hope it will do is encourage others to think critically about the situation instead of getting tied up in the tsunami of pessimistic articles posted on Slashdot.
Well, yes, but since they've remilitarized the Rhineland, they'll be advancing to the Vistula and the Channel Ports pretty soon now, and it'll be all downhill from there.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
Its a book.
Remarkably prophetic in many ways.
I'd recommend it in light of this thread.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
You mean like this?
C|N>K
"Many qualified Western professionals are moving to India for jobs." How many? Two articles; one of them has an anecdotal example, and the other mentions no numbers whatsoever. How can this be seriously accepted as a news item?
And everything will go back to Europe/US where political instability is more civil.
Think about it. Let's imagine that it gets to the point that there are so few good jobs in the U.S., that large numbers of Americans decide to emigate to India to get a call center job answering tech support questions for Dell customers in the U.S. Clearly that couldn't happen, because there wouldn't be anyone left in the U.S. who could afford a Dell at U.S. prices anymore. Before any significant number of worker emigrate to India for jobs, the U.S. economy would have to drop to India's level. If the only jobs in the U.S. were at McDonald's, then the U.S. would no longer be a rich country, and we wouldn't be able to afford to outsorce jobs to India anymore.
Perhaps this is why. While Moron-at-large is busy killing Iraqis for oil and the Twits in London are busy sucking up to "Sir" Bill, the President of India discusses the role of open source software in society with Richard Stallman. http://www.hindu.com/2004/02/01/stories/2004020104 231000.htm
(won't somebody please think of the Indians?)
There isn't a language barrier in India. India has maybe 8 major languages. Most people speak 2 or 3, but there's nothing universal. The most common - Hindi - was tried as a national language briefly. The Southerners reacted rather violently, trashing Hindi signs, etc. As a result, English ended up as the de facto national language. Anyone educated will speak English. Many uneducated people speak enough English that you can buy things at stores, etc. Your servents will definitely speak English (yes, in India, you will have several servants), and they will actually do most of the shopping for you. Also, Hindi, unlike most Oriental languages, is actually fairly easy to learn.
You will, however, run into a huge, huge cultural barrier. Cleaning your own toilet? Taboo. You hear stories where a manager drops some food on the ground, and no one picks it up until the cleaning people come by in the evening, since cleaning it would be degrading. The philosophy of the caste system is very much pervasive, and people have their roles in life, and refuse to go outside of those.
Apparently, the VA location beat out Mexico to land the factory. No joke.
well, that's maine. here in CA, there's practically one on every street corner in the white-collar/downtown environs of most cities.
"Teachers leave us kids alone
I for one, know a few people (me included) that are open to jobs abroad after college. Right after college is a great time to do something new and interesting in a new environment. In a decade, having global experience will be a very valuable trait.
As for the retirement aspect or moving back to the U.S. In a decade or two India's economy will grow big enough to match many of those around the world.
Many people think India is 3rd world, but from what I've heard about their big cities, they're pretty much exactly like our metropolitan hubs. Yeah, the rest of the country needs to catch up, but don't you think Wyoming needs to catch up the rest of the U.S. too?
You guys are the biggest whiners that I have ever meet. I am amazed at egocentrism and closed mindedness that my fellow Slashdoters display. Why is that people assume that any other country other then the US is terrible? I say take a little risk, step out side your comfort level and do something other then whine. Go to India or China for a year and if you don't like it come back. What is there to lose? I think the problem is that people are way too provincial. Or if you do not want to go to India then get out of your parents basement and start your own business. Take risks, fail and learn from your mistakes, and you will be a better person for it. I am looking forward to an Internship position in electrical engineering this summer. I have read a lot about the culture and I am looking forward to it. A break from "American" culture will be refreshing.
With the current situation in the Tech industry, it is more important now than ever to broaden your field of expertise. Don't do just "programming", but get more training in a field that needs programmers and researchers. For example, I just graduated with my Comp Sci BA, and am now getting my Masters. Except now I'm specializing my degree in bioinformatics (a highly growing field). General programmers are a dime-a-dozen right now, so make yourself marketable.
I see a lot of comments to the effect of "Why would you want to work in India for a lesser salary, since even if you save a ton, it wouldnt amount to anything when you move back to US"?
Well, those who do say such things dont take in to account the possibility that US currency may not amount to much 20-30 years from now. And possibly, just possibly, if China and India is indeed the future, who knows what you save might be a tidy enough sum for you to retire.
Rapid Nirvana
There will always be English teaching jobs in Japan. Go there, get paid enough to party it up, meet lots of loose, extremely hot women.
Uh oh, there goes my good karma. It happens.
I'd rather live in a country dominated by conservative christians and pay 14% income tax (which is what I paid last year).
I would consider it if I was out of work, but I can't *stand* indian cuisine. The smell makes my stomach turn and curry makes me gag. I don't mean to insult any of our indian readers, but is there readily available "american" food in India?
This is a serious question, not a troll!
I'd rather be a conservative nutjob than a liberal with no nuts and no job.
Fortunately, economics is NOT a zero sum game (see: Wealth of Nations, Smith, 1776.)
You mean the same book that mentions the importance of tariffs in protecting domestic industry?
Like you have ever read it.
Why don't you at least give me the chapter that deals with your BS statement.
The book was written a long time ago, advocating a financial system that was in its infancy. Just because the 10 points on the Libertarian Party's website makes sense to you doesn't mean you have a clue about society, human nature, or the purpose of life itself. It also doesn't mean you can pretend to have read famous books.
I don't read or respond to AC posts
You make a good point, but I will say this: I think the I.T. crowd's "I'm only going to code/admin systems/develop web sites/etc." attitude makes some sense, when you consider the state of the industry in recent years.
Basically, you've had a boom/bust cycle, so now it's "survival of the fittest". There was a lot of "dead wood" to get rid of in I.T. Lots of people suddenly became "computer experts" almost overnight, in a race to grab some of the easy money in the late 90's and 2000. Now, everyone's playing a game of chicken... Who's going to give up under pressure first and bail out? The people who know they want an I.T. career, and want it badly enough, are going to hold fast to what they want and not settle for anything else.
Meanwhile, most of the wanna-be's are getting out, and switching to jobs elsewhere. Good. It needed to happen.
If the salaries were equal to the US then there would be no reason to outsource.
[SIG] Remember Mattel handheld games?
I've got people skills, God damn you! Why can't you understand that? ;-)
People need to realize that the move to India is not just outsourcing. The US market is saturated. US companies need to get into India, Pakistan and other booming markets because that is where the growth will occur.
As for the jobs issues. There is not a net loss of jobs when you think of the world as a whole. This outsourcing is actually creating a big boom in job growth.
The one big question, though, is if the jobs will result in salary increases in the third world, or just hasten the transfer of wealth to the wealthiest of the world?
back in the 70s almost all north americans started buying asian cars. because the labour was cheap and the cars cost less...same thing is happening here with the IT industry. Unfortunately, the more money people spend on foreign cars, themore fuct up our economy is. dont believe what you hear in the papers. almost everything relys in some way or form on the united states. if it starts suffering. most of the world will follor like a bunch of blind lemmings. In about 10 years (by the time i finish University) the market will have shifted agian right back into north america. its only a temporary thing. people in india are not paid enough compared to people in america. there will be unrest.
A morning without coffee is like something without something else.
A lot of the highly qualified talent has traditionally been mobile and attracted to centers of excellence globally.
Are they perhaps beginning to think a bit too highly of themselves?
It might be more accurate to say that people are attracted to food/money/shelter and if they can't find these in the place where they're living now, eventually they'll have to move someplace where they can.
hey, who moved my paneer?
I'm switching careers to trades. It isn't that hard and most of us can work with our hands and will take twenty seconds instead of twenty minutes to calculate how much tile is needed for the bathroom walls. I've already done a few tiling projects on the side and now I'm getting my electrician's papers. Soon I'll be able to cover everything from finishing carpentry to wiring and plumbing. Pays just as well as the office job did at peak if you're willing to work hard. Last month I netted $5,000CAD (I live north of the border) which is a very healthy sum here especially that that's AFTER TAX money. And wehn was the last time you heard of a plumber being outsourced to India? That's right my friedns, when that pipe bursts in your CEO's house even the 20,000 Indians he's hired arent gonna be much use at 15,000 miles away.
So my friends, next time you hear that your job is getting shipped to India tell your manager that she can kiss your ass goodbye because it's a great opportunity to give up your (most likely) shitty job and do something useful instead. You'll be surprised how rewarding trades can be compared to an office job.
Oh and in the evening (that's right trade jobs run 9 to 5 not 8 to midnight, imagine that!) when you get home there is no reason not to fire up the computer and do some open source coding, for fun, without the stresss and aggravation of a PHB meddling with good things and making stupid suggestions. Write some great software and donate it to Open Source. Even Indians can't compete with that pricing model :-)
So my friends this is our new reality we all have to face. We all love programming but it doesn't make us money anymore. It started out as a hobby (for most of us) and now is the time it went back to being a hobby. For a living however, we must do something more lucrative that can't be outsourced by the next bunch of stuffed shirts. Like trades.
Your pizza just the way you ought to have it.
Hey I'm sick of being unemployed... there is zero chance of me getting a job around here. I'll go to India (or where ever), just tell me where I gotta sign up.
Whats happening right now is a global shift in where things are engineered. This has happened before as well. Basically, I am talking about how efficiency and difference in cost drives a certain economy to another area.
basically, the US produces about 10 Trillion dollars worth of goods and services. Now the US economy, as most of u know exports 600 billion dollars worth of g.s and imports 1.6 trillion dollars worht of g.s. Now who is buying the rest of what we produce?
thats right... other Americans! Basically the US is still going to produce just as much as it was-- most of the labor market in the more ineffienct areas will free up and shift to other areas.
What do you think happened to the US car industry once the japanese came in? they were forced to become more effiencet. What happened to US manufacturing? those areas of the job sector shifted to other areas, but still the US unemployment figures stayed low. Even right now at 6 % unemployment isn't to far from ideal unemployment at 5 %.
because of indian standard of living is different than the US, (the cost of a pizza delivered is about Rps 60- roughly a dollar, cost of a hair cut 40 rps, the cost of a pen 10 rps) makes it more competitve. Until the indian standard of living rises, there will be a shift of jobs... and those jobs will enter more effienct markets.
Next on CBS Reality Thusday: Extreme Internships- India.
Watch Jack edge out Ganaraj with his sharp mastery of the english language and superior problem-solving skills. Will Sharon become the next IT manager, or will Mahakanta beat her to it with her better memorization skills?
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
Well at least the nature fo the jobs that are going over are somewhat mindless (Java, database, J2EE) and all that wank. Thank god for people that actually solve hard problems, like the people on Topcoder.
See the topcoder rankings by country. India is 16th. I think this is indicative of the fact that the standard of problem solving there isn't high. It's also indicative of the fact that the nature of jobs outsourced don't require the brains that warrant a higher ranking. So all you retards complaining about losing jobs to outsourcing: 1) you are retards 2) try doing some real science like medicine, maths, physics or some real computer science 3) and then come back and complain about life being difficult.
Where the fuck do you guys get those stories from? I happen to have been born in a pretty inexpensive country (Eastern Europe). Yes some things are cheaper over there BUT my salary back home would have been an equivalent of $16,000US. A three bedroom house there costs $150,000. A new car costs $25,000. A meal in a restaurant runs up around $30. Yeah. so it's cheaper than the US. By about 20%. Except salaries (even for programmers) are about 70% lower. Stop daydreaming you are not going to live a lavish life if you move to an Indian IT sweatshop to be a code monkey for da man. However many rupees they'll pay you is definitely not going to make your life more comfortable than an average American can afford. There is a reason why US has the highest PER CAPITA Gross Domestic Product in the world.
Your pizza just the way you ought to have it.
...needs to read thier own sig. :-)
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Nobody seems to be aware of the fact that you still have to pay US taxes if you work abroad. That is in addition to whatever taxes you pay in the host country.
Really, did you need to go to whois to discover something that's plainly written at the bottom of the page? More proofs that moderators don't actually read articles any more than posters do.
My company just asked me to relocate to the Philippines for a 1-2 years (minimum) so they have someone on-site at all times. Now keep in mind my situation is different from most people in the tech industry --- I'm keeping my hourly wage, and the company is covering my housing expenses (I would have a 3-bedroom villa in a gated community, a maid, a security guard and a driver --- all that is costing them less than US$1000/month). So the deal is sweeter than moving to India, but the principles are the same.
Right now I'm in the middle of my first trip to the Philippines and it's been... a trip to say the least. Everything about this experience has been positive, largely because Filipinos seem, as a whole, a happy, gregarious people.
Everyone here speaks at least some English and anyone with an office job speaks exceptional English. The only place we ever stumble is on phrases and idioms. (Quite honestly English here is on average better than in the states --- McDonald's employees speak better English than they do in the US)
Food is American friendly... if you absolutely must, there's McDonalds, KFC, PizzaHut, etc. but the local food is also quite good. Markets and grocery stores are fine, and you can certainly muster American fare from what you can find there. And everything is cheap --- I ate for about $3/day last week and, last night, splurged and bought a $10 meal at a resort restaraunt.
After that I went out to one of the hottest clubs in the city and spent about $30 on cover charge, a couple drinks for myself, and a round for 15 of my coworkers. (When I say coworkers I mean "very intelligent, funny, cute, single women all under 30" we'll leave it at that.)
My advice -- don't reject the idea of moving overseas outright. Regardless if you come back ahead or not, it's going to be a great life experience and be a nice item on your resume.
The best line in that parody article not long ago about the family that followed their outsourced jobs to India was:
The original article is here.
Look at the bright side: there's always seppuku.
The slashdotters responses to this article is a living testimony to the fact that racism was not only invented in the west, but is pretty much alive and kicking today.
How would anyone know where you are working? You can be anywhere in the world and just say you are working in India. In fact you can impersonate 200 Indian programmers while writing code in Miami.
Know your pads. One time pad: good for cryptography. Two timing pad: where to take your mistress.
We are repeatedly hearing about how difficult it is to find work. We have to convince the peope with the money to invest it in custom technology. Have we lost the innovative drive that has carried us so far? Computer prices have plunged and people have just gotten used to waiting for prices to drop even more on everything.
IT departments are just cranking out front ends for glorified addition machines. People shove tons of information into computers and what do the computers generate? Sums and differences with a few other statistical values. Big fat hairy deal. Let this kind of work go to India.
The human mind would go crazy if all it did was add and subtract. Naturally computers should produce smarter results too. People have massive I/O bandwidth and they have to think more complexly than current software in order to cope with the environment.
Let's install this kind of bandwidth into machines. And let's make machines do something really valuable or distinctive all by themselves without any need for human control, like discover a cure for a disease or invent a better mousetrap.
Many machines are computerized today. They are computer controllable or at least able to communicate with computers. IT people should endeavor to automate these machines more or bridge gaps between machines that have limited/nonexistent computer interfaces. The peanut butter jar should be computerized perhaps with a robotic knife to spread it and a wireless link to report how many slices you are eating while trying to lose 45 lb.
People do too much in their lives. How can anyone enjoy life if they have to figure out how to find a better job? Computers should be assigned this task. Just adding and subtracting does not give enough information. The results should be interpreted already and machines should point out what information is lacking as well as how to get it.
Know your pads. One time pad: good for cryptography. Two timing pad: where to take your mistress.
The free market ensures freedom. Capitalism merely allow a few to control the mass, and therefore to limit freedom. (Yes, this is marxism rhetoric.) That's why we need government intervention to keep this freedom going -- lest monopolies form and lock it up, for example.
See, what difference in the end is there between a Soviet-style centralized economy, or a capitalistic monopoly-owned economy? Not much: the consumers/workers are screwed, innovation is stifled, etc.
Look at an hypothetical extreme end, where free market exists but concentration of capital is banned: workers own their company, and they have to compete to satisfy their customer's needs.
Yes.
It has been one of the strengths, but is not a cause: it's an effect of all the other components of America.
Making money for the shareholders is now only part of the equation. Bonuses, stock options, golden parachutes... those are what heavily drive business executives today. They have a terminally short term view and in the long run don't give a shit what happens to the company or the shareholders.
Yes. It's already beginning to happen. Ultimately the people now being disemployed are the customers of the corporations discarding them. Fucking over their U.S. employee base leads corporations on a suicidal downward spiral.
Precisely. The present jobless "recovery" is the first major indicator that the process has begun. Since "jobless" also means "without purchasing power" the cost-cutting corporations are shooting themselves in the feet.
Unlikely, in my opinion. Look back at The Great Depression. Most everyone just gritted their teeth and suffered. Of course things, people and politics are different now, so I could be wrong, but I don't think so.
Not a factor in my opinion. Of course you're quite mistaken about most Americans carrying guns. We don't. Many Americans own guns. There's a big difference.
A long time, I think. This isn't Italy or Nigeria.
A good question. Some would say, "Never." Some would say that everything is presently going according to plan. Others would say, "No, that last is too conspiratorial. Government is just a slow, dimwitted beast that requires great pain before it reacts."
Look at the bright side: there's always seppuku.
why shouldn't India take advantage of the brain drain?
Sure let every highly skilled Westerner you can grab enter your country! Makes your nation "smarter" and your global competitors dumber..
Worked really well for a few years here in the States
WAGE * (1.031^N)
A more precise calculation can be made here:
http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl
For a real eye-opener, in 1974 the California minimum wage was $2.00 per hour. In 2003 dollars, that's $8.29. The current CA minimum wage is $6.75--a loss in purchasing power of $3,203 per year in 2003 dollars from 1974. That's equivalent to 474 hours, or 11.85 weeks at the current wage! That is to say, to have the same standard of living as a minimum wage earner working 2080 hours per year in 1974, you would have to work an additional 474 hours to live that well today.
Play with it a little bit. 1968: $1.65 minimum = $8.72 in 2003-- a loss of $4,097.60 in purchasing power--roughly 607 hours more work at the current wage to reach the same potential as the bottom of the barrel in 1968. Even between 2002 and 2003, minimum wage earners lost $312 in purchasing power. That's how quickly this adds up. What is insidious about this isn't the recent trend, it is that once you go earlier than 1980, the standard of living of the bottom of the barrel was significantly better. If you start pulling back the figures to compare, say, the 1990's to 1980, for a great while the standard of living was 20-30% less at minimum wage than in 1980. If you compare, say, 1974 to 1957, minimum wage earners were actually 15% ahead and 25% ahead of 1952--that is 15-25% ahead after adjusting for inflation--they had that much more buying power.
The point is, a reversal has happened and we are driving the standard of living down for the poorest people. We spent decades IMPROVING the lot of the poor, now over the last 25 years we've been actively making life WORSE for them. In my book, that ain't cool, not the least because the minimum wage is the baseline for all other wages. When the minimum wage earners get the shaft, eventually my COLA gets smaller and eventually I get the shaft, thus it's not a bad idea to make sure the guy washing the dishes is getting a fair shake.
You're assuming that the Rupee doesn't get stronger and the Dollar weaker. In fact, the Rupee was 49 to the dollar 2 years ago and now it's 45 to the dollar so Indian workers are already 10% better paid compared to American workers than they were just 2 years ago.
There is reason to believe that this trend will continue over time as the Indian economy strengthens and the American weakens to the point that it isn't worth moving work to India. In which case salaries will end up largely comparable.
Unfortunately for European and British workers it looks like the trend is generally in the other direction for the moment so it is probably more to do with weakness of the Dollar than anything else.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
The disparity of cost between the country. To hire and give research work for a Western researcher is 6 to 10 times as much more expansive than the western counterpart. other cost are far higher too in wetsern world : the "brick and mortar" cost for example. For their 2600$ India is probably getting much more than ~1/18 of the research done by US (36k$) and that also because of the sheer number of India population. Most of my indian colleague at decision place also understand that Research and Developpement are where to Invest as this bring the $$$ of the future.
Finally your "highly cited"scientific. You never heard of the network effect , did you not ? I am pretty sure that those number only reflect the difficulty of Indian researcher to publish their work in US publication. I do wonder what would be the result of mostly highly cited person if you took Indian only publication or India buisness research & amount of patent in patenting office. If even India recognize IP even...
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
My brain, like any normal supercomputer, functions best at low temperature.
Best excuse EVER for not wanting to go to hot countries! Hah! I'll steal this line from you, thanks.
Sigged!
It is true that Western institutions are still leading the research and the scenario isn't likely to change in the next 20 years, but don't forget the head start they have had.
Also Indian research, at least in the area of weapons follows what Raj Chengappa in his book "Weapons of peace" (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/817 2233302/qid=1075638879/sr=1-7/ref=sr_1_7/002-53537 37-2500827?v=glance&s=books) calls "saw-toothed."
The explanations is as follows. India was denied many technologies by US and West. Indians developed many of these on their own. Then once Indians developed those, West would come up with an offer of using their technologies (which have already been productionalized and teething troubles sorted out) that Indians can't refuse. So the graph goes from highest to lowest in one step.
Now, another point that was made in one of the articles linked here was some Pharma company's research centre in Mumbai. They are producing the highest number of patents in the world.
So while your assessment may be true at this point in time - and it is important to remember that your assessment is a function of time - it will probably not be true in the future.
That doesn't mean that I foresee a mutually exclusive future for various nations and that one nation will prosper at the expense of others. There will be vigorous competition, and that can only be good.
For those who are considering moving to India.
Temperatures in India range from -40 celsius to +50.
In the Northern part of India, we have extreme climate, but in the southern, where Bangalore in located, we have equable type of climate.
In the North, the mighty Himalayas and many hill stationsare relatively closer. You can go to these hill stations like the British used to do. Sometimes they had two capitals, one for summers and another for winter.
There are several scenic spots in Southern India. I have never been there, but tourists' accounts say that it is greener and cleaner. Kerala is a very beautiful place. It is ruled by Communists though.
Sports.
India is crazy about cricket. It is like baseball except that you can hit the ball and choose not to run.
If the temperature is a low 38 degrees in April and you don't feel like working, you can always go out and play cricket.
Diet.
Indian food is world renowned. However, lot of mixing (also known as adulteration) occurs. The net result is that you don't get to consume as much fat as you would in USA or Canada or UK. Therefore, you lose weight. Also, 365 days of sun per year ensures you become more tanned.
Imagine the combined effect of this. Once you go back home after a stint in India, girls are going to make a beeline for you.
I just saw a job posting on a website yesterday that specified that they were looking for people who were willing to work at "Indian Salary Levels" and then pointed to an Indian job web site as a reference to find out what "competitive" bids were.
That definitely has me a bit concerned. I'm a programmer and I work out of Mexico, so while I can offer pretty competitive rates, I still expect to get paid well. Unfortunately the market is saturated by programmers, and I believe with time, that will change as programers continue to drop out because of job competition.
Really, my take on it, at least in the States, is that a lot of people went into software to make money. I think now that it's harder to make good money at it, the ones that are going to stick around are going to generally be the ones who really love doing it. Hopefully that will level the market out a bit.
The fact remains that some of us are quite skilled at what we do and that some people, no matter how hard they try, aren't going to be nearly as good as those of us who are in this field because we love the write software and have a natural ability with it. For the same reason, I'll never play guitar like Eddie Van Halen or paint like Van Gogh (and that's not to imply that I think I'm the Eddie Van Halen or Vincent Van Gogh of computer programming).
For most of the time I've been in this field (the last 4 years notwithstanding), most of the programmers were people that really loved it and the ratio of really good programmers to mediocre programers was fairly high. That ratio has reversed in the past few years. When it returns, I suspect the pay will get closer to what we expect as well.
Even here in Mexico, and granted, I live in one of the pricier towns in Mexico, living at Indian pay rates is simply out of the question.
This is exactly the problem w/ free trade. Conservatives want it for obvious reasons and progressives want it since they mistakenly believe it will bring up the standards of living in the target countries. Although it does (bring up the std of living), it does so through achieving equilibrium. The problem with that is to achieve equilibrium, two sides need to meet in the middle and that means decrease in the std of living for the higher income group. To prevent this it requires a smart plan, one which is sorely lacking in this case. In the absence of this plan, the only people who benefit from free trade are the really rich as they income gap increases.
True conservatives (not to be confused with some overlap with Bush Republicans) are actually opposed to widespread immigration and free trade, because true conservatives don't like the cultural or economic changes that go along with it. Conservatives prefer the status quo, or some recent history version of it. Bush Republicans, at least those that overlap less with true conservatives, tend to like free trade and immigration because it his immediate and obvious business value -- forces down US wages and working standards, and lowers short-term business operating costs. The impact it has on US workers or third world environments doesn't matter to them.
"Progressives", by which I think you mean those more oriented towards a left-wing set of solutions, do think it will improve third world countries through investment, and they also think that large-scale third world immigration is good for the US as well, since, at least since the 1970s, generally tends to "brown" the population which they naively see as an automatic political advantage to them since all "brown" people vote, act and think "left". Some old-line labor lefties have sounded some alarms about this, wisely seeing jobs leaving, low-wage workers coming and their traditional labor constituency getting undermined.
The big problem in improving third world living standards is that most of the time when jobs and industry are relocated, they are relocated to third world countries with no labor protections and no environmental standards. They're also extremely corrupt places, and its in the financial interest of multinationals to keep bribing officials into maintaining an artificially cheap place to do business -- government crackdowns on labor (or government turning its head when private goon squads do it), ignoring even illegal-by-local-standards pollution, all the usual things we've come to expect from dictatorships.
I've always though that Microsoft and Communist China were a lot alike. Both promote this kind of all-encompasing future, brook no dissent yet have virulent dissident groups. They both also look awkward and embarassed by high-profile public relations problems that directly contradict their propaganda systems.
C'mon, guys, don't hesitate! Get on out there after those there jobs!
:-D
Now, when I graduate in 2006 there will be a nice healthy shortage of IT people in the West
--
Paul
"Unlikely, in my opinion. Look back at The Great Depression. Most everyone just gritted their teeth and suffered. Of course things, people and politics are different now, so I could be wrong, but I don't think so."
Actually during the depression, the idea of a revolution seemed feasible to a lot of people. Read It Can't Happen Here for an example of a book that presented the fears of the time.
Why did HUAAC have such a field day in the '50s? Because people were willing to join the Communists in the '30s.
Another downturn like that with our currently reduced safety net scares me.
Most Americans will be precluded from participating in Indiana because of:
* Debt. Consumer and Credit card debt payments often exceed an India level salary on an annual basis.
* Transportation cost. Coming to/from the US for visits is prohibitive on India level salaries.
The only reason to go is to get business contacts/experience that allows you to be a US based sales agent or project manager for outsourcing to India. This is short sided as the labor cost advantage will go away quickly - much like Japan in the late 70s and 802.
-- $G
I've a hunch it's something to do with Americans working more hours per year than any other country in the world.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
The numbers you may have seen (55 % is the accurate number for Sweden) is the total tax as a percentage of GDP. That does not mean that people typically pay that much (because the tax system is highly progressive). Most people in Sweden pay only local tax, which is anywhere from 29 % to 33 % of your income. So when you get a paycheck, that amount has been deducted and you take home the rest. Of course, there is still a sales tax on items you buy (but some items, like books, have less sales tax than others) but since sales tax is always included in the pricetags it's a kind of hidden tax.
Besides, the number of deaths in France was directly attributed to the lack of care Frenchmen give to their own elderly relatives. France is a decaying, vain, miserable country.
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
Not really. The main groups killed by Bush are Iraqi's and Afghanis. Neither country are responsible for jobs lost in the US.
More importantly -- and what makes me most uncomfortable -- is that it is obvious neither Iraq nor Afghanistan financed September 11. Afghanistan either hosted Bin Landen, tolerated him, or were afraid of him... it doesn't matter they were peons. The money AND people and leadership for September 11 comes from Saudi Arabia. Given that's where Bush's oil wells are, it's NO SURPRISE a major PR effort went into linking the Taliban to September 11.
The current White House does not want to -embarrass- the Saudi's by talking about their link to September 11. After all, a major source of Bush Family wealth is the Saudi regime. That's why we hear blatent lies associating Saddam with 9-11. Although that's died down now.. the latest story is we really went to war to bring freedom to Iraq. You see Iraq was not living up to the Democratic ideals US conservatives have always supported. *cough*).
George Bush is a fucking fake. He makes my stomach turn. He is disgusting.
So it's basically possible for both salaries to be globally-speaking lower (just use raw currency exchange rates), to make outsourcing look more attractive, AND for that difference to be much lesser from employee's perspective (to make working in India a viable option).
Also note that there is already big difference in salaries inside USA. Some companies are "outsourcing" from California and New York to cheaper states. Thus, there is no single US salary rate either; which means that India (et al) will reach salary rates of, say, Alabama IT workers much sooner than those of Massachusetts.
I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
Canada requires more than US$30,000 in cash and you must be highly qualified in a professional field to move.
This has either changed, or you've been misinformed - since there are several different ways to immigrate to Canada, and they're all quite complex (fucking bureaucrats), I thought I'd give a breakdown of the easiest way - Permanant Resident status. You wouldn't be a Canadian citizen, but you'd be well on your way to becoming one. Permanant Resident status grants you priviliges to live, work, and study in Canada as any Canadian would, and is the easiest way to go about doing it.
Let's assume you're a 'skilled worker' (the category most slashdotters are likely to fall under). You need several things before you can be given a work permit.
Number one, you need to have at least one year of paid work experience in your field. Sorry guys, kernel programming doesn't hack it (hahaha) unless you were on someone's payroll. If, as a programmer (let's assume you were a programmer), your job description matches what the government has on file for a 'computer programmer', then bravo, you're a skilled worker for a qualifying profession. If you had a different job description, you may find it at the bottom of that website. If you're not a programmer at all, then check the NOC list (now I feel like a secret agent) for your profession and put the four digit code for your profession into the search box on the programmer description page.
That's a lot of typing for something that's pretty simple.
Now, we have to make sure you can support yourself in Canada, on your own, for six months. The government says you'll need about $9400 Canadian dollars to support yourself for six months. If you have a family, it may be more. In comparison, the student loan fuckers gave me $7400 to last me an entire year (minus my $4000 tuition). I hope they all die.
If you have secured work in Canada before coming, you do not have to have this money. However, you'd be stupid not to have a few grand in cash in the bank, or it'll be a bitch to rent an apartment without first/last month's rent.
Oh, and if you're bringing more than $10,000 in negotiables (cash, stocks, bonds, treasury bills, traveller's cheques, cashier's cheques, money orders, etc), for the love of god declare them at customs. You do not want to spend your first few weeks in prison or have to pay a chunk of change in fines. Just don't.
Also, while we're on the subject, don't bring marijuana. Seriously, people do this, as if we don't grow our own. You can get it here, and it's cheaper than what you paid, trust me.
Now, you have to be able to speak the language. If you've gotten this far, you probably qualify for moerate or high English lanuguage proficiency, but you may, at your option, choose to use French as your primary official language instead. Keep in mind, however, that unless you move to Quebec, you will more than likely need functioning English to get around. Whichever you choose, you will have to prove it, either by taking a test of your (e.g.) English, or by providing proof from another qualified organization. If English or French is your first language, just take the test. It'll be trivial. Some people who immigrate to Canada are pretty much functionally incompetant in English and still get in (and that's fine), so if you can understand what I'm saying, you'll be fine.
Exceptions are in the larger cities, for e.g. Chinese, Japanese, Israeli, Arabic, Sihk, etc. immigrants, as there are already large communities of these persons in the larger areas, and they will be able to help you get acclimated to your new home, and still give you a comfortable anchor, if you desire one.
For an idea of how easy or hard it is to really get into Canada, take a look at
I think USAians forget that the USSR, after initial setbacks, slaughtered Germany. The second front helped, but the tide had turned in 1942. Also, the Yugoslavs kicked, first Italy (after initial setbacks), THEN Germany's asses (after initial setbacks) while enduring little support from the USSR and duplicitous behavior from the US and UK. Dedijer tells a great story of finding US Thompsons on Chetnik fighters (Mihailovic's men) when they attacked a Partizan force using Italian air cover assisted by a British forward observer. Remember in Bush's World everything is black and white....
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
For some things things can be directly compared, sure; imports can not be much cheaper (except for medicines that are overpriced in US), but labour based products invariably ARE cheaper.
And to highest per capita GDP; strictly speaking that's not true. Go check your statistics. There are couple of countries higher; mostly oil-rich ones. Plus
more importantly, it all depends on current
US$ exchange rate. Now that dollar is coming down, except USA to "drop" down few notches next time you read the charts. But that just points the fallacy of comparing nominal salaries between countries; realistically change is hardly equivalent to what statistics tell.
And finally for whatever it's worth; the idea of "living like a king" is based on what I was told by an indian co-worker, who I would assume knows situation much better than you or I; esp. since he is rather likely to move back there in future.
I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
I did the calculation.
I have a bachelor's degree.
I have over a decade of work experience in my field, which is on the list.
I am fluent in English
I have a basic grasp of French
I scored 69 points. Take away my French (not a bad idea as it is so minimal) and I'd get the minimum passing score.
That's pretty tight. The financial figure was from memory when I looked into it a year ago, but I ran the test today. The bottom line is that without pre-arranged employment, it's a pretty tight squeeze.
zzyzx wrote:
I think that's a waaaay long stretch. I've never heard anything remotely like that and I was born in the decade immediately following the Great Depression. My father, mother and uncle all lived and worked throughout the 1930s, as did numerous more distant relatives, and the media of my youth were filled with rehashed news and stories of the 1930s and 40s. I've never heard anyone even suggest before that a revolution was possible here much less make a real case for it.
There's always a book. Someone could portray today's times any way they wish just by selecting the right book(s) from the almost infinite range available. Wearing a tinfoil hat is mandatory when doing such research or the reptilian Nazi aliens will get you.
There was a fashionable but naive affection for communism (lower case "c" just as in "capitalism") in the 1930s in certain circles. By the 1950s communism had clearly become a cancer on the world and the Cold War had begun. Nothing at all to do with any real possibility of a revolution in America in the 1930s.
The possibility of another depression (not "downturn") should scare anyone, but in the context of the Great Depression, what on Earth do you mean by "with our currently reduced safety net?" There were no "safety nets" in the 1930s.
Look at the bright side: there's always seppuku.
Property owners pay for high school even if they do not have children. Education costs make up a large chunk of the property tax landowners pay to their local government. This tax can be very expensive (especially in the Northeast), and are in addition to the other taxes you mentioned.
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Together, we will drive the rats from the tundra.
The Arabs called, and they want Mathematics and Astronomy back. They feel they had a substantial part in starting both sciences, and now want a monopoly on the practice of both. Only residents of the historical Dar al-Islam may work in these fields.
The world doesn't work that way, sorry. Once the US is senseless enough to give away its lead, chances are it will be gone for good. It sucks, but that is history for you; I'm sure the old Caliphs of yore would agree.
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Together, we will drive the rats from the tundra.
Testify, brother! I'm from Ireland where the cost of living is way higher than the US and salaries are about 30% lower. No fucking way I'm leaving the US. I miss certain things about the old sod, friends and family, but I do not miss my lower standard of living.
I did. Kentucky Financial Group? Interesting that the graphics on the homepage are pyramid shaped... doesn't inspire confidence in a financial context. ;-)
"I'll steal this line from you, thanks."
;-)
Yeah feel free, its GPL
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
-Mark
Little does India know that this has been Our Grand Plan all along.
This finally opens up opportunities in Agricultural Engineering and Development (farming) that has long been ignored by those Hindu smarties.
I just bought me a pair of overalls and a Pabst Blue Ribbon: I am now prepared to enter the new 'thing' in the job world.
In Soviet Russia, indian companies outsource to America
-- When did Ignorance Become a Point of View?
Pre-arranged employment is a good idea anyway - since you're most likely to find professional ('skiled') IT employment via the internet or by networking anyway, it's probably just as easy to find a job programming in Canada from outside of Canada than it is from inside.
What I can never understand is how so many people cross borders so easily, when it really seems quite difficult to do so. When I was visiting Israel, I was quoted a statistic from the newspapers by someone I was staying with: there was a minor exodus from Israel at the time, a significant number of families moving out of the country just to be safe, and over 75% of those people leaving the country in that period were moving to Canada. I was kind of proud, but at the same time, I wondered how hard it really is to do, and how hard it really is to move elsewhere.
Can anyone suggest a country that's easy to move to and worth moving to at the same time? I don't mind learning a new language or working simple jobs just to pay rent, I'd just like to get out and explore. Anyone?
--Dan
Cheap can be excellent. Do you know about an OS called Linux? It is free/cheap and it is excellent. Same goes for Indian software, it is cheap and gives you a good value for "what you pay".
Democratic, not as in the Democratic party in the United States, but as in the political theroy of Democracy. Democratic in this sense being of, or relating to the theroies of Democracy.
Your Indian friend will of course tell you all kinds of tales about the affluence in his country because he sees it through rose tinted glasses. But even if we take his story about servants as true, I'd rather have clean running water and 24/7 electricity (let the California jokes roll) than a stable of servants to pedal on my dynamo backup generator :-)
Your pizza just the way you ought to have it.
I was travelling around northern India from late December to mid-January of this year, so I can comment on the cost of living expenses.
Comment: yeah, it's pretty damned cheap. Big stores and most restaurants have fixed prices, but you are supposed to bargain for most things, including taxis and even room prices at some hotels. So you get in the habit, but every once in a while you start to feel like an ass arguing over pennies when you're paying prices that low. Even if you don't bargain at all (and pay up to 3x or 4x the "real" price), it's *still* cheap. I got into the habit of paying bicycle rickshaw drivers *more* than they asked for just because I could bear paying some guy 50 cents for busting his ass dragging us all the way across town.
Mind you, I did get "ripped off" a lot because I was an American tourist, but still...
When we got to Delhi it was colder than we'd expected, so I bought a thick knit coat for 250 rupees ($5.50) and had it altered to fit me better for another 50 rupees (a little over a buck). I didn't even argue on the price for the alterations -- I was so suprised how cheap it was -- so I'm sure the real price was more like 20 rupees, if that.
Everything with a large labor component, especially, is on a massively different scale from the U.S. My wife and I stayed in a hotel in Jaipur with attractive, well-maintained rooms cleaned daily, laundry service, available internet-connected computers, etc. etc. for Rs. 750 ($17) a night. Fire-eating and Rajasthani dance exhibition in hotel courtyard included. We stayed in another, less-nice but still clean hotel (with a magnificently friendly and helpful proprietor) in Delhi for Rs. 300 ($7) a night. We ate in some pretty posh restaurants and had final bills of about 1/10th what they would be for similar food/service/atmosphere in the States (well, the atmosphere of "terrace next to palace, on water's edge" isn't available, but you know what I mean).
Jewelry, artwork (like the miniature paintings Udaipur is famous for), crafts, etc. etc. are also amazingly cheap. When I was last in India in 1999 I bought a beautiful, double-gourd sitar with a hard case for about $100, and have seen similar instruments selling in the U.S. for $2000 and up.
I hope this gives you all some perspective on cost of living. I'm sure it's rising in some parts of India (and it *will* obviously rise in the real tech centers), but it's got a long way to go.
There are only 10 types of people: those who understand decimal, those who don't, and, uh, 8 other types I forget.
Refugee status helps.
Pre-arranged employment is a great idea, but try getting that for moving across your own country before thinking you'll be able to do it to another country. I spent six months trying to get responses from the east coast while living in Los Angeles. People just don't want to talk to you unless you're already settled--often they will say exactly that in the vacancy announcements. I imagine if the immigration office was added to the equation, you'd have a snowball's chance in hell. In the end, I just blindly moved.
If you just want to "explore," go be a language tutor in Prague or something. That's one industry where getting the necessary sponsorship is comparatively easy because it is in the job description.
[I'd still be curious to see how dollar's current weakness will reflect rankings for this year. I still remember time when my home country was nominally on par with US, due to grossly overpriced currency (decade before euro)]
But back to India; my main point was just that comparing hard currency exchanged salaries won't give the whole picture. Since labour is cheap, some things are so much cheaper that one can afford things there not possible here; having your own gardener, babysitter, cardriver etc. etc. Same thing as what happens in many african countries. But I certainly agree that infrastructure problems are big, and that from most POVs IT salaries are not match for US ones. You just won't be able to buy as many iPods there. And still I maintain that just comparing "hey, code monkeys only earn 1/5 of what we earn here" is over-simplifying things, to the degree it's just plain wrong. Difference is not really 1-to-5, even if raw comparison would indicate this is the case (or whatever ratio is claimed; 1-to-5 is just one I've heard).
One way to improve comparison is to consider purchasing parity; yet another (related to "live like a king") is relative IT salaries compared to other people's salaries. In US, I earn at most about twice as much as most blue-collar workers; perhaps 4x as much as burger flippers, and not that much more than other college educated workers. My understanding is that in India ratio is growing much higher. And why should this matter? Since this is what makes service products (and labour-intensive things like construction) much much cheaper; and is not usually well measured by various living cost indexes (AFAIK; services are included but underpresented).
I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
>I'm basically a master of the Rubix cube
It's Rubic's Cube. Rubic was the name of the man who invented it.
Dear Lord, it's Rubik's cube. If you're going to correct someone, at least make sure that you're correct yourself! Yeesh.
Cheers,
IT
Power corrupts. PowerPoint corrupts absolutely.
The middle classes in both rich and poor countries have this unshakable belief tha they have the right to cruise on ther inneficient polluting cars around the country, or to take cheap hollidays in spite of the environmental damage they cause, or to replace their electronic gadgets every 2 years.
If all this means that the "middle class" will have less money and thus will become more judicious about ther spending patterns I am all for it.
People in rich civilized countries today rarely have to worry about eating, a roof or healthcare and their health problems are due to overconsumption issues (hearth attack, obesity, smoking).
So cry me a river for the middle class, I think it is high time some of that wealth is redistributed elsewhere.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Germany lost in Europe due mainly to the USSR.
The help of the US was of course important to divert German troops, but the amount of USSR people dead (20 million) says where the war was won.
And also Germany was not unoppossed, they simply were vastly superior. The US are not unopossed in Iraq for example, but they steamrolled their way to Baghdad all the same.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
One of the main reasons I left was exactly the drastic reductions on freedoms.
In Singapore if you are an oposition politician the goverment will sue you for libel everytime you dare to advance a criticism. Until today all the judgments have gone, surprise, surpirse, in the favour of the goverment.
Newspapers, books and magazines are heavily censored, the Internet was proxied which is quite effective there given the small size of the country.
In Malaysia it was similar with the slants proper of an Islamic country.
I have to say in favour of Malaysia tha they are by far the most open Muslim country, but that may be constrained to Kuala Lumpur and some other places with heavy Chinese influence. In most conservative provinces you have your traditionall mullah trying to impose Sharia law and banning such evil endeavours as computer games and beauty pageants.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
... then you are completely misinformed.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
twitter, do you really have to make your stupid point by offering yet-another-dollop-of-proof-that-M$-is-evil you seem to enjoy so much?
You know, if you weren't so pathetic in this regard and just stuck to the facts then maybe no one would follow you around repeating the most embarrassing bits of your, ahem, distinguished posting history for everyone to read.
I'm continually flattered by your attention, but here you raise an interesting question: why do people do what they do? The answer, of course, is because they want to. No one ever HAS to do anything. Think about that for a while.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Be thankful Mexicans ignore lame ass trade barriers and go to work to the US, that keeps vast tracts of the US economy running smoothly.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
They go hiring bricklayers for the development of a multiplataform trading system, an embedded OS or the administration of datacentres.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
mod parent post up +5 informative :-), please.
Already pay 50% income tax to survive in the US. Of course, it's broken up into FICA, state, federal, healthcare, and life insurance to make you feel good.
Err? I don't see anything particularly enlightening. Care to expand the search a bit?
[John]
Shit better not happen!
My total tax rate for the past year is 14% as I said. This is calcualted as the amount witheld in taxes divided by the total yearly income. Sure there's 8.8% sales tax on top of this, but Swedes pay even more in sales tax ON TOP of their 50% income tax. And yeah, there are additional taxes on businesses, so by the time you spend your money it is already taxed three or four times at hefty rates.
Its not about free trade but its about fair trade. The US IT worker incurred local US cost in terms of housing, accomodation, medical and etc. Where else the Indian IT worker will accmulate enough money to spend it back home. The US IT worker do not have this privilege and thus need to charge at local rate. To be fair India and US should open up all sector and allow free flow of all types of trade, this will include the right to reside in both country. This way every person in both country can compete on equal footing.