[vibbs]

Thanks everyone for the insight the racial discrimination in GCC for jobs and salaries. It would be good to know on which are the companies, industries and levels where such discrimination occurs.

For instance I am hiring for my team globally and Dubai is a potential location. But this discrimination is not even in my horizon. Are these companies still in the stone age?

[Raj1008]

Originally Posted by Imran.Syed

Well, I believe people mistook me or did not read my previous posts on this thread.
GCC can never be > Canada in the long term. That's just not possible. Canada is shaky at the moment but it is still democratic and using just that measure, it is a good long term play.

I have spoken to some people who newly migrated to Canada in 70's - 80's during the last major cost of living crisis this country faced. All of them describe it as painful, very painful. Eventually some returned back to their home countries and waited it out, some got jobs in countries not affected much by inflation only to come back to Canada later.. and some just waited it out in Canada with not knowing how to financially afford their next day's meal.
In the end, net net, it was very positive for everybody who was inside Canada once the inflation and interest rate started cooling off.


Moving on again, I will likely leave Canada around this time next year if things keep progressing the way there are. Rate of Inflation ticked up last month in Canada directly as a result of the BOC's measure of cooling inflation by raising interest rates. Economically, Canada is effectively stuck in between a rock and a hard place aka Stagflation. I predicted this would happen but I shudder to think of the consequences if my complete prediction is proven right. I have never wanted to be so wrong in my life.


My personal plans with Canada are.. well.. Unless I decide to get an MBA, I have decided to put a pause on Canada for now. Will I return? Absolutely. But I am not sitting here and dealing with the painful affordability crisis which looks like it will get worse before it gets better. Till the time I am here though, I have forced myself to enjoy Canada.

I am really intrigued by the confidence and predictions you have made considering you have barely started your career.

I have not met anyone who migrated up till recently and then left. It’s only past two years I hear of people wanting to leave. Cest la vie.

I would recommend not delaying moving to GCC since things are slowing down there too. All you are doing being in Canada is stalling your career and adding to our CPP

Best of luck!

[SN88]

Originally Posted by Spaced Out

I care two bits for the GCC region but lets have a conversation on how Indian employers treat (abuse) their workers. My dad worked for a famous textile mill in Punjab after retirement from army. Workers from UP & Bihar (called bhayye) were given opium by the management to encourage them to stay on in Punjab and not go home.

In one case, a worked died in the course of factory work and the management (owners of the biggest woolen sweater brand of the 90s - named after a French principality) covered it up. Paid the wife off and got the local panchayat to cremate.

So folks taking the mickey for those wanting to leave for better pastures should check their privilege first.

I am sure there are many issues here itself and a lot of injustice, but that gives me no reason to keep quiet about what I have seen whilst abroad!! Why would you want me to keep mum on a topic relating to working in foreign land, I yet dont get it?

[vishnurp99]

Originally Posted by v1p3r

https://www.newindianexpress.com/cit...se-593862.html is a case that comes to mind only because I happened to be in the vicinity at the time, but there are innumerable others. Any Indian resident will know that court cases are backlogged in the decades, and you often need to bribe a policeman to file an FIR. Please do ask the Olympians protesting in Delhi how long they took to get an FIR filed against a sexual predator politician, before expounding on the virtues of the justice system. In case you weren't aware, it took a Supreme Court hearing, where the police and SGI were chastened by the Chief Justice of India, before the FIR was filed. Just by the way, one of the complainants is a child. Does this happen elsewhere? Probably. Does that excuse what happens in India? Not in my book, but maybe it does in yours.

Nobody is excusing anything that is happening in India. It's just that India is not unique in all of this. Give me any country & I can give you multiple examples of similar injustices. Life is not fair in India like it's not fair in the world. Just providing an example for Qatar.

https://theconversation.com/qatars-d...process-191017

Now your specific comment was about a tax-paying middle class citizen disappearing blah blah. In my opinion that was hyperbolic & uncalled for. You can disagree and have a different opinion on that.

I am sorry for the bad experiences that you may have had in India but to extrapolate to the universe based on personal bad experiences is the definition of bias.

Just to be clear, I am not saying you are biased. From your comments, you seem to have wide exposure to different countries and professional environments. Good for you!. All i said was that your perception of India seems to be biased based on your personal experiences. All of us have our biases which may come from our experiences & I have mine.

For eg- I got exposed to random gun violence in an NY suburb called Kew gardens in 2009 while working for a leading US Bank there. That's the kind of thing that you don't forget. So I would always be on the guard in the states for gun violence. I have travelled to the states many times (sometimes for long durations) as part of my work and I have always admired the meritocracy in US. Obviously the gun violence or the crazies & homeless on the NY subway wouldn't take away from that.

Some years back, I was hiring for setting up a big digitization initiative for a leading bank back in Dubai on behalf of a leading consulting company. To put it bluntly, the salaries were decided by the color of the passport and not the skill set. The rationale was that in GCC they don't expect you to settle down there at all. So the salary is decided by the cost of living of your country of origin/skin color etc that you will travel back after completing your tenure in GCC. So obviously I have my biases about GCC.

I am currently in Munich and experiencing inflation & strikes of public services firsthand. So I have some biases around the sustainability & independence of the strongest European power/economy.

Also the question of caste, the humble me is from a backward caste. I agree that I may have been more fortunate than some of my compatriots. My parents (in their 70s/80s now) got into good educational courses because of reservations. Thankfully i didn't need them. I don't think we are as helpless as we used to be. There has been a sea change in the last 15 years and many backward castes are mainstream now.

[hdus001]

Originally Posted by Imran.Syed

To put it bluntly, the salaries were decided by the color of the passport and not the skill set. The rationale was that in GCC they don't expect you to settle down there at all. So the salary is decided by the cost of living of your country of origin/skin color etc that you will travel back after completing your tenure in GCC.

Having learned about this recently while evaluating a GCC offer,
I understand why a person living in a Western country will need to be offered a very enticing salary to move to the GCC. However, I'm quite interested to know how this works out for the company from a financial perspective. What incentive does the company have to hire a Western passport holder, when it can get the same job done for a lot cheaper by a non-westerner?

[Raj1008]

Originally Posted by hdus001

Having learned about this recently while evaluating a GCC offer,
I understand why a person living in a Western country will need to be offered a very enticing salary to move to the GCC. However, I'm quite interested to know how this works out for the company from a financial perspective. What incentive does the company have to hire a Western passport holder, when it can get the same job done for a lot cheaper by a non-westerner?

The western person is supposedly for strategy and optics. The hard work is done by the hard working folks from non western countries.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by hdus001

Having learned about this recently while evaluating a GCC offer,
I understand why a person living in a Western country will need to be offered a very enticing salary to move to the GCC. However, I'm quite interested to know how this works out for the company from a financial perspective. What incentive does the company have to hire a Western passport holder, when it can get the same job done for a lot cheaper by a non-westerner?

Not quite sure, but let me share some thoughts/experience from some who has let an expat life for a very long time for multiple companies.

I don’t consider emigrating the same as going on an expat assignment. In general I see emigrating as something essentially permanent, and an expat assignment short term, say up to 2-4 years.

In many international companies it is important to gain international experience and build an international network of folks that know each other. So if you want to make a career, irrespective of your field of expertise, you need to move around internationally. For instance Shell International Petroleum in my days was considered a very interesting and lucrative company to work for. But you had to go where they send you. They were extremely generous and would move your family too, if you had for instance a child that would require special care they would pay for all extras to. But for the first 20-25 years of your career you had to go where they send you. You could not chose and you could not refuse. Only towards the end of your career you could chose preferred locations.

Many (western) students and graduates like the idea of working for international companies because they get a stint at working abroad. It’s not so much about the money, more about the experience.

Many international companies have similar expat renumeration packages these days. They get benchmarked too. These days, many of these packages tend to be based on what the job you apply for would pay in your home country! Not what it pays in the country you are going to. Obviously, you would get allowances to meet local expenses and so on.

With my last company we had a pretty good system too. When you got an international expat assignment you would go on the local payroll, but you would also stay on your home country pay roll. The company would pay you a nett salary and pay all the respective tax in both countries. In our case they also paid my and my wife pension and state pension in our home country.

About 20% of your salary was send to your expat country and 80% to your home country in the respective currencies. We lived a very comfortable life on just that 20%, even in the US! So that gives you some idea about the level,of compensation.

They would pay for your move back and forth. You would get an allowance for setting up home, buy a car etc. Rent and utilities were also paid for. Health insurance too.
I made very good money out of all my assignments. And we got to live and work in a number of countries around the world.

You would be given a guarantee to be given a job when your expat tenure was up and you went back home again.

In my last company expat assignments were offered for almost all roles, so not just management and executive roles. But also engineering, R&D, finance, legal, logistics, purchasing etc etc. We had on average 8-9% of the total global workforce moving around on expat contracts in those days

Things have changed a lot though. These days they will still want you to move, but you will go on a local contract only. Which for many westerners might be a huge gamble financially, if you come back.

I am still in touch with various folks around the world in different industries. Although I don’t have a detailed view, my impression is the (financial) very lucrative expat contracts is a thing of the past.

So all in all, there is likely to be a big difference between emigrating and going abroad for a certain defined period. Technically, legally and fiscally the latter is likely to be emigrating too. But it comes with very different expectations and mindset.
Jeroen

[carthick1000]

Originally Posted by v1p3r

Same pinch. But I am born male and upper caste, though I can't say with confidence if you are. What about those who aren't?

Posting rule no 13 here if you have not read it before. Suggest mods to consider adding the word caste to the sensitive discussions avoidance rule.

13. Sensitive discussions involving politics or religion are to be avoided, due to their highly subjective nature, which can lead to volatile and inconclusive debates. The only factor that unites BHPians is our love for cars, independent of religious or political inclinations.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by carthick1000

Suggest mods to consider adding the word caste to the sensitive discussions avoidance rule.

In that case, we might as well add race to the list. But we have seen, in recent posts, that it can be sadly relevant to the discussion.

[Turbanator]

Here is some information for people looking to immigrate to Canada


Canada's household debt is now highest in the G7

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65688460

[SoumenD]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Things have changed a lot though. These days they will still want you to move, but you will go on a local contract only.

Bingo, specially for product based firms. I am evaluating such an offer right now.

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Which for many westerners might be a huge gamble financially, if you come back.

And this part is kinda correct in my case but in opposite way. The offer I am getting for a local contract in a certain ‘developed European country’ is actually so low in PPP terms that its equivalent to taking a 25% pay cut compared to Indian pay. I did check with colleagues in the said country and apparently that’s a good pay there, which was shocking.

Have spent a few years as an expat in EU & Australia as a bachelor when my Indian pay was relatively lower(as I had lesser experience) but post covid pay structure here have changed so much that Europe at least doesn’t seem to be a lucrative option anymore specially if you have 10+ years experience in IT.

Yes quality of life and all is a different topic and that varies from person to person but the ‘west is lucrative’ draw seems to be fading away.

[Imran.Syed]

Originally Posted by Turbanator

Canada's household debt is now highest in the G7

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65688460

Canada has been the highest since 2008 or 2010 because they didn't have a 2008 real estate bubble burst like the rest of the world did.

Please give some pointers on what to do or not to do in this scenario for immigrants/migrants to Canada.


In other news, 2 countries that are the most important to me normalized relations today. They might even restart direct flights soon!

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/can...ions-1.6853285

[Turbanator]

Originally Posted by Imran.Syed

Please give some pointers on what to do or not to do in this scenario for immigrants/migrants to Canada.

Everyone is different in expectations and also in compromises. My favourite ghazal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ele3pNFcv_Y

I remember writing about that girl from a village near Jalandhar whose parents took a loan for her immigration, she works two jobs, shares accommodation with friends and is on top of the world somewhere in Canada.

My wife is Ok with renting a place where she has work as she wants to keep herself busy and doesn't like to come back. Me, having our own house in India and living an Okish life, do not want to go

In the same article that first appeared at

https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/hou...-gdp-1.6852027


We need to create a situation in which you are 35 years old, you're married, you have two kids and you are renting — nothing is wrong with you," he told CBC News in an interview.

[Imran.Syed]

I recently discovered a very good website/data base for fairly accurate cost of living/property prices/quality of life comparisons between major cities worldwide using various indexes and metrics.
The information is very up to date and I believe crowd sourced.

https://www.numbeo.com/

However it does not include everything, for example insurance costs, car prices, fuel prices, various taxes, etc or what type of house is being rented.

This along PPP will be very very helpful to anybody willing to move anywhere.

[V.Narayan]

A niece of mine who is studying at University of Toronto is in India for a break and staying with me, her indulgent uncle. She has been there about 4 years. What she says about a new comer living in Toronto or settling down in Canada, interestingly mirrors what @Imran Syed has expressed on this thread. This niece has lived all her young life after age of 5 in Dubai and Singapore moving around as her father's MNC employer transferred him around. So, Dubai/Singapore are her reference points, not Jabalpur of Hubli. She says for her Canada is not at all aspirational - weak career prospects, low pay, high taxes, and {according to her perception} unfriendly people. I don't wish to get into any judgements here as I am not familiar with Canada. Just sharing an input.