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A common question among students and early career professionals is whether working in the US makes more sense than working in India. Since the answer is nuanced, let us get into the minute details.
Differences in salary:
When I worked in a Food Manufacturing company for a brief period in Appalachian Ohio, one of the remotest parts of the US, the entry-level compensation for a manufacturing engineer from a local university was 65,000 -70,000$ with a 10,000 $ year-end bonus. This was the starting salary for an entry-level position in a big MNC in the Midwest. I met a friend recently who was getting around 50 lakhs (61000 $) in India in a tier 2 city. This compensation was after almost 18 years of manufacturing work experience in prestigious US MNCs and degrees from the best schools in India. Is my friend being treated unfairly? That is a wrong question to ask. Companies pay what is necessary to get the best talent, not more or not less.
When I worked in Silicon Valley, compensation was sky-high. Almost every engineer I knew was making at least 200,000 $. Married couples were easily making 400,000 $ a year at a minimum. At the same time, the cost of buying a house in Silicon Valley starts at 1.5-2 million dollars. In more posh areas, especially in the places close to good schools, the cost could shoot up to 3-4 million dollars. In Minneapolis, even if one was making just 100,000 $ as compensation, a house cost just 100-150,000 $. Hence, if one’s aim is to settle down, buy a house, and raise a family, working in the Midwest US or India makes way more sense than being in the bay area.
Cost of living differences:
Comparing compensation in India and the US is like comparing apples and oranges. One should never make the cardinal mistake of multiplying US dollars by the currency exchange rate (approximately 82). The number one gets in rupees after conversion bears no relevance to the cost-of-living differences in both countries. For example, a haircut that may cost 100 Rs (1.2 $) in India may cost 40-50 $ in big US cities like San Francisco or Seattle. A better benchmarking tool was developed by McDonald’s, which looked at the cost of creating a hamburger in both countries. It posits that dividing the dollar number by five is a fair indicator of the value in Indian Rupees. For example, a 100,000 $ salary in the US is comparable to a 20 lakh Rs. salary in India. Of course, the cost of living varies dramatically in metropolitan cities in India. Hotel rates in Delhi and Bombay are as expensive as in New York and Chicago. Pune or Kolkata has a lower cost of living and is relatively inexpensive compared to Bangalore or Hyderabad. The best scenario is if a person can work in the US and spend the amount in India. Unless one is an expat, this is practically impossible.
Career Growth and Promotions:
Since most of Multi-National Companies are headquartered in the US, from their perspective, India is not super exceptional – it is one of the many markets they operate in. The leadership team is typically based out of a US city. The closer one is to leadership, the greater the chance of promotions and career growth. This reasoning explains why one has to be in Seattle or Mountain View to become a senior leader in Amazon or Google. The CEO and the leadership team are constantly evaluating top talent, and there is nothing better than being in physical proximity to them. Proximity ensures accidental meetings and more visibility. Of course, when Indian MNCs become powerhouses, the equation could change. But this is still a long time away.
A common reason for Indians to leave MNC companies, especially at the levels of Directors and Senior Directors, is that they have reached a dead end. They have to reconcile to the fact that they can only grow upwards if they can move to a regional or international headquarters. The number of VP positions in Indian subsidiaries of MNCs is minuscule. I have seen that a corporate VP (per the global headquarters hierarchy) is typically nominated as the CEO or MD of Indian operations. There are hundreds of Corporate VPs and dozens of SVPs and EVPs in any big MNC. So even being the CEO of the Indian subsidiary is nothing to boast about in the Global arena; the person is probably one among hundreds. If one is ambitious and wants promotions in MNCs, India is not the best place to be.
Raising a family:
Most Asians in the US will quickly realize that the US is not family-friendly. Since the US cities are expensive, both husband and wife must work. This leaves little time to spend with kids. One of the ways Indians solve the problem is to invite the husband’s parents to spend six months taking care of the child and request the mother’s parents for another six months to care for the kid. US laws prevent parents from spending more than six months a year on a tourist visa. One of the advantages of working in India is that the support system and family are close by and can drop by quickly. The grandparents need help adapting to a new culture and climate in the US, but this is never a problem in India.
Parents are very close to their children because of gun shootings and street violence. They accompany them like “helicopter parents” wherever the kids go. Rarely have I seen children play with their friends in front of their houses or apartments. Parents are always close to them, watching their every move. Every street in the US is unsafe because one never knows when a stranger would jump down from a car, grab a kid and then vanish.
The terrible death of a child Adam Walsh in 1981 in Florida galvanized the entire nation. The public outcry in the United States ensured that the paranoia generated by the media lingers to this day, four decades later. A criminologist from Mount Holyoke College noted in 2016 that the case “created a nation of petrified kids and paranoid parents. Kids used to be able to go out and organize a stickball game, and now all playdates and the social lives of children are arranged and controlled by the parents…the fear still lingers today.“
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