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Russia is a pretty unique kind of hell. People who are not affected by unemployment and poverty are leaving. If you're successful, leaving is a logical choice

Russia is a pretty unique kind of hell. People who are not affected by unemployment and poverty are leaving. If you're successful, leaving is a logical choice that you have to consider. Russian emigration is white collar contrary to most of other "developing countries'" emigration. Russia is not a developing country. Russia is a crumbling country with a long history of failures and no clear future prospects. While it is true that people leave e.g. India, there's more people in India who get richer and happier staying in India, and there's still a lot of people who come to stay in India because weather is nice, food is tasty, accomodation is cheap and culture is interesting. Neither of that is much true for Russia. Only people who come is uncontrolled muslim work migrants from Central Asia, and even those are now leaving.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago
Agreed. Successful Indian immigrants that I know, usually return to India. So something about India is attractive in itself. Russia has an epidemic of suicide-by-misadventure, which is a strong indicator of hopelessness among the young.
- coldtea 11y ago
  >So something about India is attractive in itself. Just that they are accustomed to that culture (on an everyday-life basis). It's pretty unique and far less western that Russia's culture (which is mostly shared with European and Eastern European culture) is, so those traditionally inclined feel a better cultural fit there than in the West. Beyond that, India is way worse of than Russia in quality of life for hundrends of millions of its population.
  - guard-of-terra 11y ago
    As you can see there's no place for Russia: People who can live in Russia culturally also can live in Europe/USA, and it's just better. Thus only thing preventing Russia from becoming hollow place is laziness. Quality of life is tricky. Russia combines African life expectancy with Japanese birth rate. If you are aged 5 and onwards (skipped child mortality) you perhaps have longer life expectancy in India than in Russia, and that's been true for decades. Quality of life should get a heavy discount for surviving Russian winter. Yes, compared to hundred million of Indians, you sometimes lay your hands on some money. Which also fuels emigration.
coldtea 11y ago
Don't know where you got those ideas about Russia, but asking people that immigrated out of the country or who don't like it, is not exactly representative. A common mistake of people in the West is to only talk to think-alike westernized versions of themselves from other countries (found in tech, social media etc), creating an echo chamber that's as representative of the other country as talking to some Williamsburg hipster is for somebody in Kentucky or Idaho.
- guard-of-terra 11y ago
  I've got those ideas first-handedly. Should have been pretty obvious by now.

JoeAltmaier 11y ago

Agreed. Successful Indian immigrants that I know, usually return to India. So something about India is attractive in itself. Russia has an epidemic of suicide-by-misadventure, which is a strong indicator of hopelessness among the young.

coldtea 11y ago
>So something about India is attractive in itself. Just that they are accustomed to that culture (on an everyday-life basis). It's pretty unique and far less western that Russia's culture (which is mostly shared with European and Eastern European culture) is, so those traditionally inclined feel a better cultural fit there than in the West. Beyond that, India is way worse of than Russia in quality of life for hundrends of millions of its population.
- guard-of-terra 11y ago
  As you can see there's no place for Russia: People who can live in Russia culturally also can live in Europe/USA, and it's just better. Thus only thing preventing Russia from becoming hollow place is laziness. Quality of life is tricky. Russia combines African life expectancy with Japanese birth rate. If you are aged 5 and onwards (skipped child mortality) you perhaps have longer life expectancy in India than in Russia, and that's been true for decades. Quality of life should get a heavy discount for surviving Russian winter. Yes, compared to hundred million of Indians, you sometimes lay your hands on some money. Which also fuels emigration.

coldtea 11y ago

Don't know where you got those ideas about Russia, but asking people that immigrated out of the country or who don't like it, is not exactly representative. A common mistake of people in the West is to only talk to think-alike westernized versions of themselves from other countries (found in tech, social media etc), creating an echo chamber that's as representative of the other country as talking to some Williamsburg hipster is for somebody in Kentucky or Idaho.

guard-of-terra 11y ago
I've got those ideas first-handedly. Should have been pretty obvious by now.