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Chinese capital dangles carrots to lure foreign talent to its Silicon Valley
- joncrane 9y agoThis is an interesting one. Is this related in any way to the "token white guy" types of jobs which are apparently available in China?
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoNo. White monkey jobs are mostly over. Maybe you can find one in some remote tier 88 city, but not in Shenzhen.
- dtornabene 9y agothis is crazy, I had no idea these even were a thing. It sounds like a Coen Brothers plot.
- wakkaflokka 9y agoOther than the visa-related benefits, what type of monetary benefits do foreigners get for moving to China?
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoPay is pretty good (about 70% of Seattle) while living costs are low. I was able to save about 30-40% of my take home over almost 10 years.
- kbwt 9y agoSo China pays much better than Western Europe? Is this actually true?
- baby 9y agoIf you're in HongKong probably.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoHong Kong doesn’t pay programmers as well as Shenzhen outside of a few banking related jobs. Not a good comparison. HK is more of a business/banking center, so programmers don’t have as much status as they do across the border in Shenzhen.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoWestern Europe sans Switzerland doesn’t pay very high, so ya. You’ll see more Europeans working tech in china than Americans. Likewise, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea also generally don’t pay programmers as much as China does, so you’ll see foreigners from those countries working in China (and the fact that they are next door).
- richardknop 9y agoYes. HK, Shenzhen, Beijing, Shanghai pay on par or better, especially if you are in finance / fintech / AI.
- dcldcl 9y agoI've spoken to tech workers from Beijing and my impression from them is the cost to purchase homes was on par (if not higher) than SV (and Seattle). Is rent that much cheaper?
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoYes! You can rent an apartment that retails for a million dollars for $1500/month or less. It is just a huge property bubble, actual residential demand isn’t that strong.
- baybal2 9y agoYes, but.... there is a lot of but there: Technically speaking (literally), a shack in Gangxia, Shenzhen can have market value from $1m to $2m, but nobody will ever sell it. They have no value other than of land under them. Rents for a room there were around CNY400 per month 5 years ago. 80ies era apartments - also cheap, but quite a lot of them are in even worse shape than property in villages. post 2000 housing - gets better, actually livable somewhat. Look for 4k CNY in good locations. Western like proper highrise apartments - no less than 9k, availability is smallish. Everybody is looking for then. I was looking for one in Huafu area, but they just go too fast to even get sense of a price
- Slansitartop 9y ago> while living costs are low. Are you sure? From what I've seen, Shanghai real estate is comparably expensive to SF.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoOnly if you buy. Rents definitely aren’t. Shanghai and Shenzhen are worse than Beijing on rents, but not incredibly so, you won’t find $4000/month one bedroom apartments unless it’s some kind of luxury skyscraper. $2000/month for a nice two bedroom is easy, you could probably go lower than that and still be in a decent location.
- cromwellian 9y agoI had a place in 老西门 that was about $3000, not a luxury skyscraper, but owned by a French landlord, I think the closer you are to large ex-pat populations, the more expensive.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoYa, if you are in the French Concession in Shanghai, it can get a bit pricey I guess. Beijing really has nothing like that, well I guess you could try living in Sanlitun or something.
- antr 9y agoUS-biased headline. This is what US-tech firms have been doing for years, dangling carrots on foreign talent. The same reason why the US VC-lobby has been up in arms on anything and everything work visas related. China is the new USA.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoWhy is it a US biased article? China has been doing this for years also, just not very well. I still think they aren’t doing very well in this area, especially since they make immigration or at least permanent residence so impossible, but other issues related to child education costs and environment make it difficult to live and work in china long term.
- duncanawoods 9y agoThe language is pretty poor - "bait" "lure" etc. They might as well have written ITS A TRAP. As I read it, I felt enough spin to not fully trust the point about maids at the end. Was it cherry picked item from a whole slew of legal relaxations for its shame value or is it really an isolated, important and notable act presented dispassionately? I can't tell.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoThose aren’t very strong words, I don’t get the same word sentiment as you do, I’m also a native English speaker.
- duncanawoods 9y agoBait specifically, is a pejorative form of incentive. It has many negative meanings including deception, trapping, tormenting, teasing, bait-and-switch etc. There is a range of less emotive language to choose from and I can't read such a thing without assuming intentionality. For example, have you ever heard of Google "baiting employees with free food"? I haven't. To do so is to describe setting up a trap. Instead its positive language: perks, incentives, benefits etc.
- lostmsu 9y agoMaybe, once Wikipedia and Gmail are available full scale.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoWikipedia isn’t blocked in china yet as far as I know. Internet censorship is a big deal for foreigners working in China, especially since playing the cat and mouse VPN game is so tiring.
- gruez 9y agowikipedia + https isn't blocked? so there's literally nothing preventing people from visiting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1989 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiananmen_Square_protests_of_1... ?
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoIn English not a problem, however Wikipedia chinese is blocked from time to time. Note that they did block certain pages (like that one and the DL’s page) before Wikipedia moved to https for everything, then wiki was blocked for a while but they eventually unblocked it.
- bsaul 9y agoI'm in shanghai right now on a local ISP. I can view the page.
- coupdejarnac 9y agoWikipedia started being blocked when I lived in Beijing in 2005. I'd be surprised if it isn't still blocked.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoIt wasn’t blocked in 2007 when I moved to Beijing nor in 2016 when I left. There were times when it was blocked, but not for very long. Wikimedia was blocked a bit more, it still sporadic.
- pentae 9y agoThe Beijing municipality has said it will even consider allowing foreign professionals to bring in their own foreign maids, currently illegal in Beijing. Well shit, sign me up.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoThis was actually a big issue for one of my friends. They wanted a Filipino maid for communication reasons and were even able to manage it for a few years (before 2010 or so). But then China cracked down on the practice and they had to go with a chinese one eventually.
- ny2244111 9y agoYou get a foreign maid, and you get a foreign maid. Everyone gets a foreign maid!
- walshemj 9y agoYes I cant see that being a thing for 99% of the potential western candidates unless they are targeting the ME and India
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- bmc7505 9y agoI
- mtgx 9y agoOh yes, carrots, with a side of dictatorship. Sounds quite tempting.
- intrasight 9y agoUnless they make exceptions for the Great Firewall, this carrot won't be so enticing.
- dannylandau 9y agoThere are 37M college students in China and around the world. Why do they need foreigners to come over? http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2016-04/08/content_24365038.htm http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2016-04/08/content_243650...
- mrarjen 9y agoLikely because they are still in college, and China would rather want the leaders in their fields to work for them instead, and also teach the newly graduated to take it from there?
- yorwba 9y agoAlso, literally every student I've met in China wants to go to the US. Undergraduates want to do their Master's there, Master's students want to do their PhD, I guess PhD students want to become professors at a US university.
- mrarjen 9y agoYea that's also true, in Asia, the western education is perceived as far superior to theirs.
- ausjke 9y agoNo.1 SMOG SMOG SMOG No.2 No google available Bring ten foreign maids won't fix that. I'll just pass.
- bsaul 9y agoAbout the smog, i'm in shanghai right now, and i can tell you that the air is far less polluted than Paris, France. It's actually quite weird, because i thought the exact same thing as you regarding smog, i thought i would have to wear a mask for the duration of my trip. I was amazed at the number of electrical vehicle here (not a single motorcycle running on gas). Note that it may be due to the chinese new year holidays (although it's been over for two weeks now), or to the price of real estate that rose to such a level that nobody can live downtown anymore... I'm not sure the reason, but i was really really surprised.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoThe city should be almost deserted during CNY. But right now at the moment of this post, Shanghai is worse than Paris: https://aqicn.org/city/shanghai/ https://aqicn.org/city/shanghai/ (95) http://aqicn.org/city/paris/ http://aqicn.org/city/paris/ (66)
- carlmr 9y agoIt also depends on where in Shanghai and where in Paris. Also Shanghai and Beijing is a bit different.
- seanmcdirmid 9y agoThe AQICN pages with readings have maps so it’s easy to explore different areas if you want. The outskirts of Paris are mostly in the green(better air), the outskirts of Shanghai are yellow or orange (worse air).
- bsaul 9y agoThanks for the link, i was wondering if maybe shanghai had a different kind of pollution that i wouldn't notice (i can't really tell from the graph, but i think maybe pm10 is something that you'd feel more). Although they're both globally in the "yellow" range.. CNY is really over now. Some shops were closed last week, but everything's been back to normal for the last three days.. Also, Paris is experiencing a unusual freezing temperature, so maybe there's less activity. Do you know if there are some historical data on the site ? i'd be really interested to compare the days i left Paris with the day i arrived in Shanghai, because the difference was really amazing. EDIT : looking more closely at the shanghai map.. If the location is really precise, then it seems that the indicators are all set close to the huge circle roads surrounding the central city. If you want to compare that with the paris equivalent (and not the indicators next to the river), you'll find the same kind of values.
- kryptiskt 9y agoNot for me, I like being able to say "I disagree" on social media.
- draw_down 9y agoLet freedom ring!!!
- baybal2 9y agoAnybody want a mini-AMA? Worked with Chinese for bigger part of my career and did two long term on-site consulting contracts. I lived in both Shanghai and Shenzhen.
- wafflesraccoon 9y agoWould you do it again? I hear mostly good things about living in China once you get past the culture shock.
- baybal2 9y agoIf there will be a good offer? Yes, without any doubt. Getting a good offer is what makes the biggest difference. There are good jobs on the table, and they are ok for your first take on Chinese job market. $3k to $4k net income is what you can get as a developer in an in demand niche with 4~5 years experience. For me, after 6 years, just "simply good jobs" are not enough. They have to be really great. Something like with a clear road to above $4k $5k net income salaries, or $40 per hour or more short term contracts. Getting such offers is totally possible after few years there making connections and proving yourself. About quality of life and livability. I had zero complaints for last few years. Best districts of major cities in China score more on livability for me than most of Europe and America. See, the difference there is you can have great life with just mid-to-high ordinary job there. An equal lifestyle option in fancy parts of SoCal and London is virtually impossible without above 2nd percentile salary and good perks.
- orangehour 9y agoHow hard would it be to find a position in China if I don't speak Chinese? Are there certain places I should look for information on this? Job websites?
- baybal2 9y agoThis will limit you to 1 in 3 jobs open to foreigners. Which is still very good. See, the main value of a foreign specialist is that he is foreign and supposedly have rare expertise. Second to that, you will most likely to be hired with an idea in mind that you can liaise with overseas customers/specialists/authorities and etc even if your job does not implicitly require that. Best option is to actively solicit contacts and network a lot. Foreign professionals are a closely knit club here. Industry events are the best if you know nobody here. Look for job offers in English, job boards of companies with a record hiring foreigners, foreign companies that are new in China, super senior level positions, jobs with PhD. level expertise level, jobs requiring people skills in English "product managers/ field application engineers/ sales or solution engineers" Websites: 51job, zhaopin, ChinaHR. Look for English language keywords. A post in English almost certainly assumes the company keeps hiring a foreigner an option.
- landryraccoon 9y agoI think it’ll work if the carrots are big enough. People from the west have no issue working in Dubai if the check is big enough.
- cromwellian 9y agoIMHO they need to offer an officially sanctioned legal VPN for those with such Visas. It is too annoying as a technical worker doing research to reside in an environment where access to information is unpredictable.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]