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Gujarati here. Our success in Motel and Gas Station industry can be attributed to the following. The same model then also can be seen in tech industry. I have e
by DhirubhaiPatel 8y ago
Gujarati here. Our success in Motel and Gas Station industry can be attributed to the following. The same model then also can be seen in tech industry. I have explained below :
"Ability to establish trust while bypassing all the conventional channels."
Coming from a socialist country like India to USA I noticed that transaction costs in USA are damn too low simply because of the trust factor. There is no two factor auth each time you do a credit card transaction, you can do self checkouts at Walmart etc. etc. Many of first world citizens might take this for granted but these factors give a huge boost to economy. There are more transactions and less wealth is destroyed just to enforce a contract.
We Gujjus take this to the next level in USA. Consider John Smith decides to run a gas station. He has to appoint a 24x7 attendant at say $10 per hour. So he has to spend $240 per day just for the person. Assuming the profit margin per gallon is $0.15 he needs to see around 100 cars filling 16 gallons before that cost can be earned back. Not to mention these attendants steal cash and other stuff from the gas station store often too. John Smith then hires Jose who is an illegal Mexican at $5 per hour. Jose steals his cash one day and is never seen again or is caught by ICE and deported. Or John Smith sticks to the law and bleeds $240 per day.
Now Dhirubhai Patel buys the same gas station. He makes a phone call and finds another Gujju student who is currently on F1 and legally can not earn and is paying heavy rent in bay area. He agrees to man his gas station at night and sleep in there too. He saves on rent and takes literally no salary until he completes his masters. Dhirubhai saves Around $100 more on this. Also the gujju students is much less prone to stealing and cheating and on other hand is more thankful to Dhirubhai. After completing his masters this kid joins a reputed tech company and later employs Dhirubhai's daughter as an intern. Everyone wins.
I see a lot of hate for Indian tech workers among white nativists tech workers on apps like Team Blind and also on twitter (search for HR392 on twitter). They correctly point out that Indians have been succeeding at a much greater rate than natives. They claim that Indian managers tend to hire Indian employees even in top firms like Google etc.
That might be true as Indians quickly build trust among each other. It is common for a new H1B from India to work for a startup at least for 2-3 years just because founders helped him come to USA even though salary is lower (I did this). Both my founders were Indians and the company was successfully acquired. I left within 6 months of acquisition to join one of the FANGs.
Note: I think the lack of proper deterministic path to green card actually forces smaller ethnic groups to huddle together instead of being more individualistic. This in some way prevents assimilation. There are over 200K tech H1Bs who are here for decade or more and yet wont get their green cards. A lot of them would feel safer in companies where their manager is Indian, CEO is Indian etc. than a general white owned company and might be willing to work for less for the safety of job and presence in USA. Same goes for motels, farming, gas stations and many other businesses which are being completely cornered by Indian-Americans.
- DhirubhaiPatel 8y agoJust to clear any confusion I am not saying the success comes at the expense of breaking the law. In some cases it is true but at fundamental level it is about "establishing trust". You can break a lot of victim-less laws and get away with it when you can establish trust. Most often these are minimum wage laws and immigration laws (both of which in my opinion some of the worst laws in the world).
- balls187 8y ago> I think the lack of proper deterministic path to green card actually forces smaller ethnic groups to huddle together instead of being more individualistic. This in some way prevents assimilation. Every ethnic immigrant group huddles together, regardless of visa status. That is basic human nature.