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Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

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Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#31

Post by jaxbot »

zukunftsalick wrote: post #26

i've been in Hong Kong for 6.5 years already. Worked in small consultancies, large logistics company, and local startup. PROS: a) Salary is high, especially if you get to work in finance/insurance/luxury retail fields b) disposable income (aka savings) is extremely high as income tax is low, no more than 17%, also, no capital gains tax! c) great hub to work and explore Asia CONS: a) IT jobs (development mainly) aren'…

That's a great point about access to Shenzhen from HK. How's the language barrier been? Have you had to learn both Canto and Mando and read both simplified and traditional? Is there a distinct advantage to living on one side of the border over the other?

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#32

Post by zukunftsalick »

goobynight wrote: post #29
zukunftsalick wrote: post #26

i've been in Hong Kong for 6.5 years already. Worked in small consultancies, large logistics company, and local startup. PROS: a) Salary is high, especially if you get to work in finance/insurance/luxury retail fields b) disposable income (aka savings) is extremely high as income tax is low, no more than 17%, also, no capital gains tax! c) great hub to work and explore Asia CONS: a) IT jobs (development mainly) aren'…

Define high (at least the ballpark). I had a much different experience in the same city. I doubled my pay by coming back home.

high as in I usually have 50% of my income available after paying rent/food/transportation and other costs. Rent is high if you keep "western" standards for your living space, likewise for food.

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#34

Post by rb808 »

I don't know much, but did see there was a Bloomberg series about Shenzen that had some Western entrepreneurs in some episodes. It looks awesome tbh.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLmaIbb13GM

I think in that episode they were talking about the Hax incubator. https://hax.co/

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#35

Post by jaxbot »

zukunftsalick wrote: post #32
goobynight wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Define high (at least the ballpark). I had a much different experience in the same city. I doubled my pay by coming back home.

high as in I usually have 50% of my income available after paying rent/food/transportation and other costs. Rent is high if you keep "western" standards for your living space, likewise for food.

Honestly that's comparable to SF, percentage-wise. But the 50% that's left will be higher.

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#36

Post by [deleted] »

rlglwx wrote: post #5

To be honest, don’t don’t it. Unless you’re of Chinese descent and speak the language, you won’t be able to advance in most companies. The work culture is alien to most westerners and the benefits to your career are negligible. Mostly depends on what you want out of your career but speaking as someone that lived in China and worked in Chinese tech companies for seven years, including being the first foreign hire for…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#37

Post by zhte415 »

koala_man wrote: post #10
max_im wrote: post #2

my impression is that unless you're in a super high-demand and high-level role (ie. Andrew Ng), it's still not that appealing compared to the US. For engineering roles, you're going to be worked harder and for lower pay than in the US. As an engineer with a degree in Chinese, I originally planned on working in China but found much better options stateside. Some of my colleagues have been successful in getting decent…

>for lower pay How is it when adjusted for cost of living though?

What adjustment for cost of living?

Assuming living in a Tier-1 where the tech-hubs are (Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen), rents for a 2/3 bedroom apartment somewhat centralish (these are vastly larger, more populous, and higher density than most American or European cities) will be at least USD 2000, possibly 4000 depending on taste (apartment, not house). Pension may need to be privately paid, and tax-band will be above 40% for anything that can support the above. Purchasing equivalent consumables like food and eating out western-style will be the same or double than the cost in most of the USA. If with kids then international schools are pretty expensive in China, over USD 20k per kid per year. International driving license not hard but car questionable as the above Tier-1 cities have restrictions / waiting lists / lotteries on license plates.

Cost-of-living adjustment is only relevant if: no kids, no pension, able to adapt to eat locally (quite hard for a lot of people especially when hitting the ground with a full time job), don't mind a 30-60+ minute subway commute (cheaper rents).

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#38

Post by zukunftsalick »

jaxbot wrote: post #31
zukunftsalick wrote: post #26

i've been in Hong Kong for 6.5 years already. Worked in small consultancies, large logistics company, and local startup. PROS: a) Salary is high, especially if you get to work in finance/insurance/luxury retail fields b) disposable income (aka savings) is extremely high as income tax is low, no more than 17%, also, no capital gains tax! c) great hub to work and explore Asia CONS: a) IT jobs (development mainly) aren'…

That's a great point about access to Shenzhen from HK. How's the language barrier been? Have you had to learn both Canto and Mando and read both simplified and traditional? Is there a distinct advantage to living on one side of the border over the other?

HK has uncensored and fast internet. The language barrier can be a issue but English is still widely spoken, even in remote areas of HK like where I live. I know enough Canto for numbers, food and the rare times I get a taxi. I can't ready anything though. There's a big question mark as 2047 looms closer, which is till when China promised to keep HK the way it is now (capitalism, different currency, open, legal system and so on).

Re: Ask HN: Those who moved careers from the West to China, what's your experience?

#40

Post by illuminati1911 »

rlglwx wrote: post #5

To be honest, don’t don’t it. Unless you’re of Chinese descent and speak the language, you won’t be able to advance in most companies. The work culture is alien to most westerners and the benefits to your career are negligible. Mostly depends on what you want out of your career but speaking as someone that lived in China and worked in Chinese tech companies for seven years, including being the first foreign hire for…

"Unless you’re of Chinese descent and speak the language, you won’t be able to advance in most companies."

There is no such issue when working for international or western companies and/or startups. Also a local mobile games company is not a good example to generalize with since games industry is known for being pretty horrible here. Internationally as well.

While there are some things many westeners might find annoying, there are lot of good things as well. For example income tax and living costs are very low. I moved from Europe to China to work in software engineering and my living standards have increased significantly.

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