Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 178 posts

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

#121

Post by cepp »

paulsutter wrote: post #3

A warning for folks considering working in China (love to hear this debunked if untrue): https://www.chinalawblog.com/2016/09/the-china-stock-option-... > no foreign person can own stock in a Chinese domestic company not already listed on a stock market. So any such option or stock transfer is void from the start. Foreigners are not permitted to be shareholders of Chinese domestic companies, nor does China recognize…

This is true, however, very few companies will be purely Chinese entities. Both due to foreign investment and desire to IPO in Hong Kong many will manifest as a VIE in which a foreigner or foreign entity can legally own stock.

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

#122

Post by cepp »

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…

While I agree with you about the money and work-ethic, I think some aspects can be far more rewarding than in the US. In China, you're not making an absurd of money for it to only go to taxes and COL. Instead, you make a comfortable amount (comparably) and can still live a good life. I also haven't found it particularly difficult to get good offers. Quality systems engineers and architects are in high demand in China (due to both the ML boom but also low quality of this particular aspect of CS education there) and so if you find the right company you can be making just as much as in the US if not more (speaking from experience).

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

#123

Post by m00dy »

illuminati1911 wrote: post #40
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 annoy…

May I ask where you moved from in Europe ?

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

#124

Post by sureaboutthis »

My sister-in-law's ex-husband traveled to China for weeks at a time and often. After their divorce, he moved there permanently. Two things happened.

Right away, he lost a lot of weight because he didn't like the food. Too many things he would never consider eating but he had to eat something. I don't know if it's the area he was in but he is still too thin today.

They divorced because he met a Chinese girl and married her. I don't recall the details--it might be a cultural thing--but it sounds like he was bamboozled into providing a lot of financial support to her Chinese family. The impression I get is that he's now stuck and it's a heavy burden.

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

#125

Post by osrec »

sureaboutthis wrote: post #124

My sister-in-law's ex-husband traveled to China for weeks at a time and often. After their divorce, he moved there permanently. Two things happened. Right away, he lost a lot of weight because he didn't like the food. Too many things he would never consider eating but he had to eat something. I don't know if it's the area he was in but he is still too thin today. They divorced because he met a Chinese girl and marrie…

Wow, that doesn't sound great. Hope he at least has some job satisfaction?

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

#126

Post by dang »

driverdan wrote: post #120
dang wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I was interested in genuine responses, not in starting a flamewar.

I believe you, but intention isn't enough. How you frame such a question has the largest impact on what responses emerge.

The combo of a low-information comment, a pejorative, and a divisive topic is going to be a flamebait cocktail regardless of anything else.

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

#127

Post by dang »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #53
bdamm wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Canadian living in and working in America, I have a similar although less dramatic moral difficulty. The fact is that the American government is curiously abusive compared to your average developed national government.

As an American citizen I agree with you, but I think that the comparison to China is excessive and inappropriate - and serves as some kind of perverted justification for China's crimes against humanity.

Please stop doing nationalistic flamewar on HN. The denunciatory rhetoric you've been invoking in this thread has no role in the kinds of conversations we're looking for here—it's a different sort of game, for a different sort of website. Since you're an experienced HN user, I'm sure you know this.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

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

#128

Post by neonate »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #17

China executes thousands of political prisoners per year to harvest thier organs on an industrial scale.

That is highly disputed and has a distinctly propagandistic ring.

Like most people, I haven't the time to study this question in detail, so I don't know the truth about it. But that's part of how propaganda works. By repeating something often enough in enough different places, the impression of a well-documented consensus is created. When one does research it in detail, the entire narrative usually falls apart. But so few people actually have the time to do that, it doesn't matter.

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

#129

Post by dang »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #17

China executes thousands of political prisoners per year to harvest thier organs on an industrial scale.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19501572 and marked it off-topic.

Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19504235.

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

#130

Post by Scoundreller »

usmannk wrote: post #62
Scoundreller wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least Japan lets non-permanent residents avoid taxes on income from abroad (that stays abroad) for the first 5 years. Depends on your home country whether this lets you avoid their taxes. In some cases, this can save a lot of tax.

Do you have any information about this? I've been looking into the tax implications of moving to Japan recently and it's not been easy to sort through.

Just googling. It looks like it was a better situation pre2017 though:

www.mondaq.com/x/561782/tax+authorities/Change+In+Taxation+Of+NonPermanent+Residents

See an accountant/lawyer yada yada.

The bitcoiners that gave up their US citizenship, or otherwise left their home country and moved to Japan probably came out well tax-wise.

Post reply on HN