Moving from India to Bay Area with spouse.
Apr 26
100 Comments
I am moving from India to Bay Area on L1 Visa for a SDE 2 role with TC ~ 170k.
My husband will be on L2 and plans to apply for EAD. What compensation can he expect with 6.5 YOE with Indian startups. He is working as an Architect / Principal. We are concerned because the companies he worked with were all unicorns but people might not know them in the US.
His present compensation is ~ USD 105k ESOPs (120k over 4 years) in India.
What is the compensation he should be targeting ?
What companies should he be looking at ?
Anything other general advice.
comments
You don't want go leave India with that kind of compensation. You can virtually outsource all your menial work like driving, cleaning, cooking etc. And just live life
As long as he’s normal IQ, he’ll be fine.
Literally anyone can make 200k right now. What an amazing time to be alive
No one explicitly said they were dumb
I mean apart from the work culture, I don't think anything will differ. And in India, software companies already have a good culture (I think).
Quality of life - cooking, cleaning, driving all by yourself vs having house help for all of it. I would choose the later!
Quality of life, yes, but since we only plan to move for a few years it is not what we are thinking out primarily. Also, better quality of life is debatable
If you are coming for growth purposes, it's completely hit and miss kind of game. With L1 you won't be able to quit as well. If you are determined to come, I would recommend H1. If you are coming purely to put savings on steroids for some time and then go back, then it's ok.
While it's good to travel the world and live in other places, you will find most of the interesting work and bulk of the workload have moved to India and China. If you move here after becoming a manager, I know that it fast-tracks your residency or green card. You may not grow as fast in the US, even if you're better because you don't have as much leverage that people in India seem to have.
You're welcome for the experience but keep your expectations in check. Finding a great manager who'd give you the good assignments isn't something you can control.
You should target a base salary in the range of 150-170 at most companies.
Our startup scene is strong. Our big co scene is strong.
But our traffic suuuuuuucks.
Read what Duh1 said below. I know people on visas who are stuck in the same job since mid-2000s because they couldn't quit and take up growth opportunities at critical stages of their careers.
The worst barrier to your happiness could be the visa status. Unless you/your spouse can go for EB1A, you will be stuck with your job. Your husband will get a 200K job perhaps. You will just make ends meet with 300K comp.
With passage of time, you will resent the Immigration situation. At the same time even if one of the partners does not want to go back to India, you are stuck here.
Once the baby comes, all the more trouble. You are stuck here difficult to relocate with baby, moreover he/she is American. You resent the visa situation more.
All other reasons people mentioned above are secondary. The root cause of misery for Indians and Chinese in US is IMMIGRATION. If you were on L1A would have been great, I suspect this as you are on L1b!
Problem is immigration. It’s the problem that has destroyed many in US. Limited freedom to do anything due to visas, job change is difficult , job safety is always a concern, being an entrepreneur is extremely tough etc. Immigration was not a major concern in the past, but specially in the past two years it has been
Problem will be more for you than your husband. He will get an EAD and can be more flexible
Differs from person to person..
If you are in rags, 300k is big money, but remember you might be able to save 100k at best. (Huge if you are poor).. on the other hand, if you have a house in the area of your choice in India and have 2 crores in saving, please stay away from the 300k offer. You don't want the hassle of being treated like a second class citizen in another country.. if you want to experience usa, travel for 6 months, it's a beautiful country to Visit and work (for non-Indians)
For reference i just use 1/3 of your salary for savings (1/3 gone in taxes, 1/3 in expenses).
Don't go to startups. Aim for medium and large public companies in tech.
It's a nit-pick, not that big of a deal.