Why immigrants leave America

Journalist Alena Glazkova was born and raised in Russia, worked as a correspondent. NewsNN. In 2017, she moved to the US state of Florida and decided to share her observations on why people are leaving America.

Фото: Depositphotos

This is my husband's third trip to the states. And every time he takes tickets back to Russia, many acquaintances and colleagues consider it their duty to “reason”. It seems to them that leaving the USA, if you have a good job or a desire for economic well-being for your family, is some kind of unimaginable eccentricity. Or stupidity. Or someone's bad advice. But according to American journalists, every year hundreds of thousands of people leave America. Among these people there are both American citizens and immigrants, many of whom come from third world countries, like India or Russia.

Unfortunately, the State Department does not accurately calculate how many people leave the United States in a year. Or does not consider it necessary to notify their citizens about such statistics. Perhaps that is why many people in America are not interested in leaving, and even more so they do not know the reasons why people leave for another country.

Meanwhile, there are many reasons to leave America forever. America is far from ideal.

Labor law in the United States unpleasantly affects employees. Russians love to complain that the Labor Code is imperfect and many employers do not comply with it. In the US, people are more law-abiding, but the norms themselves are much tougher and less fair.

The employee’s rest is regulated exclusively in the states by the employer. There is simply no federal or regional law on this subject. Whether you work with or without a holiday, with or without a holiday, whether you are paid for your absence at the workplace or not, all that is decided by the administration of your company.

There are public holidays, but they are much smaller than in Russia. The longest day off - Thanksgiving - 4 of the day. Maternity leave for women is still governed by regional laws, but is no more than 12 weeks since the birth of the child and is not paid (the exception is the state of California). How many weeks specifically a woman will stay in it, the employer decides again. Only employees of large IT corporations, like Google, have privileges. For comparison: in Russia, a woman has the right to take maternity leave on 70 days before delivery and on 70 days after.

The main retirement age in America is 67 years. This country is also widely known for its “liberal” approach to layoffs.

According to the American Psychological Association, such labor legislation contributes to the rapid burnout of workers and the high level of stress in their lives. It is logical that people give preference to countries with a more "humane", competent and well-developed labor legislation.

Also, the reason for departure can be high prices for education and medicine. As for education, prices can be justified: in the year 2016 in the United States took first place in the study of the British company QS “Ranking of countries with the best higher education system”, that is, it was recognized as the most effective education system in the world.

At the same time, in 2013, 79% of Americans thought that education outside of high school is accessible to all who need it. There is no more recent statistics, but since there have been no major reforms in the American educational process since the end of 2000, it can be considered that problems with access to education remain.

In medicine, the quality of services most often does not correspond to the price. In the text about medicine in the USA, I said that the ranking recognized the US healthcare system as one of the most expensive and ineffective. According to the American publication Vox, there are many reasons why this is so. Among them are the lack of state control over drug prices, the system of remuneration for doctors, in which the patient pays for the service, and not for its quality, bureaucracy and much more.

Some immigrants also leave America because of the high cost of living in principle. Loss of work, as in any other country, may result in the loss of housing and all prospects. Therefore, according to the experience of my acquaintances of emigrants, it is dangerous to move without a “airbag” to 4-10 thousand dollars per person. Unfortunately, to earn such a sum in the third world countries before going to the USA is far from everyone.

Sometimes Americans complain about high taxes, but according to recent studies, this is a myth. The OECD found out in 2017 that the average US resident pays less than any other developed country in the world.

Those who moved to the United States may experience numerous social and psychological problems. It is difficult to get used to a new culture, new people, separation from family and friends. The social circle is getting considerably narrower.

There are large Russian communities in America, but in most states and cities the Russian community is small. Emigrants have a clear lack of communication and attention. And they come up with a variety of ways to deal with it: my friend Eugene writes blogs on social networks to always have someone to talk to, another friend Xenia went to an English-language school in order to “become her own” in a foreign country more quickly, and Nina just makes friends with everyone who speaks Russian. But not all emigrants end up feeling free and comfortable. And, of course, people start to miss their homeland.

It is not easy to understand the peculiarities of American tolerance. Large corporations organize special workshops and lectures for their employees that help them learn to behave tolerantly. So, working at Harman, my husband takes similar courses once a year. But what if you work in a small company and did not receive a good enough education?

For Americans, reputation is a very important category, so because of discrimination or not being sufficiently polite to the interlocutor, you can easily lose your job, no matter who you are. Regularly due to intolerant (racist or sexist) attitudes, criminal proceedings are instituted against people. And Americans love to sue: for good reason every second advertisement on the road is an advertisement for lawyers and law firms. Anyone can suffer - both the famous Hollywood producer Weinstein and an employee of the Starbucks coffee shop.

Even more difficult is the fact that the Americans themselves do not always know what can be considered tolerant and what is not. So recently there was a major scandal over the racist tweets of the new Times journalist. A girl from Korea claimed to have been forced to write several racist tweets towards “white” Americans because of trolling on the net. But people did not believe her and insisted on her dismissal. They believed that if such a person were written by a “white” race, they would have been dismissed long ago.

In general, society, with its desire not to once again offend a person of a different race, gender, religion or worldview, is a rather uncomfortable place for people who have problems with self-control or low resistance to stress.

So life in the United States has its pros and cons, which you should definitely know when you make a decision to leave or stay. And anyway, those who believe the ideal image from the American media are again and again, inspired by the stories of only the most successful immigrants or simply follow the principle “there is good where we don’t exist” and leave without looking overseas - to America.

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