Let me portray the typical life cycle of Indians in the USA with their living conditions and then I will let you decide whether settling in the USA is worth or not.
As an Indian immigrant in the USA, I have been asking myself this question for a quite long time. The reality is 95% of the Indian immigrants are settling in the US and only 5% of the immigrants are going back to India. I wondered if the “Major chunk (95%) of people settling in the US are making a wise decision or the small chunk (5%) of people going back are making a bad decision?” So I asked this question to my friends and colleagues from the 95% category but I could not get any subtle or profound answers. It looked like people are just following the crowd or falling into the trap, and not be able to go back later in life. So I did my own research asking specific set of survey questions to different age people. So let me share my findings.
First of all, why do Indians migrate to the US? One single answer for this question is scope for higher income, savings, low stress and a happy life without any common issues we experience in India. Now let’s see how these objectives are met during the life cycle of these Indian immigrants. Let me use the word NRI to describe them better.
My survey was limited to NRIs in the field of science and technology who are mostly in working class and also to a few business class NRIs as well. I took ratings on a scale of 0 to 10 (0 is low and 10 is high) for earnings, savings, stress levels, family relationships and happiness from different age categories with their typical activities in their life cycle. I realized that not every NRI in the US opens up because of ‘private space’ concept. So I chose people I have good relationship with and who are really open and can share feelings of their life. The Survey was conducted with a casual talk/discussion rather than a professional way of conducting surveys.
Based on the survey results and experiences shared by participants, I categorized the life cycle of immigrants into four different generic phases (Transform, Settle, Growth and Suffer) as shown in the graph below. Every person’s life is different so the depicted life cycle or living conditions may not apply to every NRI. It may vary for few people and life events may overlap between phases. This might be totally different for the new NRIs coming to the US because of longer green card wait time and ever changing immigration policies.
Now let me describe these phases with typical life events.
Transform Phase (21 to 28 years): This an excitement phase which starts right from India after getting the US visa. One tries to get to know the culture of the US, what to do before and after entering the US and starts living the American Dream. Parents feel proud of this great achievement by their kids and start making big expectations and hopes. Starts sharing this news to neighbors and relatives and throw a big party as if their kid already succeeded in life. Arrives in the US without the awareness that he/she broke generations of living together and unity in their families. Typically nobody think or care about how life will be in the US after 40s, 50s or 60s in this stage. One gets really amazed with the best infrastructure of America and starts loving it. Gets used to American life style with few hiccups. Starts making some money and will have parties, shopping, vacation trips and realizes that life is very comfortable in the US. Transfers money to India to support family and talks to relatives and friends and shares the greatness of America. Parents will start looking for a bride/groom. Starts green card process to continue living in American dream.
NRIs are very happy in this phase with lots of excitement and joy that American life brings in.
Settle Phase (28 to 40 years): After a couple of trips to India, gets married and spouse arrives in the US. Couple is very happy in the beginning with vacation trips and parties. Realizes that expenses are higher than living as a bachelor. First baby arrives and parents and in-laws visit America. Advances in green card process, switches jobs and moves to new locations. Second baby arrives and then visits India with kids. Realizes that their parents are not quite happy staying alone in India. Also realizes that India has changed a lot and quite expensive than ever. Thinks that they may not be able to fit in India and also India is not a right fit for the kids. NRIs usually decides to go on the path of settling down in the US with a backup plan of going back. Buys Town Home/Condo and switches to luxury cars. Realizes that single income is not really sustainable in the US. Wife decides to do a job instead of getting bored at home. So Income doubles, savings doubles but stress levels go up. Green card arrives and they feel relaxed of immigration issues. Vacation trips becomes hard with little kids so no big vacations.
Happiness level comes down due to missing family relationships…
