Letter to My Fellow Software Engineers(gist.github.com) |
Letter to My Fellow Software Engineers(gist.github.com) |
Here's my advice to you: stop caring about politics and get a remote job.
Forget all the social justice stuff and poor government regulations. It sucks, but you can't do anything about it unless you have a lot of money, which you don't.
You have good experience and your written english is fine. Be flexible with your working hours. You're about 12 hours offset from the Bay Area, so you might end up working the night shift. If you have an accent that would make it hard for Americans to work with you, that's probably the highest value thing you can improve. Indian accents are notoriously difficult and one of the reasons people in the US don't like Indian outsourcing (even if they won't admit it).
Use the HN job listings, angel, remotejobs, etc. Find yourself good paying work. Understand the situation and figure out how to exploit it. Maybe you can live comfortably on 50k/yr in India? Hiring you in the bay area would be $100k/yr minimum for someone with 7 years of experience of full-stack dev. Exploit the difference. Let companies know that you're willing to travel, that you're steeped in SV culture from the internet, that you're a hard worker, that you have lots of experience, that you're willing to work for half the price of US counterparts, and that you're willing to work on any timezone.
Save your money, invest, continually try to increase your salary. Once you have good cashflow, you might want to stay in India due to the cost of living, but you'll also have the means to relocate globally.
Just to be crystal clear: You're not failing at code or interviews, you're failing at selling yourself, and you're distracted by political issues. This is a skill you can learn and a problem you can fix.
Almost every country on Earth is good to wealthy people, so find your way to make money and learn to invest it right. Use the system on your own favor and stop trying to fight against it (because you won't win).
Usually, development countries (I live in Brazil, that's more or less like India) have great opportunities (growth rate) but you need to open yourself to them. More important than have skills is how to make them useful.
Best regards!
FWIW, I'm from the USA and have lived and worked in several states. I've known many people from India, some well, all have had success in the workplace. I've never noticed any kind of bias against these people (several were higher up the workplace ladder than I was, I believe they earned it.)
Author, if you see this-- please make a good plan and move forward. Let HN know how things go.