[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by FrozeninTime

It sucks being a doctor in India nowadays.

Long work hours ( I clock 90 hours a week) no work life balance, constant harrassment from patient and their associates, even I feel I should leave and settle outside India. But its late in career though.



.

You sound exactly like our friend Philip who is an orthopaedic surgeon in the UK and our friend Leo who is an eye specialist in the Netherlands.

The grass of the neighbour etc etc.

News flash: if you want to earn the big salaries like these guys do, you will be clocking 90 hours a week till you retire. You want to earn more than 100-150K Euro/dollars/£ a year that is the sort of work schedule you are looking at in most type of roles and usually at least a decade to get anywhere near that level and you need to keep it going till you retire. In Europe, eg me, that would be around 70.

Jeroen

[ajmat]

Believe me, the UK NHS is so under-resourced that experienced doctors are running away. A friend of mine who is one of the UK's top burns specialists is moving to the US for his last 5-10 years of his career. Might as well get paid for less!

The beauty of the NHS is that you focus on curing the patient, not so much getting on billing targets.

Another classmate of mine who was a psychiatrist, moved to India to support his aging parents but finds it difficult to adapt to the work ethos of a corporate hospital. He is not doing anything at present.

I need to get some time to pen down my experience as a confused 10 year British boy in India who morphed into a confused 20+ indian boy in the UK who returned as a confused 30+ Englishman back to India.

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by ajmat

I need to get some time to pen down my experience as a confused 10 year British boy in India who morphed into a confused 20+ indian boy in the UK who returned as a confused 30+ Englishman back to India.

We would all benefit and learn from your sharing of this unique perspective. So do write on.

[FrozeninTime]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

The grass of the neighbour etc etc.

You want to earn more than 100-150K Euro/dollars/£ a year that is the sort of work schedule you are looking at in most type of roles and usually at least a decade to get anywhere near that level and you need to keep it going till you retire. In Europe, eg me, that would be around 70.
Jeroen

Europe pay packet is less that is know fact, so issue is not of pay but to discharge your duty with diginity. If you follow news from India which I suppose you do, you would have come across strikes which are almost become a norm in some of the government hospitals as doctors beaten threatened, harassed for no fault of theirs. There are chronic shortages in drugs, equipments and blame goes to doctor not adminstration.

So in that context its better to emigrate to country which allows you to work with diginity.

[amitoj]

Originally Posted by ajmat

The beauty of the NHS is that you focus on curing the patient, not so much getting on billing targets.

I dread the medical expenses here. With 3 young kids, I don't think I can afford more than 2 visits to the emergency room per year. Funny story I read somewhere earlier about how these days people call Uber instead of an ambulance when they need to get to a hospital, because it is a lot cheaper. Cheaper by hundreds of dollars.

Originally Posted by VKumar

And the vidhan sabha tour is on me, the Indian politics make for a wonderful case study of finding the best compromise and maximizing everything in spite of millions of constraints.

Believe me I am saying this with a smile, not a frown. First you personally attack me for leaving the country and paying taxes there and then you invite me to visit a building that was built by the Britishers (since you are in NCR, I assume you are talking about Delhi Vidhan Sabha)


Anyway, in spirit of the peace accord, let's replace Vidhan Sabha with Dilli Haat.

[VKumar]

Originally Posted by amitoj

Believe me I am saying this with a smile, not a frown. First you personally attack me for leaving the country and paying taxes there and then you invite me to visit a building that was built by the Britishers (since you are in NCR, I assume you are talking about Delhi Vidhan Sabha)


Anyway, in spirit of the peace accord, let's replace Vidhan Sabha with Dilli Haat.

Believe me sirji, what I wrote was not done with an intention of a personal attack, I have just tried to keep my views quite straight.

Signed the peace pact with Narayan sir!

The vidhan sabha I was talking about is the one in Lucknow. Let's add Dilli haat too to the list. That said, I believe that this thread also need the thumbs up option, this thread is a nice one actually.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by amitoj

But there are two sides to every story. If you follow only CNN or FOX, you wont get the complete picture.

No, I didn't get that data from CNN or Fox. Few years ago, a social worker in US contacted our company for a tech solution. He was trying to get prison inmates to work as call center workers. After seeing our surprise, he described to us what was happening to poor people, mainly Blacks and Hispanics in USA. And he suggested we read Matt Taibbi's book to understand the clientele of our solution. He primarily worked with the victims depicted in the book. Eventually the project didn't work out for some reason, but it opened my eyes to what was happening.

Originally Posted by VKumar

Seriously, many have left but still India isn't having a dearth of talent.

Yes, we don't have dearth of talent. But we severely lack in good education system. And it is getting worse every year.

Originally Posted by VKumar

we have people here who are more qualified and sharper than them and they are happily living with the bad cops, reservations and highly polluted cities.

This is not true. How can we have highly sharpened and more qualified people here when we have zero universities in the top 100 in the world. Here is the ranking of the Indian universities in the top 500.



Just 8 of them, the top most being at 172th rank. The first 7 are IITs whose graduates mostly leave the country. Even if they don't, these 8 schools don't represent even 1% of the colleges in India. How are we supposed to train our kids to world standards?

Here is a study that was reported just yesterday.

A study has found that Russian and Chinese engineering students are better than those in India. Indian students make substantial gains in mathematics and critical thinking skills in the first two years of their education compared to their counterparts in China and Russia, but their overall higher-order thinking skills are substantially lower than the Chinese and Russians. This is the preliminary finding of learning outcome assessment of undergraduate engineering students conducted by Stanford Un ..

[amitoj]

Originally Posted by Samurai

Few years ago, a social worker in US contacted our company for a tech solution. He was trying to get prison inmates to work as call center workers. After seeing our surprise, he described to us what was happening to poor people, mainly Blacks and Hispanics in USA.

Yes, the racial divide in US is still very much there and that continues to be an impediment for Blacks and Hispanics to prosper.

ProPublica has compiled a comprehensive list of articles that cover segregation, right from its roots to its impact today.

Reading Guide to Segregation in America

That way, I think we Indians (and Asians) are fortunate to have been spared the struggles that many non whites have suffered historically.

About the police, if I treat them with respect, they treat me with respect. And I don't need to spend a penny out of my pocket to get them to do their job.

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by FrozeninTime

Europe pay packet is less that is know fact, so issue is not of pay but to discharge your duty with diginity. If you follow news from India which I suppose you do, you would have come across strikes which are almost become a norm in some of the government hospitals as doctors beaten threatened, harassed for no fault of theirs. There are chronic shortages in drugs, equipments and blame goes to doctor not adminstration.



So in that context its better to emigrate to country which allows you to work with diginity.

You might want to do a bit of research. In western European countries such as the UK, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany we have seen a very similar pattern.

We have seen mass demonstrations, strikes and such for better pay, better working conditions, less stress, better work/life balance by just about all in the medical and also educational sector. We have seen nurses on strike, doctors only working weekend shifts, ambulance drivers only responding to death threatening situations. Walk outs etc.

Hospitals and especially ERs have permanent guards because of the violence against staff. We have seen ambulance and fire engine being attacked as they try and do their job. I recently watch a BBC documentary where gangs set fire to some cars or a house for no other reason than when the fire brigade turns up they would pelt them with stones etc.

Ambulance staff faces daily abuse and sometimes physical threats as they try and go about their business. It ridiculous, very sad, if not to say repulsive.

So it is far from a rosey picture in this and adjacent sectors. Underpaid, overworked, under appreciated and often getting the full brunt of abuse sometimes physical from the public at large.

Many medical services are suffering from structural understaffing. To top it all due to our aging population the number of people needed to work in this sector is growing fast. What is happening is that the open, unfilled vacancies are going through the roof.

I cant judge where it is worse, but the main themes and issues are very similar.

Rough rule of thumb for western Europe, if you earn above 100K you find yourself in the top 1% earners. Its not that much different in the USA, albeit the USA has a larger bandwidth in lower and higher salaries, similar to India, although not as extreme.


Jeroen

[GutsyGibbon]

Originally Posted by amitoj

Yes, the racial divide in US is still very much there and that continues to be an impediment for Blacks and Hispanics to prosper.

That way, I think we Indians (and Asians) are fortunate to have been spared the struggles that many non whites have suffered historically.

More so for the Indians who came here to pursue higher education and landed jobs that have put them in the top 1%.

The rest of the masses have been fed the story of trickle down economics that is a massive fraud. There is a large part of the US population which would gladly enslave humans and continue to benefit from them without any guilt what-so-ever. It is heart breaking to see teachers posting their pay checks on social media and shedding tears, going on strike etc. While the IT workers (myself included) gleefully walk past these people into the top 1%, with cadillac insurance, and life in good neighborhoods.

All of my volunteering in black/hispanic neighborhoods have convinced me about how fortunate people like me have been. My heart breaks when these people are accused of free-loading, laziness and what not. US is certainly not a good example of a thriving society. It is a great success story for brainwashing, and controlling/ensuring poor people stay poor without revolting. If you are not convinced, please look at the total number of people in our prisons.

That I am able to live a happy life - does not mean the people of my country have a way/path to do well. I have participated actively in the last 6 US elections. Each time, I get incrementally disheartened at the state of the society, especially the state of the blacks and Hispanics. (policies directed towards them)

[vb-saan]

Originally Posted by VKumar

Thanks sir, neither we need your money nor we need your help. Sorry for a harsh tone.

Interesting read..! But It’s that you v/s me tone again. The reference of “we” here always amuse me

[ritz3645]

The US is called a Melting pot. People from all countries have migrated to this land across generation. The Miller high life common sense people in US are least bothered or have no idea of the status enjoyed by the US on the world stage or how world perceives the US. My information is strictly related to North America. Assimilation or becoming one takes time. Businesses wanted agility and Unions were a roadblock as seen during early Globalization days. The government their thought of Unions as the major impeding block also as Republican. Heck even Democrat were towing the same line during Obama.

Old world Europe plus Canada has the same problem, mainly Unions. Unions being hammered out (though not fully) started in the USA during Bush Junior years. The offshoring to Honduras or Mexico then China and India followed later. It is now an established trend even in India.

Someone mentioning 'of gladly enslave humans' may be referring to McDonald's corporation and it's saga, and may have no idea that deer/bear meat is what some Farmer in the US live on.

So what I wanted to say is we are just a product of our time and navigate our sails according to the environment, or a subject of change management. Who did what to become successful is a very different subject matter. Also success to each of us is different at each stages of life.

[Jomz]

Originally Posted by amitoj

Yes, the racial divide in US is still very much there and that continues to be an impediment for Blacks and Hispanics to prosper.

Obama is black. There is a racial divide, but it is not really bad.

[amitoj]

Originally Posted by Jomz

Obama is black. There is a racial divide, but it is not really bad.

Yeah but look who replaced him

But I agree with you. At least when it comes to how we are treated, there is hardly any discrimination, unless we go looking for it. What I mean by that is that I have a few friends who look at every interaction with the white folks through colored glasses. They see it where none exists, except in their mind.

[ninjatalli]

Originally Posted by Jomz

Obama is black. There is a racial divide, but it is not really bad.

Originally Posted by amitoj

But I agree with you.

It is bad if one is on the receiving (-ve) side of the bias. Apart from the odd stares and occasional comment, Indians are generally devoid of any major racism in the US; especially for those of us who come over on H1/L1/L2 visas with a pretty good pay package (top 5%-10%) and don't have to struggle that much.

But ask anyone who was born and brought up there (black/latino/brown); you probably will hear a much more clearer update.

Things are getting better; even with the current administration. I loved the point made by Jay-Z in a recent Letterman interview on how the current administration is bringing out the nastiness in people which was assumed as non-existent; and it is making people converse with each other and discuss on these problems.

Anyway this is discussion