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GREEN BACKS, GREEN CARDS AND OTHERS
February 18, 2001
In this age of informational economy, people with talent are the number one requirement for the progress of any country plus enough qualified labor force
All governments or private enterprises have tried their best to woo such talent and retain them. Among the measures taken so far are : high remuneration, free lodging, perks, early retirement programs, and permanent residency.
According to the Chinese legend, when Chang Chieh, a history-recording official of Emperor Hsuan Yuan (2697-2597 B.C.), invented Chinese CHARACTERS, ghosts started to cry; but, when Emperor Jing of Chou dynasty (544-519 B.C.) started to set up a mint to make money, ghosts started to smile. Evidently, people on earth or souls in in the nether world have at least one thing in common - they all love money. Therefore, high pay is a key to woo talents.
In the case of USA, high salary and the value of the U.S. dollar, or green backs (this word was coined since the Civil War, 1860 -1865 a.d., because that was the time the legal tender was printed in green on the back) have become a conspicuous motive of immigrants, including the knowledge workers needed in this country.
When an alien is in US, he or she does not have the right to work.
During 1965 - 1970, an official card, also in green color, started to be issued to aliens as a work card in this country. Such a privilege has been copied by other countries all over the world.
In the PRC, permanent residency, or the alike, is important to alien technicians because their visas need periodic renewal, placing great uncerntainty in longterm planning for those individuals.
One Interesting note to the issue of residency even concerns PRC's own nationals. For instance, millions of migrant workers in Beijing, Shentsen, Quandzhou, Shanghai--where jobs are more plentiful than rural areas or small cities--have to return every so often to their place of family registration (official domicile) because they do not have the right of continued residence in the place where they earn their living. In certain areas, without valid papers, those workers may not be allowed to pass the roadside checkpoints entering that area. Therefore, one comes to a surprising conclusion that factories, established at a place where labor supply is abundant, can enjoy the advantage of stabilized labor supply over even that of big cities.
If one wishes to work in China or to establish a factory there, they must either think of the PR or the labor supply. We shall be pleased to offer our ideas/advice to any of our interested readers.
E-mail: VJCHANG@hotmail.com
Tel/Fax USA : (301) 438-7439
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