IT Professionals and most other white collar jobs are draft exempted in Russia [0]
To make up for the unfairness, mobilized Russian soldiers are being paid Russian/Eastern European white collar level salaries ($2,500/mo) [1]
The issue is if you're a Russian contractor working for a western company, how is the western company supposed to pay you? Russia's banking system has been decoupled from the west, and even Asian banks in China and India (major trading partners of Russia) are hesitant to fill the gap out of fears of secondary sanctions.
If you want to earn dollars, best to move to a Russian speaking country that isn't sanctioned like Kazakhstan, Georgia, or Bulgaria or to an easy to move country for Russians like Turkiye, Serbia, UAE, etc.
>> This was about them getting paid fat paychecks from western clients/employers not out of draft fears.
> Not a new phenom, whereas the draft is.
Russian techies started to leave immediately following the invasion that started in Feb 2022, because Western firms put in policies forbidding anyone in Russia from having access to their systems due to security concerns. If they were working for or contracting with those firms and stayed in Russia, they'd lose their jobs.
It looks like Putin first announced the draft in Sept. 21, 2022, but by then the techies working for or contracting with Western firms had already left or quit.
IT Professionals and most other white collar jobs are draft exempted in Russia [0]
To make up for the unfairness, mobilized Russian soldiers are being paid Russian/Eastern European white collar level salaries ($2,500/mo) [1]
The issue is if you're a Russian contractor working for a western company, how is the western company supposed to pay you? Russia's banking system has been decoupled from the west, and even Asian banks in China and India (major trading partners of Russia) are hesitant to fill the gap out of fears of secondary sanctions.
If you want to earn dollars, best to move to a Russian speaking country that isn't sanctioned like Kazakhstan, Georgia, or Bulgaria or to an easy to move country for Russians like Turkiye, Serbia, UAE, etc.
[0] - https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-excludes-some-it...
[1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/31/opinion/russia-ukraine-wa...
> To make up for the unfairness, mobilized Russian soldiers are being paid Russian/Eastern European white collar level salaries ($2,500/mo) [1]
$2500/mo is way higher than I would have thought they were paying these soldiers.
They're only paying the surviving ones. Also they're conveniently delaying payments and benefits to the families of the deceased.
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https://youtu.be/t-VUAeRMGQU?si=0wNOnWtIiTBYh2XR&t=287
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Not all IT professionals are exempt, you have to have an university degree. Most do, but a sizeable minority doesn't.
>>> most Russian techies left
>> This was about them getting paid fat paychecks from western clients/employers not out of draft fears.
> Not a new phenom, whereas the draft is.
Russian techies started to leave immediately following the invasion that started in Feb 2022, because Western firms put in policies forbidding anyone in Russia from having access to their systems due to security concerns. If they were working for or contracting with those firms and stayed in Russia, they'd lose their jobs.
It looks like Putin first announced the draft in Sept. 21, 2022, but by then the techies working for or contracting with Western firms had already left or quit.