Tech nomads: Globe-trotting families journey to the Bay Area, going where the gigs are

The San Jose Mercury News reports:

Dad is from Poland, mom comes from the Philippines, and the kids think of Scotland as home. For now, they live in Fremont.

The globe-trotting adventure of the Kruczek family is one part of the story of H-1B and other visas that rarely gets told. With the high-tech industry’s well known reliance on international workers, the corresponding rise in nomadic global families is changing not just the course of their lives but also the nature of communities.

Highly skilled foreign workers with in-demand specialties come to the Bay Area, long one of the most diverse places in the country, for high salaries and career challenges and often bring their families with them. More than 70 percent of tech employees in the Valley are now foreign born, according to a new report based on 2016 census data. But for many, the journey will not end here. Instead, they’ll put in a few years and then move on to the next country.

“Immigrants used to stay here or go back home, but the shifting economy has created a class of workers who are multinational. They are no longer tethered to one country,” says Professor Anna Sampaio, a specialist in immigration and transnationalism at Santa Clara University. “They are really global workers.”

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