All statements in this article have reliable sources of information, and are described at the end of the article.
The dream pursuit.
Editor of Dreams.
Preliminary
In the second half of 2025, the global labour market will explode!
On the one hand, in the nursing home in Hokkaido, Japan, the nursing worker pushed a wheelchair and ran wildly in the corridor, followed by three old people waiting to change their dressing. The dean yelled at the phone: If no one comes again, we will stop!
On the other side is the Russian Siberian factory, the welding equipment has accumulated a layer of thin ashes, the director of the workshop holds the list: the three-packed flow lines, now even the two groups are not aligned!
Just as they were overwhelmed, the two countries turned their sights to the same place almost simultaneously: India.
Japan had just raised a demand for 50,000 technical talents, and Russia directly raised a "big order" of 3 million. However, what people didn't expect was that India panicked first.
The contractor at the domestic high-speed rail construction site squatted on the ground and cursed: All the skilled welders have been poached abroad. When will this bridge pier be built?
The world is in a "battle for people", and India happens to be at the center of the storm. Isn't India always said that "there are so many people that they become a burden"? How did it suddenly become a "hot potato" that people are competing for?
Japan needs 50,000 technicians
Japan's "aging" has long been news, but no one expected it to be so serious.
In the first half of 2025, the data came out, even the Japanese government was unable to sit down: in half a year, the net population decreased by 500,000, children were born less than 34,000, and the elderly died more than 830,000.
What is this concept? It is equivalent to a medium-sized town "disappearing" every month. The biggest headache is the service industry, especially elderly care and medical care.
The head of a hospital in Tokyo revealed that now in the clinic, a nurse should take care of eight elderly people, even during the meal time must hold the medical calendar, let alone on time.
The hospital has no way but to urgently open Japanese training courses, specializing in teaching foreigners the basic care terms, but even so, willing people are still less poor.
The sensitivity of the Japanese people to immigrants was not a day or two, "immigration" in Japanese public opinion is almost "mining area", so this time to introduce Indians, the government specifically changed the term, called "exchange of technical talents", and added a bunch of restrictions.
If you can't bring your family, the contract will be signed for five years, and you have to leave when it expires. Anyone with a discerning eye can see that this is the "buffer" that is afraid of causing public dissatisfaction.
But there were still protests, and some people marched on the streets of Osaka with the sign "Japan is Japan for the Japanese", and social networks were more bustling.
Some people have turned Mount Fuji P into a bowl of steaming curry rice, while others have joked that in a few years, Tokyo Bay will be renamed a tributary of the Ganges River.
The Japanese government has no end in the heart, these 50,000 say it is a "experimental product", if society can accept, then it may be increased; but once there is a little mess, the whole foreign labor policy may have to turn the car.
Russia: 3 million labor shortage
On the other hand, Japan is still bracing for 50,000, and Russia is already rushing like ants on a hot pot, and the 3 million labor shortage is not the number of words, but 4% of the total Russian working population.
Why are there so many people missing? The Russia-Ukraine War was an unavoidable reason. Many young laborers were either recruited into the army or simply took their families to other countries. The traditional "labor aid" Central Asian workers were also unreliable.
In the past, Central Asian people were willing to work in Russia because they could earn a lot more money than their hometown. But now that Central Asian countries have developed themselves, many people would rather find work at home than go to war-torn places. Take risks.
Russia has no choice but to put its hopes on India, which has seen the urgency of Russia’s move over the past two years: the visa policy has been relaxed, before it has to wait half a month for a work visa, and now it can go down a week.
Some areas have also specially opened "green channels for labor", and Indian workers can apply for temporary residence permits when they land; Even the Russian Embassy has set up a labor hotline to answer Indian inquiries.
What is even more exaggerated is that many Russian companies directly send teams to Indian states to recruit workers. At job fairs in Delhi and Mumbai, there are always long queues in front of the booths of Russian companies.
The staff took Russian textbooks and promised job seekers that "as long as they are willing to learn, they will teach and learn, and their salary will be three times that of India".
India is in a dilemma
But India also has its own problem, not that someone wants to, can send the past immediately, Russia needs to know the technology, able to handle workers, such as electrical welders, mechanical repair workers, all of which have to pass professional training.
Although India has held a lot of training courses, Trengen state has also set up courses specifically for the Russian market, to teach both Russian language, and to practice technology, even the safety standards of Russian factories to learn, the training effect is not instantaneous.
A teacher from a training institution complained: Many students don't even know basic circuit knowledge. If they want to meet Russian standards, they have to practice for at least half a year, but enterprises can't wait that long.
What is even more troublesome is the "labor shortage" in India. In recent years, India has been engaged in infrastructure construction, high-speed rail, industrial parks, and power grid transformation. Which one doesn't need people?
Previously, the person in charge of a high-speed rail project in India complained that half of the 200 skilled welders had been hired were hired by Russian companies, and now the construction period has to be delayed.
For the workers, wherever they go to work, it is like a mirror in their hearts, working in India, earning 30,000 rupees more a month, going to Russia can get 100,000 rupees, even if it is to learn Russian, to adapt to the climate, is more expensive than at home.
But as a result, India's own projects have no work, creating a embarrassing situation of "struggle abroad, not enough domestically".
Modi's Prophecy Became Real
In fact, all this a decade ago Modi anticipated, in 2014 Modi just came to power, and put forward the concept of "global Indians", when many people thought it was an empty slogan, but now look at, Modi is really in this thinking layout.
India treats its labor force as a "national asset" and has built dozens of language and vocational skills training centers in the country, tailoring courses completely to the needs of overseas markets.
Study Arabic and construction in the Middle East, study Japanese and care in Japan, and specialize in Russian and industrial technology in Russia.
How mature is this system? Data in 2024 show that India's labor force working overseas has exceeded 11 million, and the money these people send back to China every year is even more frightening. In 2022, it will be US $108 billion, accounting for a large part of India's foreign exchange earnings.
For Modi, this is not only an economic account, but also a political account!Exporting labor can alleviate the unemployment pressure at home; there are more Indians abroad, and more “speech” internationally.
For example, in Silicon Valley in the United States, there are an increasing number of Indian-American executives, and many policies will consider India's interests; in the Middle East, Indian workers support the local construction industry, and cooperation between India and Middle Eastern countries is becoming closer and closer.
There are also many problems behind it, the most worrying is the "talent emptiness", high-end talents cultivated in India, such as AI researchers, doctors, many of them went abroad.
Only 1 percent of the world’s top 8 percent of AI researchers are from India, and only 1 percent can stay in India; India is the world’s largest exporter of doctors, with about 70,000 India-trained doctors going to Europe and the United States.
It's not that the Modi government is unaware of this problem, and it has also launched many talent introduction programs, promising to provide scientific research funds and housing subsidies to returning talents, but the results are not satisfactory.
Some AI researchers said frankly, "If you have access to the most advanced technology abroad, your salary is ten times that of India. Unless there is a qualitative change in India's scientific research environment, it will be difficult to go back."
There are also those Indians who go abroad through informal channels. Life is even more difficult!
In order to go abroad, someone sought an intermediary for a holiday marriage, and it was discovered that the "bride" was shared by several people, the money was spent, the visa was not yet obtained, someone used the IELTS template was confused, and the high-rated note was taken abroad, and even customs questions were not understood.
What's more, some people choose to smuggle, cross snow-capped mountains and deserts, avoid border patrols along the way, and beware of gangs. Many people either disappear halfway or are caught and repatriated.
The U.S. Immigration Bureau has also engaged in "fishing law enforcement", opened home fake universities to attract Indians who want to cheat their visas, and finally caught more than two hundred, but this is only the tip of the iceberg.
What should India choose?
Now the global situation is obvious, the developed countries lack of people, developing countries have Indians, seemingly perfect "supply and demand match", but there are little contradictions in it.
Japan is afraid that more Indians will affect local culture, Russia is afraid that it will not be able to recruit enough skilled workers, and India is afraid that domestic talent will be drained and infrastructure will be dragged down.
To put it bluntly, this "melee of robbing people" is a game without smoke. Whoever can balance the interests of all parties will have the last laugh.
Modi's "Global Indians" prophecy at the time, now seems to be true, but whether it is good or bad, it has to be seen in the future.
If India can retain high-end talents while exporting labor and supplement the shortcomings of the local industry, it can turn the “demographic dividend” into a “development dividend.”
But if only looking at the interests ahead, ignoring the domestic demand, it may end up picking up the weed and losing the cabbage.
In the next few years, the global popularity of "grabbing people" will only get higher and higher. Whether India can seize this opportunity is not only related to the fate of tens of millions of Indians, but also affects the global labor structure.
After all, in this era of "shortage of people", whoever has enough high-quality labor force has the initiative of development, and India has obviously stood at this critical crossroads.
References:
Top News: 2025-10-11,"Russia is facing a labor shortage of 3 million, and India plans to send a large number of skilled workers to Russia"
2025-10-01 Japan becomes the “American Dream” of Indians?