Russia for immigrants: hell or heaven?

http://www.russiatoday.com/news/news/25202

There are fears in some parts of Russia that illegal immigration may grow unless official quotas are increased. Millions of migrants, mostly from former-soviet republics, live and work in Russia. Several regions have already reached their quota for foreign workers.

Moscow is a magnet for workers as it’s seen as the best place to earn a living both by migrants and Russians. So the jobs Muscovites shun, usually in low paid service industries, are taken up by those from the country’s other regions and the CIS states.  

Many say there is nothing to do in their own republics as there are no prospects there – this is the view Armenian Aleksandr Aleksanyan, a cook in a Moscow restaurant, also shares. He moved to Russia’s capital together with his family seven years ago.

Despite irregular working hours and a salary much lower than that of the locals, he would never go back. His boss Oleg Ermolaev is happy with Aleksandr, but could do with more like him. It’s this kind of employers who apply to the immigration service to allow them to hire migrant workers.