With the economy in recession, Chinese immigrants are flocking back to China. But with even highly educated professionals struggling to find work back in the homeland, working-class Chinese are caught between a rock and a hard place when it comes to making that decision – stay or leave?

The financial crisis has taken the wind out of the economy’s sails, and Chinese restaurants across the country have seen their profits plummet. Laid-off restaurant workers are flooding back to New York to seek jobs, and employment agencies in Chinese communities are mobbed. Yet there is a serious shortage of job opportunities.

Chen Hui, a Fujianese immigrant seeking work at the Forsyth Street employment agency yesterday, said that he was fired from a Chinese restaurant in Tennessee in November and returned to New York, but still cannot find a job. Immigrants in such a predicament are ubiquitous, crowding the employment agencies of Chinatown.

Chen said that he had considered returning to his home in Fuzhou, but at the thought of the several tens of thousands of dollars in debt he incurred in order to illegally enter the States, he decided to stay. But with no job opportunities and no way of earning money, he will have considerable trouble repaying his debt on time.

Steven Wong, president of the Lin Ze Xu Foundation, says that many Chinese undocumented immigrants lack education and skills outside of the food service industry. With the Chinese restaurant industry reeling from the blow of the financial crisis, employment opportunities have decreased, and those immigrants have difficulty finding new work quickly and cannot easily change occupations.

Jenny Chan, president of the Fuzhou American Council, explains that many Chinese immigrants got tens of thousands of dollars into debt in order to come to the United States, and even if they return home they may still have difficulty finding suitable employment. But the greater problem is that with a typical income in China, it would be almost impossible to repay such a debt. Remaining in the United States is essentially their only choice.

Shi Dongsheng, a recent immigrant from Changle in Fuzhou who has been looking for work at the Eldridge Street employment agency for two weeks straight, says that he has been in the United States for more than a year, and he still has $50,000 in debts to friends and high-interest loans he took out in order to reach the United States. Now with no job and no legal identification, he has squandered a fortune for nothing, he says. But if he were to return to China, he worries that he would be unable to repay his massive debts. After much deliberation, he decided to remain in the United States, because after all American dollars are worth more than Chinese yuan.

Many new Chinese immigrants say that in the United States they are limited to a small number of occupations, such as food service and construction, but if they were to return to China their incomes would be even lower and their situations even more precarious. So, although they are homesick, they have no choice but to remain in America.