1) It is very likely true that some, if not all, foreign companies do discriminate against prospective employees. The legislation protecting workers does not seem very strong. Employers ask all kinds of questions of employees that would be the basis of a discrimination suit in the West. This applies to the mention above of only hiring women of a certain age. Women are routinely asked if they are married, if they are planning to have children, because companies want to avoid hiring women that will quit or take leave to have children. Of course, with the previously admirable law on maternity leave gutted this is less of a motivating factor now.

2). Without knowing the specifics it is impossible to judge, but just saying $5000 is a “big difference” is not particularly revealing. How much was that in percentage terms? What were the relative qualifications?

3) Local salaries have gone up quite a lot. However, the demands of qualified local employees have gone up quite faster than I think many companies expected. By now, quite honestly, I’d have expected that expatriates in Kazakhstan would be relegated to the status of owners, investors and possibly top management, as local employees would pick up the slack in all other positions. So far it seems this hasn’t happened; instead, what has happened is that without necessarily increasing their qualifications much, local salary demands have increased on a par with expatriates and kept foreign workers competetive.