Expatriates’ life satisfaction and their willingness to stay longer in Malaysia

Chuie-Hong Tan, Multimedia University Cyberjaya, Malaysia
A. S. Santhapparaj, Multimedia University Cyberjaya, Malaysia

Malaysia is an important destination country for skilled migrants. Skilled workers accounted for 9.4 per cent of the foreigners working in Malaysia. This study presents the life satisfaction of expatriates in four domains. Their willingness to stay longer in Malaysia is also analyzed. The investigation was carried out using self-administered questionnaires. Binary logistic regression is used to examine the determinants of expatriates’ willingness to stay longer. For the mean values of the satisfaction scores, the expatriates in Malaysia are relatively satisfied with their job, followed by local people and culture, living environment and lastly, community facilities. Age, marital status, previous migration experience and industry involvement increase the expatriates’ probability of staying longer in Malaysia. Policy makers and service providers would be able to gain a better insight on the type of initiatives and services that could improve the well being of the expatriates and retain them.