The story has been told in various ways before.

A new migrant to Australia — already well-qualified with experience in prestigious jobs at home — has to contend with low-paying, insecure work as their qualifications do not exactly match up with Australian standards.

For those who have experienced this, it is a blunt reality, considering years of study and financial investment have at first not appeared to pay dividends.

But for a contingent of other migrants, the opportunity to throw off the shackles of white-collar work — and its high-pressure environment — is something to be relished.

Edwin and Rita Kusuma are some of these people.

They are a married couple from Indonesia who swapped office work for bus driving when they moved to Sydney from Jakarta.

Ms Kusuma told the ABC you do not need academic smarts to live a "decent life". ( Supplied: Rita Kusuma )

Previously, Mr Kusuma worked as an IT officer at Bank Indonesia for eight years, while Ms Kusuma was the head of finance for an electricity distribution company.

For Ms Kusuma, earning a living as one of Sydney's bus drivers gave her the freedom a white-collar job did not — this work was flexible, and gave her more opportunities to spend time with family.

She told the ABC's Indonesian service bus driving meant she did not have to manage piling office assignments, or was expected to work overtime without pay.

"[These] things make us think work is fun," Ms Kusuma said.

But when news of her career switch in Australia reached home, things did not exactly go well with her family in Jakarta.

Some family members were "disparaging" about her choice, she says, with one relative alleging she had brought "embarrassment" to her ancestors.

She added that because having a high-profile job title in Indonesia gave people pride, job prestige becomes something to strive for.

'Curiosity has made me stop thinking about prestige'

Lan Anh Hoang, a senior lecturer in development studies at the University of Melbourne, told the ABC familial "embarrassment" over someone's career was partly explained by some Asian societies' perception of someone's success impacting on the whole family.

"The family might not expect any economic benefit from [their relative's] success in Australia, but it's a status enhancement — it brings honour and prestige to the family," she said.

She explained this prestige was imbued in jobs perceived to bring economic stability, such as engineering, accounting, or business.

Even for people such as Anh Do — a Vietnamese-Australian multi-disciplinary artist who starred in ABC TV's Anh's Brush with Fame — Ms Hoang said he was still seen by many in the Vietnamese-Australian community as the "exception to the rule".

Anh Do has broken the traditional career expectations of Australia's Vietnamese diaspora. ( ABC TV: Anh's Brush With Fame )

Negative perceptions about non-traditional careers are found even within Ms Hoang's classes, with some of her Vietnamese-Australian students reporting their parents were "not happy" they were in her course, because development studies is perceived to "generate little income".

"The prospect of becoming a multi-million-dollar business person and someone rising to the top of society [via development studies] is very limited," she said.

Roydeh Lingkum is another migrant to Australia who has had to swat away criticism from back home for his career switch.

The 29-year-old Melbourne-based baker was previously a roadwork maintenance supervisor in Sabah, Malaysia, which put him in control over a number of employees.

Mr Lingkum told the ABC he had chosen "not to care" about the negative comments from family in Malaysia and focus on his new job's opportunities for growth.

"I don't really care what people say as long as I can be independent," he said.

"My curiosity about the jobs and opportunities in Australia has made me stop thinking about [career] prestige."

Roydeh Lingkum ditched being a roadwork supervisor in Malaysia (left) to become a baker in Australia. ( Supplied: Roydeh Lingkum )

He added that outside of his family, not many people had criticised his career switch, given that Australian wages were high for roles that would not be considered prestigious in Malaysia.

"In Sabah, I think as long as you make good money, they don't care about what you do," he said.

What happens when people aren't happy?

While there may be some migrants happy with the lower-skilled work they have found in Australia, there are also countless stories of migrants who have had to downgrade their skillset to find paid work in Australia.

Lina Cabaero, a coordinator at Asian Women at Work (AWatW) — a non-profit group advocating for better working conditions of Australia's female Asian migrants — told the ABC there were plenty of people in her organisation who had to trade down their skillset when they emigrated to Australia.

"Occupational downgrading is what I call it," Ms Cabaero said.

She said one AWatW member was a Chinese medical doctor who spoke Russian and Mandarin, but because her English skills were low, she ended up becoming an outworker in the garment industry.

The opportunity gap Migrants who've settled in Australia in the last 10 years are more likely to rate career opportunities as a problem for them personally

Migrants who've settled in Australia in the last 10 years are more likely to rate career opportunities as a problem for them personally 57 per cent of recent migrants say career opportunities are a problem, compared with 44 per cent of Australians born here

57 per cent of recent migrants say career opportunities are a problem, compared with 44 per cent of Australians born here 68 per cent of recent migrants say they'd be happier with a better job, compared with 41 per cent of Australians born here Source: the Australia Talks National Survey

Another member, Sophie, told the ABC she had been a machine designer back in China but, due to linguistic barriers, she became a factory process worker, then a hotel housekeeper upon her arrival to Australia.

She explained that while she had "never" worked a blue-collar role in China, she "had no choice" because she was raising a family.

Ms Cabaero added the Australian Government "doesn't really capture" the skillset of people moving Australia who obtain residency through spousal or family visas.

In a response to the ABC about Ms Cabaero's claims, a spokesperson for the Minister for Employment, Skills, and Small and Family Business told the ABC the Government had "placed a stronger focus on employer-sponsored migration programs where visa applicants are job matched as a condition of visa grant".

Is job prestige worth sacrificing family time?

The drawbacks of prestigious, white-collar work prove to be too much for some. ( Supplied )

But for those who do not get into the careers they have trained for, the prospect of starting from the bottom and working up can have long-lasting impacts, especially for the first-born Australian children of migrants.

Findings from the 2017/18 Multicultural Youth Australia Census from the University of Melbourne — which surveyed about 1,920 multicultural Australian youth aged between 15–25 — found social mobility was a primary concern among survey respondents if their parents remained in low-skilled work.

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"Because my parents aren't very established here and don't have people that they know, and because they both work at relatively 'low' jobs such as factory worker and part time hospitality worker, it is hard to know how to get work or where to get work," one respondent said.

Another respondent said their migrant background placed their job prospects "at a disadvantage" compared to their peers who had more established ties to the Australian community.

But the picture of Australian social mobility is a lot more complex, and for migrants such as Sydney's Ms Kusuma, bus driving is guaranteeing her children "the dreams they want to pursue without any pressures".

She explained family back home could not see that Australia still provided a high quality of life for those who were not academically successful, and that even if she wanted to head back to the office, it would involve "more time and money".

"I just think this way: 'What is the high job title or position for, if you almost don't have time for your family or parents?'"

The Australia Talks National Survey asked 54,000 Australians about their lives and what keeps them up at night. Use our interactive tool to see the results and how their answers compare with yours.

Then, tune in at 8.30pm on November 18, as the ABC hosts a live TV event with some of Australia's best-loved celebrities exploring the key findings of the Australia Talks National Survey.

Read the story in Indonesian here.

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