expatriate and permanent resident wife

[san diego 407]

I would take the job and just file later. Get an AP and EAD within 90 days of arrival back in the US and all is well. Since you know when your contract will be over, you can probably even have her another GC ready to go upon reentry (and loss of another grand). Who knows, you both may really enjoy it and never come back.

Is the actual idea of citizenship the most important? Then I would say stay, but otherwise go for it. I understand LPR is significantly different than USC, but for all practical purposes of daily life it's basically the same thing as far as legal rights to live and earn a wage.

I'm sort of in a similar position and I'm personally just looking at emigrating permanently.

PS, don't forget about your US tax obligation overseas. A "very lucrative" pharma offer will almost certainly be over the deduction so you will owe a 5% marginal rate over whatever the deduction is in a certain year. It's somewhere near $100k at this point, so it can definitely trap a lot of people who do well but are certainly not wealthy. Penalties for non declarations of foreign bank accounts amount to half the value of the largest undeclared account per year. Basically, if you're not careful with the IRS they can legally bankrupt you if you live overseas.

Thanks for the pointer. Very important!