Salary concerns renew H-1B visa opposition
By Ed Frauenheim
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
October 6, 2005 4:00 AM PDT
As offshore outsourcing boomed in recent years, the protracted controversy over the embattled H-1B immigrant labor program finally seemed to subside as U.S. jobs were exported overseas and theoretically lessened the need for foreign workers.
Yet nearly 15 years after its inception under the Immigration Act of 1990, the program remains in full force and headed for new battles. Just last month, the Indian government made a proposal to the World Trade Organization, demanding that the annual cap for H-1B visas be raised from 65,000 to 195,000.
The pivotal question: If jobs are leaving U.S. shores, is the program still needed?
"The law should specify a minimum salary (for H-1B workers), above the median wage of comparable U.S. workers." president, Programmers Guild
The H-1B program was created to keep U.S. companies competitive in the global economy by allowing them to hire professionals from other countries. Industry leaders argue that the program serves as a brake on offshoring by easing shortages in skilled labor within U.S. borders.
Critics, however, have long maintained that the program is ripe for abuse and serves only to replace American workers with cheap foreign labor. Despite safeguards to prevent employers from paying anything less than the prevailing wage for a given job, opponents say loopholes are routinely exploited.
H-1B visas allow skilled foreign workers into the United States for up to six years. The permits have generated heated disputes in the tech arena, where many of the visas are used. In 2003, 39 percent of H-1B visas approved were for workers in computer-related occupations.
Concerns about the program are being raised anew after a recent study examined federal data to rank the lowest-paying employers of H-1B computer workers last year. The Programmers Guild, an advocacy group for U.S. technology workers, claims to have found new evidence indicating that H-1Bs in computer occupations are being paid relatively little by a lot of employers--raising the prospect that visas are being used to hire cheap workers who threaten U.S. jobs and wages.
The median annual wage paid in the United States to workers in computer and math occupations was $62,620 in May 2004, according to the Department of Labor. Among companies seeking at least 100 H-1B visas last year, many employers planned to pay substantially less than that amount, according to the Programmers Guild report.
Of 100 employers in the category that planned to pay the lowest salaries, the report said, none intended to offer more than an average of $48,355 a year. Seventy-four of these companies pledged to pay an average salary of less than $45,820--a figure in the 25th percentile for U.S. math and computer workers.
H-1B rules require employers to provide at least the prevailing wage for the position or the actual rate the employer pays to similar workers--whichever is higher. The study focused on documents called Labor Condition Applications (Click for PDF), for which employers must state the minimum wage they plan to pay H-1B workers.
The Programmers Guild does not accuse the companies of violating H-1B wage rules. Instead, the guild's findings point to a flaw in the program that benefits employers, Programmers Guild President Kim Berry said.
"The law lets them use so many sources to determine prevailing wage," said Berry, whose organization reportedly has 1,000 members. "The law should specify a minimum salary, above the median wage of comparable U.S. workers."
Defenders of H-1B visas deny that it is a cheap-labor program, noting that a number of changes made to the law last year were designed to make it tougher to exploit workers. Companies are now required to pay 100 percent of the prevailing wage, up from 95 percent, and the Labor Department's investigative power has been strengthened.
But critics maintain that another change in the law last year, one involving surveys used to determine the prevailing wage, worsened the wage problem. The shift increases the number of wage levels in surveys from two to four, a change Berry said makes it easier for unscrupulous employers to pay a low wage by categorizing experienced H-1B workers as novices.
Employers can also choose a job title with a lower pay level, said Norm Matloff, a computer science professor at the University of California at Davis.
"Hire a programmer as a 'system analyst' instead of under a 'software engineer' title," said Matloff, who strongly opposes the H-1B program. "Either one can mean programmer, but the 'system analyst' people tend to be the IBM mainframers, i.e., people who don't have the hot skills and thus who tend to have lower salaries."
"I don't think it's an Indian issue. Ultimately, it's an issue of economics." U.S.-India Political Action Committee
Conflict over H-1B visas is, in some ways, a white-collar version of the debate over immigrant workers who do much of the manual labor in the United States in industries such as agriculture and restaurants. Although H-1B workers come to America legally, unlike some of their usually less-educated counterparts, opinions have clashed about whether the visas are providing a way for companies to avoid paying higher wages to domestic workers.
Circa the dot-com boom, the H-1B system was rocked by reports of corruption. Technology staffing firms, sometimes called body shops, allegedly were trafficking workers from other countries. The Programmers Guild sees its study as a sign that body shops abusing the program are alive and well--even as American tech professionals are trying to recover from years of layoffs in what seems to be a tepid hiring climate.
Moreover, the guild said, the study reinforces the notion that the H-1B program benefits primarily India-based employers operating in the United States, not American companies.
The organization's report says the lowest-paying companies are "disproportionately run by Indian nationals." It added that some Indian-run firms are "hiring almost exclusively young Indian nationals to displace American workers in our own country."
"There's a clear connection between the Indian diaspora in the United States, the use of H-1B and offshore outsourcing." "Outsourcing America"
The research shows that nearly 37 percent of H-1B approvals in 2003 were for workers born in India. Berry estimates that 18 or 19 of the 20 lowest-paying employers, among companies seeking at least 100 visas, are led by Indian citizens or U.S. citizens of Indian descent.
To make this claim, the guild did not conduct an exhaustive study of the companies on its list. Its analysis of the employers' leadership is based largely on a review of surnames and where companies have operations.
Berry denied any ethnic bias in his group's research, defending its methodology as a way to illuminate what he sees as a chief problem of the visa program: tech staffing firms bringing over low-paid H-1B workers even when qualified U.S. employees are available.
"This is a niche that Indians have developed," he said. "It helps to understand the problem to point out what the data shows. Body shops are essentially onshore offshoring."
Sanjay Puri, chairman of the U.S.-India Political Action Committee, acknowledged that Indians or Indian Americans own many of the companies that hire H-1B workers. But he said abuse is unlikely because visa holders have many more options today than in earlier years, when their plight was often likened to indentured servitude.
Indian H-1B holders not only can change employers in the United States but also have more opportunities back home, as India emerges as a tech powerhouse, said Puri, a U.S. citizen who also leads a technology services company.
"They are smart enough to move around. They might come in at low wages, but they're not staying at low wages," he said. "These guys can have five different job opportunities from companies in India."
Indeed, many Indians have taken leadership roles in the U.S. tech industry. Research by AnnaLee Saxenian of the University of California at Berkeley found that in 1998, Indian engineers were running more than 775 technology companies in Silicon Valley.
Even if tech jobs are multiplying in Bangalore and Mumbai, U.S. guest worker visas are important to India-based firms and the Indian government. And in today's global economy, businesses that thrive overseas can have benefits for U.S. companies as well.
"If U.S. immigration laws change and make it more difficult for us to obtain H-1B and L-1 visas for our employees, our ability to compete for and provide services to clients in the United States could be impaired," India-based tech services giant Wipro Technologies wrote in a public filing this month. (The L-1 is another type of work visa.)
Others insist that the use of guest worker visas by India-based tech firms has helped promote offshoring. Members of the Indian-American community have learned to use the H-1B program to do tech work through the visas and send some of the work offshore, said Ron Hira, a professor at Rochester Institute of Technology and co-author of the book "Outsourcing America."
"There's a clear connection between the Indian diaspora in the United States, the use of H-1B and offshore outsourcing," said Hira, who is of Indian descent.
Like the Programmers Guild, he, too, has found evidence that some large India-based tech companies seeking H-1B visas proposed to pay lower wages than their U.S. counterparts.
But Hira said critics of the H-1B program should focus more on the evidence that many companies appear to be paying disproportionately low salaries, instead of singling out a specific group. "That's the important outcome of the study, rather than what country the owners of the companies are from," he said.
Puri agreed. "I don't think it's an Indian issue," he said. "Ultimately, it's an issue of economics." 
In 1998, Congress created special rules for companies that relied heavily on H-1B visas in an effort to curtail the abusive practices of "body shops"--companies that specialize in the recruitment and placement of foreign programmers at U.S. businesses, often at low wages and under restrictive contracts.
Rules specific to these so-called H-1B-dependent companies expired in 2003, and new legal provisions are attempting to address the problem again. But critics say they don't go far enough.
As before, these employers must promise that they offered their positions to equally qualified U.S. workers before seeking the visas. They also must make pledges designed to prevent the displacement of U.S. workers.
There are exceptions, however. H-1B-dependent employers do not have to worry about recruiting, hiring or displacing U.S. employees if the guest workers have master's or doctorate degrees in fields related to the jobs in question or if they are paid at least $60,000 a year.
Critics note that the $60,000 threshold was set in 1998 and hasn't been adjusted to keep pace with inflation or the salaries of U.S. tech professionals, effectively making it easier for employers to bring in more foreign workers. The U.S. cost of living has risen 19 percent since then, and the average annual salary of computer programmers in the United States climbed 23 percent between 1998 and May 2004 (the latest available statistic), to $65,910.
New H-1B visas still available
Visa program may aid foreign companies
Gates wants to scrap H-1B visa restrictions
Guest worker visas come under fire
In the eye of the H-1B visa storm
'Body shop' must pay fees in H-1B lawsuit
IT groups push Congress to raise H-1B visa limits
Immigrant wives' visa status keeps them out of workplace
Flow of valued workers is slowed
Techies to wait longer for green card
Design: Ellen Ng
Production: Michelle White, Bernie McGinn
What happens today is really different - In an economy with strong trends and inclinations towards offshoring / outsourcing coupled with the limited H-1B cap, I'm seeing a lot of smart people coming out of our MITs, Stanfords and Harvards going back to India or wherever may be to start their their own companies to compete directly against the US. As a matter of fact a group of young lads who were top of their class at their respective Ivy schools working at my company later left the US to start their own offshoring company.
The bottom line - the H-1B is definitely a double edged sword - do you keep the best and the brightest in the country at the expense of US jobs or do you eject them (sometimes ones educated at our own institutions) for them to compete against the US economy and still hurt our employment statistics?
The interesting thing is: 35% of the H1-Bs reserved for U.S. advanced degree holders (20,000 total) were left unused even for FY2005; but the general H1-B category (60,000 total) has been filled up already for FY2006! This is a clear evidence that the H1-B program has been used to import cheap labors much more than to keep the talent here in U.S.
What happens today is really different - In an economy with strong trends and inclinations towards offshoring / outsourcing coupled with the limited H-1B cap, I'm seeing a lot of smart people coming out of our MITs, Stanfords and Harvards going back to India or wherever may be to start their their own companies to compete directly against the US. As a matter of fact a group of young lads who were top of their class at their respective Ivy schools working at my company later left the US to start their own offshoring company.
The bottom line - the H-1B is definitely a double edged sword - do you keep the best and the brightest in the country at the expense of US jobs or do you eject them (sometimes ones educated at our own institutions) for them to compete against the US economy and still hurt our employment statistics?
The interesting thing is: 35% of the H1-Bs reserved for U.S. advanced degree holders (20,000 total) were left unused even for FY2005; but the general H1-B category (60,000 total) has been filled up already for FY2006! This is a clear evidence that the H1-B program has been used to import cheap labors much more than to keep the talent here in U.S.
Imagine a kids that grows up in the worse conditions your can imagine. The parents are DIRT POOR. Works her ass off with very little help, just to get into HIGHSCHOOL. She make the grades and gets into college. She goes through college with tremendous acumen and talent. She is resourceful, tireless, and engaging. SHe got picked by one of the world's top technical firms and she goes to work.
Now imagine she is from South Africa.
We all have had our plights. We have all had to have a certain amount of luck to achieve the great things we are able to do daily. We ALL live in a global village, that shares not only information, but intertwines policy and economics as well. We are tied together as no other point in history. We have different laws, differnt pay rates, and different cultures. We are peaceful, and the funny part is that according this article we are mostly GEEKS!
H1B visas are just the beginning. We, as Americans, are finally learning what happens when we raise the majority of our population to be entertainment loving couch potatos. We love our sports, new cars, and plentiful food. We don't like to work our ***** off, we don't like political discourse, and we don't like books.
The problem is that a shift occuring, the service economy that we helped build here, shifting away from manufacturing to service based jobs is dependent on the very things we are beginning to noticably lag behind in.
So when an economy needs things where does it go? It trades/makes deals/adjusts itself to a temporary balancing point, and then it will do it again. That's what we are doing with the H1B visas. The answer isn't to stop the program, albeit it has holes(but show me a government run program that doesn't), the answer is much more complicated than a simple post to CNET will ever touch.
We need to understand that if we can't fill the wholes left by our lifestyle than someone else is really going to be happy doing it.
Every single company wants a piece of that, and the effect is like a tidal wave that sweeps capital investment from one country to another, bringing a flood of prosperity (with an undercurrent of hope-driven exploitation) to be followed by an urban desert when the tide moves on. Smart countries erect ***** to manage the flow and protect the infrastructure of the land. The U.S. is not one of them, because we have given ourselves over to the global corporations.
Imagine a kids that grows up in the worse conditions your can imagine. The parents are DIRT POOR. Works her ass off with very little help, just to get into HIGHSCHOOL. She make the grades and gets into college. She goes through college with tremendous acumen and talent. She is resourceful, tireless, and engaging. SHe got picked by one of the world's top technical firms and she goes to work.
Now imagine she is from South Africa.
We all have had our plights. We have all had to have a certain amount of luck to achieve the great things we are able to do daily. We ALL live in a global village, that shares not only information, but intertwines policy and economics as well. We are tied together as no other point in history. We have different laws, differnt pay rates, and different cultures. We are peaceful, and the funny part is that according this article we are mostly GEEKS!
H1B visas are just the beginning. We, as Americans, are finally learning what happens when we raise the majority of our population to be entertainment loving couch potatos. We love our sports, new cars, and plentiful food. We don't like to work our ***** off, we don't like political discourse, and we don't like books.
The problem is that a shift occuring, the service economy that we helped build here, shifting away from manufacturing to service based jobs is dependent on the very things we are beginning to noticably lag behind in.
So when an economy needs things where does it go? It trades/makes deals/adjusts itself to a temporary balancing point, and then it will do it again. That's what we are doing with the H1B visas. The answer isn't to stop the program, albeit it has holes(but show me a government run program that doesn't), the answer is much more complicated than a simple post to CNET will ever touch.
We need to understand that if we can't fill the wholes left by our lifestyle than someone else is really going to be happy doing it.
Every single company wants a piece of that, and the effect is like a tidal wave that sweeps capital investment from one country to another, bringing a flood of prosperity (with an undercurrent of hope-driven exploitation) to be followed by an urban desert when the tide moves on. Smart countries erect ***** to manage the flow and protect the infrastructure of the land. The U.S. is not one of them, because we have given ourselves over to the global corporations.
During the "dotcom boom" PERHAPS the H1B program made some sense. Personally, I don't think so because even then lower paid labor was replacing skilled American workers. Can't blame the companies, they're only trying to save a buck. Blame Bill Clinton and Washington for caving to business special interest groups. Bush has been little better.
It's a travesty, and when you're living in an America that's no longer a tech superpower, you'll have only yourselves to blame...
During the "dotcom boom" PERHAPS the H1B program made some sense. Personally, I don't think so because even then lower paid labor was replacing skilled American workers. Can't blame the companies, they're only trying to save a buck. Blame Bill Clinton and Washington for caving to business special interest groups. Bush has been little better.
It's a travesty, and when you're living in an America that's no longer a tech superpower, you'll have only yourselves to blame...
Oh but let me guess you a stay at home mom of a multimillionaire who sells the soul of america to the lowest bidder...
Oh but let me guess you a stay at home mom of a multimillionaire who sells the soul of america to the lowest bidder...
There was a time during the boom when I thought the trade off of losing lower tiered american jobs for highly dedicated and capable foreign labor was a net win for the economy, if a little unfair. Now what I see is an ailing tech economy where good young people can't get good paying jobs, and those we've trained are leaving, I don't.
Instead of hiring young people out of college, executives hire H1-Bs and train them, becuase they're lower cost, get minimal raises, and are captive to the company. What the H1-Bs have learned is to outsource the executives. I've now seen two firms where the china/indian contractors and H1-Bs collaborated to put their old company and bosses out of business.
The H1-B and outsourcing that is going on now no-longer serves the interests of America as a whole. It is decimating the careers of our younger workers, training our competitors, and only for a short time serves the interests even of the executive staff.
There was a time during the boom when I thought the trade off of losing lower tiered american jobs for highly dedicated and capable foreign labor was a net win for the economy, if a little unfair. Now what I see is an ailing tech economy where good young people can't get good paying jobs, and those we've trained are leaving, I don't.
Instead of hiring young people out of college, executives hire H1-Bs and train them, becuase they're lower cost, get minimal raises, and are captive to the company. What the H1-Bs have learned is to outsource the executives. I've now seen two firms where the china/indian contractors and H1-Bs collaborated to put their old company and bosses out of business.
The H1-B and outsourcing that is going on now no-longer serves the interests of America as a whole. It is decimating the careers of our younger workers, training our competitors, and only for a short time serves the interests even of the executive staff.
After worrying myself about it for many years, I came to the conclusion that there needs to be a system that at least clearly points to the two basic types of potential that make thing work. That is, the basic resources as one, and the ability to modify them to make something more useful as the other. To do that one may potentially use two types of money, or record keeping. To make it simple, I'll call them here resource money and cultivation money.
Resources cannot work in a negative sense very well, if at all. Yet the ability to grasp future potential can let the cultivation endeavor do so as it tries to generate the desired benefit. The primary thing that such a sytem needs to remain stable is a system of assessing to determine the actual benefit generated and to assure the funds are in system for it to function in the positive as that occurs.
With the natural leaning of man to feel there is a foundation of fairness underlaying it all (ie: "all men are created equal"), the natural goal would be to determine why the resources are not equally distributed in their potential application. Nothing work good in this world, there are all kinds of details that get involved in making thing work; yet it is a natural and healthy goal to focus on. And it may lead to much more wisdom on what all it takes to have things work properly that sustain us. Also, it would lean people to reflect longer about having more people in this world, as the resource per person ratio would only drop. It should make it quit obvious to all, that such behavior only makes each of us poorer. It also stops the thinking (that is clearly unreal these days) that one can find security from the rest of the world's woes by collecting alot of resources around them (generally at everyones elses costs).
In such a system, there is less need to lean on major industry to push an economy forward. Anyone generating a benefit for another, or possibly even themselves, could be noted as generating benefit in the system. Getting the culture money into the system for the activities may be a bit of a challenge, in our present view, yet it may be as simple as a type of grant for desired activities.
Those running major companies now, could end up helping people manage their resources properly, in all the forms that is required to do that as healthy as possible, for the sake of ourselves and our posterity. And so a new type of competition begins that is based on a more realitic foundation. In any case, money ideally is just a sytem to help us determine what is actually working, and how well. To make it something that by itself generates oppressive states is self-defeating.
Sincerely,
Gregory D. MELLOTT
After worrying myself about it for many years, I came to the conclusion that there needs to be a system that at least clearly points to the two basic types of potential that make thing work. That is, the basic resources as one, and the ability to modify them to make something more useful as the other. To do that one may potentially use two types of money, or record keeping. To make it simple, I'll call them here resource money and cultivation money.
Resources cannot work in a negative sense very well, if at all. Yet the ability to grasp future potential can let the cultivation endeavor do so as it tries to generate the desired benefit. The primary thing that such a sytem needs to remain stable is a system of assessing to determine the actual benefit generated and to assure the funds are in system for it to function in the positive as that occurs.
With the natural leaning of man to feel there is a foundation of fairness underlaying it all (ie: "all men are created equal"), the natural goal would be to determine why the resources are not equally distributed in their potential application. Nothing work good in this world, there are all kinds of details that get involved in making thing work; yet it is a natural and healthy goal to focus on. And it may lead to much more wisdom on what all it takes to have things work properly that sustain us. Also, it would lean people to reflect longer about having more people in this world, as the resource per person ratio would only drop. It should make it quit obvious to all, that such behavior only makes each of us poorer. It also stops the thinking (that is clearly unreal these days) that one can find security from the rest of the world's woes by collecting alot of resources around them (generally at everyones elses costs).
In such a system, there is less need to lean on major industry to push an economy forward. Anyone generating a benefit for another, or possibly even themselves, could be noted as generating benefit in the system. Getting the culture money into the system for the activities may be a bit of a challenge, in our present view, yet it may be as simple as a type of grant for desired activities.
Those running major companies now, could end up helping people manage their resources properly, in all the forms that is required to do that as healthy as possible, for the sake of ourselves and our posterity. And so a new type of competition begins that is based on a more realitic foundation. In any case, money ideally is just a sytem to help us determine what is actually working, and how well. To make it something that by itself generates oppressive states is self-defeating.
Sincerely,
Gregory D. MELLOTT
workers (Indians and Russians) as well as outsourced to India.
The next thing, our servers started crashing.
Someone left the back door and then connected to a server
installing some apps that in turn connected to some outside
servers. After that, server's files were damaged forcing us to
restore the system. Luckily I was able to figure out what has
happened and corrected all problems.
I have also noticed some connection attempts to our databases
from... Russia.
I think the biggest issue with hiring non-citizens and
outsourceing is security.
How can we entrust all our personal data to those people?
workers (Indians and Russians) as well as outsourced to India.
The next thing, our servers started crashing.
Someone left the back door and then connected to a server
installing some apps that in turn connected to some outside
servers. After that, server's files were damaged forcing us to
restore the system. Luckily I was able to figure out what has
happened and corrected all problems.
I have also noticed some connection attempts to our databases
from... Russia.
I think the biggest issue with hiring non-citizens and
outsourceing is security.
How can we entrust all our personal data to those people?
What I was told while working for Nokia is that Indians are preferred over Americans because the decision makers during the hiring process are indeed Indians with management positions, and this is not an hypothesis, many of my managers (all of them Indians) told me that they needed to cut expenses, and that was a very effective way to do it. If you don't believe me, ask how many H1-b visas these years Nokia had been requested to the INS and how many out of them are for Indians, you would be appalled!
And the list of American companies that follow such practices goes on and on. It's a shame that American-based companies prefer to employ qualified low-payable foreigners than unemployed equally qualified nationals.
Did well in my interviews to get job with a high tech heavyweight with 75K salary out of college. Do you see me being exploited? I don't think so...
Would you want me to go back home to India with technical knowledge and experience that I gained during my college (I was doing research in distributed systems), start/join a high tech company there, develop some ground breaking product/technology and compete with US and make hell lot of money? I guess ur answer would still be yes...
I know many of my H1B brethrens are being exploited but I would not generalize this to the entire category. I think I have some niche skills and knowledge that will help me contribute in a small way to keep this country a technology leader. Last I checked US is still referred to as "Land of Oppurtunity".
I would see H1B program as way for US to prevent brain drain from its own universities and maintain its competitive edge.
Companies like Microsoft pay 80K for an entry level software engineer and 100K for a senior one. So, H1B workers are low payable foreigners? LOL...
What I was told while working for Nokia is that Indians are preferred over Americans because the decision makers during the hiring process are indeed Indians with management positions, and this is not an hypothesis, many of my managers (all of them Indians) told me that they needed to cut expenses, and that was a very effective way to do it. If you don't believe me, ask how many H1-b visas these years Nokia had been requested to the INS and how many out of them are for Indians, you would be appalled!
And the list of American companies that follow such practices goes on and on. It's a shame that American-based companies prefer to employ qualified low-payable foreigners than unemployed equally qualified nationals.
Did well in my interviews to get job with a high tech heavyweight with 75K salary out of college. Do you see me being exploited? I don't think so...
Would you want me to go back home to India with technical knowledge and experience that I gained during my college (I was doing research in distributed systems), start/join a high tech company there, develop some ground breaking product/technology and compete with US and make hell lot of money? I guess ur answer would still be yes...
I know many of my H1B brethrens are being exploited but I would not generalize this to the entire category. I think I have some niche skills and knowledge that will help me contribute in a small way to keep this country a technology leader. Last I checked US is still referred to as "Land of Oppurtunity".
I would see H1B program as way for US to prevent brain drain from its own universities and maintain its competitive edge.
Companies like Microsoft pay 80K for an entry level software engineer and 100K for a senior one. So, H1B workers are low payable foreigners? LOL...
I agree it is not the point of the employer to solve all an employee's personal problems. And I agree there are advantages to the employer of ihring the quiet guy that has 4 roommates and no family. But don't think that guy will owe you loyalty if you don't treat him well, and don't think he will pay you what he doesn't owe.
From what I see, the advantages and disadvantages of hiring outside the country are fairly balanced. But if you hire to the *exclusion* of local talent you will have your head handed to you when the winds change. And rightfuly so.
And if you have no loyalty to your community, and are not concerned with taking care of your neighbors, you will always find that you don't like where you live. And that is also as it should be.
I agree it is not the point of the employer to solve all an employee's personal problems. And I agree there are advantages to the employer of ihring the quiet guy that has 4 roommates and no family. But don't think that guy will owe you loyalty if you don't treat him well, and don't think he will pay you what he doesn't owe.
From what I see, the advantages and disadvantages of hiring outside the country are fairly balanced. But if you hire to the *exclusion* of local talent you will have your head handed to you when the winds change. And rightfuly so.
And if you have no loyalty to your community, and are not concerned with taking care of your neighbors, you will always find that you don't like where you live. And that is also as it should be.
I also know several of my friends on H1B who are not paid at par. I don't know of anybody who is being paid $48,355 which this story claims. The norm is between $55K-$65K for jobs $60-$70 jobs. Granted my view is limited to Bay area and Massachussetts.
There was a time when changing jobs if one had an H1B took more then 6 months. This resulted in exploitation of engineers. However, that is no longer the case. Now one can change job just after applying for H1B transfer. Usually this takes 1-2 weeks. In this case the market takes care of exploitation. If someone is not getting pay which they deserve they just change jobs.
We still have some issues with employees for which the company has applied for Green Card. Although, it is possible to change jobs after green card application, it is difficult and risky process and employees are opting not to take advantage of it and are giving in to exploitation.
This brings me to the case of H1B restrictions. In case we limit number of H1B, the companies will fall back to L1B. In fact that is what they are doing right now. If an engineers comes on L1B, the person can not change jobs easily. This will allow the old styled exploitation possible. Actually, I am already seeing some signs for that.
In my opinion easiest way to solve H1B exploitation issue is to make changing jobs easy. The market is likely to take care of the rest.
flaw in that argument as long as the employee actually intends to work in the U.S. for a significant length of time.
Of course, it's not only the exploitation angle that hurts jobs. Having Indian companies that prefer to hire Indian use the H1-B to train Indians in America is misusing the program without exploiting Indians. So the criticism that H1-Bs are not in America's interst because they are an offshoring tactic still remains valid for those that don't intend to stay in the U.S.
I also know several of my friends on H1B who are not paid at par. I don't know of anybody who is being paid $48,355 which this story claims. The norm is between $55K-$65K for jobs $60-$70 jobs. Granted my view is limited to Bay area and Massachussetts.
There was a time when changing jobs if one had an H1B took more then 6 months. This resulted in exploitation of engineers. However, that is no longer the case. Now one can change job just after applying for H1B transfer. Usually this takes 1-2 weeks. In this case the market takes care of exploitation. If someone is not getting pay which they deserve they just change jobs.
We still have some issues with employees for which the company has applied for Green Card. Although, it is possible to change jobs after green card application, it is difficult and risky process and employees are opting not to take advantage of it and are giving in to exploitation.
This brings me to the case of H1B restrictions. In case we limit number of H1B, the companies will fall back to L1B. In fact that is what they are doing right now. If an engineers comes on L1B, the person can not change jobs easily. This will allow the old styled exploitation possible. Actually, I am already seeing some signs for that.
In my opinion easiest way to solve H1B exploitation issue is to make changing jobs easy. The market is likely to take care of the rest.
flaw in that argument as long as the employee actually intends to work in the U.S. for a significant length of time.
Of course, it's not only the exploitation angle that hurts jobs. Having Indian companies that prefer to hire Indian use the H1-B to train Indians in America is misusing the program without exploiting Indians. So the criticism that H1-Bs are not in America's interst because they are an offshoring tactic still remains valid for those that don't intend to stay in the U.S.
Unless the US gets more immigrants, the US is going to lose out on technology.
It is already happening with biotechnology. Stem-cell research is far more advanced outside the US, for example.
Unless the US gets more immigrants, the US is going to lose out on technology.
It is already happening with biotechnology. Stem-cell research is far more advanced outside the US, for example.
Markets only work when it's a positive sum game, and America (like no other country I know) has shown that immigration can work for everyone. The market distortions serve to make a few people wealthier in the short term, and distort investment decisions that could have been made more profitably with other people or businesses.