This will definitely curtail the abuse. Nonetheless this is a double-edged sword. Many so called STEM grads just do it to land a software job. They just invest a couple of years in some anon university and then bring their self entitlement and half-baked semi-polished language skills feeling entitled over guys who invested time and try to find an opportunity to work in the US. These "Grads" are copious in numbers and sickeningly pretentious. Sadly the system runs on money and keep feeding these idiots to attract tuitions into half-arsed universities. Most of them are rich douches with mediocre skills and can't do a lick without begging around for help. part of the rut.
Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
161–170 of 198 posts
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#162Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're aware that not every H1B is a developer right? Your proposal would change the whole basis of the program in a way that doesn't seem particularly thought out. What about people who are botanists, or harpsichord teachers?
You could have separate categories for non profit and academic positions. But for positions in private industry, I don't care. If you really, really need a foreign employee over a domestic one, you will need to pay the H1B premium, competing with everyone else. It's more fair than a system based on luck, or arbitrary criteria of review board or something guaranteed to be games and manipulated.
But the goal of the system isn't fairness, it's to provide needed skills to American businesses. It sounds like you're looking at this from the perspective of a job-seeking foreign national, but that's not actually a constituency here, they aren't American, don't vote, and our government is not intending to help them with this program.
The supposed point is to make sure American companies can compete. The idea of only allowing the very highest paid foreign workers in, and them all being software developers, has literally nothing to do with that goal.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can switch jobs on an H1-b visa. The window is too short yes but plenty of people with skills do it in SV.
You can, but it isn't for people with weak stomachs or dependents. Who thinks that that is intentional believes in conspiracies.
You realize that a person doesn't have to belong to the Illuminati as a precondition to lobby for special or opaque legislation, right? The only precondition intent needs is a conflict of interest.
Look at Intuit. A number of years back, California piloted a program that simplified filing tax returns for people opting to take the standard deduction. They would mail you a form that was prefilled so you could simply sign it and mail it back. Intuit lobbied to kill it and won. No laws were broken. They were simply acting in the interest of their shareholders.
The American Immigration Lawyers Association is one of many lobbying groups that represents 13,000 members. Many of these members help the 80,000 some H1B applicants through the process and can charge legal fees in the ballpark of $10,000 to do that. Assuming all 80,000 applicants spent $10,000 in legal fees, we're talking about ~$1bn market on top for that type of work alone. In the grand scheme of things, it's not a lot, but it's one component that can create a conflict of interest.
Let's assume the AILA is an upstanding group and all of the lobbyists they hire are ethical boy scouts. They would never influence our legislators to intentionally complicate laws to serve their members. Instead, they would recognize that it's in our nation's best interest that our immigration systems are robust, thorough and comprehensive. They'd also emphasize that their members provide a critical service to sherpa honest immigrants through this thoroughly comprehensive system.
You don't need to be behind a ridiculous conspiracy to influence legislation to serve your best interests. These days, you're way better off being transparent and operating under an ethical framework.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
No it doesn't. San Fran has higher salaries across the board, to go with the higher cost of living. It doesn't mean other areas don't need devs.
They can still hire devs. They just need to pay more. Total comp is not adjusted for cost of living for doctors, salesmen, traders, bankers, attorneys, and managers. Why do you expect it to be adjusted for software developers? This is less than intuitive for me.
I don't know if that is true. A cursory glance at compensation statistics seems to indicate wide regional variance in the compensation in all these professions.
And, for me at least, intuitively it makes sense as well, but I don't want to argue intuition here.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
No it doesn't. San Fran has higher salaries across the board, to go with the higher cost of living. It doesn't mean other areas don't need devs.
Your causality is backwards. San Francisco doesn't pay high salaries because the cost of living is high; if that model obtained, San Francisco would immediately turn into a ghost town. The cost of living is high in San Francisco because of the high salaries.
Well, there are a few other things to add:
1. There might be a feedback mechanism between the two since high salaries could lead to high cost of living which in turn means that companies have to offer higher salaries etc.
2. The higher salaries don't explain the entire cost of living story since cost of living has risen faster than salaries.
3. Cost of living -- primarily the cost of housing -- seems to spike after certain events. IPOs, or other large liquidity events.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#166Another 50 convictions like this and the H1-B problem will be over. If your employer is considering replacing you with an H1-B, give them a copy of this article.
You need at least another zero on that.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#167Earlier quoted context omitted.
Arguably the effect goes the other way: engineers are more productive in SF, so they're worth paying more in SF. (If that weren't the case, then you wouldn't be able to pay engineers enough to want to live there while still making s profit.) So the GP's policy would still fit the spirit of the H1B program, which is to allow slots for high-output roles.
Do you have any numbers at all to back up your belief that proximity to the Golden Gate Bridge somehow increases developer productivity?
The reason I gave in the post: if it were not the case, you could not bid a high enough wage to both a) make a profit and b) produce a discretionary income attractive to engineers.
If you want a further explanation of why that is, then I would say that it's the proximity to related talent and investors adapted to this kind of work.
Edit: In case it wasn't just a clever attempt at synecdoche: it can't be proximity to the Golden Gate bridge per se that increases productivity, because the North Beach/Marina/Marin tech jobs pay less than SoMa and SV tech jobs.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not that I'm in favor of the current system, but your argument is flawed. How? Loosening restrictions on sponsorships would invariably result in a net increase in the available labor pool, which would put downward pressure on wages for everyone. This is because the program as-is does not restrict people from changing jobs. It just requires a sponsorship. So, what you are really advocating is that people without jobs…
> Loosening restrictions on sponsorships would invariably result in a net increase in the available labor pool, which would put downward pressure on wages for everyone. The labour market doesn't work like that..
Of course it does. Care to explain why you think it doesn't?
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
You didn't process my comment fully. I was referring to the downward pressure on all wages (and U.S. workers in particular), not those of H1-B holders. This (and my entire comment) was a rebuttal of the GP and should be read in that context. Having workers stay in the country without jobs increases labor supply, which means lower wages for U.S. workers, contrary to the GP's counter-intuitive assertion. It's simple su…
>what you're describing is not the intent of the H1-B program Why does the "intent of the H1-B program" matter to anybody?
Because the intent of the program informs its structure, and its structure informs the agreement under which visa holders participate.
Re: Judge sends two to prison for 7 years for H-1B fraud
#170Earlier quoted context omitted.
You didn't process my comment fully. I was referring to the downward pressure on all wages (and U.S. workers in particular), not those of H1-B holders. This (and my entire comment) was a rebuttal of the GP and should be read in that context. Having workers stay in the country without jobs increases labor supply, which means lower wages for U.S. workers, contrary to the GP's counter-intuitive assertion. It's simple su…
H-1B is a dual intent program. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_intent : Dual intent is a United States immigration law concept. It generally refers to the fact that certain U.S. visas allow foreigners to be temporarily present in the U.S. with lawful status and immigrant intent. This allows those visa holders, particularly H-1B professionals, to enter the U.S. while simultaneously seeking lawful permanent res…
That's a slightly different interpretation of the intent to which I was referring. I was speaking to the genesis of the program.
But, in this context, let's just say that immigration is not the primary intent, and the secondary intent is conditioned upon the primary.
More specifically, the "lawful status" that prefaces immigration is conditioned upon sponsorship.