Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder • Hacker News Board

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#191

Post by Clubber » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 2:15 PM UTC

Hondor wrote: post #160

Clubber wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but US labor and citizens fought generations for those wages. Revolutionary War, Civil War, World Wars, company / labor riots, taxes to subsidize industry, taxes for infrastructure, taxes for education, legal systems, all that. US taxpayers paid for our economy through blood and toil. You don't think high wages just happen because companies feel generous do you?

Does what your ancestors might have done really make you more deserving of a better life? I understand that it gives you more chance of a better life, but just by the luck of the lottery of birth, not by any actual fairness. Did civil war soldiers really know they were fighting for high wages 150 years later? Were taxpayers really choosing to pay tax because they expected it would give their grandkids a higher salary…

>Does what your ancestors might have done really make you more deserving of a better life?

Look at it this way. I work hard and I pay a lot of taxes. I pay attention to elections and I petition governments because I want an opportunity for a good life for my kids and my kids' kids. I think soldiers who fought in the Civil War certainly wanted a better life for their kids.

This has been going on for generations. This generation is the first generation, I think in US history, that isn't expected to have a better life than their parent's generation, excluding possibly the depression. There are more young adults living with their parents since 1880.

I'm certainly not anti-immigrant, I think immigrants are the bloodline of the US economy and culture. What I'm against is companies outsourcing labor to other countries to save a little money while excluding US workers for consideration of those jobs. It's the companies I'm dissatisfied with, not the labor. If I was destitute in China or India, I would take those jobs too.

It's bad short term planning. Not only is it gutting our market, but China is stealing billions of dollars of our IP for their own use, and that includes military IP. Very few people benefit form this and the cost is great. Had US companies not outsourced and politicians not gutted labor unions, the US market would be much bigger. That's good for big business, small business and labor. Why do you think Trump and Sanders are so popular? There is massive dissatisfaction with opportunity in the US. It's about to bite us in the ass.

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#192

Post by HelloMcFly » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 2:53 PM UTC

Hondor wrote: post #162

HelloMcFly wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is simply no way to ensure that an American engineer is innately more valuable than a Chinese, Indian, Japanese, or African engineer Nobody made any claim of the sort! In fact, I made the opposite: when they enter into a labor market with local considerations (cost of labor, community investments) they should be treated as an equal. Right now, they are not. And one of the primary ways they are not is by being…

I agree that being locked to one employer is a kind of market distortion. Would you say non-compete clauses are too? I know they're not enforceable in California, but other states effectively lock local workers to their company because they're not allowed to move to another company in the same industry within a year or two of quitting. Should we try to prevent companies from legally hiring local workers with non-comp…

> Should we try to prevent companies from legally hiring local workers with non-compete clauses in their contracts?

Of course we should!

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#193

Post by rrecuero » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 3:35 PM UTC

onion2k wrote: post #163

rrecuero wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a good point. It would obviously need to be a more complicated system. I think it would be good to prioritize companies like Google, Facebook and the likes but good, honest consulting companies shouldn't be excluded. Factors like innovation, skill scarcity and wage/cost of living can be weighed in. That happened to me. I actually was at Zynga when they closed studios and I needed to start my green card applica…

It doesn't need to be complicated. Just a rule that the employee must be paid a minimum of the median average wage of any similar domestic employees in the company, or the market average if there aren't any.

I hear you. Although, I believe that's one of the loopholes that companies like Infosys exploits. They pay just above market average and they have a really high number of H1B employees, bordering on the limit. Also, market average fluctuates a lot between regions so it can be circumvented as well. Hard problem....

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#194

Post by IndianAstronaut » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 3:49 PM UTC

55acdda48ab5 wrote: post #190

gdilla wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all H1-B workers come via body shops. FB, Google, MSFT, Amazon all hire their own H1-Bs and pay wages no American could complain depresses anyone. This is how I came. It boggles the mind that body shops are allowed to exploit this system and abuse workers who come and do their best to drive wages down. The one solution is end the indentured servitude aspect of it. If H1Bs are free to move around and work where th…

That's a horrible idea. The whole point of the visa is to service a specific job that was impossible to fill. It makes perfect sense that an H1-b holder should be forced to stay at only one job and not be allowed to compete on the wider job market. The solution to the abuse of the visa is to get rid of all the legal and bureaucratic tests and hoops and auction off the slots instead. The firm with the winning bid gets…

They desperately need to turn this into an auction system so only the best candidates get chosen. It is also tough for those of us who have to work with sub par H1B candidates and clean up their mess.

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#195

Post by _audakel » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 3:58 PM UTC

Terr_ wrote: post #131

CamperBob2 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you define "fair" in fair market wage? It eventually has to come down to, "I'm an American, so I'm entitled to get paid more than everybody else on the planet for doing a given job." I find that attitude pretty disgusting, but that's just me. The same people who complain endlessly about H1Bs, outsourcing, and cheap foreign labor will then cheerfully drive to Wal-Mart and buy a new DVD player for $12. It will n…

> It eventually has to come down to, "I'm an American, so I'm entitled to get paid more than everybody else on the planet for doing a given job." Fuck no, it's about getting your "membership benefits" from a communal system that you've contributed to. Americans get paid more by Americans because those Americans pay more to Americans, and invest in the American economy and interact with American laws. Who you ought to…

Ideas such as "membership benifits" and "Americans pay more to Americans" seems to create an us vs. them mentality and imply that the us party receive govnt benifits. The idea that country A receives befits over country B can be abstracted to simple free trade theory.

If you abstract a skilled worker to be a countrys "resource" and accept the idea that country A and B can ingage in "trade", than it is easy to see how US h1b style imigration worker laws are basicly tariff. They distort the price to protect domestic, by making foreign more expensive.

David Ricardo (Supply/Demand economist) and many other economists have shown countless times that countrys are better off in the long run by engaging in free trade.

If we removed the worker "tariffs" we would get more engineers, companies would be able to make more / do more. In the end US consumers would be better off by having more/better choices.

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#196

Post by dghughes » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 4:19 PM UTC

Hondor wrote: post #159

dghughes wrote: post #129

In Canada Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) program was changed. It was getting to the point where entire industries changed overnight out with long-time employees and in with near slave wage "TFWs" (many people just say refer to the people as TFWs). It got so bad it became a huge political hot potato and the law was changed resulting in many TFWs disappearing as fast as they arrived. The law here was similar to the TFW…

$5/hour sounds like they were violating minimum wage law which is now about $11/hour. Surely that itself is the problem, not whether the workers were foreign or local, or how much above minimum wage they were paid.

No Canadian citizen would ever be paid less than minimum wage it was only the TFW who could be paid that.

I'm not sure of the exact wage but I know it was less than the minimum wage which is roughly $11/hour, although each province sets its own rate.

There were also problems of TFWs being house in apartments that the business owner owned and took wages for rent. Often having a dozens of people in a small apartment.

Other reports of passports being confiscated and return tickets home revoked. It's an embarrassment and thankfully the previous right wing government has been turfed.

I think the law now states TFW get the same pay and only to fill labour shortages since the program was meant to fix a labour shortage and nothing to do with wages.

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#197

Post by TheCoelacanth » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 5:50 PM UTC

gdilla wrote: post #184

nwhybrid wrote: post #77

As a former H1-B worker myself (please put down the pitch-forks :)), I can tell you that regular companies aren't hiring H1-Bs to replace you directly. Instead they contract swarms of us through companies like WiPro and other body shops. This, along with the inability to seek a more fitting job on your own regardless of skill level is the main problem I see. You're essentially shackled to these body shops. You can't…

Not all H1-B workers come via body shops. FB, Google, MSFT, Amazon all hire their own H1-Bs and pay wages no American could complain depresses anyone. This is how I came. It boggles the mind that body shops are allowed to exploit this system and abuse workers who come and do their best to drive wages down. The one solution is end the indentured servitude aspect of it. If H1Bs are free to move around and work where th…

Yes, but none of those companies save Microsoft are anywhere near the top of the list of companies employing H1-B workers. The top employers for H1-B workers are mostly bodyshops like WiPro.

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#198

Post by Terr_ » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 8:32 PM UTC

_audakel wrote: post #195

Terr_ wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It eventually has to come down to, "I'm an American, so I'm entitled to get paid more than everybody else on the planet for doing a given job." Fuck no, it's about getting your "membership benefits" from a communal system that you've contributed to. Americans get paid more by Americans because those Americans pay more to Americans, and invest in the American economy and interact with American laws. Who you ought to…

Ideas such as "membership benifits" and "Americans pay more to Americans" seems to create an us vs. them mentality and imply that the us party receive govnt benifits. The idea that country A receives befits over country B can be abstracted to simple free trade theory. If you abstract a skilled worker to be a countrys "resource" and accept the idea that country A and B can ingage in "trade", than it is easy to see how…

> seems to create an us vs. them mentality

No, it simply recognizes a situation which already exists, because different nations have different laws and economies. If you want a world hegemony, it's up to you to find a route that doesn't inordinately harm specific groups (e.g. US workers) while transferring value to others (e.g. US companies and arbitrage groups.)

> If you abstract a skilled worker to be a countrys "resource"

Oh? Seems to create a "people don't matter because they're just objects" mentality :P

> In the end US consumers would be better off by having more/better choices.

Unemployed or underemployed consumers never have more/better choices.

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#199

Post by Terr_ » Sun, Jun 12, 2016, 8:33 PM UTC

yen223 wrote: post #175

Terr_ wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It eventually has to come down to, "I'm an American, so I'm entitled to get paid more than everybody else on the planet for doing a given job." Fuck no, it's about getting your "membership benefits" from a communal system that you've contributed to. Americans get paid more by Americans because those Americans pay more to Americans, and invest in the American economy and interact with American laws. Who you ought to…

Wait, do y'all think H1Bs don't pay taxes?

Wait, do y'all just ignore the part about "outsourcing, and cheap foreign labor"?

Re: Laid-Off Americans, Required to Zip Lips on Way Out, Grow Bolder

#200

Post by gdilla » Mon, Jun 13, 2016, 2:39 PM UTC

55acdda48ab5 wrote: post #190

gdilla wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all H1-B workers come via body shops. FB, Google, MSFT, Amazon all hire their own H1-Bs and pay wages no American could complain depresses anyone. This is how I came. It boggles the mind that body shops are allowed to exploit this system and abuse workers who come and do their best to drive wages down. The one solution is end the indentured servitude aspect of it. If H1Bs are free to move around and work where th…

That's a horrible idea. The whole point of the visa is to service a specific job that was impossible to fill. It makes perfect sense that an H1-b holder should be forced to stay at only one job and not be allowed to compete on the wider job market. The solution to the abuse of the visa is to get rid of all the legal and bureaucratic tests and hoops and auction off the slots instead. The firm with the winning bid gets…

If you want indentured servitude, that's how you get indentured servitude. It is also, not a system of wage suppression that people think it is (although it certainly is abused in that way). The entire pool of H1Bs represent a tiny pimple of the US workforce.