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Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

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Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#301

Post by 794CD01 »

serge2k wrote: post #283
794CD01 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dictatorial and authoritarian are not necessarily negatives. Calls for a businessman to cut through the red tape and run the government more efficiently are almost as old as American democracy itself. Call it whatever you like, we knew that's how this candidate wanted to operate and voted for it anyway.

> Dictatorial and authoritarian are not necessarily negatives Yes they fucking are. > we knew that's how this candidate wanted to operate and voted for it anyway Most didn't vote for him.

Most didn't according to a metric that's not the metric that is actually used to select the president and thus candidates and parties don't try to optimize for. As for the other point, agree to disagree.

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#302

Post by 794CD01 »

mattnewton wrote: post #270
794CD01 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the policy itself is good either, I'm just saying that the idea of implementing policy now, even if it has bugs, might be preferable to letting the perfect be the enemy of the good to the point where we do nothing about problems - even if they are merely imaginary problems. As for electing someone because you don't believe they will follow through on their campaign promises, only to be disappointed when…

It sounds like we are almost entirely in agreement :D I just think this order should be the new textbook example on why move fast and break things should not be executive policy.

Interesting, I would have called it a good example of how moving fast and breaking things is OK even for government action. It's only been two days and it's already been amended to allow green card holders to enter again, and several courts have ordered it to not be enforced. Before this, I and most people I know would not have guessed that government could move to amend broken policy this quickly.

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#303

Post by 794CD01 »

jimmywanger wrote: post #251
794CD01 wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's both literally and figuratively backwards. You're describing a scenario where the relationship between the countries becomes so hostile that we have to worry about what happens if one of us cuts off the flow of talent. But what we should really care about is making the flow of talent so voluminous and indispensable to both nations that relations cannot deteriorate to that point. That's real national security.

> But what we should really care about is making the flow of talent so voluminous and indispensable to both nations that relations cannot deteriorate to that point. That has not happened in the history of mankind. Talent moving around is rather high on Maslov's hierarchy of needs. If your country is out of arable farmland, clean water, or minerals, you will start looking around for places to get those materials. If t…

I would say that is because, in the past, "work remotely" wasn't a viable option. Today, that sounds like a much better option than a war of conquest. To me, at least.

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#304

Post by Chris2048 »

kamaal wrote: post #273
Chris2048 wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? lack of money? Maybe if wages increased...

Why what? Why they can't start a start up? Well then there are reasons hard to understand unless you understand the socio-economic context in which a lot of people grow up in India. Not the kind of ones who you see come to US universities for higher education. But there are a lot of other exceptionally brilliant people who come from poor families, to whom any opportunity is precious. Parents come from poor families t…

> Well then there are reasons hard to understand unless you understand the socio-economic context in which a lot of people grow up in India.

I think you misunderstand my post. I'm saying Americans can found start-ups more easily than immigrant workers.

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#305

Post by 794CD01 »

akiselev wrote: post #238
794CD01 wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's both literally and figuratively backwards. You're describing a scenario where the relationship between the countries becomes so hostile that we have to worry about what happens if one of us cuts off the flow of talent. But what we should really care about is making the flow of talent so voluminous and indispensable to both nations that relations cannot deteriorate to that point. That's real national security.

Right, until that other country elects an orange demagogue that utilizes popular discontent to demonize you and cut off that flow of talent, regardless of the mutually assured harm. Societies are fickle, especially in times of war or increasing tensions. A well maintained local talent pool and industrial capacity subsidized against foreign economic forces are not. Relying on other nations is the exact opposite of nat…

The movement of labor and ideas also means that there is no shortage of educated people to speak out against said orange demagogue's terrible policies. And most peoples' postmortems of the election agree that the election was close enough that higher immigration (or even better distribution of existing immigrants) would likely have kept him out of office.

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#306

Post by asavadatti »

kalleboo wrote: post #101
moomin wrote: post #55

Disclosure: my wife used to be on a work-permit scheme similar to H1B. The problem with all of these schemes is they're tied to a particular job. You give up that job, your right to remain is toast. This makes it hard to move to competitors and artificially depresses wages. In turn, this artificially affects native workers in the same industry. I think the solution here is more capitalism, not more government. Anyone…

In comparison, the visa (technically, "residency permit") scheme in Japan (widely viewed as a xenophobic, anti-immigrant country) is tied to the person. You get sponsored in by an employer in a field, and then your residency is tied to you being employed in that field. You can instantly turn around and quit that job and find another one in the same field. Policy is you have 30 [or was it 60?90? something like that] d…

H1B holders also have 60 days to find a new job after quitting/being fired from their old job.

https://www.uscis.gov/news/news-releases/uscis-publishes-fin...

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#307

Post by 0xfeba »

serge2k wrote: post #285
0xfeba wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, yes. I mean at the Big 4 (and really, this applies to any large, cutting-edge company: Twitter, Oracle, etc.) they do reach out of the US to find great talent for higher up positions. But they also abuse the visa process for lower wages in lower positions. Lots of other companies without hype just want lower wage workers. I figure these are the majority.

> But they also abuse the visa process for lower wages in lower positions. The numbers are public on this and look fine. People keep telling you "I'm on an H-1B and I'm paid reasonably". Please, offer actual proof or quit spreading this around.

People who are in startups and other unicorns are telling me this, sure.

But lots of established SW companies use contracting companies that abuse the visa process. I should have been more clear, it's these contracting companies (usually based out of India) that are abusing the process. US companies that use them are pretty much complicit:

http://www.vocativ.com/money/business/theyll-sponsor-america...

http://www.infoworld.com/article/3004501/h1b/proof-that-h-1b...

http://www.sfchronicle.com/business/article/Chasing-dreams-a...

http://www.epi.org/blog/new-data-infosys-tata-abuse-h-1b-pro...

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#308

Post by 0xfeba »

mavelikara wrote: post #278
0xfeba wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, yes. I mean at the Big 4 (and really, this applies to any large, cutting-edge company: Twitter, Oracle, etc.) they do reach out of the US to find great talent for higher up positions. But they also abuse the visa process for lower wages in lower positions. Lots of other companies without hype just want lower wage workers. I figure these are the majority.

> But they also abuse the visa process for lower wages in lower positions. No, in lower-level positions also they are paid the same as their colleagues who are citizens. During the hiring process, the immigration status is not get considered as a positive or negative qualifier. > Lots of other companies without hype just want lower wage workers. I agree. > I figure these are the majority. This is possible, but I am n…

> No, in lower-level positions also they are paid the same as their colleagues who are citizens. During the hiring process, the immigration status is not get considered as a positive or negative qualifier.

Not if they are hired through a contracting company:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13525766

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#309

Post by davidf18 »

mavelikara wrote: post #296
davidf18 wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> " That's shitty for everyone but hte company." Not true. The limitation in "job liquidity" means less competition for Americans for jobs that immigrants might underbid. If the law were rigidly enforced so that only jobs allowed under H1-B were a job that no American could do then there would be far, far fewer than 85,000 H1-B Visas granted per year. In many cases, I'll bet the companies intentionally put the jobs n…

> The limitation in "job liquidity" means less competition for Americans for jobs that immigrants might underbid. What is stopping the employer from trapping a "job illiquid" immigrant into such a job you want to apply for? > If the law were rigidly enforced so that only jobs allowed under H1-B were a job that no American could do I could be wrong, but my understanding is that there is no such law.

According to law, H1-B Visas are only for those jobs which cannot be filled by Americans, that is no American has the skill to perform them. The law has been greatly abused, but that is in fact the law.

I find it really, really hard to believe that there are 85,000 jobs per year (the H1-B Visa limit) that cannot possibly done by Americans.

As I have pointed out the issue is that firms do not want to pay prevailing wages for IT people so they back reforms that allows the import of lower-wage labor. (Former Republican) Candidate Rubio cared not for his Florida constituents, 250 IT workers who lost jobs from being displaced by low-wage immigrants and instead took $2 million from Disney and wanted to increase the H1-B Visa limit to 250,000 from 85,000.

Trump was backing the 250 workers who lost their jobs to H1-B Visa abuse and wants Disney to give them their jobs back.

Many of the elites who want to pay less money for IT work backed candidates who wanted to depress IT wages and make more Americans unemployed. Hilary and all of the Republican candidates were for this. Only Sanders and Trump spoke out against this.

Hilary and others called Trump racist, etc. but they never addressed the fundamental issue which is not exporting American jobs overseas and not importing labor to depress wages and cause unemployment among Americans.

Re: Trump’s Next Move on Immigration to Hit Closer to Home for Tech

#310

Post by jimmywanger »

794CD01 wrote: post #303
jimmywanger wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But what we should really care about is making the flow of talent so voluminous and indispensable to both nations that relations cannot deteriorate to that point. That has not happened in the history of mankind. Talent moving around is rather high on Maslov's hierarchy of needs. If your country is out of arable farmland, clean water, or minerals, you will start looking around for places to get those materials. If t…

I would say that is because, in the past, "work remotely" wasn't a viable option. Today, that sounds like a much better option than a war of conquest. To me, at least.

> in the past, "work remotely" wasn't a viable option.

What does this have to do with anything? We're talking about resource wars. You can kidnap talent. Look at the origin of the term "shanghaied" and the British impressing American seamen.

> Today, that sounds like a much better option than a war of conquest.

You're not getting the point. Most nations can do without talent. Talent is willing to cross borders, depending on who's winning.

What nations cannot do without is food, minerals and water. Those are definitely zero sum games. Unless you're able to defend your goods with force or there is an abundance of them, they will be taken away from you.

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