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H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

economist.com

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Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#391

Post by consp »

johnnyb9 wrote: post #252
an_account wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually the opposite at many public universities. "Out of state" and international students subsidize in state students because they pay far greater tuition.

I have trouble believing students are paying less tuition because there is a greater demand from international students. If anything, the tuition would be higher. That international students are more profitable doesn't change the value of the degree or what everyone else is willing to pay for it.

The recruitment programs for foreign students are way better here (in the Netherlands) with some universities because they get about double from them vs regulars. Though the difference looks even bigger when you take into account that what students pay is not the same as what the University gets.

I think this is even worsened by the fact that foreign students pay directly towards the university and become a primary source of revenue and the 'regular' students money is tertiary (state) or secondary (scholarship) which has conditions and delays attached.

I guess it is probably the same all over the world.

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#392

Post by kartickv »

alistproducer2 wrote: post #185

I work for a large company that used to outsource all of it's IT to a large contractor. Almost all of the applications and code I've worked with that was done by the outsourcing company was substandard crap. Obviously over complicated to support large (profitable) estimates. From my experience working with a lot of tech immigrants, I can say that compared to the native population, they seem about the same in terms of…

Some Indians don't have a good command of English, but others do, just not American English. Though this is an academic difference when it comes to working together with an American team.

The first time an American said to me, "Heads up!" I looked up at the ceiling.

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#393

Post by notar »

axoltl wrote: post #320
hiram112 wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There has always been an O-1 visa for super-specialized and talented PHDs.

I came to the US on an H1-B. I work in embedded security (think silicon, PCB level attacks, bootloaders, kernels) which is a field that has, by my best guess, less than a 1000 individuals in it. For whatever reason they are largely European and while there are some that hold PhDs (mostly on the silicon side, some of the attacks there require lots of math) most while barely have finished a bachelors degree (Yours trul…

I am an American citizen and work in the exact same field. I would describe the field as much larger than you believe it to be (but certainly still rather small) and have lost jobs in this area to H1Bs.

While I'm sure you are exceptionally talented, there's more to the story than "Americans just can't do the job!" The h1b narrative is exactly what you just described. I would say that your company has recruiting issues if you truly can't find qualified Americans to work on embedded security. (Is this a Big 4 company with a crazy hiring bar? That might make sense)

There's always more to the story.

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#395

Post by HillaryBriss »

siquick wrote: post #212
HillaryBriss wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

every person (us born, immigrant, or even outside the US), organization (foreign, domestic, corporation, non-profit, et al) is entitled to say "I am America". we might be the only country like that.

> we might be the only country like that. Why?

for one thing, the US has a high profile global presence. when the US government or economy does something, people all over the world tend to hear about it and often react. sometimes it effects them in powerful ways (e.g. war, trade, Beyonce).

for another, the US seems to have evolved both the strongest individual free speech protections and some of the freest immigration policies and practices.

because of its global familiarity, in the last 30 or 40 years, many people from around the world have come to the US and felt comfortable exercising that freedom. maybe people think "if the US feels free to reach out and impact my part of the world, then i'm free to go to the US and impact it."

i don't know if there are other countries in a situation like that. maybe the UK? maybe China and India, if you consider the poor rural workers who've migrated into the big cities?

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#396

Post by 0xfeba »

davidw wrote: post #34
aub3bhat wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Economist is correct that's why it "Triggers" so many people like you, just take a look at electronics industry, if you think that the jobs wont be shipped out to india/China/Canada or reduced due to automation you are living in fantasy land. By improving portability of H-1B the government can make market fairer and less prone to misuse. Simply banning the visa will just lead to a rush of outsourcing/offshoring drain…

Sorry guys, but voting his comments down do not change the laws of economics. If someone in Romania can do your job - with the same quality - at 1/10th the price, the market will find a way to move the work there. In most cases, it really isn't equivalent and the price difference isn't that much for really qualified people, but shutting out lots of talented people might tilt things in that direction.

What irks me is a lot of companies are already doing this and think it's the same quality--only finding out years down the road with their big ball of mud...

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#397

Post by shas3 »

Zigurd wrote: post #16
ta78637 wrote: post #7

Article's concluding sentences: "Reducing the number of visas for TCS and its brethren would probably result in them shifting work to India. A better change would be to end the rule whereby H-1B recipients must stay with the company that sponsored them. For within their ranks may lurk the next Elon Musk or Sergey Brin." Personally I find this line of thought (cliche?) frustrating. Not just because apparently us prole…

You are correct. But there are market solutions: If visas were auctioned like spectrum, only high value positions would be filled by H1-Bs, which would actually implement the stated purpose of enabling only those who cannot be found domestically to get H1-Bs. And it would largely prevent H1-Bs from lowering wages. AND that "lurking Sergey Brin" would be more likely to be found among those high-value candidates.

Jeez. High skilled jobs outside software engineering pay approximately 10-20% less than software. How do you account for that in an 'auction'-based system? It is just a hard truth that unlike a software company, individual talent is proportionally less valuable in a manufacturing company, leading to lower wages (compared to software developers) for: materials scientists, chemical engineers, mechanical engineers, some electrical engineers (power systems, power electronics, etc.).

The reason for this is that a larger portion of a manufacturing company's competitive strength comes from having great manufacturing equipment, ins into markets, etc. vs. just great engineers or scientists. H1B is necessary because many of these special-skills engineers and scientists are foreigners.

This is also the same reason that hedge fund managers or doctors are paid much more than software engineers- the individual's contribution is more important than in other professions. Does this mean that hedge fund managers are more valuable to society and should be preferred over software engineers in a H1B lottery?

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#398

Post by pm90 »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #102
pm90 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly do you mean? All the major US tech companies (and plenty of minor ones as well) have huge India offices. If they were delivering "pretty poor results", they wouldn't still be operating.

I can't speak for all major US tech companies, but I can speak for my experience at a major US financial firm, household name, etc. A couple years ago they did the old dump the American devs and move everything to India. I'm the American team lead. The difference, as far as I can tell, is that the time to market for new features has doubled or tripled. This isn't because the Indian devs/QA are lower quality, they're…

I'm genuinely sorry about your situation. It seems like this is one of those cases in which management couldn't resist the short-term cost savings. I would wager this is a pretty common occurrence and I can see where you're coming from...and I completely agree. In this case its most likely not going to work out in the long term.

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#399

Post by rs999gti »

erispoe wrote: post #155
dmitrygr wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thing is, nobody wants that effect. We want the PhDs. What we do not want it companies that bring in cheap barely-qualified labour for cost-cutting. This hurts the people brought in (they are stuck in bad jobs with bad pay and no way out). This hurts the local workers who cost too much compared to this effectively-slave-labour. The hard part changing the rules such that PhDs and other productive uses of H1B do not su…

All these effects are the product of workers being stuck in their jobs through the H1B program. Give H1B workers the same rights as American workers and they will compete on the same terms, getting a competitive salary and not bringing wages down. If someone's got an H1B, it's because there's demand for the job, unsatisfied by US workers, wether at the original company requesting the visa or in the industry in genera…

> Also, ban H1B outsourcing.

No need to ban it. Just adjust the salary to REAL IT salaries.

From the article:

> The Economist found that between 2012 and 2015 the three biggest Indian outsourcing firms—TCS, Wipro and Infosys—submitted over 150,000 visa applications for positions that paid a median salary of $69,500

Essentially, these Indian firms are wage dumping by paying lower than US market.

If they had to pay 90K+ USD for these H1Bs, the number of applications would drastically reduce.

Re: H-1B visas mainly go to Indian outsourcing firms

#400

Post by wsxcde »

FooBarJmp wrote: post #260
wsxcde wrote: post #247

Although Infosys and the like apply for a lot of H1Bs, they make very very few (we're talking double-digit numbers) successful applications for green cards. This means most of these people on H1Bs for the consulting companies are actually going back home. Which means that Infosys, TCS and the like are contributing a rotating pool of about ~30k-40k "migrant" software labor consisting of individuals who live in the US…

Let's examine your math. So this year there were 86,000 visas for 2017 that last for 3 years. So that means by 2020, if the visa limit stays at 86,000, there will be 258,000 H1Bs, of course this assumes that H1Bs were created in 2017, we are ignoring all those that came before. Let's NOT ignore those and look at the below link - http://insights.dice.com/2013/05/14/how-nearly-800000-h-1b-w... Yes, in 2013, it was 775,…

You can't stay for more than 6 years on an H1B unless your employer files a PERM application, has that approved, and then you/your employer files an I-140, and that is also approved. In other words, if your employer never filed a PERM, or never had one approved, you have to leave after a maximum of 6 years.

Green card applications for Indians (and to a lesser extent Chinese and Mexicans) are backed up for decades. So you're looking at people who filed PERMs in the last decade and are still waiting for green cards. They're allowed to stay on the H1B, which is why we have 800k people on H1Bs today. But these people are not working for Infosys, they're working for Google and Microsoft.

The 86,000 number contains 20,000 visas allocated to people who have graduate degrees from US universities. I don't think any of these folks are working for Indian consulting firms. So that leaves about 66,000 visas and 40,000 of those, at most, go the consulting firms. I did make an error in my math, which is not accounting for the fact you can stay for 6 years on this visa. Anecdotally, I know that most people of these people leave after about 2-3 years, when their "project" ends. But anyway, let's assume the worst case. You may have 240,000 people in the US on an H1B and working for an Indian tech consulting firm. That is still a small fraction of 3.6 million.

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