Live data from Hacker News

USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

bloomberg.com

31–40 of 429 posts

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#31
This administration continues its onslaught on American values. Crippling those avenues that enrich our culture and civic life: a pro immigrant credo we have fostered for years. Where talent, wherever they may be, were attracted to America for different reasons but almost all envisioned a better future for their family and the world. Trump with friends are facebook, Twitter, google, and reddit have by de facto unleashed the most toxic elements of our culture. I am this close to closing Facebook, I use duck duck go for search, I really regret hosting my domains with google this year, but if the hijacking continues. Everything I do will be blockchain. Fuck Silicon Valley. The place is a dump anyways.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#32
post #13

Conservatives may generally view this as "good" regardless of the impact because (according to arguments I've heard) "the less globalization, the better." In my mind, however, it boils down to two pretty simple points: Given that (1) the US is lagging far behind every developed nation in education, and higher education in the US is prohibitively expensive compared to other developed nations, (2) the only way for the…

Paleoconservatism/populism isn't concerned about the economic benefits of immigration; it's concerned about "protecting" culture so that immigrants don't have the opportunity to reshape it in any capacity.

A sizeable portion of Trump's base believes that they are in danger of becoming a minority in "their own" country and will sidestep the economic benefits of immigration to retain a demographic majority. To these voters, power and influence is a zero-sum game where the many exercise absolute reign over the few (constitutional equality be damned), and sharing the pie with immigrants puts them at risk of becoming the few.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#33
post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the H1-B is a "Dual Intent" visa, it is absolutely still about immigration, the H1-B doesn't just allow for temporary workers. It provides a well worn path to a green card and permanent residency in the US too, and in my experience virtually everyone I've known to use the H1-B has done so. The H1-B cap is surely a far more pressing concern for most technology firms than the GC backlog. The H1-B cap and delays a…

I think the parent poster's point is that the H1B process is far from the bottleneck there, for shops intending to bring along their foreign workers rather than churn through cheap employees, which matches my experience.

I'd disagree - the H1B process can absolutely be argued to be the main bottleneck for hiring skilled foreign tech workers right now, especially as the cap has been exceeded by such an enormous number for several years.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#34
post #13

Conservatives may generally view this as "good" regardless of the impact because (according to arguments I've heard) "the less globalization, the better." In my mind, however, it boils down to two pretty simple points: Given that (1) the US is lagging far behind every developed nation in education, and higher education in the US is prohibitively expensive compared to other developed nations, (2) the only way for the…

The stated purpose of the H1-B program is to allow companies to fill vacancies with international applicants if they are unable to find US employees qualified for the roles. I've never heard any sane, rational person object to this use case. The issue most people have is that the program seems to be rampantly abused. Companies are replacing US workers with H1-B's sourced from companies like Tata and Infosys at much l…

Even established companies not in the obviously-sleazy Tata/Infosys abuse buckets play games here. "Write up job description consisting of specialty skills your H1B candidate already has, but that you don't need in your company in that role, then use them as a generic webdev" type stuff.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#35
post #5

The particular anecdote in this article almost seems anti-convincing to me... It suggests a job that should get challenged: > For Centro, a company in Chicago that makes technology for ad agencies [...] applied for visas for three young employees who already had the legal right to work for a limited time after graduating from college. > To Clark's eyes, the position — which consisted of writing algorithms and require…

It doesn't even sound particularly fluffed up. Most new grads that took a database course would probably fit that description. There are plenty of people qualified around.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#36
post #13

Conservatives may generally view this as "good" regardless of the impact because (according to arguments I've heard) "the less globalization, the better." In my mind, however, it boils down to two pretty simple points: Given that (1) the US is lagging far behind every developed nation in education, and higher education in the US is prohibitively expensive compared to other developed nations, (2) the only way for the…

To play devils advocate, at this point in time with the highest rate of immigration in the history of the country (i think 13%) "conservatives" are looking out for the american citizens that are losing out to these high skilled (and low skilled) immigrants.

Why is it that we cannot compete with foreign companies with native workers? Why should those countries be okay with losing their top talent?

Shoudnt we solve the problem of native workers not having the right skills before we open the borders to everyone else?

The other argument I understand is cultural. How much immigration can a society take before it is unrecognizable to the people that live there. You can't say that if you moved 100 million indians to the US ( A fairly small number of the population) it wouldn't look and feel completely different.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#37
As an aspiring immigrant, I feel this is great. Instead of a situation where immigration to US sort of works, sort of doesnt, is a hassle, but not really a bad one, a lot of companies were still keeping major offices in US.

Now that Americans have made up their mind that they dont want immigrants, companies will spend more money on opening engineering centers in immigration friendly countries (Canada\west Europe\Australia(maybe),etc) which from a personal perspective are great countries for me to immigrate to. And this time I might would be able to catch the first wave of immigrants (who get to convert to citizens) if there is a genuine boom in jobs in such countries (unlike US where its near impossible for an EB2 immigrant to get citizenship if moving today)

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#38
post #32
post #13

Conservatives may generally view this as "good" regardless of the impact because (according to arguments I've heard) "the less globalization, the better." In my mind, however, it boils down to two pretty simple points: Given that (1) the US is lagging far behind every developed nation in education, and higher education in the US is prohibitively expensive compared to other developed nations, (2) the only way for the…

Paleoconservatism/populism isn't concerned about the economic benefits of immigration; it's concerned about "protecting" culture so that immigrants don't have the opportunity to reshape it in any capacity. A sizeable portion of Trump's base believes that they are in danger of becoming a minority in "their own" country and will sidestep the economic benefits of immigration to retain a demographic majority. To these vo…

What US Democrats ignore is that practically every damn country in the world does this too, often to a higher degree than the US.

So there's a pragmatic question of how to avoid putting yourself at a disadvantage by being comparatively overgenerous that you don't have to be a "paleoconservative" or Trump supporter, or even Republican, to be concerned about.

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#39
post #13

Conservatives may generally view this as "good" regardless of the impact because (according to arguments I've heard) "the less globalization, the better." In my mind, however, it boils down to two pretty simple points: Given that (1) the US is lagging far behind every developed nation in education, and higher education in the US is prohibitively expensive compared to other developed nations, (2) the only way for the…

> I just don't understand why we wouldn't want to make it as easy as possible to steal talent

Because that's not what the H1-B is. The majority of H1-B holders are the IT body shops: Cognizant, Infosys, and Tata are the top 3 by a wide margin [1]. I agree with you in principle but I think the H1-B system is not a good implementation of those ideals. I have a hard time believing it does much more than depress the wages of American white collar workers.

1. http://fortune.com/2017/08/03/companies-h1b-visa-holders/

Re: USCIS is challenging an unusually large number of H-1B applications

#40
Ah yes, gotta love H-1B threads. The latent nativism among the Hacker News crowd is laid bare.

Here's a radical proposal: give anyone with a clean criminal record and a job offer a green card. No limits, no $100k minimum wage, no protectionism. If you, with all the advantages that natives get (networks, language, NETWORKS), can be beat by an immigrant with zero social connections, you probably are worth less than you think you are. Time to compete, pal.

Anything less is opportunity hoarding based on the patch of dirt you were born on.

Post reply on HN