Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 429 posts

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

#51

Post by majormajor »

maxerickson wrote: post #44
majormajor wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

What disadvantage are you talking about?

Generally churn factors. Stuff like importing young talent opening up further exposure to that talent moving on but also atrophying your in-country educational structures and investment. Kinda the societal version of "publish or perish" - always chasing just short-term dollars, without regard to long-term planning. If you want to import people to do the good jobs, but also want to ship the cheap jobs away, what happens to everyone squeezed out?

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

#52

Post by komali2 »

xienze wrote: post #43
komali2 wrote: 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 only way for the US to remain on the R&D playing field Are those the people we're bringing in with H1-Bs?

Is immigration in general.

I highly recommend a tour around your local university's Chemistry department, as a stark example.

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

#53

Post by Draco_Au »

komali2 wrote: 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…

No you are not being reductive, I appreciate your candid narrative. Bottom line, this is it for America, if we do not open the doors, sign treaties well established and reaffirm our position of leadership to our allies...the petrodollar is next, which means our chances of defaulting are 80%, and with that we will officially become a failed state. Because you let in a criminal mobster, a chauvinist, a loudmouth, a Wiseguy from queens who doesn’t know his place. Add in the hundreds of thousands of Americans who consider Trump a billionaire. I mean i’m Utterly in a state of revolsion. This behavior is abhorrent, a true affront to national security, not to mention the blatant obstruction and mishandling of justice; diluting our separation of powers, the list goes on....popcorn, you’re gonna need lots of it...and a second passport.

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

#54

Post by tomschlick »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #42

Instead of a lottery, we should have an H1-B auction. There are a limited number of H1-B slots, and the companies that offer the highest salaries get them. In addition, whistle-blower protection with automatic Green cards for anyone who reports employer abuse, with prison sentences for the entire company C-suite if a company abuses this process.

Agreed on the auction, but not on auto green cards. That would flood the system with false or minor reports.

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

#55

Post by babesh »

komali2 wrote: 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…

Because Trump does what benefits Trump, rather than the country as a whole. Support him and perhaps not get punished. Don't support him and definitely get punished. It is as simple as that.

Capital crosses national boundaries to a great extent so if you've got capital who cares where it is deployed.

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

#56

Post by powvans »

bischofs wrote: post #36
komali2 wrote: 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…

These countries may not be okay with losing their top talent. It's an interesting viewpoint on economic competition though. It absolutely is in the best interest of the US to "brain drain" other countries.

Note that this isn't new. During and after WWII the US worked hard to bring scientists to the US to prevent them working for the enemy. Just one example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip

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

#57

Post by ams6110 »

majormajor wrote: post #20
komali2 wrote: 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 US as a whole (including non-governmental culture, employer preferences, etc) is still making a massive push for higher education, which is a big part of what's caused the arms race of ever-nicer dorms etc. The thing to remember about US education is that it's highly different between the haves and have-nots. That's a problem in itself, but it's a giant oversimplification to jump to "US educations are generally p…

Also, working at a major state university in the US, I don't see that the international students are really very good, for the most part. They certainly are predominant (in a numbers sense) in fields like computer science, but they aren't very good overall. Perhaps due to being barely able to communicate in English.

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

#58

Post by giobox »

malchow wrote: post #17

Two points: 1) Given that the numbers did indeed end up proving that wage arbitrageurs like Accenture were dominating the H1B lottery [ https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/11/06/us/outsourcin... ], reform would seem to be necessary. 2) Trump has repeatedly called for a Canadian or Australian style skills-based immigration system to replace chain and quota-based immigration. One would think HN would generally sup…

I would also assume that few here would take issue with merit-based immigration policies. The problem is arguably whether you trust Trump to actually do what he says, especially when he uses immigration policy as a dog whistle when preaching to his core vote.

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

#59

Post by vmarsy »

I don't like pieces like this who mostly make people who are in a true need of an H-1B more anxious.

For instance, statements like this one below are suppose to make the reader think something is deeply wrong:

> She said in past years she's counted on 90 percent of her petitions being approved by Oct. 1 in years past. This year, only 20 percent of the applications have been processed.

But, this year Premium processing was disabled for most of the year so that would explain this, wouldn't it? For those unaware, Premium processing is where the petitioner can pay an extra $1225 on top of all the existing fees, to have its case processed in at most 14 days. Without premium processing it can take months & months instead. Also, without the fees for premium processing, I wouldn't be surprised if USCIS have less employees able to work the cases. It was disabled specifically because the Regular processing cases backlog was getting too big. So if last year 90% of her cases used Premium Processing, the quote isn't shocking at all.

The same lawyer maintains her personal blog, where she isn't as dramatic, and gives more useful facts: http://immigrationgirl.com/

Premium processing is now back[1], it'd be interesting to see if the statement still holds true.

[1] http://immigrationgirl.com/premium-processing-is-back-for-al...

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

#60

Post by damnyou »

xraystyle wrote: post #30
komali2 wrote: 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…

> 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.

This canard keeps getting repeated in HN threads. This is WRONG. 100% absolutely completely WRONG. The only stated purpose of the H-1B program is to allow foreigners with degrees (or equivalent experience) to perform skilled work in the US. Here are the DOL requirements: https://webapps.dol.gov/elaws/elg/h1b.htm

The only one that affects US workers is to "[p]rovide working conditions for H-1B, H-1B1, or E-3 workers that will not adversely affect the working conditions of workers similarly employed." (There are additional requirements on H-1B dependent companies, but those don't apply to most companies.)

Here's a fact sheet from the DOL specifically about this matter: https://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/FactSheet62/whdfs62O...

What you're talking about is requirements for an EB-2 or EB-3 green card.

Post reply on HN