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America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

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Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#201

Post by Raz2 »

seshagiric wrote: post #165
iguy wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not on a 1-for-1 basis, but something like this is the argument for allowing free movement between comparable countries. If the UK, Canada & Australia opened up to each other, there'd be no massive net flow, but many individuals could work for the most suitable company / near their in-laws / in a climate they like. This was I think also what was envisaged when the EU first wrote free movement into law -- general mixi…

EU folks can work any where in the EU right? I wonder how it is working out

Migration is limited because almost every EU country has its own language.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#202

Post by denebo »

tonmoy wrote: post #194
firedrakerage wrote: post #11

I do not typically post, but these suggestions seem like genuine improvements to the existing system: "Kerr suggests allocating H-1Bs not by lottery as they are now, but by salary — the more that a company is willing to pay for a foreign worker, the quicker they can get a visa." "A second change would be to allow H-1B workers to apply for permanent residency green cards on their own, without having to be sponsored by…

While the salary thing would help me gravely, not all industries/states pay in a similar way. It would help software companies in CA/NY a lot, but a biological research center in Midwest would be tough out of luck.

They'd definitely need to account for region, rather than just looking at the dollar amount.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#203

Post by geff82 »

dunpeal wrote: post #153
geff82 wrote: post #149

You want good healthcare, good salary, the real Autobahns, good houses and you are talented, have at least a bachelor in IT and are willing to try something out? Come over to Germany. Honestly, no I other country I know of has such a fast and well thought out way to permanent residence for foreign talent than Germany. If you are interested in working here, drop me a message to eriklistserve at gmail dot com.

Correct me if I'm wrong, a friend of mine who looked into it, all he could get in Berlin was less than half his American salary, while his taxes were very substantially higher. His take-home would have been slashed by about 70%, so he gave up the idea. Have things changed since then?

Berlin is the worst place if you want to have a good paying job. If you only want to work for startups, then Berlin is the place to go. But if you are open to work in Big Enterprise IT, then there are many places where you can work and earn very good salaries (especially Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg where Enterprise IT usually pays between 80k$-140k$ depending on your role). While taxes and contributions for singles are quite high, it also includes health insurance, retirement money and unemployment insurance. For food, Germany is one of the cheapest places in the world. Property taxes are REALLY low compared to the US (I mean, in the US or in Germany, you as a renter pay them, so rent is also cheaper here, even in the hubs). In big cities, many people do not need a car as public transportation is very affordable and available everywhere (so that money gets saved for some).

The biggest challenge: to stay here for longer, try to learn German well. It is not that difficult if you take your time.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#204

Post by denebo »

dudul wrote: post #71
dkhenry wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you can get the same effect on salary by making it easier for a H1B recipient to leave the company that brought them over. Right now its very hard for a visa recipient to move companies so they can be given sub market rate salaries, if you make it so once they show up they can move to get a market rate salary then the companies who make a pratice of hiring foreign talent and paying them below market rates will end. T…

In theory it is not very complicated for a H1B to change employer. It simply requires the employer to file a petition to sponsor the H1B. It doesn't count towards the "seats" available yearly, and it's almost guaranteed to be granted. There is a small cost, maybe a few grands. If you think about it, it's way cheaper than paying recruiter fee fo example. In practice you're right though. Most companies have limited exp…

Two problems:

- The green card process doesn't completely transfer over.

- Filing a petition to transfer an H1B puts the employee at risk of getting a denial. Every petition sent to USCIS is risking an audit, denial, and at the very least, many headaches.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#205

Post by iguy »

jshevek wrote: post #188
coding123 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly... brexit is how it worked out.

Only after an influx of economic migrants. Without that influx of migrants, I don't think most of the pro brexit people would have been concerned about the free movement of people within Europe.

Doesn't free movement include economic migrants? That said, they have also had a lot of non-EU immigration.

But my point was that free-movement between near-peer countries seems like almost pure benefit. And this was where the EU started, knocking down walls in benelux... you would struggle to get many people upset about that.

Integration all the way to Romania etc. is more recent, really quite a different thing. The hope was for rapid convergence, and the evidence is mixed I guess.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#206

Post by El_Flanagan »

onemoresoop wrote: post #191
mdpopescu wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea why this comment was killed but yes, 30K/year is a pretty good salary in a lot of Europe.

Especially in eastern Europe, for example in Romania you could live like a king on $30k per annum

I wont say that about Spain. You will have a decent life. If you want to save money or invest, that's it. No fancy dinners nor trips during your PTO. You will also have to work until you are at least 65-70 years old to have a regular retirement. I wont call that living like a King. Just like a regular working class person. Decent? Sure. But that's it.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#207

Post by shade_zzz »

duxup wrote: post #50
firedrakerage wrote: post #11

I do not typically post, but these suggestions seem like genuine improvements to the existing system: "Kerr suggests allocating H-1Bs not by lottery as they are now, but by salary — the more that a company is willing to pay for a foreign worker, the quicker they can get a visa." "A second change would be to allow H-1B workers to apply for permanent residency green cards on their own, without having to be sponsored by…

I always thought H1B should simply be $100k or $120k+ plus jobs only. I was looking through online records and found folks being brought in for sub 50k jobs that looked like low level ... customer service roles.

That seems fishy, the minimum required salary to apply for h1b was 60k/year till the beginning of the year, and there was a bill that was introduced which proposed raising it to 90k/year.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#208

Post by drankula3 »

httpz wrote: post #171
calvinbhai wrote: post #150

I agree with what Kerr is suggesting. It makes a lot of sense. I also agree with a many Americans who are anti-H1b that it suppresses wages, hence makes it attractive to higher foreign workers, quite often for jobs that are not truly state of the art, but do require the technical know how. This is why it makes sense for the H1-B to be a highest paid gets first kind of a visa. That way there's a strong incentive to no…

Though it should be divided by industry. Otherwise, highly paid software engineers will take all the visas and other industries will struggle to match the salary required get a visa. How to divide industry is a very messy business though. Some of our immigration laws divide by industry and those were written 30 years ago. A lot of jobs we hire now didn't exist 30 years ago.

So what? Wouldn't that just make wages rise in those other industries, pushing more Americans into those apparently underserved fields?

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#209

Post by slothtrop »

Hire graduates and train them, problem solved. Cheap immigrant labor is a case of employers having their cake and eating it too.

The vast majority of these jobs aren't that challenging, hence the immigrants. They're mostly looking for monkeys, not 10x devs.

Re: America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away

#210

Post by stale2002 »

bduerst wrote: post #94
pmalynin wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arguably, the salary (and price in general) is measure of marginal utility. Hence if one job pays 140, 000 over 70, 000 we can argue that the one that pays more provides more marginal utility to society. That is, the United States as a whole gains more value from that job.

Or you could argue that the U.S. gains more from allowing 20 lower-paid civil engineers than allowing 1 private sector executive buy their H1B. The point is that switching to an auction with the H1B causes more problems without really solving any, at least within the scope of the program's purpose.

But the choice is not between 20 low paid engineers vs 1 highly private sector employee.

The choice is instead between 20 low paid engineers and 20 high paid executives/engineers/employees.

This makes the answer to this choice much more clear.

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