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Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

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Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#381

Disclaimer: I'm an immigrant. There are companies like Cognizant/InfoSys/Tata/... whose business model is based on abusing the H1B system, and that's obviously wrong and I'm quite surprised they get away with it. I'm not defending that. To those who broadly argue against skilled visas, consider this: Most H1B immigrants are between 20-30 age range. The prime age to join the workforce. Think how much investment you ha…

Much of what you say is true, but it's important to realize the H1-B is not designed with any of those benefits in mind. Its only purpose is to fill roles where there is no local talent.

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#382
post #108
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If H-1B visas were being used how they were intended, they would be a good thing, but we often see them used as a way to get cheap labor, or even directly replace American workers. The company I work at has H-1B junior web developers, hardly "very niche, hard to fill" positions that they can't find any qualified Americans to do.

The answer here is to actually fix the system with compassion rather than suspend it and harm everyone using it. I'm not unbiased: I'm a former H1B visa holder and wasn't underpaid at all. I promise you we exist! It's not a fun situation to be in... if you have a pending green card application (up to a certain point in the process) you can't change jobs easily. And if you come from some countries (India, in particula…

If you’re from India the current expected wait to get your green card, no exaggeration, is closer to 50 years.

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#383

Disclaimer: I'm an immigrant. There are companies like Cognizant/InfoSys/Tata/... whose business model is based on abusing the H1B system, and that's obviously wrong and I'm quite surprised they get away with it. I'm not defending that. To those who broadly argue against skilled visas, consider this: Most H1B immigrants are between 20-30 age range. The prime age to join the workforce. Think how much investment you ha…

It is very strange that people in this comment section shout "nationalism, BAD" when someone says that skilled people should stay in their own country and potentially help these countries to grow out of poverty, and statements like the one you just made - essentially rob these country of talented people and bring them into US - is somehow not nationalistic and good.

Can you see how someone emigrating of their own volition and bringing their skills is different to a country purposefully trying to encourage immigration of skilled workers from [poorer] countries where there is a skills shortage.

The end result looks similar but motivation matters.

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#384

Disclaimer: I'm an immigrant. There are companies like Cognizant/InfoSys/Tata/... whose business model is based on abusing the H1B system, and that's obviously wrong and I'm quite surprised they get away with it. I'm not defending that. To those who broadly argue against skilled visas, consider this: Most H1B immigrants are between 20-30 age range. The prime age to join the workforce. Think how much investment you ha…

O type Visas have no quota [0]. This is what the H1B are represented as though in practice suppress wages[1][2]. This issue is decades in the making and companies exploiting these programs earned their scrutiny. Especially when there's massive unemployment companies importing labor under these auspices need to be called out.

[0] https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/temporary-worker... [1] https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-new-look-at-the-h-1b-visa-pro... [2] https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2015/05/economists-h-1b-v...

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#385
post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If globalization and automation are so good at job creation, why did the American manufacturing workforce collapse? Economies are complex, counter-intuitive feedback machines, but the "supply and demand" model fits the last 40 years of data, while the "floats all boats" model really doesn't. "Lump of labor is a fallacy, honest!" sure sounds like the kind of opinion I could get a good penny for if I were an enterprisi…

He was talking about software jobs. "More than half of the top American tech companies were founded by immigrants or the children of immigrants" https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/30/us-tech-companies-founded-by... Recent immigrants were responsible for creating tens of thousands of jobs, most of them for Americans. Software isn't a zero-sum game even on a country level and certainly US benefits enormously because companie…

Immigrants starting businesses aren't doing it on H1-B visas. Those are only for employees of existing companies and don't upgrade to permanent citizenship.

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that possible, given that these people are paid above the prevailing wage? That's literally one of the requirements for the Visa, the minimum has been repeatedly raised to address this problem. So? Want to explain that to me?

If you classify someone as foo and have them do bar you can pay them above the prevailing rate for foo while actually being below the prevailing rate for bar. It can also serve as a way for third party to earn a sizable chunk of that persons wages which would be a less likely scenario for someone hired stateside.

Why would they agree to be paid under when they are in tech where companies until at least a year ago were fighting for employees? They could literally cross the street in SF and land a better job at a better price. I mean, for a country that prides itself on free markets, it’s remarkable that you believe that free markets simply stop working.

And here’s the kicker. An H1B employee costs a company a lot more than a resident because of government fees and lawyer costs.

So if you have a citizen and an H1B holder drawing the same salary, it actually means the company values the H1B holder far more than they do the citizen.

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#388
Here are the top 10 employers of H1-B.

With the exception of MSFT, all of these are "consulting firms" or "service" providers.

So while everyone is having "ideological, values" based discussions, here is what is really happening

Employer Name Employees Hired (All Years)

Infosys Limited 182,945

Tata Consultancy Services Limited 102,722

Deloitte Consulting Llp 65,976

Wipro Limited 63,354

Accenture Llp 51,360

Ibm India Private Limited 47,839

Capgemini America Inc 40,954

Microsoft Corporation 40,828

Ernst Young Us Llp 38,631

Cognizant Technology Solutions Us Corp 34,138

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#389
post #353
post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So many people here are celebrating this order due to its supposed abstract benefits but are somehow unaware of the its cruelty. To be blunt, a nation's citizens and permanent residents' rights to economic prosperity outweigh any temporary worker's right to continued employment. Yes it may be viewed as cruel in the individual case, but the point of these visas are not to provide a vehicle for those workers to come…

How does preventing a legal employee from visiting home and returning to the US help anyone who happened to be born in the US? It serves absolutely no purpose except to be cruel and to satisfy people in this country who enjoy cruelty towards immigrants.

>How does preventing a legal employee from visiting home and returning to the US help anyone who happened to be born in the US

From a pure economics view: it does because it constrains the supply of labor. Sure, many (most?) people would probably stay and not not go back, but there's always going to be a few who do go back. That constrains the labor supply, which in theory will raise the price of labor for everyone still here, mostly natives.

Re: Executive order expected to suspend H-1B, other visas until end of year

#390

I’m curious. HN has largely agreed that the current pandemic showed that remote work is absolutely doable. At the same time, people are claiming that the H1B visa, which allows immigrants to work in the US at largely American salaries, are taking away American jobs. So the stated solution is to do away with the visa and send those people back to their home countries. So why does anyone believe that when those people…

Yep. This is already happening. As US becomes a less inviting destination for the best talent, the talent will find home elsewhere. This might be beginning of the end of US tech dominance.
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