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Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

wsj.com

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Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#431

Post by nrmitchi »

temikus wrote: post #383
nrmitchi wrote: post #33

I'll give you that, but it seems like a much simpler solution would have just been improving the flexibility for an H1B worker to be allowed to work at any employer for the term of their status. If an employer used an H1B in order to hire a foreign worker and then under pay them, the worker would just get another job that pays market rate, without the work status concern. Without the artificial control over the emplo…

As a serial immigrant myself - hit the nail on the head there. There is the “pay debt back” (relo, visa/lawyer costs) issue in some companies but this is a very good start.

IIRC having an employee pay for costs associated with H1B and/or employer-sponsored Permanent Residency applications was flat-out prohibited. Is that wrong?

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#432

Post by yurlungur »

I do have a few thoughts on this issue but chief among them is: does this really matter when the election is around the corner and so much instability is in plain sight? I'm not sure I care about a specific policy change driven by this administration when so much about everything may change in the next few months, one way or another. What I am sure is I sure do have my plan B if things don't go my way, and I hope other people have one too if they can afford to.

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#433

Post by sudosteph »

dartdartdart wrote: post #212
jzymbaluk wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is right. The answer that's best for the economy is to allow more immigration, not less (especially skilled immigration). This move will just make it more dificult for the average company to sponsor H1B workers

I agree, American is built on the hard work of immigrants. We need to allow more immigrants, especially highly skilled workers

Maybe this comes off as too negative: but that "America is built on the hard work of immigrants" meme is an absolutely tone-deaf talking point. Many people hear hear that phrase, and immediately assume you are not arguing in good faith.

Yes, immigrants built America. But so did enslaved people. So did natives. So did rebellious colonists of the British empire. Most of those people did not consider themselves immigrants - and nor do their descendants.

Many immigrants have contributed amazing things to our nation, and they still do. But immigrants as a group are not a monolith. Many of the "highly skilled workers" that come over on H1Bs, are frankly - not highly skilled workers. Many are semi-skilled workers who are preferred over qualified Americans because they work for low wages and nearly never quit when abused.

Americans have a right to say that we don't want our immigration system used as a tool to devalue working conditions - something which affects all of us. If we can solve this problem first, then we can talk about allowing in more immigrants. But it's absurd to say to reduce this to "immigrants = good = America". Not when we know the current system is abusive to both immigrants, and to the Americans who are part of the toxic workplaces that the H1B visa-mill paradigm has created.

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#434

Post by ravila4 »

I feel like this thread has a lot of bias coming from bad experiences in the computer science field. While I do understand the bad practices of many tech companies, I think the picture is very different when you look at careers in other STEM fields, such as biology, chemistry, and physics. H1B visas are very important for foreign students in these fields particularly those hoping to pursue careers in academia. H1B visas are in fact a beacon of hope that brings many talented students to America, with the promise of finding a job here. As a matter of fact, many of these students go on to work on projects that are important for human health, e.g. COVID-19 research. It is convenient for the country to attract and retain their talent, of which there is currently a shortage. Not every H1B holder is an underpaid scrum master. Some are legitimately scientists doing on a postdoc in academia, and working to improve lives. For those of you rejoicing, I just want to ask you to do more research in how this rash policy change may impact the lives of real people.

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#435

Post by phonebanshee »

jedberg wrote: post #196
dudul wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you avoid seeing 500M indians/Chinese landing in America on the very next day? I think there is a middle ground between the disaster that are immigration laws today, and full open borders.

You would still have to have a job lined up to get a work visa. So there would need to be 500M new jobs. If our economy grew by 500M new jobs, that would be unequivocally good. Those 500M people would be paying taxes, buying goods and services, paying for housing, etc.

Isn't that easy to game? You set up a bunch of shell companies that offer jobs. Problem solved.

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#436

Post by Aperocky »

tannerbrockwell wrote: post #419

H1B visas have always been about suppressing the wages of tech workers. America can be competitive on the world stage and pay a market rate. It's not true that these workers have skills that are not available domestically. Make the H1B salaries the same as the senior tech employees you're trying to displace and the calculations on firing all your senior employees goes out the window. This ultimately will be good for…

You do understand that if there is a way to pay half the money for the same work, every single one of the company would have done so right?

The only reason that isn't happening right now is because the top talent largely congregated to the USA, utilizing those visas, making finding talent in other markets harder as you usually just can't find the same level of talent out there.

That is going to change, especially when COVID eliminated a huge part of inconvenience - everybody is at home anyways, the person on the other side can be 20 miles away or 8000 miles away, it doesn't matter all that much.

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#437

Post by ocdtrekkie »

nrmitchi wrote: post #33

I'll give you that, but it seems like a much simpler solution would have just been improving the flexibility for an H1B worker to be allowed to work at any employer for the term of their status. If an employer used an H1B in order to hire a foreign worker and then under pay them, the worker would just get another job that pays market rate, without the work status concern. Without the artificial control over the emplo…

This suggests the market rate for an H1B employee isn't just, in general, lower than a comparable American employee. If everyone's underpaying H1Bs, we need to counter that.

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#438

Post by somurzakov »

this is do dumb. People will just leave to Canada/Mexico and pay taxes there and continue to be employed at their current workplace remotely (if this is IT). So jobs will continue to be offshored, this will even accelerate offshorization of high-paid IT jobs.

While number of nurses will decrease and healthcare system will suffer in form of poorer service/higher healthcare costs.

Trump has good intentions, but his policies do more harm to Americans, than the benefit they make.

There are only 85K h-1b visas awarded annually (with advanced degree and work experience required and stuff), while family reunification visas account for tens of millions of green cards.

Trump has no idea how to create legislation that works, this is purely populist move targeted at uneducated voter base to get cheap points before the election.

Don't fall for this cheap populist move, Donald ia just being desperate to score any cheap points from swing states, given Biden's increasing lead

Re: Trump administration announces overhaul of H1B visa program requiring higher pay

#440

Post by madars »

airstrike wrote: post #4

Link to DHS press release: https://www.dhs.gov/news/2020/10/06/department-homeland-secu... Probably a better link than the WSJ submission – even though I'm a subscriber, I want the facts, and the facts seem to be hard to find As a matter of fact, I still haven't found the actual "interim final rule" (an oxymoron if I've ever seen one), so if anyone has a link, I'd be immensely grateful EDIT: Here's the unpublished ru…

There are two unpublished rules. DHS rule that you mention ( https://www.federalregister.gov/public-inspection/2020-22347... ; goes in effect in 60 days) and DOL rule establishing the percentiles ( https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ETA/oflc/pdfs/DOL-Int... ; goes in effect this week).
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