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

Living The American Dream

myasmine.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 77 posts

Re: Living The American Dream

#51

Post by ylem »

throawa wrote: post #22
ebiester wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The J-1, right? I'm frankly surprised you were able to transition away from the H1-B from the F-1. (My partner is in a similar boat, but still on the F-1. I'm currently in his country, and we're hoping that despite him being on the F-1, the accumulated time that he spent in his country totalling two years will be enough to count for the requirement, despite it not being contiguous. The problem is it seems to be all u…

Yes, J-1. :) It's such an obscure corner of the US immigration law chaos, that barely anybody knows about it, except for those that have to live with it. The transition to H-1B from F-1 under J-1 cloud is even more obscure -- it's actually a legal loophole in the law that I think only a few know about. Basically, it's illegal to apply for H-1B visa without first satisfying the requirement, but it's OK to apply for H-…

A number of postdocs come in as J-1...A lot depends on if your home country is willing to waive your need to return for 2 years..

Re: Living The American Dream

#52

Post by tomjen3 »

rickmb wrote: post #25

Seems to me that from being an immigrant nation the US has become the Western country that is the hardest to immigrate to.

Actually the hardest to legally immigrate to. It is not that difficult to get across the border (and you can properly walk across the Canadian undetected).

Which is a real shame, you have the option of a real boost in the economy if you those who want to work get into the country.

Re: Living The American Dream

#53

Post by gaius »

noonespecial wrote: post #10
autarch wrote: post #7

This seems like a good example of how screwed up immigration policies are in this country. We should be running out to other countries and actively recruiting people like her to immigrate here. She's smart, she's hard-working, and she's obviously incredibly motivated. But despite all this, the process of even getting a green card took a ridiculously long time. I really don't understand people knee jerk stance against…

That's a fascinating idea I've been kicking around for a while now. What if a country recruited citizens? The US almost did in a way at the end of WW2 and we more or less got a space program out of it.

Consider the case that rich country A recruits all the, say, nurses from poor country B. Or any other skill that B is short of itself.

Re: Living The American Dream

#54

Post by ajays »

miked wrote: post #12
autarch wrote: post #7

This seems like a good example of how screwed up immigration policies are in this country. We should be running out to other countries and actively recruiting people like her to immigrate here. She's smart, she's hard-working, and she's obviously incredibly motivated. But despite all this, the process of even getting a green card took a ridiculously long time. I really don't understand people knee jerk stance against…

>> I really don't understand people knee jerk stance against immigration (well, I do understand it, it's largely racism). I don't know any Americans who are opposed to immigration. I know lots of them who are opposed to illegal immigration. Interestingly, the people I know most ferociously opposed to the illegals are themselves immigrants, three from China, one from India, and one from France. And racism has nothing…

My opposition to illegal immigration boils down to these points:

1. Many illegals die each year making the journey, and many more are brutalized on the way to the border. They have to deal with coyotes, drug gangs, etc. The current situation is untenable.

2. Once they're here, the illegals are cut-off from their families; they can't visit home and miss out on their children growing up, leading to further problems.

3. Just legalizing them doesn't solve the problem; just more people from south of the border keep trying to get in.

The solution, IMHO, is an "unskilled worker visa" available to residents of Mexico and Central American countries. Give preference to those with roots in their communities and a clean record. It would let them come to the US for manual work like picking crops, construction, etc. and go back (and forth) whenever they want. Many other countries (especially the Middle-Eastern ones) have such visas.

Re: Living The American Dream

#55

Post by pyre »

trustfundbaby wrote: post #21
micahgoulart wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada does that. They actively seek out highly skilled foreigners and offer them opportunity to immigrate to Canada. It's out of necessity since there is a shortage of highly skilled professionals in Canada. Here's a recent article about new initiatives the Canadian government is taking: http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Feds+plan+hand+pick+ski...

They've scaled back the Federal program drastically, there are only very few skills which are eligible for immigration and IT/software dev is not one of them

Doesn't it qualify under NAFTA at least (granted this only applies to US/Mexico)?

Re: Living The American Dream

#56

Post by bearmf »

rickmb wrote: post #25

Seems to me that from being an immigrant nation the US has become the Western country that is the hardest to immigrate to.

What made you think it is the hardest one? It is not easier to emigrate to UK, Canada or Australia, the systems are just different.

Re: Living The American Dream

#57

Post by throawa »

rdtsc wrote: post #24
throawa wrote: post #16

Just wanted to share my story too (throwaway account). I first came to the US when I was 16 on a high-school "exchange" program, which was actually a one-way "exchange" (nobody went to my country from the US), sponsored by the US government in order by promote democracy, American way of life and thinking, etc., across the world, and especially in the former Soviet Union, where I was from. The American plan was to imm…

Thanks for sharing. Yeah the program was called Freedom Support Act. And you probably had a J-1 visa. That was a great program and I wish there were more of those kind of programs that would bring in kids from other regions of the world. It is unfortunate about the 2 year requirement for your particular case. Since it was a US govt. sponsored program they paid for your stay, travel and allowance while here. It was no…

Overall I agree, it was a positive program, although with its own quirks and downsides. That said, my "issues" with it are:

- That "task" was never clearly spelled out to mostly immature, 16 year old minors. The attached strings were slowly revealed much later into the deal. I don't want to call it a "bait-and-switch", but it does have many attributes of it.

- There's no way to repay the State Dept for the expenses if you don't want to "do the 2 years".

- As I already mentioned earlier, communications mechanisms were revolutionized since then with the advance of Internet. Most communication and spread of informal knowledge now occurs online, even in my home country. Most ideological "debates" over Western ideals, etc., happen online.

- I wonder what the failure rate was for the program. Most people I know either came back to the US immediately, or eventually. I believe the program is shut down now. Unfortunately, a failed program to a government official is just that -- oh well, time to move on. To a participant, it's a life-altering experience, for better or worse.

Re: Living The American Dream

#58

Post by geebee »

philwelch wrote: post #42
miked wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> I really don't understand people knee jerk stance against immigration (well, I do understand it, it's largely racism). I don't know any Americans who are opposed to immigration. I know lots of them who are opposed to illegal immigration. Interestingly, the people I know most ferociously opposed to the illegals are themselves immigrants, three from China, one from India, and one from France. And racism has nothing…

If you're opposed to illegal immigration, and you're also opposed to changing the immigration laws so it's easier to immigrate legally, you're opposed to immigration. Let's just be honest about this.

I completely disagree. I think it means they're opposed to unlimited immigration.

The US currently takes in well over a million immigrants legally into the country every year. Are you "opposed" to immigration generally if you don't think it should be two million a year? If you think it should be two million a year, does that mean someone who thinks it should be four million can say you're opposed to immigration?

I'm in favor of a fairly high level of immigration, though I think our current system is completely broken (and seems to make it hard for the people we'd most want here to stay). But I absolutely support some controls on the sheer number and rate of entry, and I really don't agree that this makes me opposed to immigration in the general sense.

Re: Living The American Dream

#59

Post by peripitea »

throawa wrote: post #16

Just wanted to share my story too (throwaway account). I first came to the US when I was 16 on a high-school "exchange" program, which was actually a one-way "exchange" (nobody went to my country from the US), sponsored by the US government in order by promote democracy, American way of life and thinking, etc., across the world, and especially in the former Soviet Union, where I was from. The American plan was to imm…

I'm assuming people have suggested this to you, but in case they haven't, I've heard of people getting a lot of traction by contacting (and having their citizen friends contact) their senator/congressperson.

Re: Living The American Dream

#60

Post by rdtsc »

throawa wrote: post #57
rdtsc wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for sharing. Yeah the program was called Freedom Support Act. And you probably had a J-1 visa. That was a great program and I wish there were more of those kind of programs that would bring in kids from other regions of the world. It is unfortunate about the 2 year requirement for your particular case. Since it was a US govt. sponsored program they paid for your stay, travel and allowance while here. It was no…

Overall I agree, it was a positive program, although with its own quirks and downsides. That said, my "issues" with it are: - That "task" was never clearly spelled out to mostly immature, 16 year old minors. The attached strings were slowly revealed much later into the deal. I don't want to call it a "bait-and-switch", but it does have many attributes of it. - There's no way to repay the State Dept for the expenses i…

Very good points. Yeah at no point in the process did they make that explicit, and that is unfortunate.

And completely agree, someone should have the option to basically repay all the expenses associated with the 2 years and get a waiver in return. Heck, you have probably already repaid it many times over just by paying taxes and producing value in this country.

Looking back at my experience I did actually do some of the sharing. I was only 15 at the time and so I had 2 more years of high-school before heading back to US for the University (also a full ride scholarship). There were a number of times when teachers from my high-school back home invited me in for a round table discussion so I could share some of the teaching practices from American high-school. For example I told them about how frequent quizzes and tests are used to make grading more objective and it keeps tracks of students' progress. Or how group and research projects are used. At least in that one high-school some teachers chose to implement that. I encouraged my extended family members to study English (2 of my younger cousins followed in my footsteps). Also remember tutoring some classmates in English and telling them about American culture informally. I would like to think I made some contribution at least.

Yeah you made a good point about how Internet sort of made this obsolete. I agree 90%, the other 10% are reserved for the case when actually meeting someone who have been abroad and has acquired some of the culture and ideas is still different than reading it from a magazine or seeing it online.

Post reply on HN