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New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

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Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#171

Post by bpt3 »

rbanffy wrote: post #156
bunderbunder wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Economics is generally not a zero sum game. At least according to what they taught me in Econ 101, on a macroeconomic scale skilled workers tend to increase job availability. They spend a larger portion of their income on services, which has a positive multiplier effect.

> skilled workers tend to increase job availability Who'd imagine squeezing the middle class would backfire epically? Compensation hasn't reflected the GDP per capital increases for the majority of the workforce. I don't think even the productivity increases from personal computers in the end of the 1970's have trickled down.

> Who'd imagine squeezing the middle class would backfire epically? Compensation hasn't reflected the GDP per capital increases for the majority of the workforce. I don't think even the productivity increases from personal computers in the end of the 1970's have trickled down.

Why would investments by employers result in higher compensation for employees?

That said, median real individual income has increased substantially since the 1970s: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/mepainusa672n

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#172

Post by emodendroket »

Cipater wrote: post #108
emodendroket wrote: post #74

Nobody is willing to state this but it’s pretty clear if you look at the way officials behind the policy talk: they’re OK with this. They don’t mind economic harm. The purpose has nothing to do with protecting workers and everything to do with creating a more ethnically homogenous country.

The ship sailed on this one a long time ago. The US is going to be more and more ethnically diverse regardless.

You may well be right but that’s where the urgency for massive action comes from.

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#173

Post by BeetleB »

cogman10 wrote: post #60
Sol- wrote: post #29

It's funny how quickly tech employees turn MAGA when it comes to qualified immigration. Bad zero-sum intuitions about work abound across all strata of society, it seems.

This isn't a MAGA thing. H1-B is a bad program. I have no problem with someone getting a green card, citizenship, TPS, etc in the US. I think there should be a lot faster routes for that. Let the software devs come in and become citizens or permanent residents, I don't care about that. What I do care about is the fact that H1-B locks immigrants to a company and tie their residence in the us to their employment. That…

> What I do care about is the fact that H1-B locks immigrants to a company

They're free to change companies if the new company sponsors them. It may reset the timeline for applying for a green card, depending on the location and job type of the new job. Generally, if it's the same type of job in the same city, it doesn't reset.

People (including Indians) do it all the time.

Going to a country for employment and having your legal status tied to a company is pretty standard across the world. Do you know counterexamples?

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#174

Post by vlyan »

orangedog wrote: post #83
bijowo1676 wrote: post #65

Canada is jumping on this opportunity to invite the US tech workers who are frustrated with US H1B visa restrictions and GC backlog by offering an express permanent residency in 10 days https://canadabychoice.com/services/move-to-canada/usa/occup... Canada also floating idea of alliance with Europe for travel and job opportunities https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-european-union-eu-me...

Does Canada not already have an issue with not enough jobs available?

one man's issue is another's man opportunity to overwork and underpay :)

lower wages and higher rents are 99.99% of the reason for the West's immigration policies.

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#175

Post by fidotron »

bijowo1676 wrote: post #65

Canada is jumping on this opportunity to invite the US tech workers who are frustrated with US H1B visa restrictions and GC backlog by offering an express permanent residency in 10 days https://canadabychoice.com/services/move-to-canada/usa/occup... Canada also floating idea of alliance with Europe for travel and job opportunities https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-european-union-eu-me...

While 90% of Canadian tech grads work in the US on TN visas.

This stuff doesn't actually help Canada at all, it's in a bit of a development trap.

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#176

Post by shagie »

ok123456 wrote: post #120
shagie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

H1B also includes things like high school foreign language teachers. https://h1bdata.info/index.php?em=&job=french+language+immer... A stack rank by salary would mean "H1B is big tech employees" rather than "these are professionals who have skills."

Then you will have unscrupulous contracting firms miscategorize employees to take advantage of those different quotas.

Increased scrutiny of H-1B-dependent employers could well be in order. There is already that classification in place and restrictions... though I suspect that underfunding of the Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division may be contributing to that lack of scrutiny.

Putting additional restrictions and requirements for reporting would likely be a good thing. I am hesitant to say "H-1B needs to go" when it does serve other non-technical positions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B-dependent_employer

https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/62c-h1b-depende...

In the past there have been specific carve outs for specific fields. The H-1A was the section for nurses. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-1B_visa#The_Immigration_Act_...

It might be appropriate to separate H-1T (I'm sure its not up to section T yet, using that as a placeholder) for tech workers and have some sort of proctored test to ensure that the skills represented aren't "I know how to use Claude" along with filing fees sufficient to cover the administration of the test.

This would move tech workers out of the H-1B category allowing it to return to its original intent of skilled workers (teachers, medical technicians, private sector researchers...).

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#177

Post by rbanffy »

kccqzy wrote: post #144
bijowo1676 wrote: post #65

Canada is jumping on this opportunity to invite the US tech workers who are frustrated with US H1B visa restrictions and GC backlog by offering an express permanent residency in 10 days https://canadabychoice.com/services/move-to-canada/usa/occup... Canada also floating idea of alliance with Europe for travel and job opportunities https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-european-union-eu-me...

In my experience, people who didn’t make it in the H-1B lottery go to Canada, try the L-1 and come back to the United States. It’s good for Canada to offer a work permit so quickly, but I’m just not seeing people willing to obtain permanent residency in Canada. After all, for the same job, the pay in Canada is way worse. In fact I’m seeing Canadian citizens come to the U.S. to get a big salary bump while doing the sa…

> After all, for the same job, the pay in Canada is way worse.

OTOH, you have free universal healthcare - and, the best part is that everyone in Canada gets it. You also have gun-free schools, abortions are considered healthcare, and, on top of all that, a sane government and a population that's considered pathologically nice to each other.

Honestly, I'd take the pay cut (in fact, I did - but I live in Ireland instead).

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#178

Post by bijowo1676 »

chaostheory wrote: post #99
bijowo1676 wrote: post #65

Canada is jumping on this opportunity to invite the US tech workers who are frustrated with US H1B visa restrictions and GC backlog by offering an express permanent residency in 10 days https://canadabychoice.com/services/move-to-canada/usa/occup... Canada also floating idea of alliance with Europe for travel and job opportunities https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-european-union-eu-me...

Canadian salaries are terrible once you realize that the cost of living in Canada is just as high or even higher than the US, which is why a lot of Canadian engineers left for the US

its a matter of building a sustaining tech ecosystem: colleges, employers, investors ecosystem.

Once they figure out the ecosystem Canada can arbitrage away the broken US immigration policies and anti-immigrant bigotry.

Just as manufacturing jobs in heartland have left US for Asia, so do tech jobs can leave US for Canada, India and elsewhere

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#179

Post by infecto »

embedding-shape wrote: post #149
infecto wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada historically is also one of the worst places to work in tech. Maybe it’s changed but I remember a decade ago tech jobs were paying a 1/4th of what they were in NYC/SF.

If pay and money is the only thing you care about then yeah. But for the rest of us, none of the places are "the worst place to work in tech" as long as you're in the northern hemisphere. Take a look at what the pay is in Chile if it's so scary to you.

Nope, cost of living is what matters and at least at the time major Canadian metros were as if not more expensive than SF/NYC and got you a 1/4th of the pay. I am sure that’s attractive to some but sounds pretty miserable. Chile I imagine has pretty good cost of living economics. Anecdotally most of my friends in Latin and South America live upper middle class on software salaries.

Re: New $100k H-1B visa fee pushes tech jobs offshore

#180

Post by pastel8739 »

bijowo1676 wrote: post #65

Canada is jumping on this opportunity to invite the US tech workers who are frustrated with US H1B visa restrictions and GC backlog by offering an express permanent residency in 10 days https://canadabychoice.com/services/move-to-canada/usa/occup... Canada also floating idea of alliance with Europe for travel and job opportunities https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-european-union-eu-me...

Man it’s embarrassing that they had AI write that for them
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