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Immigration is about talent, not costs

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Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#551

Post by sumedh »

diogenescynic wrote: post #244

I've worked for tech companies and a law firm that was in the top 4 in global immigration. The worker shortage is a myth. It doesn't exist. When a company claims they can't find a US worker they are lying and going through 'recruitment efforts' for Green Card and I-140 applications. HR uses a list of skills from the H1B they wanted to hire and then tailor a job posting to that exact list of skills in order to disqual…

> How many Americans are going to work abroad in India?

Many Africans go to India for work. India is better than many African countries. Similarly many Indians go to US.

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#552

Post by neindanke »

sliverstorm wrote: post #247
halflings wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "H1B Visas exist for one reason, and one reason only" ; "it's simple reality" ; "Without a doubt" ; "It happens all-the-fucking-time" ; "There's absolutely no talent shortage in the Bay Area" Presenting something as a fact doesn't make it one. You're basically saying that American tech companies should only hire Americans. That the facebook, Google, Mozilla, ... shouldn't hire smart people from other countries. As…

Your remarks about "divisive ethic-neuveau-ghettos" with "communities insulating themselves rather than assimilating" just makes it worst. Part of the "social contract" when you immigrate to the US is to at least make an effort to join your new country. We aren't the Borg, but we would like to see you learn at least a little English, accept your new country, and generally participate. You are already most of the way…

> Part of the "social contract" when you immigrate to the US is to at least make an effort to join your new country

Huh? What social contract are you talking about? Don't use quotes as a goto escape. If there was actually a social contract, then in the valley we'd all be speaking Chumash, Mojave or something like that.

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#553

Post by [deleted] »

bduerst wrote: post #510
LordHumungous wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The government defined "prevailing wage" for a level 1 software developer in San Francisco is $74,000. Does that sound like a market rate to you? http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?area=41884... Edit: For a "web developer" the starting number is $52,000. In San Francisco. http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?area=41884...

Yes it does. Level 1 is mean salary for entry level, and it's for the peninsula, not just SFC.

[deleted]

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#554

Post by hkarthik »

exelius wrote: post #300
hkarthik wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the reality is that we need a deep bench of competent developers willing to work for substantially less than $100k a year. And there we have it. You want developers to continue to be happy with less than $100K salaries while the costs of local housing skyrockets by 20% year over year. Clearly that won't work for developers hitting their 30s and wanting to start a family or those with families already. So you're…

That's a problem unique to the bay area. You don't have to live in the bay area to be a developer.

I work for a Bay Area based company, but I work remotely in Dallas, TX and I can assure you that this problem isn't unique to the Bay Area. It's just that the numbers skew lower.

Here in Dallas, many employers scoff at paying more than $80K/year for a senior developer when they can get an H1B for $50-60K. A lot of this relates to the total capital available, as well as the lower cost of living, but the trend is the same. Employers want more bodies for less money and they've figured out that the H1B is a clear path to achieve this goal.

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#555

Post by bonobo3000 »

manticore_alpha wrote: post #86

Look HNers, let's be honest with each other. There's a lot of H1B's on here. You have friends overseas who you want to see succeed in the Bay Area. In my experience at many tech companies in the Bay Area, H1B Visas exist for one reason, and one reason only - to get skilled engineering/STEM labor -- and to exploit connections (primarily Indian/Pakistani) among these workers to continue to get cheap labor. It absolutel…

While we are on the topic, anyone care to illuminate me on the practicalities of H1Bs as a worker?

1. What do you do if your petition for H1B is rejected. I have 2 shots to apply with my time in OPT, but what if both fail? Is the only option to go back to your home country and start over? That seems freaking absurd!

2. Can you increase your chances of being selected for H1B? For example, I've heard that working at bigger companies like Google/FB/Amazon gives you a better shot. Is there any truth to this?

3. Is there any reasonable way to start a company on an OPT or H1B? AFAIK the rules state that you can either work for a company or own majority stake but not both. So its possible with a cofounder who is a resident, but he/she would own the company legally.

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#556

Post by thetruthseeker1 »

chroem- wrote: post #409
avemuri wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It absolutely, positively hurts local labor - naturalized citizens - etc. Without a doubt. This may be unpopular, but so what if it hurts local labor? The global flow of goods is good, but the flow of labor is bad? Twenty years ago Pepsi and Coke entered the Indian market and destroyed/replaced the local beverage industry. Uber and Amazon have launched their own price wars more recently. A lot of people want Indian…

>The global flow of goods is good, but the flow of labor is bad? But that's just it: this is an attempt to slow the flow and distribution of capital (wages) by importing cheap labor. It allows even more economic power and resources to be concentrated in even fewer hands. It should be pretty self-evident why that's undesirable.

Is that not true when Pepsi goes to India and sells its product there. The profit is distributed only to share holders of Pepsi, and the Indian beverage companies stand to lose. If Pepsi had not been so "greedy", Indian beverage companies would make some money and probably cause a more better distribution of wealth?

Is Amazon guilty of using drones/machines for its 70 Billion$ business where as Target employs 5 times as many people for an equivalent revenue?

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#557

Post by avemuri »

chroem- wrote: post #409
avemuri wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It absolutely, positively hurts local labor - naturalized citizens - etc. Without a doubt. This may be unpopular, but so what if it hurts local labor? The global flow of goods is good, but the flow of labor is bad? Twenty years ago Pepsi and Coke entered the Indian market and destroyed/replaced the local beverage industry. Uber and Amazon have launched their own price wars more recently. A lot of people want Indian…

>The global flow of goods is good, but the flow of labor is bad? But that's just it: this is an attempt to slow the flow and distribution of capital (wages) by importing cheap labor. It allows even more economic power and resources to be concentrated in even fewer hands. It should be pretty self-evident why that's undesirable.

1) It may be depressing wages in the US, but tech wages in India are skyrocketing. The best are leaving for better lives in the US and local companies are realizing they need to compete globally for talent.

2) Capitalism concentrates wealth in general but I don't think it's black and white that it's bad. 60% of India's population is small farmers and there's a lot of protection against scale farming with land ceiling laws, subsidies, etc. I don't think we're doing them any great favour by protecting them. The US by contrast has only 3% of it's population employed in agriculture. I'm sure there was a lot of pain in going from 60% to 3% there as well, but it's probably a better outcome even weighing the concentration of wealth that resulted. It isn't perfect, but it's sort of the best available system. And treating labour different to goods makes no sense. By the same argument, importing cheap Chinese manufactured goods are bad. Any automation that removes jobs is bad. Any consolidation for economies of scale is bad.

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#558

Post by LordHumungous »

thrwy10 wrote: post #128
manticore_alpha wrote: post #86

Look HNers, let's be honest with each other. There's a lot of H1B's on here. You have friends overseas who you want to see succeed in the Bay Area. In my experience at many tech companies in the Bay Area, H1B Visas exist for one reason, and one reason only - to get skilled engineering/STEM labor -- and to exploit connections (primarily Indian/Pakistani) among these workers to continue to get cheap labor. It absolutel…

It absolutely, positively hurts local labor - naturalized citizens - etc. Without a doubt. I disagree with this statement. I am on an H1 and know several other people who are on H1s and can testify that this is a generalization. There are many ways to end up on an H1, overseas body shops is one avenue and American grad schools are another. Most H1s I know, myself included, graduated from good schools, have worked har…

As a critic oh H1B's, I should be careful to point out that I have nothing against the holders of H1B's, many of whom are outstanding people. My problem has to do with a system that artificially limits the bargaining ability of one sector of labor. The solution is better treatment of H1B immigrants, not xenophobic responses.

Re: Immigration is about talent, not costs

#559

Post by morenoh149 »

VLM wrote: post #316
dude3 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last month I was ridding in an Uber and the driver told me he was a Math Teacher. He said that all his students wanted to do was code all day long. He asked me if I wanted to come into class and just tell the kids about my job etc., they would "love that". I was thinking to myself. Here is a math teacher in the middle of Silicon Valley asking me (no one special by any means) to come in and talk to the kids. Why don't…

There's too many artificial barriers in the market to hiring those kids. They're not ALL going to graduate from Stanford, for example.

You don't have to be a compilers expert. Yes the supply of experts in ML/CV/compilers may be small worldwide. But I believe the current situation is a symptom as well of negligence on the part of these large tech companies. It's much cheaper to train locally and hire. Microsoft, apple, google et al should join forces to establish a vocational school in the bay area. Make it a 2 year program. I bet you'd get great engineers if Hack reactor, general assembly et al are any indicator.
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