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Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

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Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

#61

Post by shas3 »

djb_hackernews wrote: post #12

This gets to the rub of prevailing wage. You are hiring a developer, do you call her an engineer where the prevailing wage is 87k or do you call her a programmer where the prevailing wage is 61k? This type of fraud is difficult to prove and there probably isn't even anyone responsible in the government to verify or investigate issues. EDIT: forgot to mention that the prevailing wage can be determined by salary survey…

Why is there an implicit assumption that the H1B visa program engenders fraud? A lot of H1B discussions on HN focus on fraud and avoid talking about legitimate talented foreigners because that stuff is not as interesting. H1B discussions on HN are like the crime beat in newspapers. Further, 'H1B' seems like a catchall term for hating on immigrant labor in the software industry. Here are some examples on HN that demonstrate bigoted generalizations and ill-informed hate on H1B-workers [1,2,3].

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8687804 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8651850 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8637756

Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

#63

Post by bzz01 »

hatred wrote: post #13

This is pretty interesting especially for cities which have mainly a single software giant to know sort of how much an engineer in that company makes. Like for example Kirkland ( google ). There might be others like Menlo Park (Facebook ? ) too.

There is no need to guess, data published by Dept of Labor (original source for this infographic) includes company names, specific position names and exact salaries.

Glassdoor was including that info in their estimates for a while though, so no big discoveries here.

Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

#64

Post by ryanSrich »

I wonder how they define "software designer". I see that 17% are making north of $130k. Does this role identify as a software architect? an API designer? Or is it referring to product designers, UX designers and such? If it's the latter that seems much higher than the self reported salaries on sites like Glassdoor and Salary Fairy.

Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

#66

Post by felixgallo »

pslam wrote: post #47
felixgallo wrote: post #5

I would like to see the 'value' taken from the point of view of the employer; how much is an H1B visa worth in terms of cost savings over a local employee?

It is very expensive to hire an H1-B compared to a US resident. The only way for it to be cheaper would involve fraud: paying a worker less than prevailing wage, which would require cooking your books, lying to US Immigration, and getting into a lot of trouble. (As is the case for a few big out-sourcing companies recently) Filing fees are high ($5k+ over 6 years), as is the cost in lawyers (probably similar), auditin…

For large institutions that have streamlined and amortized the costs of hiring H1-Bs, your assertions regarding cost ineffectiveness are not accurate. I say this through past direct experience working as a hiring manager inside several in the financial services industry, where the benefits of bringing in H1-Bs to reduce net cost were a frequent topic of conversation.

Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

#68

Post by dominotw »

felixgallo wrote: post #5

I would like to see the 'value' taken from the point of view of the employer; how much is an H1B visa worth in terms of cost savings over a local employee?

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

"Please avoid introducing classic flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say about them."

Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry

#69

Post by ryanSrich »

grecy wrote: post #58
arenaninja wrote: post #39

Wow, that disparity between developer and engineer... I'm not an H1B worker, but does this mean I should start calling myself an Engineer?

Only if you're a certified Engineer. I studied Software Engineering, and I'm accredited by the Institute of Engineers in Australia.

> Only if you're a certified Engineer

Not really. If you've got a CS or SE degree you are certainly an engineer. If you've built systems and worked in the industry solving difficult problems you are an engineer.

In the US we don't need an expensive piece of paper telling us what we're qualified to call ourselves.

EDIT: To be clear I'm referring to software engineering. Not all engineering. I thought that was obvious based on the context of the post but I guess not.

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