Wow, that disparity between developer and engineer... I'm not an H1B worker, but does this mean I should start calling myself an Engineer?
If you are in the US, yes.
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
#102Wow, 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.
At least in Switzerland those job titles are made up by the companies.
Additionally since the Bolognia process people get a degree as Bsc or Msc. in Computer Science while the older degrees do contain the title prefix "Dipl. Ing ..." (e.g. Engineer with specialization in Software Development). So while the degrees are protected the job title are basically totally random.
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#103There is a bug in the histogram for Vermont.
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#104Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 demon…
The facts 6 of the top 10 H1Bs sponsor are: - Indian companies - Using cheap labor - Paying significantly less then other companies. - Responsible for almost 50% of all H1B applications Driving the salaries by immigration is an historical complaint worldwide. HackerNews or not.
If the goal really is to enable highly qualified people to come to the U.S. (separate from the usual immigration process) wouldn't a fairly simple tweak just be to take the wage into account in the allocation? There's currently a fixed quota, with two things that go into allocating it: 1) offers not paying the "prevailing wage" are disqualified; and 2) the remaining offers are allocated in first-come, first-serve fashion until the quota is reached, with no preference to good vs. bad offers.
Seems you could collapse those two issues by just saying: the 50,000 slots (or however many there will be) are auctioned off, or allocated in order of highest salary offer, or something similar. In theory the "invisible hand of the market" ought to then allocate the slots to where foreign talent is most needed, and the companies using it for cheap labor won't be able to outbid Google/etc. for the slots.
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 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…
Problem with that is that, at least compared to actual engineers who need to take the FE exam to be called one, it's a complete misnomer and to be frank, a little embarrassing. Most CS/SE programs share no classes with engineering programs except maybe calc 1/2 and one or two others. It just feels wrong referring to myself as a software engineer because a. there's no formal definition of one and b. it's unfair to tho…
But I was a CS major and had to slog through diff. EQs, calc, physics, linear algebera, etc..
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#106What are these $200k+ software engineering jobs, and how do I get one?
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#107I own a company that specializes in hiring H1Bs and placing them into contract roles.
The data doesn't look very accurate. For one thing, this data doesn't appear to represent what companies pay.
I usually get bill rates up around $100/hr to $150/hr depending on skill and location. Like New York has higher cost of living than Michigan so I can often pull a higher bill rate.
The payout to the H1B is works out to be $60K to $80K. An Oracle DBA working in New York will make about $80K which is roughly $38/hour and the company easily pays $125/hour for 6 month contract.
I have some overhead but it's usually a one time fee such as transferring H1B from one company to mine, legal paper work to renew, attain, and transfer H1Bs runs me about $500/piece.
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#108I'm wondering where the data came from and how accurate it it is. "In 2012 the Oregon software industry gave jobs to 38 foreign software engineers." Ok so here I am assuming you mean 38 new H1B engineers were hired in 2012. There is no way that could be true, I nearly hired and processed that many H1Bs personally in 2012. I was working with several others with similar or higher numbers. And that's just one company in…
H1B is a federal corporate welfare program to address a perceived lack of homegrown IT talent. Its is a regulated and public service. Data like who is hiring and at what salaries are public. Employers do not have a right to secret salaries when using the H1B program. Download the data below and view the RatePer field for salary info:
http://www.flcdatacenter.com/download.aspx
older data here:
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#109I wonder if you can distinguish between direct hires and contracted hires through "body shops". The latter have reputationfor taking a big cut off the top. or hiring 'L'-class business visas, etc.
Re: Show HN: A histogram of salaries given to H1B workers in the software industry
#110Alternatively, you could look at what % raise a former H1-b visa holder receives when he gets his greencard. I heard it can be 2x-3x, but I've never seen a formal analysis.
Looking at http://visadoor.com/companies/google-inc for eg. doesn't look all that much different. May be only by ~10K, but that is probably expected between H1B and PERM.