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I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

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Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#281

Post by emodendroket »

kingmanaz wrote: post #250
shas3 wrote: post #68

The US legal immigration system is perfectly described by the adjective, Kafkaesque. In terms of the arbitrariness of bureaucracy, it has more in common with what I saw in the socialist days of India and what one reads in books by Solzhenitsyn and Kafka. The iniquities have been discussed repeatedly in popular press, with almost no changes wrought in the process. Many years ago (yes, 2011 was 4 years ago) Newsweek ra…

A nation exists to serve the will of /its people/. With rampant illegal and legal immigration, a nation cannot know who /its people/ are. A nation serving no one people is a nation serving no one, it instead arbitrates in favor of whichever group screams the loudest. Diversity leads to division. Division leads to divestment. Divestment leads to dissolution and war. America is more than a place to make money, it is mo…

If that were truly the rationale behind the current system, presumably we'd have no limits to "North-Western European" immigrants and not let in the others, which is not actually what we're doing.

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#282

Post by emodendroket »

winter_blue wrote: post #259
murbard2 wrote: post #12

I personally consider that opening borders is a moral imperative, but I understand why it is controversial. I understand that the arguments against "letting everyone in" have some merit, though I ultimately disagree with them. What is a real head scratcher to me is the US policy on highly-skilled immigrants. There are certainly some political constituencies in favor of those, but I can't think of anyone against, at l…

> So who's lobbying against this exactly? If you've ever come across any posts on HN regarding immigrant workers in technology (who are on the same visa, the H1B†, that the author of the Vox article was on), you will see a shockingly offensive amount contempt and hatred for highly-skilled immigrants . To answer your question more directly, despite high support for skilled immigration reform, there are currently 2 sen…

> If you've ever come across any posts on HN regarding immigrant workers in technology (who are on the same visa, the H1B†, that the author of the Vox article was on), you will see a shockingly offensive amount contempt and hatred for highly-skilled immigrants.

Well, that's probably largely because the system is being abused to bring in questionable workers and drive down wages.

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#283

Post by izztmzzt »

why-el wrote: post #280
izztmzzt wrote: post #277

Not enough job supply for all of the law school graduates and this guy is surprised that they dont allow foreign competition to immigrate. Sorry to break it, we dont need more lawyers at the moment. Maybe try again in 10 years?

What a terrible thing to say. The guy also did his bachelor's here, has friends here, and lived enough to consider this place his home.

Difference of philosophy. Every one wants to come here. NPR did a bit about this this morning, and claimed one study found that 500 - 700 million people would like to move to the US if they had the chance. We cant just let anyone live here, have to be selective. The guy argues that talent should be a factor that decides who gets in. But what if you have the wrong talent? What if you are trying to work in a collapsed field like Law?

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#284

Post by emodendroket »

saalweachter wrote: post #195
kuschku wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The debate the politicians in my state (Schleswig-Holstein, a state in Germany) had about this was really interesting, sadly it’s in German. Essentially, it boils down to two issues: Morally, we all are descendants of immigrants, or at least most. Economically, most immigrants are willing to work hard. Combined with the fact that our society has a birth rate below replacement rate (1.3 vs. 2.1) we need immigrants jus…

Another frequently-cited benefit of opened borders is that -- for the most part -- current citizens own everything in this country, and stand to make a bit of cash if there's an influx of new faces looking to buy houses, used cars, rent rooms, etc etc etc.

I don't know that that's really true anymore.

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#285

Post by tormeh »

makeitsuckless wrote: post #267
kuschku wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The debate the politicians in my state (Schleswig-Holstein, a state in Germany) had about this was really interesting, sadly it’s in German. Essentially, it boils down to two issues: Morally, we all are descendants of immigrants, or at least most. Economically, most immigrants are willing to work hard. Combined with the fact that our society has a birth rate below replacement rate (1.3 vs. 2.1) we need immigrants jus…

How about the third, conveniently ignored issue: that there is a considerable number of immigrants that bring with them an ideology (also referred to as "religion" because it's founded on supernatural believes) that is hellbent on destroying the very fabric of the society they immigrate to?

Not really. Muslim immigrants are usually just socially conservative. It's their children that are radicalized in European society. It's a testament to the failure of current integration policies.

The unpleasant fact is that proper integration costs money - they need to be taught the biggest official language and English, they need to be taught a profitable trade and they need to get up to speed on the domestic culture, which requires history classes etc. The alternative is to create an underclass visibly different to the majority - that doesn't end well.

It feels unfair to pay for outsiders' education, but in the case of Germany (and other low-reproducing countries) it's the only way to make sure there's someone left to pay for tomorrow's pensions

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#287

Post by aineko »

explorer666 wrote: post #222
aineko wrote: post #141

As a New Zealander going through the US immigration process, this whole post rings extremely true to me. People who have not gone through immigration before have no idea what its like for your entire life to be dictated by the whims of an opaque bureaucratic system. The most frustrating thing about it is that you have essentially no opportunities to better your situation via your own initiative. Don't like your job,…

Why did you leave NZ? I ask because I was thinking about moving there.

Career opportunities mostly. The startup I was working in was acquired by a US tech company and they decided to close the NZ office and give us the option to relocate to San Francisco (or stay in NZ and find another job :). I was pretty happy with this situation though as there isn't much in the way of a tech industry in NZ, so there's much more interesting work available here, especially in the bay area (same goes for my wife who is in biotech). Oh and despite the insane living costs in the bay area, the pay is far higher than you can get in NZ, I make more than three times as much here as in NZ (Plus NZ tech companies are notorious for not giving out equity or stock options to employees - even early startups).

NZ has its good points with regards to being able to have a more relaxed lifestyle, and its great for outdoorsy types - but skiing, hiking etc. doesn't really interest me that much, and I kind of like the bluster and hustle of the bay area.

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#288

Post by glass- »

geebee wrote: post #79
murbard2 wrote: post #12

I personally consider that opening borders is a moral imperative, but I understand why it is controversial. I understand that the arguments against "letting everyone in" have some merit, though I ultimately disagree with them. What is a real head scratcher to me is the US policy on highly-skilled immigrants. There are certainly some political constituencies in favor of those, but I can't think of anyone against, at l…

Any chance you'd be willing to write a bit more about your support for open borders? In particular, I'm interested in knowing whether you think this is a situation where it would be both moral and beneficial, or if you feel that it is simply wrong to limit where people can live and work based on where they were born (or even where their grandparents were born) even if the overall effect on current citizens of some re…

> Interesting that the author of this piece comes from New Zealand, because NZ is the country that often springs to mind when I think of a nation that might could change dramatically with open borders.

You might want to do some research about New Zealand's current housing crisis and other socio-economic issues (such as Māori being significantly over-represented in poverty statistics) before unilaterally advocating a country that you admit you have never been to and know nothing about (other than its size and population) open its borders because you won't have to deal with the consequences.

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#289

Post by gutnor »

murbard2 wrote: post #12

I personally consider that opening borders is a moral imperative, but I understand why it is controversial. I understand that the arguments against "letting everyone in" have some merit, though I ultimately disagree with them. What is a real head scratcher to me is the US policy on highly-skilled immigrants. There are certainly some political constituencies in favor of those, but I can't think of anyone against, at l…

> I personally consider that opening borders is a moral imperative

Or close them. The moral imperative is to have a consistent and fair rules. You can't really be the US and let people live for decades in a grey state with all the obligations of a citizen but little of the rights. You take them in or not but that should a quick and permanent decision (i.e. no 3 year limit nonsense)

That's by the way not a US-only problem. That is the same in the UK and most of Europe, even worse, I believe, in Japan.

Re: I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed

#290

Post by logfromblammo »

diego_moita wrote: post #272

Disclaimer: I am a Canadian permanent resident. > I like it here. This is the real problem, you have a severe case of non-reciprocal love. In that case the answer is obvious: move over, find another love, come to Canada or go to Northern Europe. U.S. immigration is an American problem,since they are the ones loosing talent and entrepreneurial people. It is not an immigrant's problem, since they don't have the powers…

As an American, I also strongly suggest you consider going to Canada.

The U.S. immigration system is so far gone that not even American citizens have the power to fix it. It has become a plaything in the hands of professional politicians. Just like many other things in the U.S., you won't get anything remotely like fair treatment unless you have rich or influential sponsors acting on your behalf.

Even if you do ultimately still have your heart set on the U.S., being a Canadian PR will also make that easier, due to Byzantine and Kafkaesque reasons that I don't fully understand myself. And if you don't ever make it, hey, Canada's not too bad a deal either, eh?

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