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How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

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Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#141
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that be absurd? A highly specialized skill in an area that we can infer is generally less desirable to live should command a higher than average wage. Much higher if the situation is so desperate that a foreign worker has to be sought. Also: the majority (by far) of H1-B visas are for technology work. It may not technically be "tech only" but in practice it may as well be.

> Why would that be absurd? There's more about specialization than just the area. To stay with the example, there may be many reasons why someone would want to hire an interpreter for a given language, and for someone to be willing to do the job, without it ever making sense to pay twice what a good average living wage is on the area. The "pay higher if it's high demand" excuse is cutthroat capitalism, IMO, and ignor…

> Also remember the H1B is supposed to be a temporary. It's classified as a non-immigrant visa

Technically, it is a "dual-intent" visa.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may not be the desired tone but essentially that's how America got populated in the first place, a place where foreigners with some disadvantage in their country of origin could get rich. And many did. Kicking the door behind you closed once you've got yours or because you're afraid new immigrants will take your job is hypocrisy of a terrible kind for a nation that was founded on immigration.

Give me your hungry, your tired, your poor I'll piss on 'em / That's what the Statue of Bigotry says / Your poor huddled masses, let's club 'em to death / and get it over with and just dump 'em on the boulevard

It's 2017. Trump is president. Nobody cares.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#143

Americas "tech dominance" threatens the breadbasket. The coastal areas, mostly certain cities, have become "international" and any worker from a rural area who wants to earn a living wage doing a technical job (e.g. STEM) now not only has to compete with other Americans, but everyone in the world. What exactly do the elites expect people in the breadbasket to do? If America is an international country then we're goin…

Wealth has gravitated around massive city centers since time immemorial and China is even more hostile to foreigners. If you think America is the only one artificially gating wealth within the border then you are in for a rude awakening.

Coastal cities in America will continue to be a melting pot of culture but the wealth won't be siphoned off unabated.

The rationale behind the policy is ending the indentured servitude experienced by foreign workers and the hollowing out of the middle class.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#144

Wherever there are big risks there are also great opportunities. As a Canadian, I wonder how/if Canada can benefit from Trump's lack of vision. We already have the same time zone, language, almost same culture, similar economic regulations, tight economic integration with the US, a very skilled and educated workforce, some good centers of technological excellence and an immigration policy regarded as the best in the…

Tech salaries in Canada are mediocre at best, with southern BC being the most perverted relative to cost of living. I don't see that changing anytime soon.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#145

The general direction of the Trump plan regarding H-1b is the way to go. The lottery needs to be replaced with a demand system where the highest salaries get slots. A floor of $100,000/yr should exist and adjust for inflation. Next, generously expand the green card fast track, as this category of employee, as an immigrant, is a free agent to move among companies or to start their own business. To date, as we all know…

The H1B as it is has many problems, but a big salary floor is not the way to go in my opinion. Remember H1B is not just for tech workers. If you want to hire, say, an interpreter of a specific foreign language to work on a community in rural Alabama temporarily, a $100,000 minimum wage would be absurd. They instead need to go after the companies that learned to game the system. I'm not sure what the solution is here.…

Agreed. The world is bigger than just tech. Take a look at all the other backgrounds that often get H1Bs. A big one is scientists.

If you made the floor $100K, say goodbye to non-PhD (and some PhD) scientists! And since the demand for PhDs isn't that high (you often have 2-3 non-PhDs reporting to a PhD), say goodbye to a lot of scientists using the H1B.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#146
post #139
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want to hire, say, an interpreter of a specific foreign language to work on a community in rural Alabama temporarily, a $100,000 minimum wage would be absurd. Wow, that's a really important point. I'm so in the tech-news bubble that I'd never heard anybody say that before - thanks for pointing that out!

I disagree. If you are not willing to pay 100k then finding someone is not the problem. You just don't want to pay market rates. The point of H-1B is when salary is not the problem. PS: Remember, someone on an H-1B can leave your employment. Paying market rates is supposed to keep that from happening, thus the intent is to remove a shortage not lower pay.

So you're argument is that it's impossible for their to be an actual shortage of US workers unless the salary exceed $100K?

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#147

The general direction of the Trump plan regarding H-1b is the way to go. The lottery needs to be replaced with a demand system where the highest salaries get slots. A floor of $100,000/yr should exist and adjust for inflation. Next, generously expand the green card fast track, as this category of employee, as an immigrant, is a free agent to move among companies or to start their own business. To date, as we all know…

>To date, as we all know, the H-1b system has primarily been used to arbitrage for lower wage by Indian companies

This isn't really true, or it is, but only in high profile yet minority cases.

H1B abuse is more about hiring someone at near competitive wages and telling them they're working 60 hour weeks and slowly getting rid of native workers who won't stand for that. So now your IT department is 12 people instead of 20. That's significant cost savings even if you're matching salaries. H1B's aren't typically paid less, they're worked like dogs instead. They can't easily migrate to a new employer, thus the abuse. This is the problem that needs fixing the most. The salary issue is secondary and something of a red herring as you can raise salaries but still have this abuse and it will do nothing for American workers who have been victimized by H1B abusers.

I don't see Trump or anyone addressing the indentured servitude aspects H1B creates. Considering most H1B's are clearing 80-120k, codifying 100k or more will do next to nothing. Worse, the only H1B bill I see has a 130k suggested salary but which can be contested and you can bet every HR company will do that.

These bills are mostly smoke and mirrors. H1B needs to be either completely scrapped or be re-done under a new program to allow H1B holders to switch jobs easily. Ideallym, if these people are truly hard to find hires they should be put on a fast path to naturalization and all costs paid for by the employer instead of this weird middle ground H1B currently creates where you're supposed to be super valuable but naturalization is up in the air. If it costs, say, $250k or more per head to bring them as a flat-fee and to express naturalize them, that'll stop abusive hiring I imagine. Corporations really need to have more skin in the game here and H1B's need to be naturalized quickly to avoid second class status.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#148

The general direction of the Trump plan regarding H-1b is the way to go. The lottery needs to be replaced with a demand system where the highest salaries get slots. A floor of $100,000/yr should exist and adjust for inflation. Next, generously expand the green card fast track, as this category of employee, as an immigrant, is a free agent to move among companies or to start their own business. To date, as we all know…

The H1B as it is has many problems, but a big salary floor is not the way to go in my opinion. Remember H1B is not just for tech workers. If you want to hire, say, an interpreter of a specific foreign language to work on a community in rural Alabama temporarily, a $100,000 minimum wage would be absurd. They instead need to go after the companies that learned to game the system. I'm not sure what the solution is here.…

Maybe allow for waivers, capped at xxx a year, for these essential but not high paying jobs?

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may not be the desired tone but essentially that's how America got populated in the first place, a place where foreigners with some disadvantage in their country of origin could get rich. And many did. Kicking the door behind you closed once you've got yours or because you're afraid new immigrants will take your job is hypocrisy of a terrible kind for a nation that was founded on immigration.

This is the lamest argument that people use. This is a non-argument and I have no idea why it gets upvoted. You don't understand the economics of the situation. For one thing America isn't the only nation they can go to, go steal wealth from Canada. Second, for a very long time immigrants did help build America, but they were literally poor and willing to work mundane jobs for no minimum wage, and they came over here…

Immigrants stealing wealth is not really something that happens, economics wise. Usually it's the other way around.

Re: How Immigration Uncertainty Threatens America’s Tech Dominance

#150
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would that be absurd? There's more about specialization than just the area. To stay with the example, there may be many reasons why someone would want to hire an interpreter for a given language, and for someone to be willing to do the job, without it ever making sense to pay twice what a good average living wage is on the area. The "pay higher if it's high demand" excuse is cutthroat capitalism, IMO, and ignor…

> Also remember the H1B is supposed to be a temporary. It's classified as a non-immigrant visa Technically, it is a "dual-intent" visa.

It's both.

> Even though the H-1B visa is a non-immigrant visa, it is one of the few temporary visa categories recognized as dual intent, meaning an H-1B holder can have legal immigration intent (apply for and obtain the green card) while still a holder of the H-1B visa

It means you can apply for immigrant status while holding an H1B. Differently from most other visas, which means you lose them automatically as soon as you apply for residency.

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