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U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

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Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#151

Post by pandaman »

xxpor wrote: post #118
dragonwriter wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is a backdoor immigration cut, nothing more. H1B is a non-immigrant visa. > Remember that it's not just new entrants that need H1B processing: it's immigrants currently in the country that need to transfer their visa type. Immigrants already admitted to the US can not get and would not benefit from a non-immigrant visa. Non-immigrants in the US might seek a different non-immigrant visa, but preventing them fro…

H1B is dual intent.

Dual-intent does not mean what you think it does. It means the visa beneficiary can be admitted on a non-immigrant visa even while having an immigration intent. If this has not been a non-immigrant visa then there would not be the need to designate it as a dual-intent ( there are no dual-intent immigrant visas) so, ironically, people who spam "dual-intent" as a refutal to the statement that it's a non-immigrant visa, in fact, just reaffirm the non-immigrant category of this visa.

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#152

Post by kshacker »

buttersbrian wrote: post #47
toomuchtodo wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like it's still above 0, which means you should be forced to source local talent before you're permitted to source from outside the country. It's so strange to me that this viewport is controversial, but "Buy Local" (which I have yet to encounter someone who is against supporting local businesses) is not. This is the labor version of "Buy Local".

So Buy local, not buy the best? Not advocating either way honestly, but is local more important if the H1B candidate is markedly better?

This can be solved so easily. What does countries do when they want to promote their product? They add tariffs to imports? Do the tariffs work? Totally different question but it has a change at the margins.

So you want the best but not necessarily local? At the same time serving the needs of the locals? Introduce a tariff? Not the couple of thousand dollars worth of processing fee, but a 20% tax on the salary earned : every single dollar, salary, bonus, stock : everything. This gives you a free market. No one stops you from hiring an H1, but if gives local talent 20-25% leg up over an H1 talent. [ Numbers are of course negotiable but I do not see any number below 20-30% being effective. ]

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#153

Post by pandaman »

raverbashing wrote: post #131
unishark wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

H1B was always supposed to be a temporary worker program. People have been using it as an easier-to-get form of quasi-residency with the intention to move on to green cards. Everyone in the industry and govt have been winking and nodding at each other for so long that now there's a big pool of people who are basically residents without a right to stay other than nearly-automatic extensions. Govt gives businesses what…

> H1B was always supposed to be a temporary worker program. At the same time there isn't any practical way of immigrating to the US other than being very rich, very specialized (and Outstanding) or a family member of a US citizen.

You are confusing quantity and quality. There are many more ways, including unskilled EB3 and DV, it's just too many people want to immigrate so, naturally, visas with less requirements run out faster/ have longer wait. E.g. there are just 5 or 10 thousand EB3 unskilled spots per year and, while DV is 50K, a country that had too many immigrants in the previous year cannot participate on top of the enormous number of applications from the ones, who do participate.

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#154

Post by xxpor »

pandaman wrote: post #151
xxpor wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

H1B is dual intent.

Dual-intent does not mean what you think it does. It means the visa beneficiary can be admitted on a non-immigrant visa even while having an immigration intent. If this has not been a non-immigrant visa then there would not be the need to designate it as a dual-intent ( there are no dual-intent immigrant visas) so, ironically, people who spam "dual-intent" as a refutal to the statement that it's a non-immigrant visa,…

What's your point? I'm saying just because H1B is officially a non-immigrant visa, you can still stay and a green card based on it (eventually).

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#156

Post by pandaman »

xxpor wrote: post #154
pandaman wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dual-intent does not mean what you think it does. It means the visa beneficiary can be admitted on a non-immigrant visa even while having an immigration intent. If this has not been a non-immigrant visa then there would not be the need to designate it as a dual-intent ( there are no dual-intent immigrant visas) so, ironically, people who spam "dual-intent" as a refutal to the statement that it's a non-immigrant visa,…

What's your point? I'm saying just because H1B is officially a non-immigrant visa, you can still stay and a green card based on it (eventually).

There is no green card, which is based on any non-immigrant visa, including H1B. Body shops and some other companies use a promise of a green card to convince foreigners to join on H1B but it's not what H1B is for and it doesn't mean it's an immigrant visa or a part of the "path to green card". The whole practice, is, if not illegal then immoral.

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#157

Post by kshacker »

ycombonator wrote: post #9
hn_1234 wrote: post #5

How much H1-Bs account for jobs in US ?

Estimated to be 400,000 mostly in IT.

I do not know the numbers but I suspect your numbers are way off [ BTW saw the same numbers on some websites too so you are not alone ].

There are 85000 H1s given every year, 65000 if you do not count US graduates. The visa eith extensions can last for 6 years. However, if you have applied for a green card, you can easily go twice as long, extending it bit at a time. Now not everyone who gets an H1 stays, but lets try to catch the high end of this and see what the numbers would be. 85000 a year X 12 years would be close to a million.

Now H1 also comes along with H4 which is a spouse visa and I do not know if they are allowed to work today, but there is/was a provision that spouse could work. Assume 10% spouses work, that's another 100K.

And this is before we start counting L1s which many "shops" use. People can classify them differently but from what I have seen, half of those could as well be H1 and the company used L1 because they did not have annual cap issue or some other benefit.

So that takes me to a count of 1.8 million. Assuming 1/3rd of them do not stay back and return to their country, my ballpark number would be in the range of 1.2 M.

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#158

Post by jptoor »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #21
curiousllama wrote: post #16

This is a backdoor immigration cut, nothing more. COVID is irrelevant. Remember that it's not just new entrants that need H1B processing: it's immigrants currently in the country that need to transfer their visa type (e.g., former students moving from OPT to H1B). What, are they supposed to leave or risk being denied a visa forevermore? Not to mention, they've already paused green card processing and shut down most o…

Some, but not all, H1B immigrants are highly skilled. Some are fodder for body shops, some are used to avoid having to pay market rate. This behavior has been documented in great detail. I do not believe it unreasonable to take measures to encourage hiring of citizens over importing workers when official unemployment is near 15%, and unofficially, closer to 20%. Your typical tech company is likely to be sophisticated…

What percent of these roles do you think will actually go to local talent vs. be off-shored? If tech companies can outsource, than who is benefitting?

Related - Have you personally hired an H1-B employee? The H1-B process is a pain for employers. There's a lot of costs delays, uncertainty, and legal fees to hiring H1-B.

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#159

Post by dragonwriter »

xxpor wrote: post #118
dragonwriter wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is a backdoor immigration cut, nothing more. H1B is a non-immigrant visa. > Remember that it's not just new entrants that need H1B processing: it's immigrants currently in the country that need to transfer their visa type. Immigrants already admitted to the US can not get and would not benefit from a non-immigrant visa. Non-immigrants in the US might seek a different non-immigrant visa, but preventing them fro…

H1B is dual intent.

> H1B is dual intent.

Dual-intent visas are non-immigrant visas where it is not a violation of the terms of the visa to apply for it with the intent of later seeking an immigrant visa without leaving the country.

If you do wish to immigrate after being admitted on a dual-intent visa, you still have to qualify for, apply for, and wait in the line for (if it is category with a backlog for your country of origin) an immigrant visa.

Re: U.S. Senators Advocate H-1B Freeze for 60 Days or Longer

#160

Post by dragonwriter »

xxpor wrote: post #154
pandaman wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dual-intent does not mean what you think it does. It means the visa beneficiary can be admitted on a non-immigrant visa even while having an immigration intent. If this has not been a non-immigrant visa then there would not be the need to designate it as a dual-intent ( there are no dual-intent immigrant visas) so, ironically, people who spam "dual-intent" as a refutal to the statement that it's a non-immigrant visa,…

What's your point? I'm saying just because H1B is officially a non-immigrant visa, you can still stay and a green card based on it (eventually).

> you can still stay and a green card based on it (eventually).

No, you can't.

You can apply for an immigrant visa based on any of the qualifications for such a visa without having to leave the country first if you can keep a current H1B or other dual-intent visa, but the H1B itself does not qualify you for an immigrant visa no matter how much time you stay on it.

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