I spent the last 15 years trying to become an American and failed • Hacker News Board

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

#291

Post by winter_blue » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:07 PM UTC

emodendroket wrote: post #282

winter_blue wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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.

No, it's mostly because those commentors on HN can't code worth their salt, and can't find a job, in an industry with thousands of unfilled positions, and need a scapegoat to pile hatred on.

Most of the points stated on those hateful comments are either factually wrong, or overstate something as being the norm, when it probably happens less than 10% of the time.

For one, if you are even decently good at software development, and live in any major city in the US, you really have no excuse for not being able to find a job. (Apart from being really bad at interviews.) Demand far outstrips supply.

Secondly, although work visas are used by outsourcing companies a lot, they are also used heavily by companies like Facebook, Google, Microsoft, a lot of tech startups, etc, and other companies that are looking talented engineers.

Finally, the work visa requires the employee to be paid at least the prevailing wage for the position, and most of them get paid well above the prevailing wage, so the "driving down wages" point isn't valid either.

Most of these commentors also fail to realize that there is really no other way to immigrate, besides a work visa, unless you want to go the family-based or refugeee route (not an option for most). They also show a total ignorance of the lump of labor fallacy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy

When someone heaps abuse and hatred on highly-skilled immigrants (like those on HN), and call for an end to skilled immigration, they are really calling for an end to all immigration. It's noxious xenophobia and perhaps racially-motivated hatred, plain and simple.

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

#292

Post by chx » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:08 PM UTC

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…

You know, I am a Canadian PR too and while nowhere near as bad as the US temporary worker situation, the transition from PR to citizen is not easy if you have the audacity to travel. And, thanks to this wonderful new bill, you can be stripped of your citizenship basically any time the government wants to without judicial oversight.

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

#293

Post by charonn0 » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:08 PM UTC

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…

I assume that you can prove that your ancestors migrated here legally.

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

#294

Post by felipel » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:09 PM UTC

Possibly more important, "becoming an American" (which seems to mean Usano as I am an American because I live in one of and have citizenship in one of the countries of America) means you get to pay US incometaxes on your income anywhere in the world for the rest of your life.

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

#295

Post by kuschku » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:10 PM UTC

DanBC wrote: post #253

biztos wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Schengen is for citizens only. If you are third-country national who is a permanent resident of a Schengen country, with an unlimited right to work, you have exactly ZERO right to live or work in any other Schengen country. Sure, you can travel by land without having your passport checked, but that's as far as it goes. The European Union is a Union until you need it to behave like one, and then it isn't.

Isn't Schengen only about passportless travel? I thought it didn't have anything to do with right to work?

As always, with the EU, it’s complicated, but often the "free to work, live and retire everywhere in the EU" is considered part of Schengen.

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

#296

Post by geebee » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:11 PM UTC

glass- wrote: post #288

geebee wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Why do you think I'm advocating this?

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

#297

Post by smm2000 » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:11 PM UTC

garethsprice wrote: post #120

worklogin wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Immigration is broken. But you cannot have open borders and a welfare system. It is completely unsustainable.

When going through the US immigration system, as part of the green card application you need to specify a sponsor who will be responsible for you financially if you hit hardship. As an immigrant, you do not get welfare in the US. Source: US immigrant, did the paperwork.

It's never enforced even though countless immigrants apply for mean-tested benefits. One more piece of dysfunctional immigration system.

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

#298

Post by spiralpolitik » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:13 PM UTC

josefresco wrote: post #93

scott_s wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is very unusual for 18-year-olds to accurately plan for what they will when they are 33. Most people don't plan their lives out like you are suggesting. They take opportunities as they come, and build their life as it comes along. He attended Yale, liked America, stayed, worked and built a life for 15 years. I find this reasonable, and consider it unrealistic to expect him to, at any point during that time, to jus…

Right, but what happened between 18 and 33. At some point the author must have realized "the system is fucked" but decided (for multiple reasons) to risk continuing to work and live with the US. It's one thing to attend university for 4 years, get a job and then head home. Quite another thing to base/commit your entire life/career in the US without a clear path to citizenship. I'm not saying the author should "suck i…

The problem is that you generally don't realize "the system is fucked" until you've spent several years in the system and you suddenly drop into a kafka-esque black hole because someone put one wrong date on a 50 pages filing.

Also due to the duration of time involved changes in the law can both screw you up or make it possible. Can you predict what the legal system will be like 6 years down the road ?

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

#299

Post by oconnor663 » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:16 PM UTC

LoSboccacc wrote: post #225

jacquesm wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Opening the Canadian border would not magically bring jobs back that have been moved to low wage countries.

people failed to realize while still in time that the outsourcing of manufacturing would have destroyed the production chain of all related goods. even if one were to reduce labor costs to china level, china has the infrastructure (technological and industrial) to build things and the countries that were abandoned 20 years ago do not, not anymore and not at the level they have. it is not about, say, producing mobile…

Context for this argument: The US is still the largest manufacturer of goods in the world. But the number of people in the US involved in manufacturing has declined.

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

#300

Post by winter_blue » Tue, Jun 23, 2015, 10:17 PM UTC

bsder wrote: post #241

bane wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would strongly support massive expansion of the lottery system (and the reserve on advanced degrees), and have written my local congresspeople about it in the past. I do this knowing that it may even result in driving down wages in STEM fields. Because I think it's too important over the long-term.

The simplest solution is to shorten the H1-B time to a year and auto-convert to green card. More tech immigrants. No indentured servitude. Everybody wins. Except for the tech corporations who are suppressing wages--which is all of them--which is why it never happens.

> Except for the tech corporations who are suppressing wages--which is all of them

This is not true. I'm on an H1B, and I can change jobs freely. Employers can't prevent you from changing jobs. Employers have zero power to suppress wages if you have an H1B -- because you can get a better paying job. (This is unlike the L-1, which locks you to your employer.) The only thing preventing someone from getting a better paying job is how good they are at what they do.

What's funny is that a lot of the engineers that outsourcing companies (like TCS, Infosys) bring over, end up leaving their poorly-paying sponsor soon after getting to the US (usually in 6 months), for a higher-paying job elsewhere. The only people left behind are those who can't find a better job...