TL;DR
We'll give H1B visa to Linus/Einstein;
New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
301–310 of 487 posts
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#302Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, and given that the premise of H1-B visas is that "we literally couldn't find a local who could do this", I'm OK with that. Outside the Bay Area, you're probably not going to pay a frontend website programmer $130K on an H1-B. You're not supposed to, though! You can find plenty of that talent already in the country. If you need specific PhD-level STEM skills that you haven't been able to find locally, you're pro…
There are many loopholes with this logic, although I can see how the "free market will fixit!" philosophy is so common. The unavailability of required talent does not magically make it economically feasible to pay more for that talent. Especially the process of hiring new employees is an expensive and slow process. The vitality of American businesses depends critically on the availability of great talent at a reasona…
I'd find that persuasive if I hadn't worked with H1-Bs hired solely because they'd work more cheaply and for longer hours than their local counterparts. The current H1-B program on paper looks great. In practice, in my experience, it seems to be abused all to hell.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#303Earlier quoted context omitted.
> - Startups and small businesses will get 20% of the visas. It'll be interesting to see how this is gamed Probably the old fashioned way: Tata Startup Services, a wholly owned subsidiary of Tata Consulting Services.
Someone will be using a "startup company name" generator for these wholly owned subsidiaries and be filling out the paperwork for 50 of them all at the same time. No doubt to get a discount on the legal fees.
Is there a simple way to say in legalese "we want startups, but not 1. startups that have large companies as controlling interests at any remove, or 2. startups who exist to serve only one or two large companies"?
Sure, you'd exclude a few enterprise-B2B startups from your program, and startups that have been invested in "over a barrel" such that the founders no longer retain control, but you'd also filter out these ne'er-do-wells.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#304Earlier quoted context omitted.
I get the impression that this new bill is like putting lipstick on a pig which is the current system. I was hoping the amendments to the H1-B bill would be one of the silver linings of a Trump presidency, but I guess not anymore.
I've commented on this before, at: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13433540 I'm copying the comment below: --- I'm on an H-1B, and the thing that infuriates me about the dialogue on this is that they are effectively trying to ban skilled immigration, and exclude people like me from coming. If you don't qualify for the family-based or refugee route, employment-based immigration is the only viable pathway. The amo…
I'm honestly a bit confused to see this point raised here. I certainly have seen vitriol aimed at H-1B workers, including on HN. Raising minimum salary would be a way to restrict the program, but the comment you're replying to specifically calls that change "lipstick on a pig". I guess 'lipstick' might be an endorsement, but it's fair to say that this bill is about making Americans happier with a still-broken system.
Suggesting that the existing H-1B system is broken and in need of reform isn't necessarily a call for less skilled immigration. My two biggest complaints about it are actually both pro-immigration.
First, I think what was meant as a way to integrate skilled immigrants into the economy has been transformed into a way to marginalize many visa-holders into non-standard consulting work.
Second, I think the H-1B system has created a distorted market which hurts both visa holders and domestic workers by creating a labor pool which is basically unable to bargain. Tying someone's immigration status to the actions of a single employer makes even basic negotiations like "this work environment is terrible" or "I'm underpaid for the work I'm doing" untentable, since the employer has an irrefutable lever over the employee. That's terrible for visa-holders working at inappropriate wages or under unpleasant or unsafe conditions. It's also bad news for domestic workers, who rightly complain that they're not just competing against international labor but handicapped-by-law labor. In an industry which has already seen one major wage-fixing conspiracy, I think it's understandable that there's some nervousness about employers using the law to create an artificial boundary on labor prices.
I'd like to see skilled immigration massively expanded, and I think part of that process is reforming the H-1B system. Many companies use the system quite reasonably, but others are specifically using it to avoid treating American or international workers fairly.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#305Here is the summary straight from the horses mouth: https://lofgren.house.gov/uploadedfiles/high_skilled_bill_sx... A few points: - This does not raise the salary requirement to $130k/yr. This only applies to employers that do not want to do the extra paper work for "attestations regarding recruitment and non-displacement of U.S. workers" - It takes a "market based" allocation strategy which allows "cash bonuses and…
I think the shortest fix for the violation part(Corporate/Ed tech loophole and the Implementation/Consultant loophole) is some boots on the ground for DHS to investigate worksites. If there is enough economic incentive vested in any one area, sooner or later people will game it. And the H1B business is very lucrative. Putting in oversight to such a thing is hard without boots on the ground/human resources. AFAIR Visa…
> DHS to investigate worksites
This is not a man in suite arriving at site via Uber asking polite questions. This is mostly a SWAT team storming through all doors and killing dogs if any an then taking away all your documents, interviewing all employees. In short that is end of business to you.
Remember they will not come alone. They will bring sleuths from all other departments and you will be fined for not having appropriate number of fire extinguishers and for not having a separate bin for dry cells.
You clients will avoid you and your landlord will be upset.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#306Color me surprised, I commented on many related threads recently but this sounds actually pretty good! $130k is maybe a little high for seed stage startups but given that we're talking about relocating engineers to the most expensive region in the world, I believe it's fair. And the path from F-1 to Green Card will solve companies taking advantage of people on OPT status, at least partially.
> http://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=60...
Those seed stage startups are going to need more capital! Go back to what valuations in 1989 looked like too.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#307Here is the summary straight from the horses mouth: https://lofgren.house.gov/uploadedfiles/high_skilled_bill_sx... A few points: - This does not raise the salary requirement to $130k/yr. This only applies to employers that do not want to do the extra paper work for "attestations regarding recruitment and non-displacement of U.S. workers" - It takes a "market based" allocation strategy which allows "cash bonuses and…
I think the shortest fix for the violation part(Corporate/Ed tech loophole and the Implementation/Consultant loophole) is some boots on the ground for DHS to investigate worksites. If there is enough economic incentive vested in any one area, sooner or later people will game it. And the H1B business is very lucrative. Putting in oversight to such a thing is hard without boots on the ground/human resources. AFAIR Visa…
I think it would be much cheaper and more effective to just auction the the slots (by how much the employer is willing to pay the employee); otherwise, you're just in a quagmire of "is this really a startup for purposes of the exemption", "is this person's role really close enough to Deep Learning Expert", "is this really what similar workers" make, etc -- a hundred loopholes to exploit.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#308Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it's a combination of hyperbole and being out of touch. $130K is not "barely a living wage". It's a very good salary in the Bay Area and 1.5 times the average wage in SF.
OK, it is a bit exagerated, but try living on $130k in SF (as opposed to, say, East Palo Alto), paying off student loans, saving a bit, etc. $130k is a very good salary if you moved to SF a couple of decades ago and bought a house then .
H1B holders don't have student loans
argument fails. you can rent, max out your 401k, and enjoy all the frivolousness you want on a 130k salary. downpayment? yeah not gonna happen. better off than 95% of the population? immediately gonna happen.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#309Earlier quoted context omitted.
I get the impression that this new bill is like putting lipstick on a pig which is the current system. I was hoping the amendments to the H1-B bill would be one of the silver linings of a Trump presidency, but I guess not anymore.
I've commented on this before, at: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13433540 I'm copying the comment below: --- I'm on an H-1B, and the thing that infuriates me about the dialogue on this is that they are effectively trying to ban skilled immigration, and exclude people like me from coming. If you don't qualify for the family-based or refugee route, employment-based immigration is the only viable pathway. The amo…
The hard truth is that nobody loves voluntary slaves, and even less of all - their masters.
> These people make it seem like employment-based immigration is not as respectable or legitimate, compared to refugee/asylum and family-based immigration.
Re: New H1-B Visa bill doubles the salary requirements to $130K/yr
#310Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are at least four stakeholders in this situation: 1. The American company that wants to save money 2. The Middleman (e.g. Wipro etc) that wants to make money on the wage arbitrage 3. The foreign worker on the H1B 4. The American citizen that doesn't want to be replaced by the foreign worker I'm all for cutting out (2) and making it easier for the foreign worker (provided they have the skills) to become an Ameri…
Yes, #4 is the first problem to handle. I have this idea there's at least a dual world here. (a) IT workers that get replaced by H1Bs and are often asked to train their replacements (more operations and putting things together), (b) big software co that writes handmade software, like Microsoft, Amazon, Google, a startup. It's category (a) where people lose jobs and can't find them, because they are more easily replac…
A lot of people don't understand this concept.
People even apply it on a more local level, like "why don't Amazon and MS hire more UW grads instead of bringing in transplants from all over the country?"
Amazon could hire 50% of UW CS grads and MS the other 50% and it wouldn't be enough to fill their needs.