Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

justice.gov

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 123 posts

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#41

Post by mavelikara »

lifesucks1 wrote: post #29
nickpsecurity wrote: post #28

One in my area straight-up said "H1-B Visa's Preferred" on the job notice. Not even worried about hiding it. I wonder if any are doing that now.

It took me less than 5 seconds to come up with one. DOJ needs people to complain about this??? Seriously its wide out in the open. They can just go through job boards and figure what is going on in less than a few days and know which companies to prosecute. Let us break this position below up. Basically no one other than H1b/F1 are welcome. Show me what specialized skill is needed in the requirements. Why shouldn't a…

[IANAL] Advertising a job specifically targeting H-1Bs is illegal. You should consider writing in to ReportH1BAbuse@uscis.dhs.gov about it.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#42

Post by AlexB138 »

ebola1717 wrote: post #24
solutionyogi wrote: post #21

I am so torn on this. On one hand, I spent 10 years on H1B in the US and the amount of H1B abuse that goes on is crazy. On the other hand, I would not have received my H1B under current guidelines.

Yeah, this policy is very clearly meant to curb immigration , not H1B abuse.

Can you explain why that is? I'm not clear on how that's the case.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#43

Post by rhizome »

skookum wrote: post #2

This also came out and is more narrowly focused on areas relevant to frequent discussion on HN: https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/files/nativedocume... SUBJECT: Rescission of the December 22, 2000 “Guidance memo on H1B computer related positions” (edit to add:) Some key passages from the USCIS memorandum: "... an entry-level computer programmer position would not generally qualify as a position in a specialty…

"... an entry-level computer programmer position would not generally qualify as a position in a specialty occupation ...

So that's why every job is "Senior Developer" now.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#44

Post by cromwellian »

I'm concerned about the effect this will have on F-1 Visa holders, if they can't convert to H1-b, they'll take their graduate degree back to their home country which is a net negative for us.

This seems to be throwing out the baby with the bath water, if you want to fix the body shop consulting firm issue, then target that. "Entry level programmer" is very broad, it could mean a guy with no experience who just graduated MIT with expertise in machine learning, but no projects under his belt.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#45

Post by int_19h »

mavelikara wrote: post #16

Also, USCIS has announced plans to combat H-1B fraud [1]. They seem to provide two provisions with this: 1) An avenue [2] for members of the workforce to report H-1B abuse. People on H-1B are offered some protection against retaliation. 2) Targeted onsite visits at worksites of employers who have larger fraction of their employees on H-1Bs, and those who sent employees to other locations. Together, this seems to be a…

You know what's the fastest way to curb H-1B fraud?

Make it so that if an H-1B visa holder complains, and their complaint is found to be valid, they are entitled to apply for a green card immediately, and get EAD for the duration of their application.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#46

Post by thisisit »

acchow wrote: post #6
ziszis wrote: post #3

H1b visas have primarily been used by consulting companies to bring in less expensive junior engineers ( [1] http://www.myvisajobs.com/Reports/2017-H1B-Visa-Sponsor.aspx

More demand for senior engineers will decrease their salaries?

Most of the consulting companies like Infosys, CTS etc work as such: They hire tons of people fresh out of college. Some of those have contractual obligations called "bonds" which force them to stay with company for 2 years or so. That is the stick. Later comes the carrot in form of H1 sponsorship a year or two down the line. So the median work ex for H1 tends to be 3-4 years. Then there are those who change jobs simply to get the promise of being sponsored. I know couple of people, one with Amazon, with over 8 years of work-ex joining as software analyst because it helps companies pay them least of salaries. If senior dev is the new norm they will shape the supply accordingly and try to suppress salaries in that direction. The only way out was(is?) to provide salary directions too but vague wording allowing companies to include non monetary benefits will again be suspectible to manipulation. But not doing so means startups will not be able to afford engineers with only monetary benefits. It is a very difficult problem to get around.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#47

Post by corporateslave »

cromwellian wrote: post #44

I'm concerned about the effect this will have on F-1 Visa holders, if they can't convert to H1-b, they'll take their graduate degree back to their home country which is a net negative for us. This seems to be throwing out the baby with the bath water, if you want to fix the body shop consulting firm issue, then target that. "Entry level programmer" is very broad, it could mean a guy with no experience who just gradua…

Most immigrants treat graduate degrees like a back foot toward immigration. Sure the ones at MIT should stay here, but most are getting a masters at Mississippi state, in hopes of immigrating.

Re: DOJ Cautions Employers Seeking H-1B Visas Not to Discriminate Against US Workers

#49

Post by throwaway201414 »

tn135 wrote: post #23
ziszis wrote: post #3

H1b visas have primarily been used by consulting companies to bring in less expensive junior engineers ( [1] http://www.myvisajobs.com/Reports/2017-H1B-Visa-Sponsor.aspx

Only if laws of economics in such a complex system were easy to guess. The more likely scenario in my opinion is American companies more aggressively moving their jobs to India and even other related business to more visa friendly countries like Mexico. My employer has already moved his QA department to India full fledge putting freeze on all QA hiring in USA. Easily 10-15 jobs lost.

Company I'm at (and building up a team at) is currently ramping up our QA/SDET efforts here in the US, as my belief is that we want the Quality Engineers to be as close as possible to the regular engineers (to the extent possible) - for maximum benefit (rapid iterations, faster to fail, higher velocity).

Been interviewing a ton of QA/SDET candidates over the last few weeks, and a challenge is that so few (regardless of immigration/legal status) seem to be open to working with many different languages/tech in any given day - meanwhile switching between areas that historically may be perceived to be within coding, product management, ops.

It's a challenge finding people that fluently can navigate between all those areas. I strongly believe the future of QA is in filling out this void that is - usually - left behind when you have Product/Dev/Ops working together; nothing encompasses all disciplines but good QA folks.

Post reply on HN