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I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

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Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

#401

Post by shiroiushi »

jorvi wrote: post #315
briandear wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for Best Buy. Entire teams fired but first had to train the Indian Accenture replacements. Entirely their right to fire us but don’t you dare say there is a “talent shortage.” There is definitely a talent shortage — of talent willing to work for $20/hour. In the jobs I’m seeing now, what used to be $65/hour jobs are now $48/hour. I remember making $90/hour a few years ago — now similar levels one would be ve…

I can't speak to Indian replacements, but I remember reading on here that the people at Google MV were furious that the Python team got completely disbanded and reconstituted in Munich. Obviously this was to lower wage costs, but I was reading that and was in awe of the entitlement. Like.. the jobs belong to US personnel or to no one, EU devs don't deserve them?

Personally I think a big part of this is the utterly absurd cost-of-living in the US. Why should it cost SO much more to hire US devs instead of devs in Munich, Germany, which is a world-leading economy and highly technological nation? This isn't quite like moving jobs from the US to Chile or India. Perhaps it has something to do with the ridiculous housing costs in the US, plus the ridiculous healthcare costs, plus the ridiculous transportation costs (you don't need a car in Munich), plus the ridiculous cost of eating in a restaurant (no 20% tipping in Munich), I could go on and on.

I really think the US is pricing itself out of the market in many places, and I almost never see anyone actually address this in discussions about international economics.

Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

#402

Post by ondrsh »

proberts wrote: post #374
ondrsh wrote: post #329

Hello, What options are available for an EU national who wants to start a U.S.-based company and relocate there but doesn’t have the capital required for an E-2 visa? Let’s assume they start a U.S. company while staying in the EU, and the company is generating significant revenue. From what I understand, the E-2 visa requires the investment to come from the entrepreneur’s personal funds. While they could pay out divi…

The E-2 requires that the money be from a company or individual of the same nationality as the E-2 applicant; it also can come from the E-2 applicant himself or herself. Revenue generated by the U.S. company doesn't count unless the revenue then were given in the form of profits or dividends to the E-2 applicant and reinvested into the U.S. company. The other option is the E-1 treaty trader visa, which doesn't requir…

Thanks so much for taking your time.

Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

#403

Post by midhunsezhi »

I was in the USA on H1-B for 3.5 years and moved to India in 2019. My employer recently applied for my H1B, but it got rejected stating that I'm subject to the fiscal year cap (“lottery”). The company lawyers have turned the case around and re-filed it because I've had H1b in the past and didn't use my full quota of 6 years and should be cap-exempt now. Have you seen this happen before? Does USCIS typically correct itself when it makes a mistake in a reasonable time? (fwiw, my case is filed as premium)

Thanks in advance!

Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

#404

Post by pdutt111 »

briandear wrote: post #361
pdutt111 wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are 600k H1B holders in total in the USA so they're not taking as many jobs as you think they are. $40 per hour is the minimum requirement by law for H1B ( https://day1cpt.org/news/understanding-h-1b-minimum-salary-r... ) and also the average is $80 for H1B holders ( https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2023/06/05/immig... ) In FY 2021, 66% of approved H-1B beneficiaries earned a master’s degree or highe…

When Accenture has a huge offshore workforce to augment the H1Bs — they are still part of the problem, visa or not. H1B is tightly related to offshoring. They might have a few H1Bs with a client company, and then 50 or 100 offshore employees who are definitely not making $40 per hour. I personally trained Accenture employees who had a team in India doing the “real” work at far less than $40/hour. Most of Bangalore ex…

US loves when capitalism works for US and it’s bad otherwise. Outsourcing will still happen even if you ban H1b. Maybe try asking lawmakers to sign in some proper workers protections!! if you allow companies to treat employees as dirt don’t be surprised when they do. No one should be able to kick you to the curb if you’ve spent your whole life at a place.

Re: I'm Peter Roberts, immigration attorney who does work for YC and startups. AMA

#406

Post by Detrytus »

yyhhsj0521 wrote: post #353
d1sxeyes wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who defines “profession” though? Is “farmer” all encompassing, or is “chicken farmer” different from “cattle farmer”? Is “battery chicken farmer” different to “free range chicken farmer”? Do I need to be top 5% US-wide or just the city/state I would be hired in?

I don't disagree there's a lot of complications in the actual implementation, but this approach is a better-than-status-quo way to achieve some fairness IMO. Currently the US Dept of Labor has a system of determining the fair wage that should be paid to a certain job description at a certain geographic location. In the green card process this is called "prevailing wage determination". Why not use it for H1b too?

“Prevailing wage determination” is already a part of h1b process, but it is easily gamed.
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