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

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

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

441–450 of 479 posts

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

#441

Post by usr1106 »

matmann2001 wrote: post #312

This might be a strange question, but I'll give it a shot anyway. Amongst myself and a number of friends (whom work in tech), we've observed a similar difficulty with meeting and employing lawyers for either personal- or business-related issues. We all seemed to arrive at the same conclusion that we don't know any lawyers personally, they don't seem to be part of our extended circle of acquaintances, and are difficul…

So how do find a good software developer without paying a lot of salary for trial and error? The real good ones are rarely available, there are many more who will create a buggy mess. And now imagine, that you don't understand anything about software development yourself.

So what you are asking for is simply impossible, there is no silver bullet.

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

#442

Post by amf12 »

winter_blue wrote: post #438
nos4A2 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for this comment, it made my day. I usually see posts wanting skilled immigrants out. The last few months have been especially bad due to the various policies that have been adopted.

> I usually see posts wanting skilled immigrants out. You have your answer there. There are a lot of Americans who love and welcome immigrants (and I know many of them – 99% of my friends are American), but there are also many who hate immigrants , and of all places, many of these immigrant-haters have found a home at HN. (Open up any HN thread on US visas and immigration, and the level of immigrant-hatred and xenoph…

> These Americans who hate immigrants vote. You can guess what party they vote. Their votes are the reason our immigration system is broken beyond measure.

I am not sure if that's really the case. Case in point, the Obama administration. They had 8 years to fix this, but they didn't.

Now Obama did do some small changes that were a net positive to the immigrant community (Work Permit for spouses who are waiting for GC, 1 year increase in work permit for students who graduate from US colleges, etc). But all the other bad parts of the system are unchanged.

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

#443

Post by winter_blue »

amf12 wrote: post #442
winter_blue wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I usually see posts wanting skilled immigrants out. You have your answer there. There are a lot of Americans who love and welcome immigrants (and I know many of them – 99% of my friends are American), but there are also many who hate immigrants , and of all places, many of these immigrant-haters have found a home at HN. (Open up any HN thread on US visas and immigration, and the level of immigrant-hatred and xenoph…

> These Americans who hate immigrants vote. You can guess what party they vote. Their votes are the reason our immigration system is broken beyond measure. I am not sure if that's really the case. Case in point, the Obama administration. They had 8 years to fix this, but they didn't. Now Obama did do some small changes that were a net positive to the immigrant community (Work Permit for spouses who are waiting for GC…

> They had 8 years to fix this, but they didn't.

I'm not sure if you're being facetious here, or if you simply are ignorant of how the U.S. Constitution / government works.

There are two types/levels of federal laws: (1) statutory laws - made by Congress ("U.S.C."/US Code), and (2) regulatory laws ("C.F.R.") - made by the Executive Branch.

For a statutory law to pass in the US, the House + Senate + President has to agree. When one party has control over all 3, it's called a "trifecta". Moreover, in the Senate, you need 60% votes due to the what's called the legislative filibuster.

Democrats had a trifecta only for 2 years (2009 and 2010). During the remaining 6 years that Obama was in office, Republicans blocked practically everything substantive. The Democrats actually did try to pass a small immigration bill (the DREAM Act) during their trifecta, but that bill (S. 2205) got 52-44 votes, and thus failed due to the legislative filibuster. It's extremely difficult to pass statutory laws in the US.

Obama and the Democrats spent put a huge amount of effort trying to fix the immigration system, but they were blocked by Republicans through and through.

> Obama did do some small changes

He actually made a huge number of substantial changes with regard to immigration in our regulatory laws (the CFR). More than any recent President. Obama did everything he could that was within his power (ie within the power granted to him by the Constitution and statutory law).

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

#444

Post by not_a_moth »

bberenberg wrote: post #320

Can you speak at all to how a US based company that is 100% remote should hire "employees" in various countries? Today we make most of them contractors, but are trying to understand if there is a better method. It seems particularly difficult especially when we only have 1 person in a given country.

For those viewing solutions here, do your diligence on permanent establishment. You're almost certainly still liable for corporate tax in country where you're indirectly employing people, OECD is clear on that as a general guideline. Few solutions bother with actual compliance here and are in a bit of a legal grey area.

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

#445

Post by IWantOut_ »

frandroid wrote: post #303
IWantOut_ wrote: post #53

I have a job offer from Microsoft in Vancouver and might move there after the pandemic ends. I am Indian citizen residing in India. The main challenge however is that I am disabled (quadriplegic) and I would be needing a caregiver to travel with me to Canada. I understand that there used to be a caregiver visa, for Canada, which was discontinued back in 2019. So my question really is, is there a way in which I can br…

Vancouver being a much younger city is more accessible than the average North America city for wheelchair users, starting with the entirety of the Skytrain system... But you probably already know that. :) Good luck!

Yes, I'm aware of that and really excited! Although, after having lived in India for so long, I don't really mind the absence of accessibility (life in permanent hard mode here for wheelchair users), and it's not a key driving factor for me.

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

#447

Post by ameen »

digianarchist wrote: post #92
ameen wrote: post #12

Is Trump’s plan to bring merit-based immigration going to affect country-based quotas?

The RAISE act doesn’t touch country quotas for employment based Green Cards. In fact on my reading it implements a cap for spouses and children for family based immigration.

Thank you. My question was in response to this development: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pk7iQtad2Qo

Didn't know it referred to the RAISE act.

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

#448

Post by rafaelm »

bitL wrote: post #295
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have to pay tax in USA though?

Last time I checked, both Delaware and Nevada were tax-free up to $1M revenue. However, franchise tax depended on the amount of C-Corp shares (i.e. instead of paying $250 for an LLC one could end up paying $70k for a C-Corp). And for your personal taxes it depends on the agreement between the US and your home country. In the worst case you'd have to pay both if there is no agreement.

What type of professional would I need to talk to, to learn more about this? I've been looking at Stripe Atlas and Firstbase.io for options, but I want to talk to someone that can tell me what the best option for incorporating is.

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

#449

Post by mattm »

newyankee wrote: post #431
jkingsbery wrote: post #171

I'm an American citizen, but many of my current and former colleagues have moved here from other countries. On a number of occasions, those colleagues have explained something about their own immigration process. The current system is crazy. What is the likelihood of process simplification? What are some groups that are pushing for concrete, attainable steps to simplify the process?

I moved back to my country (India) after more than a decade in USA because waiting list for my country was about 150+ years. I went to a good grad school, worked at big cos, was generally focused mostly on my work and well respected to the extent i know. It is unfortunately not my mistake that my country has 17% of the world's population and almost #1 or #2 waiting list in Green card applications. I had to follow rul…

> I have seen many people getting diversity lottery just by virtue of having a family member in USA.

AFAIK the diversity lottery is random and doesn't take family members into account.

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

#450

Post by mtremsal »

sharmajai wrote: post #402
temp_2020 wrote: post #41

Hi Peter, I am an Indian citizen on an H1B. Recently, my H1B was extended and so I have the I-797A. However, now the H1B stamp in my passport has expired. I would like to travel outside the country in the fall, but it seems like traveling back to India to get a stamp is not a possibility. What are my options to get my passport stamped? Or should I not even bother taking such a chance and stay put?

While I agree that Peter's suggestion is the safe thing to do, based on the following tweet from the official account, if you were in the country legally on 06/24, the proclamation doesn't seem to apply. https://mobile.twitter.com/TravelGov/status/1285331446232743...

Being exempt doesn't help in practice when consular offices are closed.
Post reply on HN