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

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

vox.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 615 posts

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

#61

Post by surge »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #51
surge wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a major problem for Scandinavian countries right now, if you read the local news, its a big problem that many immigrants have a higher and satisfactory conditions of living on welfare compared to where they were from. They have little incentive to work when they are provided what they consider a high standard of living with no effort. It's caused quite a bit of backlash and "racism" in their otherwise progressiv…

If a welfare system only works because people are culturally indoctrinated/shamed away from using it, then it's broken by design. Sure, it would be nice to have a culture in which people are disinclined to be supported by charity unless they absolutely need it (though that kind of shaming can also push people to avoid it even when they do need it). But at the same time, if that cultural disinclination is the only con…

That's how a functioning society works, you're shamed away from unnecessarily doing lots of things that create a burden on others. Littering for example. It creates a burden on society to clean up after others.

There isn't shame in using welfare as a safety net, its there to catch you from following in to absolute destitution from which there is no climbing out of in many cases. There is shame or stigma with staying on it and not finding work, or not retraining to find work. Their is shame in unnecessary long term dependency of an able bodied person being on it. There is shame if everyone just up and decided everything I want is already being paid for, why should I bother. That's abuse, by doing so, you take away from others who truly need welfare to survive and aren't capable of finding work or disabled, you take money from other areas that need it like healthcare, parental leave, education, etc. That's finding a candy jar of free candy and just dumping all the candy in your pocket.

There is no welfare system in existence, theoretical or otherwise that could sustain a disproportionally large number of people dependent on it by active choice, where there is more being taken out then being paid into it. There isn't a socialist democracy that can function that way.

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

#62

Post by axoltl »

pierotofy wrote: post #22
fsloth wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Sometimes you need to try harder." You mean search for an employer whom would sponsor citizenship? The article explained it is quite expensive - do employer sponsored citizenships happen?

Nobody sponsors citizenship. They can sponsor you for a green card (permanent residency). It costs thousands of dollars (I have been told in the range of $12,000, without considering attorney's fees). But it locks you in with the employer for several years, and when you consider the amount of money that you can generate for a company, combined with the fact that you will probably get an average or below average salar…

I worked for my employer for about 6 months when we started green-card proceedings. I was a junior engineer on an H1-B then, having been hired straight out of college from the Netherlands. The job-req I applied for had been sitting there for well over a year, no American worker could be found to fill that position (many interviews were done, no suitable candidate found). I got my green card (EB3) in January of this year, 5 years later and am now the lead security architect on a large project. In those 5 years I've never been paid below average. I'd say it panned out quite nicely for both me and the employer.

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

#63

Post by IkmoIkmo »

mc32 wrote: post #38
murbard2 wrote: post #12

I personally consider that opening borders is a moral imperative, but I understand why it is controversial. I understand that the arguments against "letting everyone in" have some merit, though I ultimately disagree with them. What is a real head scratcher to me is the US policy on highly-skilled immigrants. There are certainly some political constituencies in favor of those, but I can't think of anyone against, at l…

While open borders is an ultimate goal, it would be a bit perilous to allow 'everyone who wanted to' to enter a given country, as things stand. First, I think we should seek bilateral treaties such that we can enter their country as much as they can enter ours and that both parties have reciprocal rights. This should allow all parties entering an agreement to slowly stabilize, or reach some kind of equilibrium. One o…

> From Europe, where people share some culture, they never the less still experience integration issues where locals resent foreign populations, example France and polish workers, or Germany and Serbs or Turks, or Spaniards.

It's not really foreign populations per se. The resentment is really mostly socioeconomic. Nobody resents Persians in the Netherlands because the Persians who migrated here are mostly upper-class with a long tradition of higher education. Whereas the Turks you mentioned were considered guest laborers, Dutch companies literally drove busses to the poorest little villages in Turkey in the 60s and found the people with the least education, who couldn't read or write and had perhaps 2-3 years of primary education, then offered them a job working unskilled labour in a factory hoping they'd go back home after 10 years, basically the 1960s equivalent of off-shoring production to China at a pre-globalisation time when the factories were still back home.

Knowing what we know of lower-socioeconomic classes (higher rates of crime, lower rates of education, higher pregnancy rates, more conflict with authority etc etc), it's no real surprise it turned out this way. The sad thing is that in Europe the debate about these problems acts as if it's a cultural issue (e.g. Turkish culture or Islamic culture), when it's really a socioeconomic problem (taking the least educated people from an already poor country, putting them in factory housing and not teaching them the local language, and expecting them to go back home or thrive), not a cultural one. And this debate has essentially created tons of animosity because it invites all this 'class of civilisations' bs rhetoric and turns it into what in the US is referred to as a 'racial' problem.

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

#64

Post by jacquesm »

param wrote: post #43
mcguire wrote: post #35

Are there any countries where the immigration system is not "broken" in this way? I have seen some in the past with "entrepreneur" or "retirement" visas: you are allowed to stay in the country if you promise to spend a lot of money, but that doesn't seem optimal for this kind of case. I've also heard of places desperately seeking workers, but that also doesn't seem to fit the current American situation.

Canada (and I believe some other countries, like Australia) has a points based system. You can fill in a PR (equivalent to US Green Card) application from the comfort of your home country. When you are filling up the application, you can tally the points and know for sure whether you meet the cut-off to have your application be granted - i.e. you don't need to submit if you aren't going to make it. Points are given f…

I spent many years waiting to get my Canadian paperwork sorted out and spent a small fortune doing so. In the end I gave up and moved back to NL.

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

#65

Post by sigzero »

zzalpha wrote: post #56
kazinator wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Opening borders works for multicultural countries built on immigration. For countries that are based on a unique language, ethnicity and culture, it is damaging.

Damaging in what sense?

A problem being, if you open the door, you don't control who comes through. I am totally against an open borders policy.

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

#66

Post by JoshTriplett »

surge wrote: post #61
JoshTriplett wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a welfare system only works because people are culturally indoctrinated/shamed away from using it, then it's broken by design. Sure, it would be nice to have a culture in which people are disinclined to be supported by charity unless they absolutely need it (though that kind of shaming can also push people to avoid it even when they do need it). But at the same time, if that cultural disinclination is the only con…

That's how a functioning society works, you're shamed away from unnecessarily doing lots of things that create a burden on others. Littering for example. It creates a burden on society to clean up after others. There isn't shame in using welfare as a safety net, its there to catch you from following in to absolute destitution from which there is no climbing out of in many cases. There is shame or stigma with staying…

Other than the fact that littering is typically a legal offense (albeit an extremely minor one, as it should be), I think you're saying exactly the same thing.

A safety net is exactly what a welfare or other charity system should be. I'm simply suggesting that ensuring it's no more than a safety net should be backed up by more than just shame.

To be clear, the reason to not do something wrong shouldn't just be "because I'll get in legal trouble if I do"; laws should reflect morality. But that needs to be around as a backup for the sadly large number of people who will only pay attention to that and nothing less. Some people avoid littering because it's wrong and disrepectful to others; others avoid littering because it's illegal and will cost them a fine. Some people avoid drinking and driving because it could hurt or kill people; others only avoid it because it's illegal. Some people turn down charity because they actively want to be self-sufficient and contribute something; others will only do so if it is limited to need.

> There is no welfare system in existence, theoretical or otherwise that could sustain a disproportionally large number of people dependent on it by active choice, where there is more being taken out then being paid into it. There isn't a socialist democracy that can function that way.

Agreed completely. There isn't any governmental or societal system that can function that way.

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

#67

Post by anocendi »

It is kind of surprising to learn that those Big Law Firms rolling in huge piles of cash minute by the minute do not want to spend a mere couple of thousands for a member of their team.

Is it because petitioning for a candidate without a STEM degree is that much harder?

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

#68

Post by shas3 »

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 ran a story about how irrational bureaucratic delays derailed a guy's career in a consulting firm: http://www.newsweek.com/story-one-mans-immigration-ordeal-66...

I know at least 6 other people who have had similar experiences: well qualified people in great skill-specific jobs who were caught up in bureaucratic nightmares. Unlike the subject of the Newsweek article, these people had employees who could afford to keep them on the payroll.

New York Times also ran an article on this issue, of a Google employee who had to move to Canada because of arbitrary bureaucratic rules concerning the work visa. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/12/business/12immig.html?page...

Further, green card applications have country quotas, which, in the context of citizenship were deemed unconstitutional during JFK/LBJ's civil rights actions.

In spite of such iniquities, there seem to be no political efforts to fix the system.

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

#69

Post by Symmetry »

worklogin wrote: post #26
murbard2 wrote: post #12

I personally consider that opening borders is a moral imperative, but I understand why it is controversial. I understand that the arguments against "letting everyone in" have some merit, though I ultimately disagree with them. What is a real head scratcher to me is the US policy on highly-skilled immigrants. There are certainly some political constituencies in favor of those, but I can't think of anyone against, at l…

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

It's more sustainable if you have US style welfare where benefits are things like wage subsidies, for a limited duration after employment, or in kind in some way like Medicaid or food stamps.

EDIT: I think I should point out that the tradeoff is that this way of doing welfare is less efficient but requires less trust.

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

#70

Post by rrss1122 »

I'll supply an anecdote of my own. My parents both immigrated to the US, both obtained permanent residency, and are both on the path to citizenship.

This guy has been trying for 15 years. It doesn't explain in the article why he doesn't at least have his residency yet.

Post reply on HN