4 ms·

From the quote you gave, "What is going on is he is effectively giving Green Cards to people on H-1B visas who are unable to get Green Cards due to the [annual]

From the quote you gave, "What is going on is he is effectively giving Green Cards to people on H-1B visas who are unable to get Green Cards due to the [annual] quotas… it could be over 100,000." [emphasis added] The article states effectively which means that while they aren't given out in reality, they are accomplishing much the same thing in practice and that 100,000 more people are working here than should be according to the intent of the law. For every one of those workers working here, there is one less American working here. When Congress passed the law, they knew what they were doing. 7% is about 1 in 14 for a world with over 180 countries. Instead of an executive order, they should probably change the law through Congress. If you want to talk about fairness, then talk about how unfair it is that American workers have wages further depressed and have a more difficult time finding jobs because of this change in executive order (and not the law). The President is supposed to represent American citizens who vote him in office, instead represents the elites (e.g. Silicon Valley firms and Wall Street firms) who want depressed wages for American STEM workers.

mavelikara 10y ago
H-1B, the input stream for these skilled immigrants, do not have any such per-country limits. But the green card process does. This brings into existence a large number of skilled immigrants who have their stay in the country tied to their job. This weakens their negotiation power, and contributes significantly to the wage depression you talk about. Even NumbersUSA do not oppose removing this [1] restriction. Yet, you are _for_ keeping the per-country quotas. Why? [1]:https://www.numbersusa.org/content/news/november-30-2011/sen-chuck-grassley-place-hold-employment-based-visa-bill.html https://www.numbersusa.org/content/news/november-30-2011/sen...
- serge2k 10y ago
  I'm (selfishly) for keeping them because I don't want to get stuck in line with the huge backlog of people from India and China. That's a lousy reason though. I'm not going to spend a decade living a shitty life waiting though. So if the per country caps go I might just give up.
  - mavelikara 10y ago
    > I'm not going to spend a decade living a shitty life waiting though. Obama administration estimated that with the per country quotas removed, the backlogs for everyone will be gone in under 5 years. Sure, that is worser than getting your GC in a year.
serge2k 10y ago
No it doesn't. India has a massive backlog of green card applicants. Obama's order makes it so taht people who are already here working under H-1B laws can cut ahead of that line and start getting green cards. That's a change in priority. Otherwise these people are stuck here tied to a company for a decade+. That's shitty for everyone but hte company. If you really want H-1B visas to not be abused then you should be in favor of more reasonable paths to PR and citizenship.
- davidf18 10y ago
  > " That's shitty for everyone but hte company." Not true. The limitation in "job liquidity" means less competition for Americans for jobs that immigrants might underbid. If the law were rigidly enforced so that only jobs allowed under H1-B were a job that no American could do then there would be far, far fewer than 85,000 H1-B Visas granted per year. In many cases, I'll bet the companies intentionally put the jobs not where people want to live (e.g., NYC, Boston, DC, ...) but in places they don't necessarily want to live.
  - mavelikara 10y ago
    > The limitation in "job liquidity" means less competition for Americans for jobs that immigrants might underbid. What is stopping the employer from trapping a "job illiquid" immigrant into such a job you want to apply for? > If the law were rigidly enforced so that only jobs allowed under H1-B were a job that no American could do I could be wrong, but my understanding is that there is no such law.
    - davidf18 10y ago
      According to law, H1-B Visas are only for those jobs which cannot be filled by Americans, that is no American has the skill to perform them. The law has been greatly abused, but that is in fact the law. I find it really, really hard to believe that there are 85,000 jobs per year (the H1-B Visa limit) that cannot possibly done by Americans. As I have pointed out the issue is that firms do not want to pay prevailing wages for IT people so they back reforms that allows the import of lower-wage labor. (Former Republican) Candidate Rubio cared not for his Florida constituents, 250 IT workers who lost jobs from being displaced by low-wage immigrants and instead took $2 million from Disney and wanted to increase the H1-B Visa limit to 250,000 from 85,000. Trump was backing the 250 workers who lost their jobs to H1-B Visa abuse and wants Disney to give them their jobs back. Many of the elites who want to pay less money for IT work backed candidates who wanted to depress IT wages and make more Americans unemployed. Hilary and all of the Republican candidates were for this. Only Sanders and Trump spoke out against this. Hilary and others called Trump racist, etc. but they never addressed the fundamental issue which is not exporting American jobs overseas and not importing labor to depress wages and cause unemployment among Americans.

mavelikara 10y ago

H-1B, the input stream for these skilled immigrants, do not have any such per-country limits. But the green card process does. This brings into existence a large number of skilled immigrants who have their stay in the country tied to their job. This weakens their negotiation power, and contributes significantly to the wage depression you talk about. Even NumbersUSA do not oppose removing this [1] restriction. Yet, you are _for_ keeping the per-country quotas. Why? [1]:https://www.numbersusa.org/content/news/november-30-2011/sen-chuck-grassley-place-hold-employment-based-visa-bill.html https://www.numbersusa.org/content/news/november-30-2011/sen...

serge2k 10y ago
I'm (selfishly) for keeping them because I don't want to get stuck in line with the huge backlog of people from India and China. That's a lousy reason though. I'm not going to spend a decade living a shitty life waiting though. So if the per country caps go I might just give up.
- mavelikara 10y ago
  > I'm not going to spend a decade living a shitty life waiting though. Obama administration estimated that with the per country quotas removed, the backlogs for everyone will be gone in under 5 years. Sure, that is worser than getting your GC in a year.

serge2k 10y ago

No it doesn't. India has a massive backlog of green card applicants. Obama's order makes it so taht people who are already here working under H-1B laws can cut ahead of that line and start getting green cards. That's a change in priority. Otherwise these people are stuck here tied to a company for a decade+. That's shitty for everyone but hte company. If you really want H-1B visas to not be abused then you should be in favor of more reasonable paths to PR and citizenship.

davidf18 10y ago
> " That's shitty for everyone but hte company." Not true. The limitation in "job liquidity" means less competition for Americans for jobs that immigrants might underbid. If the law were rigidly enforced so that only jobs allowed under H1-B were a job that no American could do then there would be far, far fewer than 85,000 H1-B Visas granted per year. In many cases, I'll bet the companies intentionally put the jobs not where people want to live (e.g., NYC, Boston, DC, ...) but in places they don't necessarily want to live.
- mavelikara 10y ago
  > The limitation in "job liquidity" means less competition for Americans for jobs that immigrants might underbid. What is stopping the employer from trapping a "job illiquid" immigrant into such a job you want to apply for? > If the law were rigidly enforced so that only jobs allowed under H1-B were a job that no American could do I could be wrong, but my understanding is that there is no such law.
  - davidf18 10y ago
    According to law, H1-B Visas are only for those jobs which cannot be filled by Americans, that is no American has the skill to perform them. The law has been greatly abused, but that is in fact the law. I find it really, really hard to believe that there are 85,000 jobs per year (the H1-B Visa limit) that cannot possibly done by Americans. As I have pointed out the issue is that firms do not want to pay prevailing wages for IT people so they back reforms that allows the import of lower-wage labor. (Former Republican) Candidate Rubio cared not for his Florida constituents, 250 IT workers who lost jobs from being displaced by low-wage immigrants and instead took $2 million from Disney and wanted to increase the H1-B Visa limit to 250,000 from 85,000. Trump was backing the 250 workers who lost their jobs to H1-B Visa abuse and wants Disney to give them their jobs back. Many of the elites who want to pay less money for IT work backed candidates who wanted to depress IT wages and make more Americans unemployed. Hilary and all of the Republican candidates were for this. Only Sanders and Trump spoke out against this. Hilary and others called Trump racist, etc. but they never addressed the fundamental issue which is not exporting American jobs overseas and not importing labor to depress wages and cause unemployment among Americans.