5 ms·

If it wasn't tipped toward foreign workers, you'd hear stories of H1B workers who sadly lost their job to an American. You'd hear stories about companies who hi

If it wasn't tipped toward foreign workers, you'd hear stories of H1B workers who sadly lost their job to an American. You'd hear stories about companies who hired all American employees, then apologized when they realize it didn't work out and they went back to H1B workers. You'd hear politicians calling for more foreign workers because there are too many jobs for Americans. The 25% success rate? That's the system working as intended. But your story of American workers just needing to find a willing employer, your story of proving that an American worker isn't available to do the job, it's just not true. Or at least it's not as true as you want to make it seem. The minimum for an H1B employee is $60,000 right now. I made more than that at my first tech job right out of college, living in a small city in the Midwest. To get an H1B employee, all you have to do is put up a job posting for $60,000 and wait. The people who will fill that position will be expecting $80,000 and will turn it down. To get an H1B employee, all you need to do is pay far less than market rate (but at or above H1B minimum). Boom, you have highly skilled Americans out of a job and companies getting employees for less than market rate. I've seen it happen at every place I've ever worked. Part of Trump's idea is to raise the minimum for H1B workers to $100k. The idea of an H1B is that it allows you to hire employees who have such a specialized skillset that you can't find someone in America to do the work. What it's become is finding an entry-level Java coder for less than what an American college-educated entry-level employee would make. If the work you need done is so advanced or so specialized that there is no one in America who can do it, you should be willing to pay whatever it costs to get it done. It should be extremely difficult to hire a foreign worker. Not impossible, but really, really hard. Yes, it may be a privilege to be an American, but there are a lot of unemployed, skilled, college-educated Americans. The problem isn't not finding enough Americans to fill the positions, it's not wanting to pay what they need to get paid. And that's the wrong sort of behavior to encourage. H1B visas should drive pay up, not down.

mavelikara 10y ago
> If it wasn't tipped toward foreign workers, you'd hear stories of H1B workers who sadly lost their job to an American. You don't, because when an H-1B worker loses her job, she has to leave the country or find another job real quick. Either way, she most likely do not have time to get her story across to you.
- freehunter 10y ago
  That's another problem I have with the current H1B visa system: the workers are almost literally slaves. It is so close to indentured servitude that I'm not sure if it isn't the same thing as indentured servitude. I've worked at multinational tech companies and I've worked at regional enterprises and everywhere in between and unfailingly, the H1B employees have four people in a two bedroom apartment all sharing a 1987 Toyota Camry. They work 17 hour days for less money than their coworkers, and if they complain, they're deported and banned from the country. That's not fair. If your skillset is so important that American companies will bring you across the ocean from your home country to work for them, you should be a god to them. You should be the most valuable employee they have. They hired Joe because he was the best candidate that applied to their local ad. They hand-picked Prakesh and brought him all the way to California from his home in India because no one is better than Prakesh. The best way to make that happen? Pay them more.
  - mavelikara 10y ago
    > That's not fair. What you are asking for is a point-based skilled immigration system like in Canada, Australia etc. Nobody has proposed that in US yet. But there is a bill - H.R.392: Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act of 2017 [1] - currently up for consideration of the Congress which removes the multi-decade green card backlogs for skilled immigrants. From [2]: H.R. 392, Fairness for High Skilled Immigrants Act replaces the current per-country caps on immigration with a first-come first-served visa system without increasing the total number of available visas. The current system of awarding no more than 7% of available employment-based visas to one country is discriminatory. It ultimately imposes decades-long wait times for people from some countries, creating a backlog of qualified workers. The bill makes no changes to the current law limiting US employers to hire foreign workers except when there are no qualified, willing, able, and available American citizens. Please consider supporting H.R.392 as that is closest we have now to what you are asking for. [1]: https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392/text?r=3 https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392/... [2]: http://chaffetz.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=785 http://chaffetz.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentI...

mavelikara 10y ago

> If it wasn't tipped toward foreign workers, you'd hear stories of H1B workers who sadly lost their job to an American. You don't, because when an H-1B worker loses her job, she has to leave the country or find another job real quick. Either way, she most likely do not have time to get her story across to you.

freehunter 10y ago
That's another problem I have with the current H1B visa system: the workers are almost literally slaves. It is so close to indentured servitude that I'm not sure if it isn't the same thing as indentured servitude. I've worked at multinational tech companies and I've worked at regional enterprises and everywhere in between and unfailingly, the H1B employees have four people in a two bedroom apartment all sharing a 1987 Toyota Camry. They work 17 hour days for less money than their coworkers, and if they complain, they're deported and banned from the country. That's not fair. If your skillset is so important that American companies will bring you across the ocean from your home country to work for them, you should be a god to them. You should be the most valuable employee they have. They hired Joe because he was the best candidate that applied to their local ad. They hand-picked Prakesh and brought him all the way to California from his home in India because no one is better than Prakesh. The best way to make that happen? Pay them more.
- mavelikara 10y ago
  > That's not fair. What you are asking for is a point-based skilled immigration system like in Canada, Australia etc. Nobody has proposed that in US yet. But there is a bill - H.R.392: Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act of 2017 [1] - currently up for consideration of the Congress which removes the multi-decade green card backlogs for skilled immigrants. From [2]: H.R. 392, Fairness for High Skilled Immigrants Act replaces the current per-country caps on immigration with a first-come first-served visa system without increasing the total number of available visas. The current system of awarding no more than 7% of available employment-based visas to one country is discriminatory. It ultimately imposes decades-long wait times for people from some countries, creating a backlog of qualified workers. The bill makes no changes to the current law limiting US employers to hire foreign workers except when there are no qualified, willing, able, and available American citizens. Please consider supporting H.R.392 as that is closest we have now to what you are asking for. [1]: https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392/text?r=3 https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392/... [2]: http://chaffetz.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=785 http://chaffetz.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentI...