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Whoever is working on the bill is disconnected from reality and the damage it is doing long term here. Why's everyone so focused on IT? Everyone can learn how
by readhn 10y ago
Whoever is working on the bill is disconnected from reality and the damage it is doing long term here.
Why's everyone so focused on IT? Everyone can learn how to code, it's not a real science.. Oh it's hacker news :)
Now walk into any major university science department. See who the newly minted PhD students are in biology, chemistry, physics, math ... Most are foreigners. This bill will send them home after they graduate... USA will lose here and other countries win big time on people with great science backgrounds with brains who are willing to work and move the science forward. It will take decades for American educational system to change (if it ever changes) and generate the replacements.
- sytelus 10y agoYou are exactly right. Single minimum wage doesn't make any sense considering there is such a wide gap between IT and everything else. However keeping minimum wage to the 1989 level hurts H1B IT workers more because many of them literally end up getting just that even if they qualify for far more. I guess the issue is not solvable easily because to create job titles and assign it minimum wage number that is, say, at least 10% more than average current is herculean task in itself.
- jackweirdy 10y agoYour point stands, I just wanted to note that the wage level was established in 1998, not 1989. There is a typo in this article, possibly misread from the bill summary https://lofgren.house.gov/uploadedfiles/high_skilled_bill_sxs_and_analysis_-1-2017__final.pdf https://lofgren.house.gov/uploadedfiles/high_skilled_bill_sx...
- TheCoelacanth 10y agoIf the demand for other types of workers isn't high enough to warrant that level of pay, why do they need to bring in foreign workers?
- sytelus 10y agoLower pay doesn't mean abundance. For example, professors for mathematics, theoretical physics, geology etc would be low paying job but its also hard to find people with great skills in these areas.
- thr1234567 10y agoI don't think academic jobs are covered in this. The current system also has exemptions for academic H1-B workers (no lottery).
- hocuspocus 10y agoAlso, hard science PhD students are typically hired on J-1 (when they stay in academia/research) or O-1 visas (if they find a relevant position the industry).
- readhn 10y agoAfter you graduate you have to get h1b to work. Nobody is going to pay straight out of school biologist 130k.
- hocuspocus 10y agoAgain, a lot of these people find positions on J-1, O-1, or cap-exempt H-1 visas. Edit: you can downvote me but it'd be nice to explain why at least. I have a hard time understanding how raising the salary requirement for capped H-1B visas will affect core science PhD students.
- angry_octet 10y agoThere is no shortage of biologists. Pay and conditions in the life sciences is abysmal. The sausage factory relies on graduates for cheap labour. So if foreign students knew the couldn't even get a poorly paid job after graduating, would they go elsewhere? Would this cause a collapse of the university pyramid scheme? Would labs have to start paying real living wages for staff? Lots less science would get done in the short term. US universities would no longer get the best and the brightest from around the world. The size of departments would plummet. But in a few years the number of graduates wouldn't totally dwarf the number of jobs available. That might not be a bad thing.
- readhn 10y agoLet's hope you are not in a life/death situation later in your life where you get some disease for which treatment could have been available earlier if that foreign student was "allowed" to stay and do the work in the USA... All because of some delusional billionaire who is allowed (by us) to play his real life monopoly game.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- btbuildem 10y agoAnd probably for the best. We kind of need the US to take a back seat for a while. Let it be an inbreeding backwater that it clearly wants to be, the world will breathe easier for it.
- jessaustin 10y agoWe've been drifting in this direction for decades now... if someone else wanted to take the wheel, why haven't they done so already? Sure, Putin wants to be the daddy, but he just doesn't have the industry to get there. Other than him? It's like the rest of the world believes the hype, even more than we do. Or maybe the hype is true?
- drzaiusapelord 10y agoChina certainly is doing a great job at this and Trump's dismissal of the TPP means China just get a major leg up in its regional ambitions. The US still is an 800lbs gorilla, but it got there by making a lot of aggressive globalization, immigration, military, and investment moves. Now we have an administration that is against all those things and is run by a man who has a cult of personality behind him and can do 'not wrong' to his base. We're on a completely new path that, historically, has not ended well for modern economies. Isolationism and protectionism in a globalized economy simply does not work. Ask Hugo Chavez how well his Venezuelan experiment worked. >We've been drifting in this direction for decades now... This is untrue. Ignoring Bush's recession, we've been on a non-stop upwards path in almost any metric that matters: gdp, gdp per capita, military power, science publishing, space, tech innovations, environment regulations, social progress, healthcare access, etc. We are hard to beat when managed correctly. The current administration is going against all the things that have given us a leg up over the years. That is something to be concerned about. US supremacy is not a given. Its hard fought and Trump is giving up the global fight for bizarre reasons like trying to bring coal and manufacturing jobs back, neither of which is even feasible considering natural gas/renewable competition and what automation is doing to manufacturing right now.
- jessaustin 10y ago
- samfisher83 10y agoThere aren't a ton of job for PHds in chemistry, biology, chemist, math etc. They end up working at hedge funds or web developers or things not necessarily related to their PHd. Look at big pharama and see how much they spend on R&D or basic research. Its a very small percentage of revenues.
- readhn 10y agoYou are clearly outside of the field. There are tons of jobs in the biotech industry for qualified graduates. The issue is finding people with appropriate scientific and industry backgrounds. This is why h1bs are hired. I don't care what color you are and where you come from. If you know your stuff I will hire you.
- samfisher83 10y agoI do know something about the industry. A couple a of years ago Merk had a massive layoff. Basically there mission was to get rid of R&D because R&D wasn't cost effective. They would much rather just buy up startups when a drug looked promising. I think most of the other big pharmas are doing the same. I have friends who are phds doing stuff that a tech could do. Look at how many BMEs with BS degrees are getting jobs. A lot of these jobs don't need a phd.
- readhn 10y agoWho do you think is driving a lot of the research work at the biotech start ups that the Merc and others are buying up?
- 1_2__3 10y agoIndependent investment? Is this a trick question?
- samfisher83 10y agoI don't know that much about biotech startups. Maybe you can tell me who pays for them?
- ChemicalWarfare 10y agoI would agree with this. These new changes are clearly attempting to address the rampant abuse of the system by the likes of TCS and Infosys and in the process they are affecting other legitimate h1b candidates. A potential solution can be something like a different type of work permits or different requirements for h1b applicants applying after they studied here, something along those lines.
- mi100hael 10y ago> Why's everyone so focused on IT? Everyone can learn how to code, it's not a real science. I think that's exactly why people are focusing on IT. The H-1B program is meant to allow companies to hire foreigners with rare skills that are hard to find domestically. In reality it's abused to import cheap labor and undercut average American workers doing common work like building applications or administering systems. There should be no problem continuing to hire PhDs and other foreigners with actual unique skillsets at $130k.
- readhn 10y agoThe abuse of h1b program by IT firms is the issue that has to be separated out and resolved on its own. There is no reason why we should send a freshly graduated physics scientist back to Uganda or whatever because he can't find an employer willing to pay him/her some abstract 130k salary straight out of school (which is A LOT OF MONEY). Again, when I hire - I do it strictly based on skills and experience. If I have to do a bit more paper work to get this talented guy work for us I'll do it - but there is a limit. And at 130k limit a lot of these brains will flow back overseas. It would be a huge mistake for USA to get rid of willing to work just talent like that.
- dukeluke 10y agoI don't see any reason why h1b visa holders shouldn't have a high bar to reach. The whole point of the program is to bring the best of the best, not the average or mediocre, which could likely be filled by an American somewhere.
- toephu2 10y ago"Everyone can learn how to code, it's not a real science." Yes but not everyone who learns to code can get a job coding. Not everyone can get into Google or Facebook just cause they learned to code. The software engineering interviews don't test your ability to code, they test your ability to problem solve w/ data structures & algorithms.
- WildUtah 10y agoIf you live in middle America flyover country it's hard to get any tech job. And the H1-B program is making it a lot harder.
- smsm42 10y agoIf you think banning access to international talent will make next startup owner to set up shop in Omaha, you are sadly mistaken. It'll be Toronto, or Vancouver.
- dukeluke 10y agoIf you think there won't be people that would try to start businesses in America, you are sadly mistaken.
- smsm42 10y agoOf course there would be. There are people trying to start business in Somalia, US is not that bad :) It's just there would be less of them, and when they hit the limitations they'd tend to move to places where such limitations do not exist.
- eli_gottlieb 10y ago>If you live in middle America flyover country it's hard to get any tech job. Mind, that might have something to do with middle America having defunded its state university systems, making skilled labor difficult to produce. We live in an economy where gluts of unskilled labor are a very bad thing for productivity, and it's about time state governments got that through their damned heads.
- tempw 10y agoYou and some other folks seem to be oblivious on how H1-B works and this bill itself. You need to have 12 years of working experience OR bachelors degree OR a mix of both for H1-B eligibility. Regarding students (PhDs or anyone on F-1 visa), they will get straight path to permanent residence.
- F1_student 10y agoAt least the pdf file for new H1B visa bill means that there will be new line or new path for F1 visa holders. Also, F1 visa students provide good enough subsidies and education discounts to American students (both in-state & out-of-state tuition).
- hn_news 10y agoThere is no straight path for students from F-1 visa to permanent residence.