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> If you want to hire, say, an interpreter of a specific foreign language to work on a community in rural Alabama temporarily, a $100,000 minimum wage would be
by 542458 10y ago
> If you want to hire, say, an interpreter of a specific foreign language to work on a community in rural Alabama temporarily, a $100,000 minimum wage would be absurd.
Wow, that's a really important point. I'm so in the tech-news bubble that I'd never heard anybody say that before - thanks for pointing that out!
- edge17 10y agohttp://www.myvisajobs.com/Reports/2017-H1B-Visa-Category.aspx?T=OC http://www.myvisajobs.com/Reports/2017-H1B-Visa-Category.asp...
- LeifCarrotson 10y agoWow. I knew the H1B category was biased towards large companies, but I didn't realize it was so bad. The first cultural, linguistic, or otherwise geographically-constrained job in the list is #84, "Foreign Language And Literature Teachers." "Interpreters and Translators" is down at #131, with a grand total of 268 applicants - practically a rounding error after 300,000 tech applicants. Whatever_dude's example seems so appropriate, that it's shocking to see it so far down the list.
- edge17 10y agoIt's like anything, there's a whole ecosystem involved - which includes having a lot of money to pay the right lawyers that know how to navigate the system properly. I've seen companies hire the wrong lawyers and, after promising the individual that everything would come through, end up having to tell the person that the application was denied.
- bostonpete 10y ago> Wow. I knew the H1B category was biased towards large companies, but I didn't realize it was so bad. Where does that page say anything about large companies?
- sharemywin 10y agosounds like each job class needs it's own minimum.
- mavelikara 10y agoWhich is what the current rule - the one based on prevailing wages - tries to address. Minor tweaks to it - for e.g. using the mean of the top 1/3rd of the salaries surveyed - will accomplish what you ask for, IMO.
- sharemywin 10y agowonder if that shouldn't be by city since salaries very so much by geography.
- mavelikara 10y agoThe current rules determine prevailing wage per geography.
- secfirstmd 10y agoYeah, or what about those of us in the NGO and non-profit sector who need people with specific regional skills/knowledge/experience and/or folks (including tech people) who prefer to take a slightly lower salary because they want to work with us on important stuff? We've had to sort visas on a number of occasions for people. $100,000 would be like one of the highest ever non-profit salaries!
- sharemywin 10y agoSounds like each job class needs it's own salary minimum.
- gnopgnip 10y agoThe salary floor is when the business does not have to prove they did not first search for openings in the US. If you want to hire someone with extremely specialized skills for under 60k(or $130k as proposed by the new bill) a year you have to at least try to recruit in the US first.
- testUser69 10y agoIf an interpreter is so rare that one can't be found in the US and they need to be hired internationally, then maybe it's worth it to pay $100,000?
- whatever_dude 10y ago"It's worth it" only applies if a company is directly going to make a ton of money out of that person. Not every company operates like that. I know it's hard to believe, or even comprehend, in the tech world.
- untog 10y agoObviously we can't know what the organisation doing the hiring is like in this fictional scenario, but $100k would be a huge, huge amount for non-senior staff in rural Alabama no matter what. The problem with a hard salary floor is that it doesn't account for differences in cost of living at all. It would very quickly become the visa of coastal cities and little else.
- googletazer 10y agoThen they can't afford to run. I'd also love to bring say professional 3D modellers and animators from Eastern Europe or Brazil and pay then 20k CAD/year, but thats not how reality works. All of these programs (hb1/etc...) are basically wage arbitrage schemes and have little to do with presence/absence of talent.
- untog 10y agoThere is no universal H1B salary. Translators do not earn as much as developers, in general. People living in Alabama do not earn as much as those working in Silicon Valley, in general. H1B applications go through a "labor condition application" for this exact reason - the government approves the salary, based on industry and location. Therefore, you can't bring 3D developers to Silicon Valley and pay them $20k. But you might be able to bring a translator to rural Alabama. If the aim of the H1B program was to bring in the highest possible paid workers, you'd be correct. But it isn't. These programs are designed in such a way that all states can benefit from them, and a variety of professions.
- Retric 10y agoI disagree. If you are not willing to pay 100k then finding someone is not the problem. You just don't want to pay market rates. The point of H-1B is when salary is not the problem. PS: Remember, someone on an H-1B can leave your employment. Paying market rates is supposed to keep that from happening, thus the intent is to remove a shortage not lower pay.
- refurb 10y agoSo you're argument is that it's impossible for their to be an actual shortage of US workers unless the salary exceed $100K?
- NhanH 10y agoI am not the GP, and I do not agree with the statement. However, I have seen it being made numerous times: any shortage of US workers just means the companies are not paying enough (their argument being, try to pay $1mil and you will certainly fill your positions, this is just very minor exaggeration)
- refurb 10y agoI see the thought process, but it's not universally true since you have to account for value the employee brings as well. Consider a company with only 1 employee. That employee can create 1 widget per year which sells for $100,000. The market for widgets is very elastic and at price points above $100,000, the demand is zero. Overhead and cost of goods is $50,000. In that case, the person's salary can't exceed $50,000 or else the company operates at a loss. Even if there is an extreme shortage of skilled workers who can do the job.
- Retric 10y agoSuppose you could higher a doctor and at the end of the year get 50k in value. Is that still a viable business? Why or why not? IMO, that's the crux of the issue. Yes, the clearing price for some jobs mean people are expensive; making some business nonviable. But, that does not inherently mean there is a shortage.