6 ms·

I don't think I, or most other people who are against the H1B visa system, have anything against H-1B holders themselves. They're obviously everyday people who

I don't think I, or most other people who are against the H1B visa system, have anything against H-1B holders themselves. They're obviously everyday people who are doing what's right for themselves and taking a big risk that generally pays off pretty well for them. If I was in their place, I hope I would have the cojones to do the same thing. Picking up and moving to another country is a big deal. What I have a problem with is the companies who employ them. The intent of the H1-B visa is for companies to be able to hire workers with skills they can't hire for in America. The reality is that 99% of H1-B programmers are hired because they're cheaper or some other anti-labor reason. There is not a shortage of programmers in the US - I'll grant there could be in Silicon Valley or California - these companies are not looking very hard for programmers, and they're more willing to get someone from a foreign country than pay for relocation for someone from say, Iowa, or to open an office there. So, frankly, I see virtually every tech company hiring H1-Bs as committing immigration fraud in order to screw over people like me. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H1b#No_labor_shortages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H1b#No_labor_shortages - basically sums it up. Unlike other people in this thread, I don't give a fig for free markets, except to the extent they make people's lives better, which they do have a decent track record of doing in many instances. Since I live in America and only the US government has direct power over the lives of Americans, I judge US government policy by that criteria. It seems clear to me a global free market for labor is the worst thing imaginable for Americans in the short term, and the world population in the very long run. Free immigration is a handout to corporations, who want to expand the labor pool as much as possible so they can play us all off against each other on a grand scale. It disgusts me enough to watch corporations and businesses play off state and national governments against each other for tax incentives and subsidies. I'm not interested in programming being a minimum-wage job or living under any more of a global techno-corporate system than I already do.

humanrebar 10y ago
> I'll grant there could be in Silicon Valley or California I'd be willing to relocate there if it made economic sense. If H1B were not available and bay area salaries higher, it would be more in the realm of personality. I know a lot of great engineers in "flyover states" that more than understand that they'd have to take a decrease in standard of living to move to the Bay Area so don't even consider it.
- ghaff 10y ago
  The Bay Area situation is complicated. Relocating to the Bay Area from a not-low-cost East Coast area looked like a decrease in standard of living to me 25 years ago. (Admittedly other positions might have been different. But Bay Area CoL has been high for a long time.)
- Merad 10y ago
  > I know a lot of great engineers in "flyover states" that more than understand that they'd have to take a decrease in standard of living to move to the Bay Area so don't even consider it. Yup. According to all the cost of living calculators I'd need upwards of $175k in SF to match what I'm getting at the moment in boring old Tennessee. There's no way it's worth it for me.
  - humanrebar 10y ago
    ...and in my experience, those cost of living calculators underestimate how much nicer (and more commutable) homes are in lower cost of living areas.
    - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
      They also over estimate how much non housing expenses are in places like SF. Food is often cheaper in those cities, not more expensive, and most non service items cost almost the same. It's a wash.
pm90 10y ago
American companies are not a welfare state. A corporation can only expend so much time and money in the search for good workers. So you can't expect the companies to actively go out to every little town in Iowa and see if there are workers willing to relocate at a reasonable pay (more on the reasonableness of pay later). The workers themselves need to apply, to be proactive in their search for jobs. I think this last fact is overlooked a lot. Many (not all, of course) workers are extremely unwilling to move, and may even be really unhappy about moving away from the social structures that they are comfortable with. Every US company I've worked at has favored hiring locally, hiring US citizens etc. if only because there is less uncertainty relating to the visa situation, and the process of applying for H1B and green card is not cheap. However, if you have qualified workers applying to your company and you determine they are a good fit, you will try to hire them. Because ultimately you, the company, does want to stay competitive and hire good workers who are motivated enough to 1) Get the technical skills and 2) Actively seek out great opportunities. Her is another thing I noticed about the tech companies I've worked at: Once you're an employee and in good standing, the company will do almost anything to help you remain that way. Paying extra for the visa and green card process is just another expense; spending extra time and money to convince joe tech worker to move from nowheretown is just a lot more complex. My solution to this problem would be more comprehensive. Instead of reactive policies like increasing the minimum salary requirement or decreasing visas, create a more comprehensive job matching program/board. Have a system where companies looking for engineers must register and get matched with Americans looking for jobs and interview them. If you're really serious about helping Iowan programmers, then make it more convenient for companies to find the kind of workers they are looking for. I said I would address "reasonable pay" more. A lot of people seem to think that if you can't find employee at salary A, you just need to increase the salary and employees will magically appear. This is just not the way the market works. If American workers become too expensive, it becomes more cost effective to open a satellite office in another country and the jobs move overseas.
- Amezarak 10y ago
  > American companies are not a welfare state. A corporation can only expend so much time and money in the search for good workers. So you can't expect the companies to actively go out to every little town in Iowa and see if there are workers willing to relocate at a reasonable pay (more on the reasonableness of pay later). I agree. That's why I support the abolition of the H1-B visa program, at least in the form it currently takes. As long as it exists, companies will abuse it. Part of the problem is to some extent, the government has been captured by corporate interests. > Many (not all, of course) workers are extremely unwilling to move, and may even be really unhappy about moving away from the social structures that they are comfortable with. This is absolutely true. It's also true that programmers, especially, can work remotely or in cheap satellite offices, and that this is probably preferable to them moving all around. Strengthening social structures for American workers should be a priority of the government. It makes for happier, healthier, better-adjusted people. It makes for people less prone to mental illnesses like depression and drug addiction, less likely to become homeless, and more likely to be deeply involved in their community and local politics. (Something I have been considering for a while now is the flagrant corruption in local US politics that is becoming increasingly enabled by transient populations who haven't lived in the same place for decades, and therefore lack deep knowledge and experience of local issues and local politicians, and who aren't much interested because they don't expect themselves, their children, or their grandchildren to remain in the area.) It also often has the side-effect of making life a lot cheaper. If your retired grandparents are willing to watch your kids while you're at work, that's a lot cheaper than paying for daycare. > A lot of people seem to think that if you can't find employee at salary A, you just need to increase the salary and employees will magically appear. This is just not the way the market works. If American workers become too expensive, it becomes more cost effective to open a satellite office in another country and the jobs move overseas. If you can't afford the labor costs, then your business doesn't get to exist. That's the way the market works. If I could hire people for ten cents an hour, I could start a great software business. I can't. Too bad for me. Your statement in general is representative of the race-to-the-bottom thinking I referenced in my earlier post - the idea that we have to do this, or the jobs will go elsewhere, where labor is cheaper. Well, that's how you get savage cuts to labor protections, stagnant wages, and massive corporate welfare in the form of tax cuts and subsidies. What's the endgame, here? Essentially, a global, common market with freedom of movement, a world where democratic governments are entirely subordinate to large corporate interests, a world where wages start plummeting because someone, somewhere, is perfectly willing to program for 5k/year and live in a one-bedroom apartment with five other people, all the while the company involved is getting massive tax breaks lest they start move somewhere else even cheaper. No thanks. The reality is that American workers are highly educated and there's a huge amount of social capital and financial capital that will keep businesses operating in the US. If they really wanted to, it's already cheaper open foreign offices and hire locals elsewhere - there's more than just immediate financial considerations already in effect. In a future with more expensive American labor, brilliant US programmers will still be starting their companies in the US, because they already live here. They will hire their friends and alumni from their college in the US. They will hire people those people give references for. They will hire people who live near them. Most businesses will not leave the US in the near-term, H1-Bs or no H1-Bs. If they choose to go elsewhere to evade American labor prices and American labor protections, there is a simple solution. They can be forbidden from selling their products and services here. Access to the American market can be predicated on worker wages and benefits. I don't see any other solution that prevents a global corporate oligarchy.

humanrebar 10y ago

> I'll grant there could be in Silicon Valley or California I'd be willing to relocate there if it made economic sense. If H1B were not available and bay area salaries higher, it would be more in the realm of personality. I know a lot of great engineers in "flyover states" that more than understand that they'd have to take a decrease in standard of living to move to the Bay Area so don't even consider it.

ghaff 10y ago
The Bay Area situation is complicated. Relocating to the Bay Area from a not-low-cost East Coast area looked like a decrease in standard of living to me 25 years ago. (Admittedly other positions might have been different. But Bay Area CoL has been high for a long time.)
Merad 10y ago
> I know a lot of great engineers in "flyover states" that more than understand that they'd have to take a decrease in standard of living to move to the Bay Area so don't even consider it. Yup. According to all the cost of living calculators I'd need upwards of $175k in SF to match what I'm getting at the moment in boring old Tennessee. There's no way it's worth it for me.
- humanrebar 10y ago
  ...and in my experience, those cost of living calculators underestimate how much nicer (and more commutable) homes are in lower cost of living areas.
  - seanmcdirmid 10y ago
    They also over estimate how much non housing expenses are in places like SF. Food is often cheaper in those cities, not more expensive, and most non service items cost almost the same. It's a wash.

pm90 10y ago

American companies are not a welfare state. A corporation can only expend so much time and money in the search for good workers. So you can't expect the companies to actively go out to every little town in Iowa and see if there are workers willing to relocate at a reasonable pay (more on the reasonableness of pay later). The workers themselves need to apply, to be proactive in their search for jobs. I think this last fact is overlooked a lot. Many (not all, of course) workers are extremely unwilling to move, and may even be really unhappy about moving away from the social structures that they are comfortable with. Every US company I've worked at has favored hiring locally, hiring US citizens etc. if only because there is less uncertainty relating to the visa situation, and the process of applying for H1B and green card is not cheap. However, if you have qualified workers applying to your company and you determine they are a good fit, you will try to hire them. Because ultimately you, the company, does want to stay competitive and hire good workers who are motivated enough to 1) Get the technical skills and 2) Actively seek out great opportunities. Her is another thing I noticed about the tech companies I've worked at: Once you're an employee and in good standing, the company will do almost anything to help you remain that way. Paying extra for the visa and green card process is just another expense; spending extra time and money to convince joe tech worker to move from nowheretown is just a lot more complex. My solution to this problem would be more comprehensive. Instead of reactive policies like increasing the minimum salary requirement or decreasing visas, create a more comprehensive job matching program/board. Have a system where companies looking for engineers must register and get matched with Americans looking for jobs and interview them. If you're really serious about helping Iowan programmers, then make it more convenient for companies to find the kind of workers they are looking for. I said I would address "reasonable pay" more. A lot of people seem to think that if you can't find employee at salary A, you just need to increase the salary and employees will magically appear. This is just not the way the market works. If American workers become too expensive, it becomes more cost effective to open a satellite office in another country and the jobs move overseas.

Amezarak 10y ago
> American companies are not a welfare state. A corporation can only expend so much time and money in the search for good workers. So you can't expect the companies to actively go out to every little town in Iowa and see if there are workers willing to relocate at a reasonable pay (more on the reasonableness of pay later). I agree. That's why I support the abolition of the H1-B visa program, at least in the form it currently takes. As long as it exists, companies will abuse it. Part of the problem is to some extent, the government has been captured by corporate interests. > Many (not all, of course) workers are extremely unwilling to move, and may even be really unhappy about moving away from the social structures that they are comfortable with. This is absolutely true. It's also true that programmers, especially, can work remotely or in cheap satellite offices, and that this is probably preferable to them moving all around. Strengthening social structures for American workers should be a priority of the government. It makes for happier, healthier, better-adjusted people. It makes for people less prone to mental illnesses like depression and drug addiction, less likely to become homeless, and more likely to be deeply involved in their community and local politics. (Something I have been considering for a while now is the flagrant corruption in local US politics that is becoming increasingly enabled by transient populations who haven't lived in the same place for decades, and therefore lack deep knowledge and experience of local issues and local politicians, and who aren't much interested because they don't expect themselves, their children, or their grandchildren to remain in the area.) It also often has the side-effect of making life a lot cheaper. If your retired grandparents are willing to watch your kids while you're at work, that's a lot cheaper than paying for daycare. > A lot of people seem to think that if you can't find employee at salary A, you just need to increase the salary and employees will magically appear. This is just not the way the market works. If American workers become too expensive, it becomes more cost effective to open a satellite office in another country and the jobs move overseas. If you can't afford the labor costs, then your business doesn't get to exist. That's the way the market works. If I could hire people for ten cents an hour, I could start a great software business. I can't. Too bad for me. Your statement in general is representative of the race-to-the-bottom thinking I referenced in my earlier post - the idea that we have to do this, or the jobs will go elsewhere, where labor is cheaper. Well, that's how you get savage cuts to labor protections, stagnant wages, and massive corporate welfare in the form of tax cuts and subsidies. What's the endgame, here? Essentially, a global, common market with freedom of movement, a world where democratic governments are entirely subordinate to large corporate interests, a world where wages start plummeting because someone, somewhere, is perfectly willing to program for 5k/year and live in a one-bedroom apartment with five other people, all the while the company involved is getting massive tax breaks lest they start move somewhere else even cheaper. No thanks. The reality is that American workers are highly educated and there's a huge amount of social capital and financial capital that will keep businesses operating in the US. If they really wanted to, it's already cheaper open foreign offices and hire locals elsewhere - there's more than just immediate financial considerations already in effect. In a future with more expensive American labor, brilliant US programmers will still be starting their companies in the US, because they already live here. They will hire their friends and alumni from their college in the US. They will hire people those people give references for. They will hire people who live near them. Most businesses will not leave the US in the near-term, H1-Bs or no H1-Bs. If they choose to go elsewhere to evade American labor prices and American labor protections, there is a simple solution. They can be forbidden from selling their products and services here. Access to the American market can be predicated on worker wages and benefits. I don't see any other solution that prevents a global corporate oligarchy.