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>>President Obama even allowed spouses of H1-B to work, displacing and lowering wages of yet more American workers. You need to be more informed. Not any H1-B

>>President Obama even allowed spouses of H1-B to work, displacing and lowering wages of yet more American workers. You need to be more informed. Not any H1-B spouse is allowed to work. That provision was created as a bandaid fix to alleviate the problems of people (mostly Indian and Chinese) who have to endure a decade+ long wait to get a green card (due to the stupid EB country cap limits). While that wait continues, their dependents cannot work. By this provision, only spouses of workers who have a permanent residency petition approved but are not able file for a green card due to unavailability of numbers are able to apply. The estimated number of spouses expected to apply was around 179k out of which only about 37% ended up applying. In contrast, the US issues 860,000 green cards every year (non employment based) which by your argument should be displacing even more local workers. And not all spouses work in the software field. My wife works in healthcare and this provision was a Godsend for us since it has been 5 years and counting since my green card was applied for by my company. If this provision goes away or the immigration system does not improve for the better (reducing backlogs), we are seriously contemplating our future here.

davidf18 10y ago
I'm sorry for your personal suffering, but as a systemic issue, immigrants are taking jobs away from Americans. Whether it be in software, healthcare, or other professional job, Americans are being displaced. As for the number of Green cards, I can only take your word for it, but I'm guessing most of them are not displacing college graduates/ STEM/ etc. 179K * .37 is still > 65,000 jobs that Americans could have done filled by others and depressing wage conditions regardless of the field. Remember that most of the people in the US on H1-B are here because the law which states that there must not be any American capable of filling the job was violated. That is the law. The H1-B has been used by US firms many of which are very wealthy to try to drive down wage rates. That is the problem. If someone is here on H1-B according to the law where there is no American with the skill set (perhaps a PhD nuclear physicist that deals with machine learning and nuclear reactions) then that is a completely different matter. But any H1-B hired for almost any software development there are American that can do the job.
mavelikara 10y ago
Spouses of L and J visa holders are able to work; and as you said, 860K immigrants are added to the system every year. I don't quite understand the grief over spouses of H visa holders from India and China being allowed to work legally. The family, by then, have filed for a green card, made clear indication of wanting to immigrate to the country and are not allowed to do so only because of unfair per-country quota limits. As an aside, I hope HR 392 [1] passes. It eases out the per-country quota limits for skilled immigration over 5 years. It currently has 173 co-sponsors in the house. [1]: https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392 https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392
- davidf18 10y ago
  Passing the bill means more importation of cheap labor effectively lower wages while displacing Americans from working in America. I'm for enforcing the H1-B Visa law which means only for jobs where there is no American with the skill to perform it.
  - mavelikara 10y ago
    > Passing the bill means more importation of cheap labor effectively lower wages while displacing Americans from working in America. > I'm for enforcing the H1-B Visa law which means only for jobs where there is no American with the skill to perform it. I don't mean to be snarky, but you really need to educate yourself on these issues better before commenting here. The bill does nothing to increase the number of H-1Bs, nor reduce the enforcement of existing H-1B regulations. All it does it remove the long (decade+) backlogs for skilled immigrants from India and China. So, in summary, this bill does not have any effect on your stated position - enforcing the H1-B Visa law.
    - davidf18 10y ago
      It does allow more immigrants to displace American workers or workers looking for work or depress American wages. The only bill that needs passing is one that rescinds all H1-b visas that don't follow the letter of the law including the Disney H1-b workers that displaced Americans.

davidf18 10y ago

I'm sorry for your personal suffering, but as a systemic issue, immigrants are taking jobs away from Americans. Whether it be in software, healthcare, or other professional job, Americans are being displaced. As for the number of Green cards, I can only take your word for it, but I'm guessing most of them are not displacing college graduates/ STEM/ etc. 179K * .37 is still > 65,000 jobs that Americans could have done filled by others and depressing wage conditions regardless of the field. Remember that most of the people in the US on H1-B are here because the law which states that there must not be any American capable of filling the job was violated. That is the law. The H1-B has been used by US firms many of which are very wealthy to try to drive down wage rates. That is the problem. If someone is here on H1-B according to the law where there is no American with the skill set (perhaps a PhD nuclear physicist that deals with machine learning and nuclear reactions) then that is a completely different matter. But any H1-B hired for almost any software development there are American that can do the job.

mavelikara 10y ago

Spouses of L and J visa holders are able to work; and as you said, 860K immigrants are added to the system every year. I don't quite understand the grief over spouses of H visa holders from India and China being allowed to work legally. The family, by then, have filed for a green card, made clear indication of wanting to immigrate to the country and are not allowed to do so only because of unfair per-country quota limits. As an aside, I hope HR 392 [1] passes. It eases out the per-country quota limits for skilled immigration over 5 years. It currently has 173 co-sponsors in the house. [1]: https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392 https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/392

davidf18 10y ago
Passing the bill means more importation of cheap labor effectively lower wages while displacing Americans from working in America. I'm for enforcing the H1-B Visa law which means only for jobs where there is no American with the skill to perform it.
- mavelikara 10y ago
  > Passing the bill means more importation of cheap labor effectively lower wages while displacing Americans from working in America. > I'm for enforcing the H1-B Visa law which means only for jobs where there is no American with the skill to perform it. I don't mean to be snarky, but you really need to educate yourself on these issues better before commenting here. The bill does nothing to increase the number of H-1Bs, nor reduce the enforcement of existing H-1B regulations. All it does it remove the long (decade+) backlogs for skilled immigrants from India and China. So, in summary, this bill does not have any effect on your stated position - enforcing the H1-B Visa law.
  - davidf18 10y ago
    It does allow more immigrants to displace American workers or workers looking for work or depress American wages. The only bill that needs passing is one that rescinds all H1-b visas that don't follow the letter of the law including the Disney H1-b workers that displaced Americans.