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H-1B visa debate: India says it’s a trade and services issue

19 points by i0exception 9y ago

harigov 9y ago
I am not opposed to H1b reforms but I am opposed to the protectionist rhetoric that inspired those reforms. If you visit any major Indian cities, you would notice that many of the streets are filled up with many American companies like Nike, McDonald's, KFC, PizzaHut, etc., So much of modern Indian's income goes towards buying stuff from other countries. If we are talking about jobs, what is stopping us from blocking these companies from serving Indian market? Aren't we losing jobs as well? Why is it that trading goods, especially the ones that US excels at, is good, but not trading services that require people to travel to the customer's location?
- tyingq 9y ago
  There is, as you say, some amount of rhetoric from people that are opposed to the H1B program in general. Most of what I see from the HN crowd, though, isn't that. They seem to be fine with how companies like Google are leveraging H1B...honestly filling slots that can't be filled locally. The angst is with companies like WiPro and Tata that are gaming H1B to undercut the labor market.
  - latentpot 9y ago
    Tata and Infosys are perhaps the worst abusers. Wonder if it makes sense to have a better mechanism to keep a check on the visa applications instead of having given them free reign to game the system.
    - ap46 9y ago
      Someone on HN proposed to have application fees for individual applicants under a company be proportional to the total number of applications by that company, so as to deter them from applying in high number & having to pay exorbitant amounts as fees. Only then would companies with few requirements are also able to get H1B candidates at low fees also without suffering the sheer probability advantage that BigIT gets.
- nullnilvoid 9y ago
  If anything, the Indian outsourcing companies such as TCS, Wipro, Infosys violated the principles of trade, to begin with. They have abused the H-1B visa loophole for many years. Real highly skilled workers from other countries with even PhD's cannot get any H-1B visa at all.
  - cmpxchg8b 9y ago
    Really highly skilled workers (especially with a PhD) would be better off getting an O-1 visa anyway.
- davidf18 9y ago
  > "Why is it that trading goods, especially the ones that US excels at, is good, but not trading services that require people to travel to the customer's location?" Here is the reason: the intent of the H1-B program is to import labor only in the case that there is absolutely no American capable of doing the job. For example, a nuclear physicist that is good at programming computers. It has been abused. If India doesn't want to buy high quality goods like Apple iPhones, then they are hurting their population. I'll withhold comment about McD, KFC, PizzaHut. Some people understand that American is for Americans and some don't seem to understand that. Why should people from other countries who are not US citizens depress wage rates in STEM and compete with Americans for jobs? One reason that Trump won over the Republican and Democratic political elite is that they didn't understand this very basic concept. Those that want to immigrate should follow the law and go through the proper procedures. Many do. Abuse of H1-B is wrong. Lowering rates rates of American STEM workers is wrong. Competing with Americans for STEM jobs is wrong.
- biocomputation 9y ago
  * India is sovereign and can do whatever it likes. It can ban American companies at will. * There are hundreds of thousands of H1-Bs in America right now. * Most, if not all, of these jobs should go to Americans. * Non-profits ( virtually all universities and hospitals in the US ) are exempt from annual caps. * H1-B is frequently used to illegally replace American workers. * There are so many Indians and Chinese in the H1-B program that legitimately qualified foreign nationals ( ex: PhD degree holders ) from other countries cannot even get into the US. * Why is H1-B 80% Indian? India surely doesn't have a monopoly on brilliant people. * If hundreds of thousands of Americans were being imported into India to do jobs for which there were qualified Indian workers, you better believe that Indians would be extremely unhappy about it. * And here you are, with the expectation that US professionals should welcome low cost replacements with open arms. * I live and work in Seattle. Nearly every single American citizen I know is opposed to H1-B. Many are too polite/afraid to say anything at work, but most of them would rather the H1-B workers just went home.
  - subhobroto 9y ago
    I love this response. The H1-B program was meant to import labor only in the case that there is absolutely no American capable of doing the job: in reality, it has become a means of labor arbitrage. Make no mistake though, that labor arbitrage is a challenge special to the U.S. As I have explained in my answer (https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/answer/Subhobroto-Sinha-1 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une...) and comments (https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/comment/1989873 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une...) on Quora, most developed nations make extensive use of labor arbitrage. Sure, China and India is the center of labor arbitrage, but there are a lot of applicants from developed countries too. I have spoken with Canadians immigrating to the U.S. because they can't afford to live in Canada; I have spoken with Germans immigrating to the U.S. because they can't afford to live in Germany; I have spoken with Finns immigrating to the U.S. because they can't afford to live in Finland and so on. All have the same story. The reason being that at their home country, the companies are hiring immigrants from developing countries at lower labor costs. That depresses wages for that industry and I am not only talking about tech jobs. My Quora answer shows how doctors are similarly affected: https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/comment/1989873 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une... The Canadians/Germans/Finns/etc have an expectation for a quality of life they are now unable to maintain on such depressed wages and hence they immigrate to the U.S. Here are some more datapoints: https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/comment/2013178 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une... None of them are happy they had to immigrate to the U.S. and the U.S. citizens they likely displaced are not happy about that either. I hate the exploitation of the H1-B program: but the H1-B is capitalism, free markets and the global marketplace at its best. The free market does not care if it burns the factory and workers its making money off to the ground. The free market only looks at one thing: Profit.
- wmil 9y ago
  Restaurant chains are a bad example. They're going to be using local labour and ingredients. And India does often block companies from serving the Indian market if there isn't enough perceived benefit. For instance Apple isn't allowed to open retail stores because they don't want to meet guarantees about percentages of made in India goods available in store.
ap46 9y ago
Everyone knows that people on the H1B(20K) with higher education from USA are the actual skilled/MS/PhD candidates that companies want, not the bodyshop which imports one-employee-one-company labor on the 65K remaining H1B quota. Jaitley(FM) would have us believe that the 65K are the skilled ones, while they are the ones who just happened to be the bosses pet/bribed ones getting a chance to go on-site & not because of some specialised skill.
- FreedomToCreate 9y ago
  There are enough professionals with bachelors being hired from top universities outside the US (ex. University of Waterloo, ETH Zurich, University of Cambridge, Peking University, etc...) who come to the US on H1B visas in the 65K batch.
  - amatim 9y ago
    Coming from Waterloo, ETHZ, Cambridge, etc for 65k would be unwise at least if they don't switch soon enough
    - ap46 9y ago
      No, its not the salary. Its the number of non-migrant visas quota for a year. 65000 for workers & 20000 for those with higher education from USA.
  - ap46 9y ago
    Yeah, they are for sure. My point was the huge chunk close to 80% or more which goes to these out-sourcing companies.
MS_Buys_Upvotes 9y ago
I would post this in it's own thread but I'm sure it will get buried https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/66kb3c/95_engineers_in_india_unfit_for_software/ https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/66kb3c/95_engi...
- harigov 9y ago
  That "research" is done by a company called Aspiring Minds, whose business is to teach folks software programming skills. You know what their motivations are. Also, that statement itself is so broad, it's just playing with words. They ran that test in engineering schools so these are students. How many of these are freshman or juniors? How many of them fail to write programs because of lack of time?
MS_Buys_Upvotes 9y ago
I would post this in it's own thread but I'm sure it will get buried https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/66kb3c/95_engineers_in_india_unfit_for_software/ https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/66kb3c/95_engi...

19 points by i0exception 9y ago

I am not opposed to H1b reforms but I am opposed to the protectionist rhetoric that inspired those reforms. If you visit any major Indian cities, you would notice that many of the streets are filled up with many American companies like Nike, McDonald's, KFC, PizzaHut, etc., So much of modern Indian's income goes towards buying stuff from other countries. If we are talking about jobs, what is stopping us from blocking these companies from serving Indian market? Aren't we losing jobs as well? Why is it that trading goods, especially the ones that US excels at, is good, but not trading services that require people to travel to the customer's location?

tyingq 9y ago
There is, as you say, some amount of rhetoric from people that are opposed to the H1B program in general. Most of what I see from the HN crowd, though, isn't that. They seem to be fine with how companies like Google are leveraging H1B...honestly filling slots that can't be filled locally. The angst is with companies like WiPro and Tata that are gaming H1B to undercut the labor market.
- latentpot 9y ago
  Tata and Infosys are perhaps the worst abusers. Wonder if it makes sense to have a better mechanism to keep a check on the visa applications instead of having given them free reign to game the system.
  - ap46 9y ago
    Someone on HN proposed to have application fees for individual applicants under a company be proportional to the total number of applications by that company, so as to deter them from applying in high number & having to pay exorbitant amounts as fees. Only then would companies with few requirements are also able to get H1B candidates at low fees also without suffering the sheer probability advantage that BigIT gets.
nullnilvoid 9y ago
If anything, the Indian outsourcing companies such as TCS, Wipro, Infosys violated the principles of trade, to begin with. They have abused the H-1B visa loophole for many years. Real highly skilled workers from other countries with even PhD's cannot get any H-1B visa at all.
- cmpxchg8b 9y ago
  Really highly skilled workers (especially with a PhD) would be better off getting an O-1 visa anyway.
davidf18 9y ago
> "Why is it that trading goods, especially the ones that US excels at, is good, but not trading services that require people to travel to the customer's location?" Here is the reason: the intent of the H1-B program is to import labor only in the case that there is absolutely no American capable of doing the job. For example, a nuclear physicist that is good at programming computers. It has been abused. If India doesn't want to buy high quality goods like Apple iPhones, then they are hurting their population. I'll withhold comment about McD, KFC, PizzaHut. Some people understand that American is for Americans and some don't seem to understand that. Why should people from other countries who are not US citizens depress wage rates in STEM and compete with Americans for jobs? One reason that Trump won over the Republican and Democratic political elite is that they didn't understand this very basic concept. Those that want to immigrate should follow the law and go through the proper procedures. Many do. Abuse of H1-B is wrong. Lowering rates rates of American STEM workers is wrong. Competing with Americans for STEM jobs is wrong.
biocomputation 9y ago
* India is sovereign and can do whatever it likes. It can ban American companies at will. * There are hundreds of thousands of H1-Bs in America right now. * Most, if not all, of these jobs should go to Americans. * Non-profits ( virtually all universities and hospitals in the US ) are exempt from annual caps. * H1-B is frequently used to illegally replace American workers. * There are so many Indians and Chinese in the H1-B program that legitimately qualified foreign nationals ( ex: PhD degree holders ) from other countries cannot even get into the US. * Why is H1-B 80% Indian? India surely doesn't have a monopoly on brilliant people. * If hundreds of thousands of Americans were being imported into India to do jobs for which there were qualified Indian workers, you better believe that Indians would be extremely unhappy about it. * And here you are, with the expectation that US professionals should welcome low cost replacements with open arms. * I live and work in Seattle. Nearly every single American citizen I know is opposed to H1-B. Many are too polite/afraid to say anything at work, but most of them would rather the H1-B workers just went home.
- subhobroto 9y ago
  I love this response. The H1-B program was meant to import labor only in the case that there is absolutely no American capable of doing the job: in reality, it has become a means of labor arbitrage. Make no mistake though, that labor arbitrage is a challenge special to the U.S. As I have explained in my answer (https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/answer/Subhobroto-Sinha-1 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une...) and comments (https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/comment/1989873 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une...) on Quora, most developed nations make extensive use of labor arbitrage. Sure, China and India is the center of labor arbitrage, but there are a lot of applicants from developed countries too. I have spoken with Canadians immigrating to the U.S. because they can't afford to live in Canada; I have spoken with Germans immigrating to the U.S. because they can't afford to live in Germany; I have spoken with Finns immigrating to the U.S. because they can't afford to live in Finland and so on. All have the same story. The reason being that at their home country, the companies are hiring immigrants from developing countries at lower labor costs. That depresses wages for that industry and I am not only talking about tech jobs. My Quora answer shows how doctors are similarly affected: https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/comment/1989873 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une... The Canadians/Germans/Finns/etc have an expectation for a quality of life they are now unable to maintain on such depressed wages and hence they immigrate to the U.S. Here are some more datapoints: https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-unemployment-in-the-US/comment/2013178 https://www.quora.com/Are-H-1B-visas-causing-large-scale-une... None of them are happy they had to immigrate to the U.S. and the U.S. citizens they likely displaced are not happy about that either. I hate the exploitation of the H1-B program: but the H1-B is capitalism, free markets and the global marketplace at its best. The free market does not care if it burns the factory and workers its making money off to the ground. The free market only looks at one thing: Profit.
wmil 9y ago
Restaurant chains are a bad example. They're going to be using local labour and ingredients. And India does often block companies from serving the Indian market if there isn't enough perceived benefit. For instance Apple isn't allowed to open retail stores because they don't want to meet guarantees about percentages of made in India goods available in store.

ap46 9y ago

Everyone knows that people on the H1B(20K) with higher education from USA are the actual skilled/MS/PhD candidates that companies want, not the bodyshop which imports one-employee-one-company labor on the 65K remaining H1B quota. Jaitley(FM) would have us believe that the 65K are the skilled ones, while they are the ones who just happened to be the bosses pet/bribed ones getting a chance to go on-site & not because of some specialised skill.

FreedomToCreate 9y ago
There are enough professionals with bachelors being hired from top universities outside the US (ex. University of Waterloo, ETH Zurich, University of Cambridge, Peking University, etc...) who come to the US on H1B visas in the 65K batch.
- amatim 9y ago
  Coming from Waterloo, ETHZ, Cambridge, etc for 65k would be unwise at least if they don't switch soon enough
  - ap46 9y ago
    No, its not the salary. Its the number of non-migrant visas quota for a year. 65000 for workers & 20000 for those with higher education from USA.
- ap46 9y ago
  Yeah, they are for sure. My point was the huge chunk close to 80% or more which goes to these out-sourcing companies.

MS_Buys_Upvotes 9y ago

I would post this in it's own thread but I'm sure it will get buried https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/66kb3c/95_engineers_in_india_unfit_for_software/ https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/66kb3c/95_engi...

harigov 9y ago
That "research" is done by a company called Aspiring Minds, whose business is to teach folks software programming skills. You know what their motivations are. Also, that statement itself is so broad, it's just playing with words. They ran that test in engineering schools so these are students. How many of these are freshman or juniors? How many of them fail to write programs because of lack of time?

MS_Buys_Upvotes 9y ago