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Even though Silicon Valley sees the H-1B program as one of its top political priorities, this campaign of reform by red tape has avoided the frantic poli

Even though Silicon Valley sees the H-1B program as one of its top political priorities, this campaign of reform by red tape has avoided the frantic political fights surrounding other aspects of immigration, like the proposed travel ban or the cancellation of DACA, a program for those who came to the country as undocumented children. This is conflating two different things - DACA and travel ban are issues related to immigration; H-1B is about temporary guest workers. The (skilled) immigration issue which concerns most of SV is green card backlogs. That has not gotten any attention from SV leadership.

giobox 9y ago
Given the H1-B is a "Dual Intent" visa, it is absolutely still about immigration, the H1-B doesn't just allow for temporary workers. It provides a well worn path to a green card and permanent residency in the US too, and in my experience virtually everyone I've known to use the H1-B has done so. The H1-B cap is surely a far more pressing concern for most technology firms than the GC backlog. The H1-B cap and delays are making it significantly harder to hire foreign workers. I don't think the big tech firms care nearly as much about GC backlogs - if anything they probably like this, as it arguably aids in staff retention if your workforce is less able to easily switch job.
- majormajor 9y ago
  I think the parent poster's point is that the H1B process is far from the bottleneck there, for shops intending to bring along their foreign workers rather than churn through cheap employees, which matches my experience.
  - giobox 9y ago
    I'd disagree - the H1B process can absolutely be argued to be the main bottleneck for hiring skilled foreign tech workers right now, especially as the cap has been exceeded by such an enormous number for several years.
  - mavelikara 9y ago
    Indeed. Also, the GC backlogs are more relevant to SV than the two other issues mentioned - travel ban and DACA. Yet SV leadership is way more vocal on travel ban and DACA than they are about GC backlogs.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago
>The (skilled) immigration issue which concerns most of SV is green card backlogs. That has not gotten any attention from SV leadership. Of course not. If workers were not held hostage by one company, and were free to go to any company they wanted without worrying about their immigration status, the companies would have to pay higher wages to keep their workers.
- sage76 9y ago
  Not to mention, many would be able to work for or create startups, small businesses, or heck, just bum around or retire if they had saved enough over the years. Companies hate employees having this kind of flexibility. Just on some other thread on HN, there was talk of how foreign grad students were not treated well compared to citizens, since the foreigners were tied to a visa.
chimeracoder 9y ago
> H-1B is about temporary guest workers. The H-1B is not about guest workers, which are an altogther separate set of programs/visas. The H-1B is a dual-intent visa, so it supports both people who intend to obtain a green card or citizenship eventually as well as people who only intend to work in the US for a period of time before returning home. (Even in the latter case, this doesn't qualify it as a guest worker program, which is a third category altogether). An easy heuristic you can use to remember why the H-1B visa isn't a guest worker program is that many people who obtain H-1B visas enter the country without any plan for the date that they will return home. (Whether or not they ultimately stay and immigrate is a separate matter, but guest workers by definition know their expected departure date when they enter, because the terms of their employment and entry are inherently temporary.) Some critics of the H-1B visa refer to it as a guest worker program, in an attempt to conflate it pejoratively with the latter (which are generally for low-skilled labor, and therefore viewed less favorably than specialty visas like the H-1B).

giobox 9y ago

Given the H1-B is a "Dual Intent" visa, it is absolutely still about immigration, the H1-B doesn't just allow for temporary workers. It provides a well worn path to a green card and permanent residency in the US too, and in my experience virtually everyone I've known to use the H1-B has done so. The H1-B cap is surely a far more pressing concern for most technology firms than the GC backlog. The H1-B cap and delays are making it significantly harder to hire foreign workers. I don't think the big tech firms care nearly as much about GC backlogs - if anything they probably like this, as it arguably aids in staff retention if your workforce is less able to easily switch job.

majormajor 9y ago
I think the parent poster's point is that the H1B process is far from the bottleneck there, for shops intending to bring along their foreign workers rather than churn through cheap employees, which matches my experience.
- giobox 9y ago
  I'd disagree - the H1B process can absolutely be argued to be the main bottleneck for hiring skilled foreign tech workers right now, especially as the cap has been exceeded by such an enormous number for several years.
- mavelikara 9y ago
  Indeed. Also, the GC backlogs are more relevant to SV than the two other issues mentioned - travel ban and DACA. Yet SV leadership is way more vocal on travel ban and DACA than they are about GC backlogs.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 9y ago

>The (skilled) immigration issue which concerns most of SV is green card backlogs. That has not gotten any attention from SV leadership. Of course not. If workers were not held hostage by one company, and were free to go to any company they wanted without worrying about their immigration status, the companies would have to pay higher wages to keep their workers.

sage76 9y ago
Not to mention, many would be able to work for or create startups, small businesses, or heck, just bum around or retire if they had saved enough over the years. Companies hate employees having this kind of flexibility. Just on some other thread on HN, there was talk of how foreign grad students were not treated well compared to citizens, since the foreigners were tied to a visa.

chimeracoder 9y ago

> H-1B is about temporary guest workers. The H-1B is not about guest workers, which are an altogther separate set of programs/visas. The H-1B is a dual-intent visa, so it supports both people who intend to obtain a green card or citizenship eventually as well as people who only intend to work in the US for a period of time before returning home. (Even in the latter case, this doesn't qualify it as a guest worker program, which is a third category altogether). An easy heuristic you can use to remember why the H-1B visa isn't a guest worker program is that many people who obtain H-1B visas enter the country without any plan for the date that they will return home. (Whether or not they ultimately stay and immigrate is a separate matter, but guest workers by definition know their expected departure date when they enter, because the terms of their employment and entry are inherently temporary.) Some critics of the H-1B visa refer to it as a guest worker program, in an attempt to conflate it pejoratively with the latter (which are generally for low-skilled labor, and therefore viewed less favorably than specialty visas like the H-1B).