53 ms·

DHS weighs major change to H-1B foreign tech worker visa program

90 points by nullspace 9y ago

cmurf 9y ago
This administration is such a clown act. H1B's bad/unnecessary. H2B's good/necessary. I think it's obvious the idea is to be protectionist with tech jobs, making those people more inclined to vote for party/people who have enacted that protectionism. Meanwhile at the low end of the scale, competition is good to keep low end wages suppressed. It's protecting classism. Here's an example of a local career placement service with thousands of qualified workers already in the county, and yet a certain politician snags 70 visas for cooks and maids. http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/358793-trump-wins-visas-to-hire-70-foreign-workers-at-mar-a-lago http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/358793-trump-wins...
throwaway_45 9y ago
This is not going to be a popular opinion. My opinion has kind of changed on H1B people. I have talked to a bunch of these folks and they were hating on other immigrants. Some of the people from South American countries are basically are coming here so they don't get killed. Most of the H1Bs could get a job in their country and at least have some safety. Everyone is just trying to better their lives. India Graduates vastly more people than america. Even if only 10% of them are any good that is a massive number of good people. I am not sayings only 10% are any good its just a number. American companies should just go over there if they want. Did you know you can get perm residency in Canada and its not nearly as hard. Why hasn't Canada surpassed the US for tech jobs?
- txsh 9y ago
  > Some of the people from South American countries are basically are coming here so they don't get killed. So? That’s a problem for their government to solve, not mine.
- freeone3000 9y ago
  Lower population, essentially. Vancouver, Montreal, and Waterloo are major tech cities. There's cutting-edge research paired with major companies and univerisites. You might have heard of a few small companies such as "shopify", "500px", or "kik". Canada is 6% tech. But there's a bit of ramp-up delay. Canada has nearly the population of California. There's a practical limit to how fast growth can take place. There are also other factors, such as weather (it's -26C in Montreal today), and salary (you will earn less as a canadian permanent resident than you will on a H1B in the states).
  - throwaway_45 9y ago
    Cali has a 67% higher gdp than canada. Texas has the same gdp as Canada despite having 2/3rd the number of people. I just think the importance of the H1B is a little overblown, but I am not opposed to to it either. I think if you can make it to the US and hold a job we shouldn't kick you out.
  - uiri 9y ago
    It isn't lower population. Canadian culture has a bad case of tall poppy syndrome. I'm Canadian and the jobs in the US simply pay 50% more (before taking into account things like the exchange rate or taxes) than jobs in Canada do. Employers don't want to hire Silicon Valley level talent. If they did, they would pay to match. Canada's economy and policies actively encourage brain drain.
- Alfredo123 9y ago
  > American companies should just go over there if they want. India lacks freedom. There is no free speech, no freedom to start edu institutes and retrospective taxation.
  - dang 9y ago
    We've banned this account for abusing HN. Nationalistic and ideological battle is not welcome here.
petilon 9y ago
It's a hardened belief that jobs are a zero-sum game — and from this arises the idea that every skilled immigrant takes away a job from a U.S. worker. This isn't true. More skilled, educated workers will actually add to the economy — and grow the economy. More: http://journal.dedasys.com/2014/12/29/people-places-and-jobs/ http://journal.dedasys.com/2014/12/29/people-places-and-jobs...
qaq 9y ago
Hmm are there many large tech companies left that do not have dev. offices outside of US? The place I work at has r&d offices in Germany, Ireland, India in addition to US. So if this goes through people can shift to working from whatever non-us office they like. The only effect on US is that tax revenue from salaries will go to Ireland, Germany, India.
strangeloops85 9y ago
This is explicitly racist: it will primarily only apply to Indians on H-1B seeking permanent residency, some of whom wait 10-15 years for their green cards. I would say that Indian-Americans working with the Trump administration with any decency should resign in protest of such actions, but I'm not sure they have a sense of self-respect to begin with.
- halamadrid 9y ago
  What if this is fake news? Once it becomes law you can ask for people with decency to resign.
- Alfredo123 9y ago
  Indian-American are non entities in American politics. Do you think Ajit Pai will resign ? A lot of them are pretty much house niers. Look at Bobby Jindal for example. The guy is pretending to be hard core Christian and a white. No one cares about immigrants.
ratbr 9y ago
Remains to be seen how this impacts the US universities. Part of the incentive for the international students to choose the US over other countries for higher studies is because there are some seriously great professional opportunities after the studies if you can immigrate. For example, our industry is centered in the US, the US is truly a super power in research, the US mindset (startups, relatively merit-driven systems) etc compared to other developed western countries. If there is no clear path to immigration, and if high quality education becomes relatively easily available (see: western universities setting up centers in the east), that can dry up the desire to choose a US based university I think.
bitL 9y ago
Hey, please come to US to be a slave for 3 years, then get off my lawn once you'd like to be promoted into a free citizen! Your only value is that your value is lower!
karmapolic 9y ago
this is a weird rule. H1B workers can only work as contractors then. what is the incentive to hire them full time knowing they have an expiry date?
tehwebguy 9y ago
Not sure if this is a good move but hopefully this will increase scrutiny on this $40B / year nightmare. Aside from the valid CBP responsibilities DHS has due to absorbing that agency, I would estimate that 100% of their resources are wasted doing nothing.
justboxing 9y ago
> The administration is specifically looking at whether it can reinterpret the "may grant" language of the American Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act to stop making the extentions. The act currently allows the administration to extend the H-1B visas for thousands of immigrants, predominantly Indian immigrants, beyond the allowed two three-year terms if a green card is pending. They might as well do away with the H1-B program all together. Not all H1B visas are granted for multi-year expirations. Many are granted for 6 or 9 months, and then the employer finds out that they need the person for longer and apply for extension. Also, the Green Card is tied to employment, so if you stop working for an employer because your H1B expired and DHS refuses to renew it because of this new rule (if it goes into effect) then the person has to go to the beginning of the line / process to apply for the Green Card. I understand that H1B is a non-immigrant visa, but if this change goes into effect, most people won't even apply for the H1B because it would make no sense. Probably what the Trump administration wants in the first place.
- pandaman 9y ago
  Employment Based Green Card is for the future worker. The proper way it's supposed to work is that, when hiring for non-temporary positions, you go straight for the EBGC for the foreign worker. Who, of course, is not working for you yet so he gets his GC for the future job. And it's the way it worked before H1 program has been introduced in 1990. What happens now is that people are hired in the H1B status, which is, by definition, a status for temporary worker. And then the vast majority of them suddenly realize that the job is not temporary (wow, surprise!) and they need to be in a permanent status to do this job, nobody else can (here is the proof that we tried to find somebody and failed, honestly!). So they need to go through adjustment of status (AOS) process to change their "temporary worker" status to the "permanent resident" one. Of course, while the process is going, the worker is in a vulnerable position. On one hand, he or she just claimed that they have been in the wrong status (by requesting it to be adjusted) so their temporary status became even more temporary, so to say. On the other, the EBGC has not been granted yet so the worker remains in the state of, essentially, temporary suspended deportation. For the great benefit of the employer, of course. Don't you find this strange that so many companies fail to estimate permanency of their jobs? Don't you think they might be doing this intentionally in order to exploit the AOS process?
chrisper 9y ago
This is exactly why I left the US after I graduated. Being on H1B is such a huge gamble these days. Now I am living in Europe, making good money, and living happily without having to worry about crap like this.
- zerr 9y ago
  If only there was a good (emigrant-based a la US, Canada, Australia) and sunny English speaking country in Europe...
  - jotm 9y ago
    I like Ireland too!
    - qaq 9y ago
      well minus sunny but actually good option. Malta is another option with the bonus of nice tax system if you make enough.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- brazzledazzle 9y ago
  While this is anecdotal it does worry me that we invest (as a society, in the general sense) in educating people in the US and then don’t do enough to keep them here. It should be easy to obtain a permanent work visa after graduating. You’d need controls like perhaps a minimum degree earned, minimum number of credits earned/years in school and approved institutions but it seems feasible. It would do a lot to retain people that not only we’ve invested in, but who (hopefully) have had a chance to integrate culturally at a young age and formed friendships and connections that will help anchor them.
  - jotm 9y ago
    I like to believe that's the plan - get them to US, teach them, force them back home. Truly doing the world a service, Team America!
immgrnt 9y ago
I'm an H1B visa holder, I think this is a step in the right direction. American Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act - should have never existed. It allows H1B visas to be extended beyond 6 years. No one should be forced to remain on abusive H1B visa for more than 6+ years of their life. It hurts everyone expect the SV tech giants.
- frankchn 9y ago
  No one is being forced to remain on H1B visas for any length of time, you can always quit and leave any time. This affects individuals who have green card applications pending and are being granted 1-year extensions while their applications are pending due to a country-based quota system and thus backlog. The only way this would not affect these individuals is if they remove the quota and backlog and grant green cards immediately, but it doesn't sound like the Administration is planning to do that with the talk of "self-deportation" and all. Instead, they just plan to stop the 1-year renewal and effectively kick these individuals out of the country, even if they like their current status and have been waiting for a decade for a green card. I fail to see how this is a step in the right direction for these workers.
  - immgrnt 9y ago
    > No one is being forced to remain on H1B visas for any length of time, you can always quit and leave any time I'm taking the abuse for a better life for my family. >This affects individuals who have a green card application pending and are being granted 1-year extensions while their application is pending due to a country-based quota system and thus backlog. The wait time is somewhere between half a century and three and a half centuries [1] The Tech companies or the attorneys never tell their employees about this long wait time. Instead they just lie it being 5-to-10 years. It happened to me, I realised my turn will never come up only after waiting 10 years in the line. [1] https://www.cato.org/blog/no-one-knows-how-long-legal-immigrants-will-have-wait https://www.cato.org/blog/no-one-knows-how-long-legal-immigr...
    - frankchn 9y ago
rtpg 9y ago
I really wish that someone would do the right thing and fix H-1B by attaching the visa to the person, not the job/employer. That would help fix sooo many of the objections to this program. But perhaps most importantly it would mean people on this visa would not be indentured servants , with the possibility of visa revocation hanging over them.
- immgrnt 9y ago
  The Tech giants like, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, etc. will never let that happen.
  - tedivm 9y ago
    I don't think that's the case. Right now a ton of the H1-B visa's are given to various IT contracting companies, which use them to suppress wages. Those companies know that their people can't easily leave (and wouldn't be qualified for lots of other companies anyways), and so they can pay them less than they would US citizens. The bigger tech companies aren't using the program to suppress wages though, they're using it to bring in highly skilled employees. For example, there is a ton of hiring in the AI field and grabbing up foreign workers who are skilled in this area is a huge economic advantage for the US. The tech companies want these people, not some dude who took a three month course and is now "qualified" to work on a helpdesk. It's in the best interest of these tech companies to reform the H1-B program to make it more viable for these highly skilled workers. Unfortunately the big fear right now is that any reform attempts will be used by the current administration to crack down on all H1-B holders instead of simply reforming the system so it fits the original purpose.
- always_good 9y ago
  When I worked for Amazon, I felt bad for the people working there on visas. They never felt like they could say no when pressured into working through the weekend. After uprooting your family and bringing them to the States, you have zero bargaining power. It's a pretty dark system.
  - 9y ago
dirkdk 9y ago
Some background, this is regarding the intermediate status once you have maxed out your 2 H1b visas for 3 years, and have applied for a green card. There are queues per country, with the one for India being the longest at 12 year (1). Not allowing green card petitioners to stick around will hit hundred of thousands of foreigners that are almost certain eligible for a green card, but just have the bad luck of being stuck in a queue. They will have to leave the USA and many will abandon their green card efforts. I'm sure a lot of employers will not like this, so the chance of this happening would seem slim. However with the current government one never knows. 1. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/nri/visa-and-immigration/indians-applying-for-green-card-have-12-year-waiting-list/articleshow/59543350.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/nri/visa-and-immigratio...
- BurningFrog 9y ago
  The real problem is the absurdly long processing time for these green card applications.
MollyR 9y ago
I'm not a fan of the program, after what happened in Disney. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/last-task-after-layoff-at-disney-train-foreign-replacements.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/last-task-after-layoff... It really soured me on the whole program.
- dirkdk 9y ago
  yeah an obvious way to improve the program is to require the applicant to have much more added value than the average American worker. I would argue that salary is the best but still a very poor indicator. What about fields where the average salary is low like agriculture or areas like North Dakota where the cost of living is low and therefore salaries are low? I think the USCIS should start to calculate these numbers per industry and geographical area
  - frankchn 9y ago
    The Department of Labor does (here is one for Software Developers in the Bay Area: http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?area=36084&code=15-1133&year=18&source=1 http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?area=36084...) and requires that H1B applicants be paid at or above market rate for a given job code and level.
  - wagecuck 9y ago
    If salaries are low, the employer doesn't need a visa program. They need to raise wages.
- vichu83 9y ago
  Well these jobs aren't worth the pay American expect to be paid. As how LCD tv's costed >$2000 in 2012 and not it just costs ~$500. These low quality jobs pay goes down. If not the low paid H1B workers, these jobs would have been outsourced to those countries. These worker didn't update their skills for changing times. I still keep reading new stuff to keep myself updated and my wife complains that I am always with computer and books. I am an immigrant in H1B, been here over 10 years. I agree like any system people will find ways to abuse it, like Wall Street abused sub prime mortgage and brought the whole world to knees. We should come up with better ways to regulate the system rather than racially profile and oppressing us.
damnyou 9y ago
This will only affect Indians and maybe Chinese. It's time to stop pretending the Trump administration isn't racist to the core.
- TheCoelacanth 9y ago
  I don't know why you are being downvoted. This is essentially accurate. There may be a few other countries affected like the Philippines but no predominately white countries will be affected because their green card waiting lists are short enough that people from those countries can get a green card before the original six years expires.
- cmurf 9y ago
  Indians and Chinese received 82% of the H-1Bs in 2016. I don't know who's pretending the Trump isn't a racist, you have to be really deeply ignorant and incapable of rudimentary character assessment to dismiss his long history of racism: even if you just keep it to the recent history of birtherism. It is time to stop incorrectly weighting race as a factor in American politics, as if it's a solved problem, or as if it's a central problem, or as if it's an unsolvable problem. But more importantly it's time to stop pretending most Americans aren't racist, or that the problem is getting better with Xers and Millenials. Ignoring the depth of racism in the country is how people draw the wrong conclusion that Trump is some kind of black swan event. As well as the very specious idea that this gets better with Millennials. The American National Election Studies, the long-running, extensive poll of American voters, asked voters in 2012 a basic test of prejudice: to rank black and white people on a scale from hardworking to lazy and from intelligent to unintelligent. The researchers found that 62 percent of white people gave black people a lower score in at least one of the attributes. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/clinton-wasnt-wrong-about-the-deplorables-among-trumps-supporters/2016/09/12/93720264-7932-11e6-beac-57a4a412e93a_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/clinton-wasnt-wrong-... https://www.thecut.com/2015/01/millennials-are-less-tolerant-than-you-think.html https://www.thecut.com/2015/01/millennials-are-less-tolerant...
LorenPechtel 9y ago
While the H1-B program needs a lot of reform this isn't it. This is an attempt to get a quick change by throwing out a lot of people waiting for green cards rather than addressing the true issue of a lot of those visas being for cheaper workers rather than rare talent. It's a good thing for America to bring in the brightest workers. It's not a good thing when American jobs are given to cheaper foreign workers. Disney is merely the tip of the iceberg, a case where the company goofed up and didn't put a secrecy clause in the agreement. I rather like bhickey's suggestion of basing it on salary. I also would like to see a change to contract law--allow someone to go before a judge and ask that a secrecy clause be struck as not in the public interest. This would only apply when the actions being protected appear to be basically illegal activity even if it might be within the letter of the law. (Being required to train foreign replacements certainly skirts the intent of the H1-B as it's obvious there are suitable Americans.)
cinquemb 9y ago
I wonder how/if academia will be forced to pay more for talent as well, I know many labs where people have been for years on h1b's... The growing protectionism policies by governments, will make the global market for skilled labor more lucrative as companies and organizations will have to pay more for talent (and to keep it).
neeleshs 9y ago
63 points, 77 comments, and 2 hours ago. This post is relegated to 3rd page already by HN. That's an interesting algorithm
tech_geek 9y ago
Just for computation sake, there are more than a million tech workers waiting for the GC as per this article. They have been here over a decade, and been in the tech industry. So even if you take a conservative number, the saving each one would have made over the decade would be around 100k. So we are talking around a 100 billion dollars in saving which would go back to India or other countries if these workers were deported by expiring the h1b, insteading of spending it in the US. Do the americans want that?
- fooker 9y ago
  100k seems extremely conservative. It is not that difficult to get to a million in a decade with proper investments.
aoeuhtns 9y ago
As an immigrant on H1B, if it wasn't for the quality of work and people here in the valley, I'd definitely look to go elsewhere with my skills because of this incessant existential risk to our life in this country. This administration really stresses immigrants like me. Like, are we staying here or are we not... can we plan to buy a house or not... should we plan our kids education here or elsewhere... should we save money here or elsewhere... Pfft. Not sure if I'd have made the same decision going back 4 years. Friends who chased professional opportunities in Europe, Canada seem to have their visa stuff figured out. But over here, the rules just keep changing.
- SeoxyS 9y ago
  For what it's worth, as a fellow immigrant on a work visa (O-1 here… wasn't eligible for H-1B), the stress around a visa status is nothing new. It's been a constant struggle since I moved to the USA in 2009; and all 8 years of Obama were pretty bad too. Trump might be bad, but the immigrant struggles are nothing new, and won't change regardless of whether the administration is blue or red.
  - aoeuhtns 9y ago
    I guess so... but headline-grabbing news around immigration does seem to pop up more. And then I have to dive into that and figure out if this applies to us or not. Definitely leaving a bad taste. Some amount of "lock-in" period to laws so that people can plan their lives better would definitely help. But hey... I'm no lawmaker.
vichu83 9y ago
Indian government is really corrupt and don't have any self respect. India should ban all American companies in Indian soil pushing Indians entrepreneurs down. Companies like Coke, Pepsi, KFC, McDonnell, Starbucks, Google, Microsoft, Amazon etc and away lot more should be banned to operate in India and Indian entrepreneurship should be promoted. if India does that, I ll any day go back to India as a proud Indian. Since India is corrupt and has no unity to stand up against American imperialism, I have to fight here to go up. This is ridiculous. As top 15% of this country benefit from me, I have to take stones from bottom 5% percent of losers who does't blame them for their position and hit on colored people to feel good about themselves.
Alfredo123 9y ago
Trump's H1B motivations are purely racist and both political parties are extremely racist towards Asians hands down. The idea is to force Chinese and Indians to go back because there are the only two groups get affected as Green card queue for them is over 30 years now (if they apply today). Just like minimum wage or other policies that have unintended implications this will harm US tech scene and marginally benefit India and China but it is the bigger loss for humanity.
mankash666 9y ago
This is absurd. People on H1-B pay taxes like Americans - i.e Social security, Medicare, State, federal, sales, property... They're, however, not eligible for ANY of the social safety net they subsidize America for, (no social security, unemployment, Medicare, etc). They're overwhelmingly peaceful, law abiding residents with higher education, most earning in the top 5%. Abuse of the system is not by the recipients, but the companies enabling the abuse - punish the companies, not the innocent, tax paying, peaceful, law abiding residents who don't wake up every morning saying "Today, I want to replace an American job and suppress some wages, dream FUCKING LIFE". If this law does pass, I believe those being asked to leave should sue the US for repayment of Social security and Medicare taxes paid - after all they're non resident aliens and should be taxed as such. Ludicrous restrictions like not being allowed open their own businesses, killing any chance of monetizing a side hustle is another opportunity cost that the govt. cannot compensate for - and it may even be illegal, after all bringing an idea to life is free speech! Most of all, if this is squarely an anti-India policy, India should return the favor in kind and add tariffs to American businesses & individuals benefiting from trading with India. A page from Trump's own playbook is the only answer that'll get through to him.
legalstruggle 9y ago
my understanding : Abuse: Many companies bring in H1b with minimum wage and replace existing Americans doing the same job and qualified enough. i had this experience with my colleage american who expresed his frustration of me replacing him. He has masters with 6 years experience. where as i have bachelors with 3 years experinece. My company brought me here with min wage required for h1b. This is strictly taking american jobs. Rule: While i am qualified enough to get another job where they could not find an american i would apply. So in the end its the companies that are carrying these cheap labor tricks. We as H1b dont know what thier interviewing and rejecting process for an american. If we are offered a job we take it. How should these rule be made and how to fine companies that replace americans. how to identify skilled labor. I dont agree that there are few americans with IT knowledge. In my past 10 years experience i have seen many with good knowledge and highly qualified. With my company going there and replacing them just because we quote less. Sorry but i am frank. I am still on h1b renewal with awaiting GC pending. ( i lost hope of getting GC). SO folks dont blame people/ Just blame the system and companies who pocket profit keepig us in limbo. But be ready to face the consequence. Because we all said to our visa councellor that we will return back to our home country during our visa interview.

90 points by nullspace 9y ago

This administration is such a clown act. H1B's bad/unnecessary. H2B's good/necessary. I think it's obvious the idea is to be protectionist with tech jobs, making those people more inclined to vote for party/people who have enacted that protectionism. Meanwhile at the low end of the scale, competition is good to keep low end wages suppressed. It's protecting classism. Here's an example of a local career placement service with thousands of qualified workers already in the county, and yet a certain politician snags 70 visas for cooks and maids. http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/358793-trump-wins-visas-to-hire-70-foreign-workers-at-mar-a-lago http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/358793-trump-wins...

throwaway_45 9y ago

This is not going to be a popular opinion. My opinion has kind of changed on H1B people. I have talked to a bunch of these folks and they were hating on other immigrants. Some of the people from South American countries are basically are coming here so they don't get killed. Most of the H1Bs could get a job in their country and at least have some safety. Everyone is just trying to better their lives. India Graduates vastly more people than america. Even if only 10% of them are any good that is a massive number of good people. I am not sayings only 10% are any good its just a number. American companies should just go over there if they want. Did you know you can get perm residency in Canada and its not nearly as hard. Why hasn't Canada surpassed the US for tech jobs?

txsh 9y ago
> Some of the people from South American countries are basically are coming here so they don't get killed. So? That’s a problem for their government to solve, not mine.
freeone3000 9y ago
Lower population, essentially. Vancouver, Montreal, and Waterloo are major tech cities. There's cutting-edge research paired with major companies and univerisites. You might have heard of a few small companies such as "shopify", "500px", or "kik". Canada is 6% tech. But there's a bit of ramp-up delay. Canada has nearly the population of California. There's a practical limit to how fast growth can take place. There are also other factors, such as weather (it's -26C in Montreal today), and salary (you will earn less as a canadian permanent resident than you will on a H1B in the states).
- throwaway_45 9y ago
  Cali has a 67% higher gdp than canada. Texas has the same gdp as Canada despite having 2/3rd the number of people. I just think the importance of the H1B is a little overblown, but I am not opposed to to it either. I think if you can make it to the US and hold a job we shouldn't kick you out.
- uiri 9y ago
  It isn't lower population. Canadian culture has a bad case of tall poppy syndrome. I'm Canadian and the jobs in the US simply pay 50% more (before taking into account things like the exchange rate or taxes) than jobs in Canada do. Employers don't want to hire Silicon Valley level talent. If they did, they would pay to match. Canada's economy and policies actively encourage brain drain.
Alfredo123 9y ago
> American companies should just go over there if they want. India lacks freedom. There is no free speech, no freedom to start edu institutes and retrospective taxation.
- dang 9y ago
  We've banned this account for abusing HN. Nationalistic and ideological battle is not welcome here.

petilon 9y ago

It's a hardened belief that jobs are a zero-sum game — and from this arises the idea that every skilled immigrant takes away a job from a U.S. worker. This isn't true. More skilled, educated workers will actually add to the economy — and grow the economy. More: http://journal.dedasys.com/2014/12/29/people-places-and-jobs/ http://journal.dedasys.com/2014/12/29/people-places-and-jobs...

qaq 9y ago

Hmm are there many large tech companies left that do not have dev. offices outside of US? The place I work at has r&d offices in Germany, Ireland, India in addition to US. So if this goes through people can shift to working from whatever non-us office they like. The only effect on US is that tax revenue from salaries will go to Ireland, Germany, India.

strangeloops85 9y ago

This is explicitly racist: it will primarily only apply to Indians on H-1B seeking permanent residency, some of whom wait 10-15 years for their green cards. I would say that Indian-Americans working with the Trump administration with any decency should resign in protest of such actions, but I'm not sure they have a sense of self-respect to begin with.

halamadrid 9y ago
What if this is fake news? Once it becomes law you can ask for people with decency to resign.
Alfredo123 9y ago
Indian-American are non entities in American politics. Do you think Ajit Pai will resign ? A lot of them are pretty much house niers. Look at Bobby Jindal for example. The guy is pretending to be hard core Christian and a white. No one cares about immigrants.

ratbr 9y ago

Remains to be seen how this impacts the US universities. Part of the incentive for the international students to choose the US over other countries for higher studies is because there are some seriously great professional opportunities after the studies if you can immigrate. For example, our industry is centered in the US, the US is truly a super power in research, the US mindset (startups, relatively merit-driven systems) etc compared to other developed western countries. If there is no clear path to immigration, and if high quality education becomes relatively easily available (see: western universities setting up centers in the east), that can dry up the desire to choose a US based university I think.

bitL 9y ago

Hey, please come to US to be a slave for 3 years, then get off my lawn once you'd like to be promoted into a free citizen! Your only value is that your value is lower!

karmapolic 9y ago

this is a weird rule. H1B workers can only work as contractors then. what is the incentive to hire them full time knowing they have an expiry date?

tehwebguy 9y ago

Not sure if this is a good move but hopefully this will increase scrutiny on this $40B / year nightmare. Aside from the valid CBP responsibilities DHS has due to absorbing that agency, I would estimate that 100% of their resources are wasted doing nothing.

justboxing 9y ago

> The administration is specifically looking at whether it can reinterpret the "may grant" language of the American Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act to stop making the extentions. The act currently allows the administration to extend the H-1B visas for thousands of immigrants, predominantly Indian immigrants, beyond the allowed two three-year terms if a green card is pending. They might as well do away with the H1-B program all together. Not all H1B visas are granted for multi-year expirations. Many are granted for 6 or 9 months, and then the employer finds out that they need the person for longer and apply for extension. Also, the Green Card is tied to employment, so if you stop working for an employer because your H1B expired and DHS refuses to renew it because of this new rule (if it goes into effect) then the person has to go to the beginning of the line / process to apply for the Green Card. I understand that H1B is a non-immigrant visa, but if this change goes into effect, most people won't even apply for the H1B because it would make no sense. Probably what the Trump administration wants in the first place.

pandaman 9y ago
Employment Based Green Card is for the future worker. The proper way it's supposed to work is that, when hiring for non-temporary positions, you go straight for the EBGC for the foreign worker. Who, of course, is not working for you yet so he gets his GC for the future job. And it's the way it worked before H1 program has been introduced in 1990. What happens now is that people are hired in the H1B status, which is, by definition, a status for temporary worker. And then the vast majority of them suddenly realize that the job is not temporary (wow, surprise!) and they need to be in a permanent status to do this job, nobody else can (here is the proof that we tried to find somebody and failed, honestly!). So they need to go through adjustment of status (AOS) process to change their "temporary worker" status to the "permanent resident" one. Of course, while the process is going, the worker is in a vulnerable position. On one hand, he or she just claimed that they have been in the wrong status (by requesting it to be adjusted) so their temporary status became even more temporary, so to say. On the other, the EBGC has not been granted yet so the worker remains in the state of, essentially, temporary suspended deportation. For the great benefit of the employer, of course. Don't you find this strange that so many companies fail to estimate permanency of their jobs? Don't you think they might be doing this intentionally in order to exploit the AOS process?

chrisper 9y ago

This is exactly why I left the US after I graduated. Being on H1B is such a huge gamble these days. Now I am living in Europe, making good money, and living happily without having to worry about crap like this.

zerr 9y ago
If only there was a good (emigrant-based a la US, Canada, Australia) and sunny English speaking country in Europe...
- jotm 9y ago
  I like Ireland too!
  - qaq 9y ago
    well minus sunny but actually good option. Malta is another option with the bonus of nice tax system if you make enough.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
brazzledazzle 9y ago
While this is anecdotal it does worry me that we invest (as a society, in the general sense) in educating people in the US and then don’t do enough to keep them here. It should be easy to obtain a permanent work visa after graduating. You’d need controls like perhaps a minimum degree earned, minimum number of credits earned/years in school and approved institutions but it seems feasible. It would do a lot to retain people that not only we’ve invested in, but who (hopefully) have had a chance to integrate culturally at a young age and formed friendships and connections that will help anchor them.
- jotm 9y ago
  I like to believe that's the plan - get them to US, teach them, force them back home. Truly doing the world a service, Team America!

immgrnt 9y ago

I'm an H1B visa holder, I think this is a step in the right direction. American Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act - should have never existed. It allows H1B visas to be extended beyond 6 years. No one should be forced to remain on abusive H1B visa for more than 6+ years of their life. It hurts everyone expect the SV tech giants.

frankchn 9y ago
No one is being forced to remain on H1B visas for any length of time, you can always quit and leave any time. This affects individuals who have green card applications pending and are being granted 1-year extensions while their applications are pending due to a country-based quota system and thus backlog. The only way this would not affect these individuals is if they remove the quota and backlog and grant green cards immediately, but it doesn't sound like the Administration is planning to do that with the talk of "self-deportation" and all. Instead, they just plan to stop the 1-year renewal and effectively kick these individuals out of the country, even if they like their current status and have been waiting for a decade for a green card. I fail to see how this is a step in the right direction for these workers.
- immgrnt 9y ago
  > No one is being forced to remain on H1B visas for any length of time, you can always quit and leave any time I'm taking the abuse for a better life for my family. >This affects individuals who have a green card application pending and are being granted 1-year extensions while their application is pending due to a country-based quota system and thus backlog. The wait time is somewhere between half a century and three and a half centuries [1] The Tech companies or the attorneys never tell their employees about this long wait time. Instead they just lie it being 5-to-10 years. It happened to me, I realised my turn will never come up only after waiting 10 years in the line. [1] https://www.cato.org/blog/no-one-knows-how-long-legal-immigrants-will-have-wait https://www.cato.org/blog/no-one-knows-how-long-legal-immigr...
  - frankchn 9y ago

rtpg 9y ago

I really wish that someone would do the right thing and fix H-1B by attaching the visa to the person, not the job/employer. That would help fix sooo many of the objections to this program. But perhaps most importantly it would mean people on this visa would not be indentured servants , with the possibility of visa revocation hanging over them.

immgrnt 9y ago
The Tech giants like, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, etc. will never let that happen.
- tedivm 9y ago
  I don't think that's the case. Right now a ton of the H1-B visa's are given to various IT contracting companies, which use them to suppress wages. Those companies know that their people can't easily leave (and wouldn't be qualified for lots of other companies anyways), and so they can pay them less than they would US citizens. The bigger tech companies aren't using the program to suppress wages though, they're using it to bring in highly skilled employees. For example, there is a ton of hiring in the AI field and grabbing up foreign workers who are skilled in this area is a huge economic advantage for the US. The tech companies want these people, not some dude who took a three month course and is now "qualified" to work on a helpdesk. It's in the best interest of these tech companies to reform the H1-B program to make it more viable for these highly skilled workers. Unfortunately the big fear right now is that any reform attempts will be used by the current administration to crack down on all H1-B holders instead of simply reforming the system so it fits the original purpose.
always_good 9y ago
When I worked for Amazon, I felt bad for the people working there on visas. They never felt like they could say no when pressured into working through the weekend. After uprooting your family and bringing them to the States, you have zero bargaining power. It's a pretty dark system.
- 9y ago

dirkdk 9y ago

Some background, this is regarding the intermediate status once you have maxed out your 2 H1b visas for 3 years, and have applied for a green card. There are queues per country, with the one for India being the longest at 12 year (1). Not allowing green card petitioners to stick around will hit hundred of thousands of foreigners that are almost certain eligible for a green card, but just have the bad luck of being stuck in a queue. They will have to leave the USA and many will abandon their green card efforts. I'm sure a lot of employers will not like this, so the chance of this happening would seem slim. However with the current government one never knows. 1. https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/nri/visa-and-immigration/indians-applying-for-green-card-have-12-year-waiting-list/articleshow/59543350.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/nri/visa-and-immigratio...

BurningFrog 9y ago
The real problem is the absurdly long processing time for these green card applications.

MollyR 9y ago

I'm not a fan of the program, after what happened in Disney. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/last-task-after-layoff-at-disney-train-foreign-replacements.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/last-task-after-layoff... It really soured me on the whole program.

dirkdk 9y ago
yeah an obvious way to improve the program is to require the applicant to have much more added value than the average American worker. I would argue that salary is the best but still a very poor indicator. What about fields where the average salary is low like agriculture or areas like North Dakota where the cost of living is low and therefore salaries are low? I think the USCIS should start to calculate these numbers per industry and geographical area
- frankchn 9y ago
  The Department of Labor does (here is one for Software Developers in the Bay Area: http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?area=36084&code=15-1133&year=18&source=1 http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?area=36084...) and requires that H1B applicants be paid at or above market rate for a given job code and level.
- wagecuck 9y ago
  If salaries are low, the employer doesn't need a visa program. They need to raise wages.
vichu83 9y ago
Well these jobs aren't worth the pay American expect to be paid. As how LCD tv's costed >$2000 in 2012 and not it just costs ~$500. These low quality jobs pay goes down. If not the low paid H1B workers, these jobs would have been outsourced to those countries. These worker didn't update their skills for changing times. I still keep reading new stuff to keep myself updated and my wife complains that I am always with computer and books. I am an immigrant in H1B, been here over 10 years. I agree like any system people will find ways to abuse it, like Wall Street abused sub prime mortgage and brought the whole world to knees. We should come up with better ways to regulate the system rather than racially profile and oppressing us.

damnyou 9y ago

This will only affect Indians and maybe Chinese. It's time to stop pretending the Trump administration isn't racist to the core.

TheCoelacanth 9y ago
I don't know why you are being downvoted. This is essentially accurate. There may be a few other countries affected like the Philippines but no predominately white countries will be affected because their green card waiting lists are short enough that people from those countries can get a green card before the original six years expires.
cmurf 9y ago
Indians and Chinese received 82% of the H-1Bs in 2016. I don't know who's pretending the Trump isn't a racist, you have to be really deeply ignorant and incapable of rudimentary character assessment to dismiss his long history of racism: even if you just keep it to the recent history of birtherism. It is time to stop incorrectly weighting race as a factor in American politics, as if it's a solved problem, or as if it's a central problem, or as if it's an unsolvable problem. But more importantly it's time to stop pretending most Americans aren't racist, or that the problem is getting better with Xers and Millenials. Ignoring the depth of racism in the country is how people draw the wrong conclusion that Trump is some kind of black swan event. As well as the very specious idea that this gets better with Millennials. The American National Election Studies, the long-running, extensive poll of American voters, asked voters in 2012 a basic test of prejudice: to rank black and white people on a scale from hardworking to lazy and from intelligent to unintelligent. The researchers found that 62 percent of white people gave black people a lower score in at least one of the attributes. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/clinton-wasnt-wrong-about-the-deplorables-among-trumps-supporters/2016/09/12/93720264-7932-11e6-beac-57a4a412e93a_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/clinton-wasnt-wrong-... https://www.thecut.com/2015/01/millennials-are-less-tolerant-than-you-think.html https://www.thecut.com/2015/01/millennials-are-less-tolerant...

LorenPechtel 9y ago

While the H1-B program needs a lot of reform this isn't it. This is an attempt to get a quick change by throwing out a lot of people waiting for green cards rather than addressing the true issue of a lot of those visas being for cheaper workers rather than rare talent. It's a good thing for America to bring in the brightest workers. It's not a good thing when American jobs are given to cheaper foreign workers. Disney is merely the tip of the iceberg, a case where the company goofed up and didn't put a secrecy clause in the agreement. I rather like bhickey's suggestion of basing it on salary. I also would like to see a change to contract law--allow someone to go before a judge and ask that a secrecy clause be struck as not in the public interest. This would only apply when the actions being protected appear to be basically illegal activity even if it might be within the letter of the law. (Being required to train foreign replacements certainly skirts the intent of the H1-B as it's obvious there are suitable Americans.)

cinquemb 9y ago

I wonder how/if academia will be forced to pay more for talent as well, I know many labs where people have been for years on h1b's... The growing protectionism policies by governments, will make the global market for skilled labor more lucrative as companies and organizations will have to pay more for talent (and to keep it).

neeleshs 9y ago

63 points, 77 comments, and 2 hours ago. This post is relegated to 3rd page already by HN. That's an interesting algorithm

tech_geek 9y ago

Just for computation sake, there are more than a million tech workers waiting for the GC as per this article. They have been here over a decade, and been in the tech industry. So even if you take a conservative number, the saving each one would have made over the decade would be around 100k. So we are talking around a 100 billion dollars in saving which would go back to India or other countries if these workers were deported by expiring the h1b, insteading of spending it in the US. Do the americans want that?

fooker 9y ago
100k seems extremely conservative. It is not that difficult to get to a million in a decade with proper investments.

aoeuhtns 9y ago

As an immigrant on H1B, if it wasn't for the quality of work and people here in the valley, I'd definitely look to go elsewhere with my skills because of this incessant existential risk to our life in this country. This administration really stresses immigrants like me. Like, are we staying here or are we not... can we plan to buy a house or not... should we plan our kids education here or elsewhere... should we save money here or elsewhere... Pfft. Not sure if I'd have made the same decision going back 4 years. Friends who chased professional opportunities in Europe, Canada seem to have their visa stuff figured out. But over here, the rules just keep changing.

SeoxyS 9y ago
For what it's worth, as a fellow immigrant on a work visa (O-1 here… wasn't eligible for H-1B), the stress around a visa status is nothing new. It's been a constant struggle since I moved to the USA in 2009; and all 8 years of Obama were pretty bad too. Trump might be bad, but the immigrant struggles are nothing new, and won't change regardless of whether the administration is blue or red.
- aoeuhtns 9y ago
  I guess so... but headline-grabbing news around immigration does seem to pop up more. And then I have to dive into that and figure out if this applies to us or not. Definitely leaving a bad taste. Some amount of "lock-in" period to laws so that people can plan their lives better would definitely help. But hey... I'm no lawmaker.

vichu83 9y ago

Indian government is really corrupt and don't have any self respect. India should ban all American companies in Indian soil pushing Indians entrepreneurs down. Companies like Coke, Pepsi, KFC, McDonnell, Starbucks, Google, Microsoft, Amazon etc and away lot more should be banned to operate in India and Indian entrepreneurship should be promoted. if India does that, I ll any day go back to India as a proud Indian. Since India is corrupt and has no unity to stand up against American imperialism, I have to fight here to go up. This is ridiculous. As top 15% of this country benefit from me, I have to take stones from bottom 5% percent of losers who does't blame them for their position and hit on colored people to feel good about themselves.

Alfredo123 9y ago

Trump's H1B motivations are purely racist and both political parties are extremely racist towards Asians hands down. The idea is to force Chinese and Indians to go back because there are the only two groups get affected as Green card queue for them is over 30 years now (if they apply today). Just like minimum wage or other policies that have unintended implications this will harm US tech scene and marginally benefit India and China but it is the bigger loss for humanity.

mankash666 9y ago

This is absurd. People on H1-B pay taxes like Americans - i.e Social security, Medicare, State, federal, sales, property... They're, however, not eligible for ANY of the social safety net they subsidize America for, (no social security, unemployment, Medicare, etc). They're overwhelmingly peaceful, law abiding residents with higher education, most earning in the top 5%. Abuse of the system is not by the recipients, but the companies enabling the abuse - punish the companies, not the innocent, tax paying, peaceful, law abiding residents who don't wake up every morning saying "Today, I want to replace an American job and suppress some wages, dream FUCKING LIFE". If this law does pass, I believe those being asked to leave should sue the US for repayment of Social security and Medicare taxes paid - after all they're non resident aliens and should be taxed as such. Ludicrous restrictions like not being allowed open their own businesses, killing any chance of monetizing a side hustle is another opportunity cost that the govt. cannot compensate for - and it may even be illegal, after all bringing an idea to life is free speech! Most of all, if this is squarely an anti-India policy, India should return the favor in kind and add tariffs to American businesses & individuals benefiting from trading with India. A page from Trump's own playbook is the only answer that'll get through to him.

legalstruggle 9y ago

my understanding : Abuse: Many companies bring in H1b with minimum wage and replace existing Americans doing the same job and qualified enough. i had this experience with my colleage american who expresed his frustration of me replacing him. He has masters with 6 years experience. where as i have bachelors with 3 years experinece. My company brought me here with min wage required for h1b. This is strictly taking american jobs. Rule: While i am qualified enough to get another job where they could not find an american i would apply. So in the end its the companies that are carrying these cheap labor tricks. We as H1b dont know what thier interviewing and rejecting process for an american. If we are offered a job we take it. How should these rule be made and how to fine companies that replace americans. how to identify skilled labor. I dont agree that there are few americans with IT knowledge. In my past 10 years experience i have seen many with good knowledge and highly qualified. With my company going there and replacing them just because we quote less. Sorry but i am frank. I am still on h1b renewal with awaiting GC pending. ( i lost hope of getting GC). SO folks dont blame people/ Just blame the system and companies who pocket profit keepig us in limbo. But be ready to face the consequence. Because we all said to our visa councellor that we will return back to our home country during our visa interview.