5 ms·

As someone, who argues for H1b, I support these changes. The H1b visa should be restricted to the well-qualified, i.e. people who hold Master's degrees or highe

As someone, who argues for H1b, I support these changes. The H1b visa should be restricted to the well-qualified, i.e. people who hold Master's degrees or higher and actually qualified for the jobs (not the body shopping TCS & Wipro types).

peteradio 7y ago
> people who hold Master's degrees I'm not so sure a masters is a good indicator of much these days.
- thbr99 7y ago
  Do you mean the schools are not that great ?
  - Junk_Collector 7y ago
    I don't think the schools are all that different myself and in some ways are probably better than ever. I do think it is easier than ever to get through school without actually learning what you are exposed to. In engineering maths, people lean on Wolfram Alpha to solve and break down equations then pretend like they understand because they know the steps. You can look up endless discussion and breakdown of rhetoric and take a position as your own without applying much critical thought beforehand. Cliffnotes. People these days seems to think that because they can look up information it's the same as knowing it. That's before we get into issues such as institutional cheating. I know a person who makes most of his daily cash shadow writing essays for college and high school students. It's done through an anonymizing method on the web. No idea how many he actually writes, but he seems to write a lot of them especially late spring/fall.
    - vsskanth 7y ago
      This is basically implying schools haven't updated their teaching methods to consider the access to infinite information through the internet. I've taken courses in grad school where the professor lets you bring a laptop to the exams to lookup whatever you want. You still can't solve his problems if you don't understand the basics.
atonse 7y ago
I have a BS in CompSci. I hired a person with a masters in CompSci from Syracuse. She didn’t know what null was. Nor did she know how to write a single line of code. Which leads me to believe that Either she lied about that degree (unlikely because her visa was tied to it), or that a masters isn’t a sign of anything.
- romanovcode 7y ago
  > masters isn’t a sign of anything. This is true, however people making decisions do not hold this opinion.
- slumdev 7y ago
  If decades of autodidact humblebrags and anti-university anecdata haven't convinced employers and the world, one more comment isn't going to do it.
  - javagram 7y ago
    Parent has a BS, it’s not necessarily an anti-university statement. I have an MS but my undergrad degree was liberal arts, I’m sure there are plenty of BS comp sci degree holders who know as much or more than me about topics. Requiring an MS for immigration is questionable to me.
- juskrey 7y ago
  It is a sign of compliance: someone who favors career over skills. Not even loyalty though.
- dx87 7y ago
  It depends on what she did during school. I've worked with someone who had a masters in CompSci who couldn't use a computer to save their life, but they could write algorithms and design systems no problem. They had no interest in programming, but loved the mathematical side of it.
- corn_dog 7y ago
  Then why did you hire them?
barry-cotter 7y ago
Why not just start with the person being offered the highest salary and work your way down until you reach the cap? If someone is being offered $500,000 a year who cares if they never finished high school? This would also render the argument that H1-Bs are depressing wages pretty academic.

peteradio 7y ago

> people who hold Master's degrees I'm not so sure a masters is a good indicator of much these days.

thbr99 7y ago
Do you mean the schools are not that great ?
- Junk_Collector 7y ago
  I don't think the schools are all that different myself and in some ways are probably better than ever. I do think it is easier than ever to get through school without actually learning what you are exposed to. In engineering maths, people lean on Wolfram Alpha to solve and break down equations then pretend like they understand because they know the steps. You can look up endless discussion and breakdown of rhetoric and take a position as your own without applying much critical thought beforehand. Cliffnotes. People these days seems to think that because they can look up information it's the same as knowing it. That's before we get into issues such as institutional cheating. I know a person who makes most of his daily cash shadow writing essays for college and high school students. It's done through an anonymizing method on the web. No idea how many he actually writes, but he seems to write a lot of them especially late spring/fall.
  - vsskanth 7y ago
    This is basically implying schools haven't updated their teaching methods to consider the access to infinite information through the internet. I've taken courses in grad school where the professor lets you bring a laptop to the exams to lookup whatever you want. You still can't solve his problems if you don't understand the basics.

atonse 7y ago

I have a BS in CompSci. I hired a person with a masters in CompSci from Syracuse. She didn’t know what null was. Nor did she know how to write a single line of code. Which leads me to believe that Either she lied about that degree (unlikely because her visa was tied to it), or that a masters isn’t a sign of anything.

romanovcode 7y ago
> masters isn’t a sign of anything. This is true, however people making decisions do not hold this opinion.
slumdev 7y ago
If decades of autodidact humblebrags and anti-university anecdata haven't convinced employers and the world, one more comment isn't going to do it.
- javagram 7y ago
  Parent has a BS, it’s not necessarily an anti-university statement. I have an MS but my undergrad degree was liberal arts, I’m sure there are plenty of BS comp sci degree holders who know as much or more than me about topics. Requiring an MS for immigration is questionable to me.
juskrey 7y ago
It is a sign of compliance: someone who favors career over skills. Not even loyalty though.
dx87 7y ago
It depends on what she did during school. I've worked with someone who had a masters in CompSci who couldn't use a computer to save their life, but they could write algorithms and design systems no problem. They had no interest in programming, but loved the mathematical side of it.
corn_dog 7y ago
Then why did you hire them?

barry-cotter 7y ago

Why not just start with the person being offered the highest salary and work your way down until you reach the cap? If someone is being offered $500,000 a year who cares if they never finished high school? This would also render the argument that H1-Bs are depressing wages pretty academic.