5 ms·

Ah yes, we can expect restaurant staff to soon be working tech jobs.

WillPostForFood 6y ago
College graduate unemployment rate is over 8%, up from 2% a few months ago. There are a lot of skilled, educated, unemployed workers right now. I wouldn’t kick out H-1Bs, but no reason take in new ones right now. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CGRA2534 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CGRA2534
- oneplane 6y ago
  You do know that H-1B's are already only in because there was no American that could do it, right? Plenty of education and skill in the USA that doesn't have a fitting job (right now) to put that to use. Say there are 100000 MBA's but you need someone who knows how to run a kubernetes cluster with a custom syscall shim for a modified kernel and there is someone in Norway who knows how to do that. Even combining all those college graduates combined with all their business education wouldn't be useful for such a role, but that Norwegian person would be. But you still want to stop H-1B?
  - x0x0 6y ago
    The number of recent layoffs make it clear that there are plenty of people perfectly capable of performing even your pretend scenario. See eg http://layoffs.fyi/ http://layoffs.fyi/ and also eng layoffs at Uber, Samsara, etc.
    - oneplane 6y ago
      Well, then the government in the USA is wrong, because they wrote that the Immigration and Nationality Act, section 101(a)(15)(H) is for foreign workers in specialty occupations, especially due to the need of skills that are urgently needed by the country. Also, those mass layoffs you reference are rather recent and doesn't seem to have anything to do with this specific visa system. At the same time, the pool of available people might suddenly exist now, and that means that a company that needs someone with those skills now has a native worker available instead of having to search for people elsewhere. H-1B workers that were laid off have to exit the USA so it's not like they will add to that pool. That said, it is still possible that those laid off people were selected to let go because their stills aren't as needed as others inside that company (i.e. positions that only exist due to scale). That doesn't mean those people happen to be the ones that you'd need to seek someone else for. Assuming that all tech people have identical skills doesn't help the conversation.
      - jessaustin 6y ago
        Well, then the government in the USA is wrong, because... That's always true. You don't need to provide particulars.
- belltaco 6y ago
  Unemployment in tech is down from Jan to May this year. https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2020/06/11/unemployment-rate-for-computer-occupations-fell-in-may/#1920885216ad https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2020/06/11/unemp...
theonemind 6y ago
The average H1B doesn't seem to have a PhD or get more than $100,000/yr (indicating that they can't do something that rare or valuable that you likely can't find in the American labor pool). It seems pretty clear to me that the program gets abused and Americans could fill most of those jobs. It does, of course, also fulfill its intended purpose of supplying skilled talent when/where Americans can't.
- neilparikh 6y ago
  > get more than $100,000/yr If this is objection, why not just raise the minimum salary requirements to 100k instead of banning it? Most Silicon Valley companies would easily meet it.
  - theonemind 6y ago
    I would support that. The program is supposed to allow for filling positions unfillable in the American labor market with specialized skills, not as a way to undercut American salaries.
    - neilparikh 6y ago
      My point is that Trump isn’t pushing for that, and instead just suspending it completely, because his goal isn’t to reform H1Bs, so mentioning specific criticism of the program is irrelevant when the primary objection is idealogical.
- oneplane 6y ago
  You don't need a Phd or a lot of money to have a skill that an American doesn't have. Assuming that those things are 'indicators' doesn't seem to be based on anything. The difference here is that America has a large 'labour' pool, but the roles you need filled aren't as much just clocking in and out doing some random task, but have requirements that are harder to meet and apparently aren't met by the available Americans. Assuming malice isn't very constructive and to do something about it that actually helps anything needs some backing information. The other way around: most people don't really want to work in the USA and will only go if the money is right. This also means that the company in the USA that is trying to find someone to fill a gap in their needs might have to spend twice as much getting their problem solved. At the same time, the amount of Americans asked to work outside of the USA is rather low as there aren't that many special skilled people that aren't already available. If you check out the sources listed at the WikiPedia page at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_diaspora https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_diaspora you'll find that a lot of emigration happens for other reasons, and only a small part is related to special skills needed in emerging markets (which are markets that need a lot of skilled people but are not very attractive to a lot of people due to cultural differences or stability worries).

College graduate unemployment rate is over 8%, up from 2% a few months ago. There are a lot of skilled, educated, unemployed workers right now. I wouldn’t kick out H-1Bs, but no reason take in new ones right now. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CGRA2534 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CGRA2534

oneplane 6y ago
You do know that H-1B's are already only in because there was no American that could do it, right? Plenty of education and skill in the USA that doesn't have a fitting job (right now) to put that to use. Say there are 100000 MBA's but you need someone who knows how to run a kubernetes cluster with a custom syscall shim for a modified kernel and there is someone in Norway who knows how to do that. Even combining all those college graduates combined with all their business education wouldn't be useful for such a role, but that Norwegian person would be. But you still want to stop H-1B?
- x0x0 6y ago
  The number of recent layoffs make it clear that there are plenty of people perfectly capable of performing even your pretend scenario. See eg http://layoffs.fyi/ http://layoffs.fyi/ and also eng layoffs at Uber, Samsara, etc.
  - oneplane 6y ago
    Well, then the government in the USA is wrong, because they wrote that the Immigration and Nationality Act, section 101(a)(15)(H) is for foreign workers in specialty occupations, especially due to the need of skills that are urgently needed by the country. Also, those mass layoffs you reference are rather recent and doesn't seem to have anything to do with this specific visa system. At the same time, the pool of available people might suddenly exist now, and that means that a company that needs someone with those skills now has a native worker available instead of having to search for people elsewhere. H-1B workers that were laid off have to exit the USA so it's not like they will add to that pool. That said, it is still possible that those laid off people were selected to let go because their stills aren't as needed as others inside that company (i.e. positions that only exist due to scale). That doesn't mean those people happen to be the ones that you'd need to seek someone else for. Assuming that all tech people have identical skills doesn't help the conversation.
    - jessaustin 6y ago
      Well, then the government in the USA is wrong, because... That's always true. You don't need to provide particulars.
belltaco 6y ago
Unemployment in tech is down from Jan to May this year. https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2020/06/11/unemployment-rate-for-computer-occupations-fell-in-may/#1920885216ad https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2020/06/11/unemp...

theonemind 6y ago

The average H1B doesn't seem to have a PhD or get more than $100,000/yr (indicating that they can't do something that rare or valuable that you likely can't find in the American labor pool). It seems pretty clear to me that the program gets abused and Americans could fill most of those jobs. It does, of course, also fulfill its intended purpose of supplying skilled talent when/where Americans can't.

neilparikh 6y ago
> get more than $100,000/yr If this is objection, why not just raise the minimum salary requirements to 100k instead of banning it? Most Silicon Valley companies would easily meet it.
- theonemind 6y ago
  I would support that. The program is supposed to allow for filling positions unfillable in the American labor market with specialized skills, not as a way to undercut American salaries.
  - neilparikh 6y ago
    My point is that Trump isn’t pushing for that, and instead just suspending it completely, because his goal isn’t to reform H1Bs, so mentioning specific criticism of the program is irrelevant when the primary objection is idealogical.
oneplane 6y ago
You don't need a Phd or a lot of money to have a skill that an American doesn't have. Assuming that those things are 'indicators' doesn't seem to be based on anything. The difference here is that America has a large 'labour' pool, but the roles you need filled aren't as much just clocking in and out doing some random task, but have requirements that are harder to meet and apparently aren't met by the available Americans. Assuming malice isn't very constructive and to do something about it that actually helps anything needs some backing information. The other way around: most people don't really want to work in the USA and will only go if the money is right. This also means that the company in the USA that is trying to find someone to fill a gap in their needs might have to spend twice as much getting their problem solved. At the same time, the amount of Americans asked to work outside of the USA is rather low as there aren't that many special skilled people that aren't already available. If you check out the sources listed at the WikiPedia page at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_diaspora https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_diaspora you'll find that a lot of emigration happens for other reasons, and only a small part is related to special skills needed in emerging markets (which are markets that need a lot of skilled people but are not very attractive to a lot of people due to cultural differences or stability worries).