7 ms·

Fantastic. Now let’s fast track them to a green card and then citizenship. As someone born and raised in America, I appreciate immigrants (i.e. human beings) wo

Fantastic. Now let’s fast track them to a green card and then citizenship. As someone born and raised in America, I appreciate immigrants (i.e. human beings) work ethic, innovation, and their continued contribution to keeping America at the technological and economic forefront.

lelanthran 3y ago
It's always struck me as absurd that the H1B visa exists at all. I mean, if an individual is such a valuable contributor to the economy, why would you want to bring them in as indentured laborers, let them accumulate even more value, and then send them away to create startups and value in their home country? Just bring em in, say welcome, stay as long as you can, settle down if possible, have children here. Better to bring in talent permanently rather than temporarily. Of course, I'm not American so I might be missing something mething here...
- alephnerd 3y ago
  Inertia. Reforming H1B requires congressional intervention, and as such it's extremely difficult because of partisan bickering. Also, a number of pressure groups on the Dems (eg. The EPI, AFL-CIO, and sometimes the SEIU) and the Republican (eg. NumbersUSA, ProjectUSA) sides are opposed to immigration.
  - giobox 3y ago
    Agreed, It's also worth remembering the recipients of work visas can't vote either, nor can green card holders, so not a constituency that rewards a political party at the ballot box for policy change, which also likely contributes to the inertia. The earliest (generally speaking) an H1B holder could likely become a voter is often 10 years in the best cases, and decades in the worst. GC quota queue for countries like India is measured in decades, and you need a GC for something like 5 years before you can apply for citizenship and finally get a vote.
    - alephnerd 3y ago
      > recipients of work visas can't vote either, nor can green card holders Exactly this - I worked on the Hill during the time period when immigration was the hot buzzword and this was a persistent undercurrent in all the convos going on back then. The RoI was questionable for a number of Congressional members, so we ended up in this weird equilibrium.
    - arcticbull 3y ago
      > The earliest an H1B holder could likely become a voter is 10 years in the best cases. Not really, the earliest you can become a citizen is (1) get your H-1B and arrive in the US (2) get a green card, roughly 1.5-2 years if you're going employment route (3) wait 5 years for citizenship - 3 if you marry someone. The fastest by the employment route is 6.5 years-ish, the fastest by marriage is probably 4.
      - giobox 3y ago
        Its generally approximately a decade in my experience, and your advice is not applicable to Indian citizens (of which there are many, many waiting in the quota line). Your fast example is possible but not the norm outside of marriage.
        arcticbull 3y ago
        The point I was responding to is "the earliest an H1B holder could likely become a voter" - which I agree, the average is probably 10 years, but the earliest is much shorter if you and your employer are motivated. And of course, the shortest time it takes definitely doesn't apply to Indians. Even during COVID and having two RFEs (and not being super diligent at a few points) the GC process took me 3 years. That puts me on the 8 year clock should I pursue citizenship.
        giobox 3y ago
        Hence my use of the word "likely" - it was never stated as fact. Your own personal example is 80 percent of the way there!
- arcticbull 3y ago
  > I mean, if an individual is such a valuable contributor to the economy, why would you want to bring them in as indentured laborers, let them accumulate even more value, and then send them away to create startups and value in their home country? Generally H-1B's can begin the green card process the moment they set foot in the US and it takes about 1.5-2 years (which is about 1y6m too long). The issue is not with the H-1B per se (quotas aside). The issue is that the green card process is too onerous and is subdivided by country of origin so some have to wait much longer than others. Timeline: 1. Prepare PERM: 6 months. 2. File for DOL certification and get an approved ETA-9089: 120 days. 3. File for I-140 and I-485 concurrently assuming a current priority date with premium processing: 14 days for an approved I-140 and 6-12 months for an approved I-485 assuming no request for evidence. During this time you'll need to go in for biometrics appointment.
  - distcs 3y ago
    I hear some nationals have to wait for 20 years or more. which countries are those? any info around that?
    - arcticbull 3y ago
      Yeah, it's in the Adjustment of Status Visa Bulletin. [1] Go down to Employment Based and look at the priority dates (the priority date for employment based petitions is generally when you file for PERM with the Department of Labor, but there's some complexity here - although that should give you a good idea). 1st Preference (EB1) - extraordinary abilities, etc - is current for everyone except India and China, who are backed up to February 2022 filings. 2nd Preference (EB2) - masters degree or bachelors + 5 years work experience + a job that requires 5 years work experience - is backed up to January 2011 filings for India. 3rd Preference (EB3) - bachelors degree - is backed up to June 2012 filings for India, November 2018 filings for China but is current for anyone else who wants one. [1] https://www.uscis.gov/green-card/green-card-processes-and-procedures/visa-availability-priority-dates/when-to-file-your-adjustment-of-status-application-for-family-sponsored-or-employment-based-87 https://www.uscis.gov/green-card/green-card-processes-and-pr...
- MontyCarloHall 3y ago
  Because the original intent of the H-1B was to facilitate highly specialized temporary workers doing highly specialized jobs that literally nobody in the US would be capable of. For example, suppose an American oil company wants to use an exotic drilling technique that has only ever been used in Norwegian oil fields, and thus only a few Norwegian petroleum engineers have any expertise in. As originally conceived, the H-1B would have allowed them to come to the US for a few years, set up the oil field, and then head back home. Unfortunately, it has since been perverted into a mechanism for skilled (but nonspecialized) workers to be indentured, often with substandard wages.
  - rhaway84773 3y ago
    Right, there’s a whole host of American workers that can do the H1B jobs that are lying around doing nothing, that’s why 90% of them got re-employed and software development salaries are among the highest in the country…
  - returningfory2 3y ago
    This is literally false? Ever since the H-1B has been in law the requirement is that the person has a degree and is working in a speciality occupation related to that degree. The INA imposes no conditions like “occupations for which there are no US workers”.
    - MontyCarloHall 3y ago
      I'm strictly referring to the intent of the H-1B program, not the actual letter of the law. The Department of Labor's website makes this intent explicitly clear: > The intent of the H-1B provisions is to help employers who cannot otherwise obtain needed business skills and abilities from the U.S. workforce by authorizing the temporary employment of qualified individuals who are not otherwise authorized to work in the United States. [0] You are mostly correct that the actual Immigration Act has almost no legal teeth to enforce this. The only explicit provision in the law is that H-1B dependent companies (≥15% of the workforce is H-1B) must "take good faith steps to recruit U.S. workers for the job for which the H-1Bs are sought." [1] In practice, this almost never applies, but it is nonetheless token lip service towards the ostensible intent of the H-1B program as strictly a specialized visa program, which is the pretense under which it was passed in 1990. [0] https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/immigration/h1b https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/immigration/h1b [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/20/655.739 https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/20/655.739
- stcroixx 3y ago
  The only entity in the US that wanted and continues to lobby for H1B to continue is industry and their sole reason for doing so is keeping their salary expenses as low as possible. In the software industry it began with the fake premise that there was a shortage of qualified labor. Without a loophole like H1B, when a labor shortage occurs, you have to raise wages to attract people to the profession. With H1B, average wages (not FAANG) have been allowed to stagnate because the visa workers come from countries with a lower cost of living. I'm all for immigration, but not sure it's humane to tie it to a profession - if someone is allowed to become a citizen because of their profession, are they not allowed to give it up and do something else in the future?
  - injb 3y ago
    >>> The only entity in the US that wanted and continues to lobby for H1B to continue is industry and their sole reason for doing so is keeping their salary expenses as low as possible. In the software industry it began with the fake premise that there was a shortage of qualified labor. Without a loophole like H1B, when a labor shortage occurs, you have to raise wages to attract people to the profession. With H1B, average wages (not FAANG) have been allowed to stagnate because the visa workers come from countries with a lower cost of living. I'm all for immigration, but not sure it's humane to tie it to a profession - if someone is allowed to become a citizen because of their profession, are they not allowed to give it up and do something else in the future? Some quick googling indicates there are around 65K H1Bs issued every year, and around 4.4 million software developers. So even assuming that most of those H1Bs go to software developers (they certainly don't all go there) it's still hard to imagine this having a serious detrimental effect on salaries, although I agree it's probably an incentive for the few companies that actually get H1B workers. BTW, to answer your second question, yes if you become a US citizen you can generally abandon the career that led to your getting whatever visa you had before. In fact you can do that long before you become a citizen. You can do it once you have a green card, which in most of these cases is a minimum of 5 years before they become a citizen. For most H1Bs it's going to be something like 3-6 years on the H1B during which time you're basically "indentured", followed by 5-6 years on a greencard, during which time you can do whatever you like for a living as long as you don't do anything that suggests your H1B sponsor was lying, followed citizenship.
princevegeta89 3y ago
Thanks. On the contrary, we need to blame the companies not the people
pers0n 3y ago
Would you say the same for migrant workers? If so how long should they work cheap before citizenship?
seanmcdirmid 3y ago
H1Bs are pretty much guaranteed green cards after 6 years. Unfortunately, there are green card quotas for a few countries that could delay that, but it’s not a question of if but when if you make it to 6.

lelanthran 3y ago

It's always struck me as absurd that the H1B visa exists at all. I mean, if an individual is such a valuable contributor to the economy, why would you want to bring them in as indentured laborers, let them accumulate even more value, and then send them away to create startups and value in their home country? Just bring em in, say welcome, stay as long as you can, settle down if possible, have children here. Better to bring in talent permanently rather than temporarily. Of course, I'm not American so I might be missing something mething here...

alephnerd 3y ago
Inertia. Reforming H1B requires congressional intervention, and as such it's extremely difficult because of partisan bickering. Also, a number of pressure groups on the Dems (eg. The EPI, AFL-CIO, and sometimes the SEIU) and the Republican (eg. NumbersUSA, ProjectUSA) sides are opposed to immigration.
- giobox 3y ago
  Agreed, It's also worth remembering the recipients of work visas can't vote either, nor can green card holders, so not a constituency that rewards a political party at the ballot box for policy change, which also likely contributes to the inertia. The earliest (generally speaking) an H1B holder could likely become a voter is often 10 years in the best cases, and decades in the worst. GC quota queue for countries like India is measured in decades, and you need a GC for something like 5 years before you can apply for citizenship and finally get a vote.
  - alephnerd 3y ago
    > recipients of work visas can't vote either, nor can green card holders Exactly this - I worked on the Hill during the time period when immigration was the hot buzzword and this was a persistent undercurrent in all the convos going on back then. The RoI was questionable for a number of Congressional members, so we ended up in this weird equilibrium.
  - arcticbull 3y ago
    > The earliest an H1B holder could likely become a voter is 10 years in the best cases. Not really, the earliest you can become a citizen is (1) get your H-1B and arrive in the US (2) get a green card, roughly 1.5-2 years if you're going employment route (3) wait 5 years for citizenship - 3 if you marry someone. The fastest by the employment route is 6.5 years-ish, the fastest by marriage is probably 4.
    - giobox 3y ago
      Its generally approximately a decade in my experience, and your advice is not applicable to Indian citizens (of which there are many, many waiting in the quota line). Your fast example is possible but not the norm outside of marriage.
      - arcticbull 3y ago
        The point I was responding to is "the earliest an H1B holder could likely become a voter" - which I agree, the average is probably 10 years, but the earliest is much shorter if you and your employer are motivated. And of course, the shortest time it takes definitely doesn't apply to Indians. Even during COVID and having two RFEs (and not being super diligent at a few points) the GC process took me 3 years. That puts me on the 8 year clock should I pursue citizenship.
        giobox 3y ago
        Hence my use of the word "likely" - it was never stated as fact. Your own personal example is 80 percent of the way there!
arcticbull 3y ago
> I mean, if an individual is such a valuable contributor to the economy, why would you want to bring them in as indentured laborers, let them accumulate even more value, and then send them away to create startups and value in their home country? Generally H-1B's can begin the green card process the moment they set foot in the US and it takes about 1.5-2 years (which is about 1y6m too long). The issue is not with the H-1B per se (quotas aside). The issue is that the green card process is too onerous and is subdivided by country of origin so some have to wait much longer than others. Timeline: 1. Prepare PERM: 6 months. 2. File for DOL certification and get an approved ETA-9089: 120 days. 3. File for I-140 and I-485 concurrently assuming a current priority date with premium processing: 14 days for an approved I-140 and 6-12 months for an approved I-485 assuming no request for evidence. During this time you'll need to go in for biometrics appointment.
- distcs 3y ago
  I hear some nationals have to wait for 20 years or more. which countries are those? any info around that?
  - arcticbull 3y ago
    Yeah, it's in the Adjustment of Status Visa Bulletin. [1] Go down to Employment Based and look at the priority dates (the priority date for employment based petitions is generally when you file for PERM with the Department of Labor, but there's some complexity here - although that should give you a good idea). 1st Preference (EB1) - extraordinary abilities, etc - is current for everyone except India and China, who are backed up to February 2022 filings. 2nd Preference (EB2) - masters degree or bachelors + 5 years work experience + a job that requires 5 years work experience - is backed up to January 2011 filings for India. 3rd Preference (EB3) - bachelors degree - is backed up to June 2012 filings for India, November 2018 filings for China but is current for anyone else who wants one. [1] https://www.uscis.gov/green-card/green-card-processes-and-procedures/visa-availability-priority-dates/when-to-file-your-adjustment-of-status-application-for-family-sponsored-or-employment-based-87 https://www.uscis.gov/green-card/green-card-processes-and-pr...
MontyCarloHall 3y ago
Because the original intent of the H-1B was to facilitate highly specialized temporary workers doing highly specialized jobs that literally nobody in the US would be capable of. For example, suppose an American oil company wants to use an exotic drilling technique that has only ever been used in Norwegian oil fields, and thus only a few Norwegian petroleum engineers have any expertise in. As originally conceived, the H-1B would have allowed them to come to the US for a few years, set up the oil field, and then head back home. Unfortunately, it has since been perverted into a mechanism for skilled (but nonspecialized) workers to be indentured, often with substandard wages.
- rhaway84773 3y ago
  Right, there’s a whole host of American workers that can do the H1B jobs that are lying around doing nothing, that’s why 90% of them got re-employed and software development salaries are among the highest in the country…
- returningfory2 3y ago
  This is literally false? Ever since the H-1B has been in law the requirement is that the person has a degree and is working in a speciality occupation related to that degree. The INA imposes no conditions like “occupations for which there are no US workers”.
  - MontyCarloHall 3y ago
    I'm strictly referring to the intent of the H-1B program, not the actual letter of the law. The Department of Labor's website makes this intent explicitly clear: > The intent of the H-1B provisions is to help employers who cannot otherwise obtain needed business skills and abilities from the U.S. workforce by authorizing the temporary employment of qualified individuals who are not otherwise authorized to work in the United States. [0] You are mostly correct that the actual Immigration Act has almost no legal teeth to enforce this. The only explicit provision in the law is that H-1B dependent companies (≥15% of the workforce is H-1B) must "take good faith steps to recruit U.S. workers for the job for which the H-1Bs are sought." [1] In practice, this almost never applies, but it is nonetheless token lip service towards the ostensible intent of the H-1B program as strictly a specialized visa program, which is the pretense under which it was passed in 1990. [0] https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/immigration/h1b https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/immigration/h1b [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/20/655.739 https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/20/655.739
stcroixx 3y ago
The only entity in the US that wanted and continues to lobby for H1B to continue is industry and their sole reason for doing so is keeping their salary expenses as low as possible. In the software industry it began with the fake premise that there was a shortage of qualified labor. Without a loophole like H1B, when a labor shortage occurs, you have to raise wages to attract people to the profession. With H1B, average wages (not FAANG) have been allowed to stagnate because the visa workers come from countries with a lower cost of living. I'm all for immigration, but not sure it's humane to tie it to a profession - if someone is allowed to become a citizen because of their profession, are they not allowed to give it up and do something else in the future?
- injb 3y ago
  >>> The only entity in the US that wanted and continues to lobby for H1B to continue is industry and their sole reason for doing so is keeping their salary expenses as low as possible. In the software industry it began with the fake premise that there was a shortage of qualified labor. Without a loophole like H1B, when a labor shortage occurs, you have to raise wages to attract people to the profession. With H1B, average wages (not FAANG) have been allowed to stagnate because the visa workers come from countries with a lower cost of living. I'm all for immigration, but not sure it's humane to tie it to a profession - if someone is allowed to become a citizen because of their profession, are they not allowed to give it up and do something else in the future? Some quick googling indicates there are around 65K H1Bs issued every year, and around 4.4 million software developers. So even assuming that most of those H1Bs go to software developers (they certainly don't all go there) it's still hard to imagine this having a serious detrimental effect on salaries, although I agree it's probably an incentive for the few companies that actually get H1B workers. BTW, to answer your second question, yes if you become a US citizen you can generally abandon the career that led to your getting whatever visa you had before. In fact you can do that long before you become a citizen. You can do it once you have a green card, which in most of these cases is a minimum of 5 years before they become a citizen. For most H1Bs it's going to be something like 3-6 years on the H1B during which time you're basically "indentured", followed by 5-6 years on a greencard, during which time you can do whatever you like for a living as long as you don't do anything that suggests your H1B sponsor was lying, followed citizenship.

princevegeta89 3y ago

Thanks. On the contrary, we need to blame the companies not the people

pers0n 3y ago

Would you say the same for migrant workers? If so how long should they work cheap before citizenship?

seanmcdirmid 3y ago

H1Bs are pretty much guaranteed green cards after 6 years. Unfortunately, there are green card quotas for a few countries that could delay that, but it’s not a question of if but when if you make it to 6.