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Just question. For software jobs. Why is there a demand that can drive abuse. When there are so many people that can't find jobs? It seems like right now th

Just question. For software jobs. Why is there a demand that can drive abuse. When there are so many people that can't find jobs? It seems like right now there should not be enough demand for H1-b (for software) to justify abuse. Like it shouldn't be profitable enough.

odux 3y ago
There are actually four large “buckets” on H1B usage in software. First are the “regular” software jobs. At the large tech players or other regular companies (eg a software job at a bank). Like you said, there is a lot of supply due to layoffs and not a lot of demand. H1Bs in this area are also limited this year due to this. Second are the college graduates. Once you complete a STEM degree as a foreign student you get three years of OPT which is for all practical purposes a work permit to work in STEM jobs (with some conditions). If the student (now employee) needs to continue working for the company in the US after this they need a H1B or a green card. Most genuine companies apply for H1B for these employees the moment they join and because it is a lottery keep doing it in the hope that the employee gets a H1B and continues working. These are not new jobs but people in jobs for up to 3 years that the company wants to continue employing and does not intend to layoff. Supply and demand plays a smaller part here. Third are the outsourcing companies, TCS, Accenture and the like. These companies have people in India and contracts with large Us companies. They predict some number of demand for moving people from India to US (to help support the rest of the offshore team, to replace a higher paid employee at the US company with a lower paid employee of the contracting company etc). These companies will mostly but just barely follow the law (they have also been caught and paid files) and will use all loopholes available to them. These are the biggest “abuses” you see in the press. While the general “abuse” news in the press is about these companies replacing American workers with lower cost H1B employees the other problem is they are not catering to current demand but predicting work at a “client” based on current or future contract, creating “job openings” based on this (which they can, it is their own company) and flooding the lottery. The fourth are smaller body shops and “consulting” companies in the US. These also predict demand and “create jobs” to enter applicants to the lottery. But the difference is typically the companies in the third category don’t get the employees to the US if there is no “client project” (as in, real demand) and even if they they do, they have the means to pay the minimum required pay the H1B demands - they are big enough to afford a bench of employees. The companies in the fourth category will get people to the US first on fake, or near-fake demand and then pitch them to “clients”. In the meantime the employee is not paid the companies skirt the law in all ways as possible to continue “holding” the employee. They also refuse to share paperwork with the employee (preventing them from moving jobs) and sometimes have the employees pay for the H1B which is illegal (but gets to the grey area if they get the payment in India before the employee travels to the US). There is very less demand today in the first category. The second category is not much related to demand. Most of the “abuse” happens in the third (by volume) and fourth (by severity). Abuse in quotes because a lot of this is in the gray areas of legality and sometimes outrightly legal but not “right”.
- FrustratedMonky 3y ago
  Thank You. I did not realize about the 3 year college graduate category. But does the law make these buckets? Or is there one H1-B bucket and you are categorizing the buckets by industry and types of companies that hire H1-B. Don't you think that the 3 year college student bucket, and the generally other buckets, would suppress jobs/salary of the local US population? They would be competing against US students graduating. I am wondering about the supply/demand analysis. Do you think that the jobs in bucket 3 and 4, the outsourcing companies and smaller body shops, don't impact US based SW/CompSci employees? I'm just thinking with the current glut of US based people looking for jobs, and new US graduates, that they might also be applying to these companies, and be competing against the H1-B employees.
  - eropple 3y ago
    > Don't you think that the 3 year college student bucket, and the generally other buckets, would suppress jobs/salary of the local US population? Only if you can find somebody to hire--because it's important to realize that H-1B applies to more than just computer touchers. Before we got married, my wife was on an OPT. Her employer was not used to hiring foreign nationals, but they literally couldn't find somebody who would be willing to do the job. My wife is a special-education teacher at a school for very difficult kids, and not a programmer. That's not a common skillset and it's a very stressful job that almost nobody wants. (Turnover at her job is close to 100% per year, and is over 100% per year in some roles.) The school isn't going to pay more for a probably-mythical candidate; the money doesn't exist. But kids need teachers. Tech workers are absolutely a different story and causing some impact on the local tech-worker economy (but probably less than most people think; my employer just hires in India when it can now, instead, so no local businesses get paid by people working here), but every road that seems to be currently on the table seems to indicate that the overwhelming desire in the louder quarters isn't "fix tech-worker H-1B", it's "they terk er jerbs, kill H-1B". Which scans, given that when we get really honest about it; the spiciest reaction to H-1B, in my experience, is that it's dual-intent. So even with the best of intentions (not those ones), touching the system is hard. The political valence is fraught, the system itself is complex and has a lot of moving parts, and the core assumptions being bandied around about job availability and supply curves are just not proven--or, probably, provable.
shmatt 3y ago
The unfortunate answer is: love them or hate them, people can't pass the leetcode interviews I've worked as a hiring manager in multiple companies, and recommending or not recommending a hire is done without any knowledge of their status, but solely on the 45 minute interview I did. If they need some sponsorship thats done without communicating to me, I just say yes/no. And with that, somehow most of the Yes's need sponsorship, so what else can you do from an interviewing perspective
- orangevelcro 3y ago
  I've always suspected that this was the real reason for the leetcode interviews.
- throwaway5959 3y ago
  Maybe stop doing leetcode interviews and start doing interviews that measure whether or not the candidate can actually do the job?
- confidantlake 3y ago
  Not always. I passed hiring committee but couldn't team match in multiple companies because of hiring freezes/layoffs. Recruiter told me that the majority of candidates would not team match. But somehow they still needed all the h1bs.
twobitshifter 3y ago
I recently hired for an entry level position, blind to VISA status. We received an enormous number of applications. We received very few applications that were from US residents, I’d estimate only 5%. By the end of the drawn out process of filtering people based on cover letters, resumes, majors, GPA, work experience, portfolios, papers published, etc. There were 2 Americans left, who didn’t respond to the interview request. American Colleges are full of foreign students, who are often at the top of their class and have made it through several ability filters to get here. If you’re hiring with meritocracy in mind, you’ll end up interviewing foreign students. Software consulting can be abused because these type of contracts are often awarded based on cost. By driving down salary costs compared to other consultancies, the Indian firms are able to win jobs. These firms aren’t interested in hiring Americans because of the power dynamic that they’ve established with their staff.

odux 3y ago

There are actually four large “buckets” on H1B usage in software. First are the “regular” software jobs. At the large tech players or other regular companies (eg a software job at a bank). Like you said, there is a lot of supply due to layoffs and not a lot of demand. H1Bs in this area are also limited this year due to this. Second are the college graduates. Once you complete a STEM degree as a foreign student you get three years of OPT which is for all practical purposes a work permit to work in STEM jobs (with some conditions). If the student (now employee) needs to continue working for the company in the US after this they need a H1B or a green card. Most genuine companies apply for H1B for these employees the moment they join and because it is a lottery keep doing it in the hope that the employee gets a H1B and continues working. These are not new jobs but people in jobs for up to 3 years that the company wants to continue employing and does not intend to layoff. Supply and demand plays a smaller part here. Third are the outsourcing companies, TCS, Accenture and the like. These companies have people in India and contracts with large Us companies. They predict some number of demand for moving people from India to US (to help support the rest of the offshore team, to replace a higher paid employee at the US company with a lower paid employee of the contracting company etc). These companies will mostly but just barely follow the law (they have also been caught and paid files) and will use all loopholes available to them. These are the biggest “abuses” you see in the press. While the general “abuse” news in the press is about these companies replacing American workers with lower cost H1B employees the other problem is they are not catering to current demand but predicting work at a “client” based on current or future contract, creating “job openings” based on this (which they can, it is their own company) and flooding the lottery. The fourth are smaller body shops and “consulting” companies in the US. These also predict demand and “create jobs” to enter applicants to the lottery. But the difference is typically the companies in the third category don’t get the employees to the US if there is no “client project” (as in, real demand) and even if they they do, they have the means to pay the minimum required pay the H1B demands - they are big enough to afford a bench of employees. The companies in the fourth category will get people to the US first on fake, or near-fake demand and then pitch them to “clients”. In the meantime the employee is not paid the companies skirt the law in all ways as possible to continue “holding” the employee. They also refuse to share paperwork with the employee (preventing them from moving jobs) and sometimes have the employees pay for the H1B which is illegal (but gets to the grey area if they get the payment in India before the employee travels to the US). There is very less demand today in the first category. The second category is not much related to demand. Most of the “abuse” happens in the third (by volume) and fourth (by severity). Abuse in quotes because a lot of this is in the gray areas of legality and sometimes outrightly legal but not “right”.

FrustratedMonky 3y ago
Thank You. I did not realize about the 3 year college graduate category. But does the law make these buckets? Or is there one H1-B bucket and you are categorizing the buckets by industry and types of companies that hire H1-B. Don't you think that the 3 year college student bucket, and the generally other buckets, would suppress jobs/salary of the local US population? They would be competing against US students graduating. I am wondering about the supply/demand analysis. Do you think that the jobs in bucket 3 and 4, the outsourcing companies and smaller body shops, don't impact US based SW/CompSci employees? I'm just thinking with the current glut of US based people looking for jobs, and new US graduates, that they might also be applying to these companies, and be competing against the H1-B employees.
- eropple 3y ago
  > Don't you think that the 3 year college student bucket, and the generally other buckets, would suppress jobs/salary of the local US population? Only if you can find somebody to hire--because it's important to realize that H-1B applies to more than just computer touchers. Before we got married, my wife was on an OPT. Her employer was not used to hiring foreign nationals, but they literally couldn't find somebody who would be willing to do the job. My wife is a special-education teacher at a school for very difficult kids, and not a programmer. That's not a common skillset and it's a very stressful job that almost nobody wants. (Turnover at her job is close to 100% per year, and is over 100% per year in some roles.) The school isn't going to pay more for a probably-mythical candidate; the money doesn't exist. But kids need teachers. Tech workers are absolutely a different story and causing some impact on the local tech-worker economy (but probably less than most people think; my employer just hires in India when it can now, instead, so no local businesses get paid by people working here), but every road that seems to be currently on the table seems to indicate that the overwhelming desire in the louder quarters isn't "fix tech-worker H-1B", it's "they terk er jerbs, kill H-1B". Which scans, given that when we get really honest about it; the spiciest reaction to H-1B, in my experience, is that it's dual-intent. So even with the best of intentions (not those ones), touching the system is hard. The political valence is fraught, the system itself is complex and has a lot of moving parts, and the core assumptions being bandied around about job availability and supply curves are just not proven--or, probably, provable.

shmatt 3y ago

The unfortunate answer is: love them or hate them, people can't pass the leetcode interviews I've worked as a hiring manager in multiple companies, and recommending or not recommending a hire is done without any knowledge of their status, but solely on the 45 minute interview I did. If they need some sponsorship thats done without communicating to me, I just say yes/no. And with that, somehow most of the Yes's need sponsorship, so what else can you do from an interviewing perspective

orangevelcro 3y ago
I've always suspected that this was the real reason for the leetcode interviews.
throwaway5959 3y ago
Maybe stop doing leetcode interviews and start doing interviews that measure whether or not the candidate can actually do the job?
confidantlake 3y ago
Not always. I passed hiring committee but couldn't team match in multiple companies because of hiring freezes/layoffs. Recruiter told me that the majority of candidates would not team match. But somehow they still needed all the h1bs.

twobitshifter 3y ago

I recently hired for an entry level position, blind to VISA status. We received an enormous number of applications. We received very few applications that were from US residents, I’d estimate only 5%. By the end of the drawn out process of filtering people based on cover letters, resumes, majors, GPA, work experience, portfolios, papers published, etc. There were 2 Americans left, who didn’t respond to the interview request. American Colleges are full of foreign students, who are often at the top of their class and have made it through several ability filters to get here. If you’re hiring with meritocracy in mind, you’ll end up interviewing foreign students. Software consulting can be abused because these type of contracts are often awarded based on cost. By driving down salary costs compared to other consultancies, the Indian firms are able to win jobs. These firms aren’t interested in hiring Americans because of the power dynamic that they’ve established with their staff.