They're crazy outliers, and that's fine. The point of H1B is hiring talent outside of the United States, not hiring normal webdevs or commodity software enginee

They're crazy outliers, and that's fine. The point of H1B is hiring talent outside of the United States, not hiring normal webdevs or commodity software engineers. A fee like that, where a large salary for an exceptional job would make the cost relatively small, brings the program back to its original goal. If you just need a normal worker, there are plenty of CS grads and unemployed SWEs you can hire in the US right now. If you need a specialized foreign worker because he or she is not available in the US, then chances are you are going to pay a premium anyway; that's the point.