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This does not square with my perception but that's anecdotal. Nonetheless I work at a very large financial firm and the rates paid for consulting are 70-80% hig

by tsax 13y ago

This does not square with my perception but that's anecdotal. Nonetheless I work at a very large financial firm and the rates paid for consulting are 70-80% higher than salaries at the same level. Even accounting for 30-50% add-ons for benefits/vacations, etc, consulting firms are still paid higher than employees, at least here.

malandrew 13y ago
That wasn't my point at all. I was making the point that we should be encouraging immigrant visas for positions that actually create growth. i.e. The position will help with scaling so that we end up with a larger business that results in more jobs for Americans. If an immigrant moves here and works for a company that has 10 people and helps create a product that scales so that one day that company employs 1000 people, the US is better off. If the immigrant comes to the country to work at a consultancy doing work that doesn't really scale, that worker is just another person suppressing the wages for Americans who would otherwise be doing that work. An immigrant who comes here to do consultancy doesn't do work that typically generates more jobs. The consultancy can only grow by adding more people like the immigrant since the supply of people like the technical immigrant is already limited. Second, although consultants typically make more than other software engineers, it still suppresses wages for all software consultants. The pay for software consultants in the US would be much higher without bringing in immigrants to do that work. Personally, I don't want to reduce the number of highly skilled immigrants that come to this country. I would love to see it increase a lot more. But I don't think it benefits the United States economy and the average American citizen when this immigrant labor is focused on non-scalable activities where the labor needed is likely to be highly fungible. That only serves to increase the bottom line of the shareholders of such companies at the expense of suppressing wages for similar professionals working in the US. That's net-negative for the country, and a subsidy for those shareholders. Every one of those H1-B visas should be decided on the likely value that immigrant can bring to the US economy and not the value that immigrant provides to the shareholders of a consultancy. IBM getting 5 more generalist software engineers is far less valuable to the US economy than 5 engineers that are specialists in some new emerging technology such as renewable energy. The decision process for granting H1-Bs should be similar to the decision process for making an investment in a startup. You invest in things that can grow. FWIW, You might think I'm a red-blooded anti-immigration American, but I'm actually an immigrant software engineer living in the US.

by tsax 13y ago

malandrew 13y ago

That wasn't my point at all. I was making the point that we should be encouraging immigrant visas for positions that actually create growth. i.e. The position will help with scaling so that we end up with a larger business that results in more jobs for Americans. If an immigrant moves here and works for a company that has 10 people and helps create a product that scales so that one day that company employs 1000 people, the US is better off. If the immigrant comes to the country to work at a consultancy doing work that doesn't really scale, that worker is just another person suppressing the wages for Americans who would otherwise be doing that work. An immigrant who comes here to do consultancy doesn't do work that typically generates more jobs. The consultancy can only grow by adding more people like the immigrant since the supply of people like the technical immigrant is already limited. Second, although consultants typically make more than other software engineers, it still suppresses wages for all software consultants. The pay for software consultants in the US would be much higher without bringing in immigrants to do that work. Personally, I don't want to reduce the number of highly skilled immigrants that come to this country. I would love to see it increase a lot more. But I don't think it benefits the United States economy and the average American citizen when this immigrant labor is focused on non-scalable activities where the labor needed is likely to be highly fungible. That only serves to increase the bottom line of the shareholders of such companies at the expense of suppressing wages for similar professionals working in the US. That's net-negative for the country, and a subsidy for those shareholders. Every one of those H1-B visas should be decided on the likely value that immigrant can bring to the US economy and not the value that immigrant provides to the shareholders of a consultancy. IBM getting 5 more generalist software engineers is far less valuable to the US economy than 5 engineers that are specialists in some new emerging technology such as renewable energy. The decision process for granting H1-Bs should be similar to the decision process for making an investment in a startup. You invest in things that can grow. FWIW, You might think I'm a red-blooded anti-immigration American, but I'm actually an immigrant software engineer living in the US.