5 ms·

The Founder Visa Ignores Immigration Reality

78 points by yangyang 17y ago

pmichaud 17y ago
He's right, immigration is insane. My wife is British, one in several million smart, highly educated, and she could barely scrape in.
- KirkWylie 17y ago
  You should join her and move back here to blighty. I can say that we've now got a pretty vibrant tech scene here in London and have sources of investment lined up and ready to go.
  - tomjen2 17y ago
    What is the closest thing the London start-up scene has to Hacker News? I feel there is little point in hanging out here as long as it is effectively American only (YC, not the boards).
    - KirkWylie 17y ago
      Seriously? Was that a joke? Hacker News is largely American because it's an outgrowth of YC, which is American Only. I would hardly think having a website portray a particular provincial bias would be a reason to live somewhere. Seriously, though, we Brits just hang out wherever the interesting conversations are. That's the beauty of teh interwebz: nobody knows you're not a Yank (until you go off and spell something with an s or an extra u or something silly).
      - nopassrecover 17y ago
        I don't think he was talking about living (or not living) somewhere based on HN but was looking for a more london focused online startup community.
        KirkWylie 17y ago
        We all know each other and mostly hang out on twitter to be honest. Try me (@kirkwy), @monkchips, @monadic, @cpswan, @codepope, @leastfixedpoint, ... Seriously, though, I've not really noticed not being back in a local "tech cluster" on a day-to-day basis these days (except that when I meet people that aren't in the industry they have NO idea what I do; in the valley, everybody has some clue). Mostly we like to know who each other are so we can all drink together. Tech social functions, like ALL social functions here, involve much beer.
      - petercooper 17y ago
        Right on. I consider myself a citizen of the United States of Internet. I'm in Britain but know barely the last thing about the "scene" here - it's all in the US and it's easy to access online (or on trips).
- tptacek 17y ago
  Why was it hard to get your wife in? I thought it was easy to get spouses in.
  - nopassrecover 17y ago
    Married spouses at least (other spouses aren't accepted) but you're assuming the parent had a visa himself (well assuming the parent is male as lesbian couples aren't recognised either) and that the particular visa he had was one of the visas that grant a spouse rights.
    - yangyang 17y ago
      I thought one's spouse is one's husband / wife, and one's husband / wife is married to you, by definition.
      - nopassrecover 17y ago
        Yeah I think you're typically right. I guess I interchange partner with spouse in my mind because of the whole recognition of de facto couples here in Australia and the whole civil union bit.
        yangyang 17y ago
        Thanks, I didn't know about de facto couples.
  - cousin_it 17y ago
    I guess she immigrated before they met.
    - pmichaud 17y ago
      Bingo.
  - davidw 17y ago
    It's easy in the sense that it's more or less a sure thing. It's not easy in the sense that you still have to go through a lot of paperwork and bureaucracy, and even have to go in for a doctor to poke you and prod you to see if you're fit to live in the US. Nothing like being treated like livestock to make you feel welcome. It was way easier for me to deal with the Italian bureaucracy once we were married than it would be for my wife to go to the US. And that's saying something: Italian bureaucracy is about as bad as the stereotypes make it out to be.
- tokenadult 17y ago
  What country does better? http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=835559 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=835559
  - potatolicious 17y ago
    Canada. My folks immigrated from Taiwan to Canada about 15 years ago using the skilled migrant program, when I was just a kid - and the process could not have been better (not to mention superior to the US). Apply, interview (with offices all around the world, you don't even have to travel to Canada), get your papers, fly over. From day 1 we were treated as equals - and never as unwelcome disturbances (which is how I feel all the damned time here in the US). My folks were allowed to work for anyone and everyone - certainly no bullshit employer-chain like the H-1B visa. We were given the same universal health coverage, the same social benefits... we were equal to a citizen in every way except the vote. If it's of anyone's interest, we looked at the USA before applying to Canada, but the system was too onerous and far too risky to be of serious consideration. For one thing, for someone who wanted to start a new life with his family in another country, being chained to an employer who would abuse you knowing you cannot quit simply wasn't an appeal. Nor was the incredibly long process to get the green card and finally citizenship (we had Canadian citizenship within 3 years of arrival). IMHO the US lost out big time. My family earns several times the Canadian average income, and pays taxes on all of it. My mother is an entrepreneur who has supported her local economy - and their kids are all highly educated tax-paying individuals. We were a huge net-win for Canada, and if the US was somewhat less retarded in its immigration policies, we would've easily have been Americans.
    - snprbob86 17y ago
      > if the US was somewhat less retarded in its immigration policies, we would've easily have been Americans. Serious question: Why? If Canada is so great, why the preference for the US? I hear these sorts of things all the time, yet everyone still wants to come to the US. I feel like I am missing a piece of the puzzle.
      - potatolicious 17y ago
- joe_the_user 17y ago
  Further, he's right that with a broken system, adding one more Rube Goldberg attachment won't help.
- ninguem2 17y ago
  >one in several million smart, highly educated Then she qualifies for EB-1 or 2 permanent residence.
kevinpet 17y ago
Better option would simply be the "write us a big fat check" visa. Presumably, the only people who would be willing to pay, say, $50,000 over the course of five years would be those who can make enough to make it worthwhile. It would also get rid of the perverse incentives related to having to stay with the employer you got the H1-B from.
- pavlov 17y ago
  Don't underestimate the willingness of third world families to send their children to the US under this "fat check visa" scheme, regardless of whether they would have any source of guaranteed income. Currently Africans are commonly paying over 10,000 euros for an illegal trip to an undetermined European country. The families raise the money for young men even though there's no guarantee whether the kid will end up in Norway or Italy (and often no further than Morocco). Compared to this, a five-year US visa for $50k would be an extremely attractive option. I doubt that desperate young men whose families are hopelessly in debt are the kind of immigrants that the US would want to specifically attract.
  - ajju 17y ago
    Agreed. Which is why skill based immigration has to be a huge component. Canada does this exceptionally well.
- KirkWylie 17y ago
  They have one. It involves a $1MM investment and no employment options (you have to "invest" it and can't work for the firm(s) in which you "invest").
- potatolicious 17y ago
  This is a terrible idea. We already have people borrowing money in huge sums to get themselves smuggled into first-world countries, then becoming indentured slaves in perpetuity to pay it off. No one should ever be able to buy their way into a country with raw cash. Skilled immigration policies that aren't stupid (i.e. H-1B is the dumbest "immigration" policy I've ever seen) are a much better idea.
huherto 17y ago
The U.S. immigration is definitely insane. I know people that have been waiting for ten or more years. It almost doesn't matter what qualifications you have.
- potatolicious 17y ago
  I'm currently working in the US on a TN visa. I like it here, and if given the chance I'd probably stay. But the odds of me being able to do that, without jumping through large number of inhumane hoops like a circus animal, are low. Odds are I will be moving back to ole Canada at some point. The US is so busy being afraid of everyone else that they're very, very quickly driving themselves into irrelevance.
  - jgrant27 17y ago
    Canada is a great country too. I'm sure that if you asked many people who have jumped through all the hoops like a circus animal to stay in the US that a significant percentage of them would tell you that it just wasn't worth it in the end.
- nopassrecover 17y ago
  I'm not even sure why qualifications are the benchmark for some of these visas. As it stands you need either a bachelor's degree or 10 years working experience to justify as qualified for most visas I've seen.
Ionic_Walrus 17y ago
Im planning to move back to Bangalore to my roots. Anyone have an idea what the tech scene in Bangalore is ?
pageman 17y ago
can an EB-5 visa (using the special case of 500K) be used for a tech company? anyone here who is an immigration lawyer?
seldo 17y ago
Three cheers to Kirk for pointing out the particularly demeaning way in which gay people are treated for the purposes of immigration. Everybody knows that marriage is viewed as the "easier" way of getting into the US: find somebody who likes you enough to marry you for two years, then you can divorce and you can keep the green card. But if you're gay? Get to the back of the line.
- joubert 17y ago
  Hopefully DOMA will get overturned and/or UAFA passed in the current session.
radu_floricica 17y ago
> ...if his firm decided to let him go for whatever reason, he had two weeks to leave the country forever. I love EU. It got something right.
- KirkWylie 17y ago
  FWIW, this isn't an EU thing, it's a national thing. Immigration from outside the EU is 100% left to the member states, and it's why I can't work in the rest of the EU until I get off my arse and apply for my British citizenship: member states have complete control over their visas and citizenship. It's just that once you have citizenship in any EU state, you're allowed to live and work in any other without any discrimination based on your nationality (assuming you're not from one of the New States of course). I love that the UK has same-sex immigration rights, and had them before much of the rest of the EU. Now they're common-place, but when the UK did it, it was pretty new and special.
  - radu_floricica 17y ago
    What I meant was, within EU the notion of having two weeks to pack your bags is already absurd. This, I think, is what should be fought against, not specific immigration rights. What is needed now is to enlarge this space with countries like US, Japan or Australia, and slowly with the whole world.

78 points by yangyang 17y ago

He's right, immigration is insane. My wife is British, one in several million smart, highly educated, and she could barely scrape in.

KirkWylie 17y ago
You should join her and move back here to blighty. I can say that we've now got a pretty vibrant tech scene here in London and have sources of investment lined up and ready to go.
- tomjen2 17y ago
  What is the closest thing the London start-up scene has to Hacker News? I feel there is little point in hanging out here as long as it is effectively American only (YC, not the boards).
  - KirkWylie 17y ago
    Seriously? Was that a joke? Hacker News is largely American because it's an outgrowth of YC, which is American Only. I would hardly think having a website portray a particular provincial bias would be a reason to live somewhere. Seriously, though, we Brits just hang out wherever the interesting conversations are. That's the beauty of teh interwebz: nobody knows you're not a Yank (until you go off and spell something with an s or an extra u or something silly).
    - nopassrecover 17y ago
      I don't think he was talking about living (or not living) somewhere based on HN but was looking for a more london focused online startup community.
      - KirkWylie 17y ago
        We all know each other and mostly hang out on twitter to be honest. Try me (@kirkwy), @monkchips, @monadic, @cpswan, @codepope, @leastfixedpoint, ... Seriously, though, I've not really noticed not being back in a local "tech cluster" on a day-to-day basis these days (except that when I meet people that aren't in the industry they have NO idea what I do; in the valley, everybody has some clue). Mostly we like to know who each other are so we can all drink together. Tech social functions, like ALL social functions here, involve much beer.
    - petercooper 17y ago
      Right on. I consider myself a citizen of the United States of Internet. I'm in Britain but know barely the last thing about the "scene" here - it's all in the US and it's easy to access online (or on trips).
tptacek 17y ago
Why was it hard to get your wife in? I thought it was easy to get spouses in.
- nopassrecover 17y ago
  Married spouses at least (other spouses aren't accepted) but you're assuming the parent had a visa himself (well assuming the parent is male as lesbian couples aren't recognised either) and that the particular visa he had was one of the visas that grant a spouse rights.
  - yangyang 17y ago
    I thought one's spouse is one's husband / wife, and one's husband / wife is married to you, by definition.
    - nopassrecover 17y ago
      Yeah I think you're typically right. I guess I interchange partner with spouse in my mind because of the whole recognition of de facto couples here in Australia and the whole civil union bit.
      - yangyang 17y ago
        Thanks, I didn't know about de facto couples.
- cousin_it 17y ago
  I guess she immigrated before they met.
  - pmichaud 17y ago
    Bingo.
- davidw 17y ago
  It's easy in the sense that it's more or less a sure thing. It's not easy in the sense that you still have to go through a lot of paperwork and bureaucracy, and even have to go in for a doctor to poke you and prod you to see if you're fit to live in the US. Nothing like being treated like livestock to make you feel welcome. It was way easier for me to deal with the Italian bureaucracy once we were married than it would be for my wife to go to the US. And that's saying something: Italian bureaucracy is about as bad as the stereotypes make it out to be.
tokenadult 17y ago
What country does better? http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=835559 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=835559
- potatolicious 17y ago
  Canada. My folks immigrated from Taiwan to Canada about 15 years ago using the skilled migrant program, when I was just a kid - and the process could not have been better (not to mention superior to the US). Apply, interview (with offices all around the world, you don't even have to travel to Canada), get your papers, fly over. From day 1 we were treated as equals - and never as unwelcome disturbances (which is how I feel all the damned time here in the US). My folks were allowed to work for anyone and everyone - certainly no bullshit employer-chain like the H-1B visa. We were given the same universal health coverage, the same social benefits... we were equal to a citizen in every way except the vote. If it's of anyone's interest, we looked at the USA before applying to Canada, but the system was too onerous and far too risky to be of serious consideration. For one thing, for someone who wanted to start a new life with his family in another country, being chained to an employer who would abuse you knowing you cannot quit simply wasn't an appeal. Nor was the incredibly long process to get the green card and finally citizenship (we had Canadian citizenship within 3 years of arrival). IMHO the US lost out big time. My family earns several times the Canadian average income, and pays taxes on all of it. My mother is an entrepreneur who has supported her local economy - and their kids are all highly educated tax-paying individuals. We were a huge net-win for Canada, and if the US was somewhat less retarded in its immigration policies, we would've easily have been Americans.
  - snprbob86 17y ago
    > if the US was somewhat less retarded in its immigration policies, we would've easily have been Americans. Serious question: Why? If Canada is so great, why the preference for the US? I hear these sorts of things all the time, yet everyone still wants to come to the US. I feel like I am missing a piece of the puzzle.
    - potatolicious 17y ago
joe_the_user 17y ago
Further, he's right that with a broken system, adding one more Rube Goldberg attachment won't help.
ninguem2 17y ago
>one in several million smart, highly educated Then she qualifies for EB-1 or 2 permanent residence.

kevinpet 17y ago

Better option would simply be the "write us a big fat check" visa. Presumably, the only people who would be willing to pay, say, $50,000 over the course of five years would be those who can make enough to make it worthwhile. It would also get rid of the perverse incentives related to having to stay with the employer you got the H1-B from.

pavlov 17y ago
Don't underestimate the willingness of third world families to send their children to the US under this "fat check visa" scheme, regardless of whether they would have any source of guaranteed income. Currently Africans are commonly paying over 10,000 euros for an illegal trip to an undetermined European country. The families raise the money for young men even though there's no guarantee whether the kid will end up in Norway or Italy (and often no further than Morocco). Compared to this, a five-year US visa for $50k would be an extremely attractive option. I doubt that desperate young men whose families are hopelessly in debt are the kind of immigrants that the US would want to specifically attract.
- ajju 17y ago
  Agreed. Which is why skill based immigration has to be a huge component. Canada does this exceptionally well.
KirkWylie 17y ago
They have one. It involves a $1MM investment and no employment options (you have to "invest" it and can't work for the firm(s) in which you "invest").
potatolicious 17y ago
This is a terrible idea. We already have people borrowing money in huge sums to get themselves smuggled into first-world countries, then becoming indentured slaves in perpetuity to pay it off. No one should ever be able to buy their way into a country with raw cash. Skilled immigration policies that aren't stupid (i.e. H-1B is the dumbest "immigration" policy I've ever seen) are a much better idea.

huherto 17y ago

The U.S. immigration is definitely insane. I know people that have been waiting for ten or more years. It almost doesn't matter what qualifications you have.

potatolicious 17y ago
I'm currently working in the US on a TN visa. I like it here, and if given the chance I'd probably stay. But the odds of me being able to do that, without jumping through large number of inhumane hoops like a circus animal, are low. Odds are I will be moving back to ole Canada at some point. The US is so busy being afraid of everyone else that they're very, very quickly driving themselves into irrelevance.
- jgrant27 17y ago
  Canada is a great country too. I'm sure that if you asked many people who have jumped through all the hoops like a circus animal to stay in the US that a significant percentage of them would tell you that it just wasn't worth it in the end.
nopassrecover 17y ago
I'm not even sure why qualifications are the benchmark for some of these visas. As it stands you need either a bachelor's degree or 10 years working experience to justify as qualified for most visas I've seen.

Ionic_Walrus 17y ago

Im planning to move back to Bangalore to my roots. Anyone have an idea what the tech scene in Bangalore is ?

pageman 17y ago

can an EB-5 visa (using the special case of 500K) be used for a tech company? anyone here who is an immigration lawyer?

seldo 17y ago

Three cheers to Kirk for pointing out the particularly demeaning way in which gay people are treated for the purposes of immigration. Everybody knows that marriage is viewed as the "easier" way of getting into the US: find somebody who likes you enough to marry you for two years, then you can divorce and you can keep the green card. But if you're gay? Get to the back of the line.

joubert 17y ago
Hopefully DOMA will get overturned and/or UAFA passed in the current session.

radu_floricica 17y ago

> ...if his firm decided to let him go for whatever reason, he had two weeks to leave the country forever. I love EU. It got something right.

KirkWylie 17y ago
FWIW, this isn't an EU thing, it's a national thing. Immigration from outside the EU is 100% left to the member states, and it's why I can't work in the rest of the EU until I get off my arse and apply for my British citizenship: member states have complete control over their visas and citizenship. It's just that once you have citizenship in any EU state, you're allowed to live and work in any other without any discrimination based on your nationality (assuming you're not from one of the New States of course). I love that the UK has same-sex immigration rights, and had them before much of the rest of the EU. Now they're common-place, but when the UK did it, it was pretty new and special.
- radu_floricica 17y ago
  What I meant was, within EU the notion of having two weeks to pack your bags is already absurd. This, I think, is what should be fought against, not specific immigration rights. What is needed now is to enlarge this space with countries like US, Japan or Australia, and slowly with the whole world.