4 ms·

From where I am sitting, it looks like more than just cost, it's about control. If a smart mouth prima donna like myself lost his job, it would suck, yes, but i

From where I am sitting, it looks like more than just cost, it's about control. If a smart mouth prima donna like myself lost his job, it would suck, yes, but if I were an H1-B I could be deported. If I were in that position I would think twice about telling my boss something he didn't want to hear. But it's worse than that. An Indian coworker once shared an unsubstantiated story about how an unscrupulous recruiter brought over a bunch of IT workers from India and forced them to work for essentially nothing. One call to immigration from their employer and they are sent back. It's hard for me to imagine the vulnerability of being in a place distant from my home with minimal language skills and no knowledge of my rights. Neither your boss nor US immigration is your friend. Another thing I see from Indian workers is a strange ability to be experts in extremely specific and obscure technologies. If in an interview if I am asked about my proficiency in unfamiliar piece of software, I might respond "It looks similar to other tools I have used. I am sure I could pick it up quickly." This is NOT what pointy-haired HR suit-monkeys want to hear. I don't know if Indians are more comfortable lying about this, or if they take a crash course to prepare for the interview, or if they are graduates of some school in India called "The Institute of Suspiciously Obscure Technologies" but this may be a large part of the justification behind the "talent" excuse for more H1-Bs. There is plenty of talent domestically - they real business need is simply being buzzword-compliant and an unwillingness to train. If that came across a little racist, Let me say that with rare exception the Indian people I have known are competent and pleasant coworkers. I have no personal issues there.

makmanalp 12y ago
Without replying to the rest of your comment: > an unscrupulous recruiter brought over a bunch of IT workers from India and forced them to work for essentially nothing. One call to immigration from their employer and they are sent back One call to immigration and the company would be quite fucked with horrible fees and probably an audit / prosecution for fraud and human rights abuses. One does NOT mess with this. They'd never dare. What would happen is that they'd just not renew the person's visa, screwing them over that way. > with minimal language skills and no knowledge of my rights Let's be honest here, a TON of Indians (especially those in the higher economic strata that afforded a good education and picked up IT skills) have great english, and are perfectly capable of reading their rights, which if you've ever gone through the process, you'll know in minute detail. That's not to say that abuse doesn't happen, but I think your view of how it happens is very skewed, and you're quite misinformed. It's much more banal and sinister than that. Then again, it's the exception rather than the norm among the more "modern" companies. The abusers, I think, would tend to be the large IT sweatshops and "consulting" firms.
- nojvek 12y ago
  When someone is paying you 10X to what you can possibly learn in India, you're willing to absorb shit. Yes in US terms it could be peanuts but in Indian terms its quite a bit. Work 2-3 years in US and save well, the guy could buy a nice house and India and live decently. No one apart from the US has figured out how to build billion dollar companies like popcorn.
shas3 12y ago
I am surprised each time I see this kind of casual bigotry on HN. Seriously, "school in India called, Institute of Suspiciously Obscure Technologies"? I don't think there's any other way of reading your comment other than "most Indians lie on resumes and in interviews." It's understandable seeing this kind of stuff on reddit from 13 year-olds. But I don't understand what vantage makes you make such sweeping generalizations about a supposedly monolithic chunk of 1 billion human beings. Haven't you heard the joke about how pretty much everything that requires a caveat "not trying to be racist here" is actually racist?
- arenaninja 12y ago
  > I don't think there's any other way of reading your comment other than "most Indians lie on resumes and in interviews." That's not what I got out of reading that same snippet
  - shas3 12y ago
    And what did you get out of it, then?
- ambrood 12y ago
  Not to mention the fact that a sizeable number of Indians on H1Bs actually went to great grad schools... Not everyone from India came here to work for a bodyshop.

makmanalp 12y ago

Without replying to the rest of your comment: > an unscrupulous recruiter brought over a bunch of IT workers from India and forced them to work for essentially nothing. One call to immigration from their employer and they are sent back One call to immigration and the company would be quite fucked with horrible fees and probably an audit / prosecution for fraud and human rights abuses. One does NOT mess with this. They'd never dare. What would happen is that they'd just not renew the person's visa, screwing them over that way. > with minimal language skills and no knowledge of my rights Let's be honest here, a TON of Indians (especially those in the higher economic strata that afforded a good education and picked up IT skills) have great english, and are perfectly capable of reading their rights, which if you've ever gone through the process, you'll know in minute detail. That's not to say that abuse doesn't happen, but I think your view of how it happens is very skewed, and you're quite misinformed. It's much more banal and sinister than that. Then again, it's the exception rather than the norm among the more "modern" companies. The abusers, I think, would tend to be the large IT sweatshops and "consulting" firms.

nojvek 12y ago
When someone is paying you 10X to what you can possibly learn in India, you're willing to absorb shit. Yes in US terms it could be peanuts but in Indian terms its quite a bit. Work 2-3 years in US and save well, the guy could buy a nice house and India and live decently. No one apart from the US has figured out how to build billion dollar companies like popcorn.

shas3 12y ago

I am surprised each time I see this kind of casual bigotry on HN. Seriously, "school in India called, Institute of Suspiciously Obscure Technologies"? I don't think there's any other way of reading your comment other than "most Indians lie on resumes and in interviews." It's understandable seeing this kind of stuff on reddit from 13 year-olds. But I don't understand what vantage makes you make such sweeping generalizations about a supposedly monolithic chunk of 1 billion human beings. Haven't you heard the joke about how pretty much everything that requires a caveat "not trying to be racist here" is actually racist?

arenaninja 12y ago
> I don't think there's any other way of reading your comment other than "most Indians lie on resumes and in interviews." That's not what I got out of reading that same snippet
- shas3 12y ago
  And what did you get out of it, then?
ambrood 12y ago
Not to mention the fact that a sizeable number of Indians on H1Bs actually went to great grad schools... Not everyone from India came here to work for a bodyshop.