4 ms·

A possible solution here is for countries to treat labor the way they have started to treat capital and goods and services. Start signing reciprocal free-labor

by glesica 12y ago

A possible solution here is for countries to treat labor the way they have started to treat capital and goods and services. Start signing reciprocal free-labor agreements. If country Y is willing to allow anyone who can legally live and work in country X to legally live and work in country Y, then country X will do the same for people who can legally live and work in country Y. In my mind, if companies were serious about this shortage (and not just trying to hire more people they can abuse as you described) they would be pushing for far more than a few more H1Bs. But we haven't really seen that, at least that I know of.

dalke 12y ago
Such exists between many countries in the EU. It's not so simple though. Free movement of labor also requires a correspondence in the national health care and retirement programs, so for example totalization agreements to eliminate dual Social Security coverage. The US has such agreements with only a score or so countries (see http://www.ssa.gov/international/agreements_overview.html http://www.ssa.gov/international/agreements_overview.html ). It gives an example of a 66% tax rate when such an agreement does not exist. As it stands now, there is no such agreement between the US and, say, New Zealand. A NZ citizen working in the US for 8 years before returning to NZ would pay US Social Security taxes for those 8 years, but receive no benefits.
- glesica 12y ago
  Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that it would be easy, just that it would be a much, much better solution to the problem (in part because it would address the general problem of labor shortages / surpluses instead of being specific to some industry or type of work).
- MichaelCrawford 12y ago
  The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) established such a free labor market under the TN-1 visa, which is extremely easy to get, however it only applies to twenty different occupations. It's commonly thought that Computer Programming or Software Engineering qualify, but they don't - the TN-1 provides for Systems Analysts, who are commonly programmers as well, but Systems Analysis is really quite a different thing. Before we were married, my Canadian ex-wife obtained a TN-1 so she could live with me in California. She has a Biology degree, and so was able to find work as a Biological Lab Technician, which is one of the twenty on the list. In general, Canadians, Mexicans and Americans can get a TN-1 if they have a written offer letter for one of those twenty kinds of jobs and a four-year college degree. The visa expires in a year, but is renewable. Canadians and Americans just show up at a port of entry, request the visa, present the offer letter and their diploma or college transcripts, then pay a fifty dollar fee. The visa itself is a small card that is stapled onto one of your passport pages. For a Mexican to work in the US, they must request the visa at the US embassy in Mexico City. I don't know what they must do to get a TN-1 for Canada. For my ex-wife's TN-1, the whole process of applying for her TN-1 only took ten minutes and cost fifty bucks. By contrast, an H1-B costs thousands of dollars in attorney fees, one must apply months in advance, and one must qualify before the cap is over its limit. It's not well-understood that, in Canada and the US at least, it's completely legal for foreigners to work without a visa provided they are paid in their home country. That's how I myself was able to work in Canada. I'm a self-employed consultant, so I deposited all of my clients' payments in a bank back in the US, then withdrew Canadian currency from ATM machines in Canada. I don't have a clue whether this last applies in other countries. Strictly speaking I overstayed my Canadian tourist visa. I started paying Canadian taxes after I got a work permit, as I had applied for landed immigration - what the US calls a Green Card. However, no one actually objected. Just being married to a citizen of some other country does NOT automatically permit one to reside or work there! That fact is also poorly understood. That's not right, but that's the law in the US, Canada and the UK that I know of, I expect many other countries as well. One must apply for a visa after getting married; before one is wed, one can apply for a fiance visa.
  - fredophile 12y ago
    I'm a TN-1 visa holder and you've got some misinformation in your post. Nothing major but some of the details can be important when talking about working in another country. First you're correct that computer programmer is not on the list of approved occupations. However, both systems analyst and software engineer are listed. Most people view software engineer and programmer as being the same but you have to make sure you use the correct terms. The length of the visa is up to three years. It also can't go past when your passport expires and may be shorter depending on your job offer. It can be renewed many times (I think up to twenty years but could be wrong). Application and renewal is normally pretty easy. If you're doing a border crossing it takes a little time and a $50 fee. If you're doing it through the mail it takes about 2 months and a larger fee (several hundred dollars).

by glesica 12y ago

dalke 12y ago

Such exists between many countries in the EU. It's not so simple though. Free movement of labor also requires a correspondence in the national health care and retirement programs, so for example totalization agreements to eliminate dual Social Security coverage. The US has such agreements with only a score or so countries (see http://www.ssa.gov/international/agreements_overview.html http://www.ssa.gov/international/agreements_overview.html ). It gives an example of a 66% tax rate when such an agreement does not exist. As it stands now, there is no such agreement between the US and, say, New Zealand. A NZ citizen working in the US for 8 years before returning to NZ would pay US Social Security taxes for those 8 years, but receive no benefits.

glesica 12y ago
Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that it would be easy, just that it would be a much, much better solution to the problem (in part because it would address the general problem of labor shortages / surpluses instead of being specific to some industry or type of work).
MichaelCrawford 12y ago
The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) established such a free labor market under the TN-1 visa, which is extremely easy to get, however it only applies to twenty different occupations. It's commonly thought that Computer Programming or Software Engineering qualify, but they don't - the TN-1 provides for Systems Analysts, who are commonly programmers as well, but Systems Analysis is really quite a different thing. Before we were married, my Canadian ex-wife obtained a TN-1 so she could live with me in California. She has a Biology degree, and so was able to find work as a Biological Lab Technician, which is one of the twenty on the list. In general, Canadians, Mexicans and Americans can get a TN-1 if they have a written offer letter for one of those twenty kinds of jobs and a four-year college degree. The visa expires in a year, but is renewable. Canadians and Americans just show up at a port of entry, request the visa, present the offer letter and their diploma or college transcripts, then pay a fifty dollar fee. The visa itself is a small card that is stapled onto one of your passport pages. For a Mexican to work in the US, they must request the visa at the US embassy in Mexico City. I don't know what they must do to get a TN-1 for Canada. For my ex-wife's TN-1, the whole process of applying for her TN-1 only took ten minutes and cost fifty bucks. By contrast, an H1-B costs thousands of dollars in attorney fees, one must apply months in advance, and one must qualify before the cap is over its limit. It's not well-understood that, in Canada and the US at least, it's completely legal for foreigners to work without a visa provided they are paid in their home country. That's how I myself was able to work in Canada. I'm a self-employed consultant, so I deposited all of my clients' payments in a bank back in the US, then withdrew Canadian currency from ATM machines in Canada. I don't have a clue whether this last applies in other countries. Strictly speaking I overstayed my Canadian tourist visa. I started paying Canadian taxes after I got a work permit, as I had applied for landed immigration - what the US calls a Green Card. However, no one actually objected. Just being married to a citizen of some other country does NOT automatically permit one to reside or work there! That fact is also poorly understood. That's not right, but that's the law in the US, Canada and the UK that I know of, I expect many other countries as well. One must apply for a visa after getting married; before one is wed, one can apply for a fiance visa.
- fredophile 12y ago
  I'm a TN-1 visa holder and you've got some misinformation in your post. Nothing major but some of the details can be important when talking about working in another country. First you're correct that computer programmer is not on the list of approved occupations. However, both systems analyst and software engineer are listed. Most people view software engineer and programmer as being the same but you have to make sure you use the correct terms. The length of the visa is up to three years. It also can't go past when your passport expires and may be shorter depending on your job offer. It can be renewed many times (I think up to twenty years but could be wrong). Application and renewal is normally pretty easy. If you're doing a border crossing it takes a little time and a $50 fee. If you're doing it through the mail it takes about 2 months and a larger fee (several hundred dollars).