6 ms·

Why is there an implicit assumption that the H1B visa program engenders fraud? A lot of H1B discussions on HN focus on fraud and avoid talking about legitimate

by shas3 12y ago

Why is there an implicit assumption that the H1B visa program engenders fraud? A lot of H1B discussions on HN focus on fraud and avoid talking about legitimate talented foreigners because that stuff is not as interesting. H1B discussions on HN are like the crime beat in newspapers. Further, 'H1B' seems like a catchall term for hating on immigrant labor in the software industry. Here are some examples on HN that demonstrate bigoted generalizations and ill-informed hate on H1B-workers [1,2,3]. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8687804 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8687804 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8651850 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8651850 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8637756 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8637756

negrit 12y ago
The facts 6 of the top 10 H1Bs sponsor are: - Indian companies - Using cheap labor - Paying significantly less then other companies. - Responsible for almost 50% of all H1B applications Driving the salaries by immigration is an historical complaint worldwide. HackerNews or not.
- kd0amg 12y ago
  For more info, see: http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/pdf/H-1B_Selected_Statistics_FY2014_Q4.pdf http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/pdf/H-1B_Selected_Sta...
- _delirium 12y ago
  If the goal really is to enable highly qualified people to come to the U.S. (separate from the usual immigration process) wouldn't a fairly simple tweak just be to take the wage into account in the allocation? There's currently a fixed quota, with two things that go into allocating it: 1) offers not paying the "prevailing wage" are disqualified; and 2) the remaining offers are allocated in first-come, first-serve fashion until the quota is reached, with no preference to good vs. bad offers. Seems you could collapse those two issues by just saying: the 50,000 slots (or however many there will be) are auctioned off, or allocated in order of highest salary offer, or something similar. In theory the "invisible hand of the market" ought to then allocate the slots to where foreign talent is most needed, and the companies using it for cheap labor won't be able to outbid Google/etc. for the slots.
  - negrit 12y ago
    The wage is already part of the criteria for application. USCIS only accept application if the salary of the visa beneficiary is comparable to a US citizen salary doing the same job.
    - _delirium 12y ago
      I mentioned that part; that's the "prevailing wage" requirement in (1) in my comment above. I'm proposing prioritizing by wage beyond that, e.g. if there are 300,000 applications that meet the "prevailing wage" requirement, and 50,000 slots, instead of allocating the slots randomly or first-come-first-serve, allocate them highest-wage-first.
      - negrit 12y ago
        Then Facebook, Google, Apple & co could be the only one winning the hiring war. Sponsoring someone would be too damn dangerous and expensive for smaller companies and startups.
        _delirium 12y ago
        Sure, markets are an imperfect way to allocate limited resources. But is a lottery really a better way? At least markets would allocate the slots in way that bears some relationship to where the maximum demand in the economy for those workers is.
  - Spooky23 12y ago
    If that were the goal, the tweak would be simple -- give out more green cards to people with appropriate education. Let them come here and get jobs. These programs suppress wages for low-end computer positions. If you were around in the 90s at a big company/government, you'd run into old guys who made big bucks tweaking COBOL and Operator types tweaking Batch jobs. The whole point of COBOL was that you could teach the average bean counter to write it, so the answer to the problem of these guys retiring was to import cheap workers and automate. My grandparents all came to the U.S. from Ireland. No H-1 nonsense where you get tied to an employer, just plain immigration and a path to citizenship. It should be no different today.
unprepare 12y ago
Because we have major unemployment inside of the US. We also have the highest ever rate of Computer Science graduates.[1] Those two combined make the 'need' for foreign tech workers seem very suspicious. On top of questionable need, there are other facets of the program that are obvious areas of potential abuse (employer reported prevailing wages, employer sponsorship forcing employees to stay out of the competitive job market, etc) There may be some absolute need for the most talented people other countries have to offer, but there is little evidence that generic 'programmers' or 'analysts' need to be imported into this country when we have 4-5% of college graduates unemployed[2] (thats ~2 million people at least[3]) Or maybe everyone here is a xenophobe [1] http://www.geekwire.com/2014/analysis-examining-computer-science-education-explosion/ http://www.geekwire.com/2014/analysis-examining-computer-sci... [2]http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_501.80.asp http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_501.80.as... [3]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_United_States#Graduation_rates http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_U...
- balls187 12y ago
  > Those two combined make the 'need' for foreign tech workers seem very suspicious. Anecdotally speaking, it's hard find and hire good engineers in Seattle.
  - aceperry 12y ago
    So, would you have to go to India to find good engineers? And if you do, what is the interview process like?
    - balls187 12y ago
      We have an office in India that is staffed by a number of exceptionally talented engineers. Locally the talent pool is shallow, as most if not all the good engineers are well taken care of by their employers (as they should be). If you're lucky you'll contact one at the right time who is looking for new opportunities. If you're a Google, Amazon, or MSFT with deep pockets then you can pay to acquire talent. For others, it's not easy.
aceperry 12y ago
"A lot of H1B discussions on HN focus on fraud and avoid talking about legitimate talented foreigners" Not just on HN, but the discussions on H1B are similar everywhere. And just in case you don't understand the controversy, a lot of people believe that the H1B program is being misused and abused, to the detriment of employees here. If you don't agree with that, you should make your case instead of whining about the arguments. The links you cite don't point to any specific post, and I couldn't go through all of them to figure out which ones you consider bigoted. But if there are bigoted and hateful posts (which are wrong and I don't condone) I would disagree with you that most people here hate on immigrant labor.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
Spooky23 12y ago
Becuase it's a shady industry that exploits foreign labor and suppresses wages. A former employer employed J2EE devs for $25/hr from an agency, meaning the workers literally make about $15, and are basically indentured to their employer for the visa period
useonetimeacct 12y ago
> Why is there an implicit assumption that the H1B visa program engenders fraud I can offer this from personal observations: - I work with many clearly talented foreigners such as Indians here on H1B - But I've also seen entire floors of companies such as at Cisco and Ebay that are almost 100% Indian - This appears to happen when management positions are attained by Indians who only hire more Indians and contract with Indian-based outsourcing companies - The Indians in these companies are different than Indians who work at other companies that are not dominated by Indians, in that they tend to be of much more dubious ability. This leads me to believe that there is widespread fraud on the visa applications. - I've heard of under the table dealings among the same people where positions at companies are sold for thousands of dollars. All this leads me to be against the work visa program for spouses of H1B workers. I can easily imagine wives of Indians without skills creating fake resumes, and paying under the table to gain positions in Indian dominated departments. Almost guarantee this will be a widespread problem.

by shas3 12y ago

negrit 12y ago

The facts 6 of the top 10 H1Bs sponsor are: - Indian companies - Using cheap labor - Paying significantly less then other companies. - Responsible for almost 50% of all H1B applications Driving the salaries by immigration is an historical complaint worldwide. HackerNews or not.

kd0amg 12y ago
For more info, see: http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/pdf/H-1B_Selected_Statistics_FY2014_Q4.pdf http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/pdf/H-1B_Selected_Sta...
_delirium 12y ago
If the goal really is to enable highly qualified people to come to the U.S. (separate from the usual immigration process) wouldn't a fairly simple tweak just be to take the wage into account in the allocation? There's currently a fixed quota, with two things that go into allocating it: 1) offers not paying the "prevailing wage" are disqualified; and 2) the remaining offers are allocated in first-come, first-serve fashion until the quota is reached, with no preference to good vs. bad offers. Seems you could collapse those two issues by just saying: the 50,000 slots (or however many there will be) are auctioned off, or allocated in order of highest salary offer, or something similar. In theory the "invisible hand of the market" ought to then allocate the slots to where foreign talent is most needed, and the companies using it for cheap labor won't be able to outbid Google/etc. for the slots.
- negrit 12y ago
  The wage is already part of the criteria for application. USCIS only accept application if the salary of the visa beneficiary is comparable to a US citizen salary doing the same job.
  - _delirium 12y ago
    I mentioned that part; that's the "prevailing wage" requirement in (1) in my comment above. I'm proposing prioritizing by wage beyond that, e.g. if there are 300,000 applications that meet the "prevailing wage" requirement, and 50,000 slots, instead of allocating the slots randomly or first-come-first-serve, allocate them highest-wage-first.
    - negrit 12y ago
      Then Facebook, Google, Apple & co could be the only one winning the hiring war. Sponsoring someone would be too damn dangerous and expensive for smaller companies and startups.
      - _delirium 12y ago
        Sure, markets are an imperfect way to allocate limited resources. But is a lottery really a better way? At least markets would allocate the slots in way that bears some relationship to where the maximum demand in the economy for those workers is.
- Spooky23 12y ago
  If that were the goal, the tweak would be simple -- give out more green cards to people with appropriate education. Let them come here and get jobs. These programs suppress wages for low-end computer positions. If you were around in the 90s at a big company/government, you'd run into old guys who made big bucks tweaking COBOL and Operator types tweaking Batch jobs. The whole point of COBOL was that you could teach the average bean counter to write it, so the answer to the problem of these guys retiring was to import cheap workers and automate. My grandparents all came to the U.S. from Ireland. No H-1 nonsense where you get tied to an employer, just plain immigration and a path to citizenship. It should be no different today.

unprepare 12y ago

Because we have major unemployment inside of the US. We also have the highest ever rate of Computer Science graduates.[1] Those two combined make the 'need' for foreign tech workers seem very suspicious. On top of questionable need, there are other facets of the program that are obvious areas of potential abuse (employer reported prevailing wages, employer sponsorship forcing employees to stay out of the competitive job market, etc) There may be some absolute need for the most talented people other countries have to offer, but there is little evidence that generic 'programmers' or 'analysts' need to be imported into this country when we have 4-5% of college graduates unemployed[2] (thats ~2 million people at least[3]) Or maybe everyone here is a xenophobe [1] http://www.geekwire.com/2014/analysis-examining-computer-science-education-explosion/ http://www.geekwire.com/2014/analysis-examining-computer-sci... [2]http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_501.80.asp http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_501.80.as... [3]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_United_States#Graduation_rates http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_U...

balls187 12y ago
> Those two combined make the 'need' for foreign tech workers seem very suspicious. Anecdotally speaking, it's hard find and hire good engineers in Seattle.
- aceperry 12y ago
  So, would you have to go to India to find good engineers? And if you do, what is the interview process like?
  - balls187 12y ago
    We have an office in India that is staffed by a number of exceptionally talented engineers. Locally the talent pool is shallow, as most if not all the good engineers are well taken care of by their employers (as they should be). If you're lucky you'll contact one at the right time who is looking for new opportunities. If you're a Google, Amazon, or MSFT with deep pockets then you can pay to acquire talent. For others, it's not easy.

aceperry 12y ago

"A lot of H1B discussions on HN focus on fraud and avoid talking about legitimate talented foreigners" Not just on HN, but the discussions on H1B are similar everywhere. And just in case you don't understand the controversy, a lot of people believe that the H1B program is being misused and abused, to the detriment of employees here. If you don't agree with that, you should make your case instead of whining about the arguments. The links you cite don't point to any specific post, and I couldn't go through all of them to figure out which ones you consider bigoted. But if there are bigoted and hateful posts (which are wrong and I don't condone) I would disagree with you that most people here hate on immigrant labor.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

Spooky23 12y ago

Becuase it's a shady industry that exploits foreign labor and suppresses wages. A former employer employed J2EE devs for $25/hr from an agency, meaning the workers literally make about $15, and are basically indentured to their employer for the visa period

useonetimeacct 12y ago

> Why is there an implicit assumption that the H1B visa program engenders fraud I can offer this from personal observations: - I work with many clearly talented foreigners such as Indians here on H1B - But I've also seen entire floors of companies such as at Cisco and Ebay that are almost 100% Indian - This appears to happen when management positions are attained by Indians who only hire more Indians and contract with Indian-based outsourcing companies - The Indians in these companies are different than Indians who work at other companies that are not dominated by Indians, in that they tend to be of much more dubious ability. This leads me to believe that there is widespread fraud on the visa applications. - I've heard of under the table dealings among the same people where positions at companies are sold for thousands of dollars. All this leads me to be against the work visa program for spouses of H1B workers. I can easily imagine wives of Indians without skills creating fake resumes, and paying under the table to gain positions in Indian dominated departments. Almost guarantee this will be a widespread problem.