H-1B Visas: do they cost American workers jobs?

[BrotherIvan]

I have been in several discussions lately where I've been told that H1B visas are not a problem for US workers. I have also been told there are laws in place that limit abuses.

In the spirit of turnabout is fair play, here is a recent comment

The link pertaining to HB1 Visas was Hillary stating she supported them for STEM jobs for Silicon valley and other tech companies.

I live in the Seattle area. My wife worked for a long time in Silicon Valley and then for Microsoft as a manager. There is a real problem with finding STEM qualified applicants in this area. MS has used the HB1 visa program to fill a good number of vacant jobs here. They are paid well. In addition, we have a booming job market here. Low unemployment, easy to sell a house, and great schools. So much for your sky is falling claims.

Secondly, in the exact same video she touts support for funding to improve the number of STEM qualified American graduates, and emphasizes the importance of the US generating it's own workers through government support for this type of education.

And she is exactly fucking right.

In my experience I have seen the industry where I work absolutely decimated by outsourcing and H-1B visas. People that were able to support their families have had to find other lines of work because of job loss and depressed wages (cuts up to 4/5 of original salaries). Jobs that once paid $80k-150k per year are now paid about $500 per week with no benefits and the workers are housed in dorms in Central California.

I know there are many people on this board in the tech industry, so here is the question?

Were you and others in the tech industry affected by H-1B visas? Or is it just some liberal myth that these are bad for US workers?

I guess that's two questions...oh well.

Here are some recent articles to back my argument.

http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-20150222-column.html#page=1

http://www.computerworld.com/article/2879083/southern-california-edison-it-workers-beyond-furious-over-h-1b-replacements.html

http://fusion.net/story/105274/outsourced-at-home-u-s-workers-pissed-at-h-1b-visa-program/

In 2010, there were nearly half a million workers on H1B visas in the United States, 18 percent higher than in 2001.
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/02/are-americans-losing-high-skilled-jobs-to-foreigners/

Let me say this, if I am wrong and H-1B visas are helpful to the economy or no big deal as posters are stating, I will be the first to admit it. If posters can present factual arguments as to why Democrats should embrace H-1B workers and prove that there is a lack of US STEM workers, then I will be very interested to hear it.

[hollysmom]

1. yes I post about it all the time,Ihave written my congressman, a republican and

he answered a non-answer. Corey Booker and Menendez are my democratic senators and neither answered me at all.

If the H1B were indeed being used for hard to fill jobs only, then there would be enough to fill those jobs, but as it is they are being used to fill any job where the pay can be cut, which is why companies like Tata are some of the largest right now.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. It is worst

your job in the entertainment industry, doing animation, IS A STEM JOB.

[winter is coming]

3. Anyone who doesn't think H1B visas are being abused to drive down salaries

is either a liar or a fool. The STEM shortage is, IMO, complete bullshit. Employers can't find workers with the exact skill set they need that day who are willing to work cheap. The idea that you should pay for talent is gone, as is the notion that you keep employees and train/retrain as needed. Like pretty much every other industry, it's all about cutting costs and making short-term profits so the suits can get their bonuses.

[arcane1]

5. Cheap AND disposable.

A righteous rant!

[winter is coming]

7. The thing is, it's incredibly short-sighted.

Long-range planning and long-term investments used to be an integral part of business strategy, because you generally need both to have a sustainable business. Now, it's all about buy-outs and chasing the cheapest labor around the world to maximize your bonuses. That's not sustainable. People need money to buy products and we will eventually come to the point where not enough people can afford the things that corporations are selling.

[arcane1]

9. As we reach the limits of "growth", it's damn near a day-to-day outlook at this point

[pscot]

20. That depends on who they're looking ot for

[hollowdweller]

26. You said that so very well.

I think we are coming closer to the point you mention now.

[BrotherIvan]

15. That is my experience is well

"A STEM shortage" really means, no one is willing to work for what little we want to pay. It is a ruse to drive wages to the bottom and put money in the owner's pocket. Nothing more. I'm so surprised that Democrats have fallen for the propaganda.

[hollowdweller]

27. Same here

But it's in the country in the wood products industry.

[Sun19]

47. Why are you such a racist? Why do you hate brown people?

They're just coming here for a better life, yada yada...

Yeah, when it hits everyone else's pocketbooks, they'll see how wrong they were about the manual laborers, too. But it didn't affect their job so it's just pure bigotry...

[hughee99]

73. There is a shortage of STEM workers willing

To work for what they want to pay. H1-b not only allows tech companies to pay workers less at the start, but also makes it far less likely they'll leave for a better offer in 6 months or a year.

[arcane1]

4. I haven't been personally affected, but my workplace is full of them

And it made me a little sick for having phrased it that way

There is this one awesome guy in my department, who started as a contractor 6 years ago, and has an H1B visa. Even though the contract with his agency said we have to either hire him or set him free after 1 year, we kept him on as a contractor for five fucking years by pretending he was being hired by different departments every year. We would make arrangements with other departments to handle the billing and paperwork for us, simply because we didn't want to pay what he was worth, but he was too damn good to let go. He was finally made a full-time employee a few months ago, but only because we couldn't scam his agency any more.

I realize that story was as much about outsourcing as it was visas, but my employer uses the hell out of contractors, and every one I have ever encountered has been on an H1B visa except for one. The over-reliance on contract and temp work is definitely also a problem. Off-shoring IT support is another one. Super-cheap though!

I hate to even talk like this, because it can so easily come across as anti-immigrant, but it isn't!

[BrotherIvan]

16. It isn't anti-immigrant

Your story goes to the heart of how employers take advantage whenever they are allowed. H-1B visas create a loophole. I would be perfectly fine for there to be legal immigration and for everyone to compete for the same job. But when you live in a dorm, knowing you will be returning to your home country, that pittance salary is worth a lot. And it's a salary that a person in the US can't live on. It's exploitation of both American and foreign workers. And there are quite a few abuse stories as well because and H-1B worker is powerless and afraid to be sent back or cut loose.

[Chathamization]

28. True. H1-B1's are anti-immigrant, for example, since you're only supposed to be eligible if you have

no intent to immigrate to the U.S. For regular H1-Bs, you can apply for a green card, but the process is a nightmare nowadays (for immigration in general, and for some reason no politician seems interested in fixing USCIS), and you'll probably need at least one if not multiple H1-Bs to complete the process.

In general I'm in favor of more open immigration, but the idea of only targeting individuals for certain industries, then telling them that we're happy to have them live and work here as long as they leave here after a few years, bothers me a great deal. And again, USCIS really needs to be fixed, but it seems that the powers that be are happy sitting around while things fall apart.

[hollowdweller]

29. Great example of the serious bullshit that is fucking up the middle class.

[gd770226]

6. I was affected

I worked for a small business for 17 years. The IT department was 4 people ( not counting the manager ). 2 were recent hires and were on H1B visas. Company lays off 25 percent of all employees in one day across all departments. I was let go because of my high salary and the two H1B workers were kept. 1 was given all my previous tasks after I was let go.

It's my understanding that once hired there is no differance between a US citizen and a H1B in terms of who they can fire. They don't have to let go of H1B before letting a citizen go. That part does not seem right to me and is one way that they get around the laws that are in place to try to protect US citizens.

I am also in NJ and see that another poster did not get a response from Senator Menendez's office. Doesn't suprise me, he supports every pro-immigration position out there. He is supposed to represent the citizen's of NJ first, but doesn't. I will never vote for him. He's lucky it is NJ and that there is nobody to run against him or challenge him in a primary.

[dreamnightwind]

19. Good post

and I agree that it's a problem, one that the left has done a poor job of talking about. Many of our politicians are not representing our interests in this area, and we're not supposed to say so because it's perceived as anti-immigrant. If they had to pay the immigrants on our pay scale it would be different.

Welocme to DU, and I love your user name! That was the Swing show, right? Used to have a tape of it, excellent show. I started seeing the Dead in '79 so I missed that one. My user name comes from China Cat.

Here's a video you might appreciate, or not, me & my buds playing some GD, I play the Jerry leads. Just clips from a fun rehearsal. Got the pix from an upload posted by Brent's widow (not sure if they were married, so widow may be incorrect) and used them for a slideshow, if you want them let me know (maybe send a private message so it's off thread, don't mean to hijack this one) and I'll dropbox them for you. Peace and welcome.

[madfloridian]

23. I have read of long time workers having to "train" their H1B replacements.

That would just kill me if that happened to me.

Nice post. Welcome to DU.

[X_Digger]

10. Telecom worker, checking in. Yes, H1B's depressed wages and cost jobs.

Verizon luuurvs them some H1Bs- they get to ditch US workers with nice benefit packages and honest-to-god-pensions, and pay a lower rate to infosys or tata for a worker absolutely terrified of not meeting expectations who will put in 80 hours a week for a 40 hour rate.

Our CIO, Shaygan Kheradpir (CIO at the time, that is) says on an open conference call, "Why the fuck can't you fix this? I can have a room full of high school kids from India over here next week and they could fix it." (He was a clueless moron about technology, but he was so surrounded by suck-up yes-men that when something was actually impossible, he became an insensate, incohate jibbering asshole.)

[arcane1]

13. Tata is one of the agencies my employer uses too.

Lately, having not apparently saved enough that way, they're getting addicted to trying to off-shore everything.

Even worse: they always discuss these things in terms of "this is how our peers are doing it, so we have to do it too"

[X_Digger]

14. Yeah, my response for that is- "That kind of thinking doesn't work with your kids, why here?"

The more-clever-than-you MBA types really don't like having their strategies exposed as adolescent reasoning.

[winter is coming]

17. Too many business decisions are made by people who don't understand the

business they're supposedly leading. True in general, but especially true for tech. I sometimes wonder if one of the reasons they try to get rid of experienced workers isn't just that they cost more, but that they're more likely to point out the time the company tried X and it was an epic fail.

[X_Digger]

21. They certainly don't understand what tech can do for them- which is okay..

.. that's what good analysts do- keep asking 'why' until you get to the core problem or need and come up with a plan to remedy it.

Right now I'm having to fight to avoid recreating in technology a process that's currently manual.

Why spend good money just digitizing a manual process? Nobody ever asks, "what are the things that we would like to do, but never could because it was a manual process.."

*sigh*

[BrotherIvan]

18. Absolutely

H-1B is a way to get rid of pensions and benefits as you cycle workers in an out on the same visa. The living conditions of the dorms I visited were substandard and people were sitting in pitch black dark (for effects you need maximum screen resolution) for twenty hour stretches. Work them to the bone then get a new one.

[crazylikafox]

60. Same here

OMG.. how true! Shaygan cost me my career years ago. Working in his department was a never ending nightmare. He drove the place into the ground. My job went to India, of course. I don't have time right now to elaborate, but I could go on for hours....

[Baitball Blogger]

11. Hell yes.

I know someone who does extremely well with those exams that determine programming skill level, and though he can pass them, including the Microsoft exam for techies, the only job he landed involved a company that uses a programming language that is nearly obsolete. I figure the good jobs are not being advertised, or headhunters are not really out there to help people find the jobs that won't become obsolete as soon as the company upgrades their software.

Don't ask me for the name of the program. This is about as much of the conversation that I could follow.

[BrotherIvan]

64. It's true, we have tons of talented people in this country who are probably working minimum wage

We need to help them get into skilled, well paying jobs!

[Baitball Blogger]

70. It's a heart break.

People are paying 50 grand a year in tuition to become skilled workers, and then shuffled into jobs that won't allow them to keep their skills sets current.

Something is very wrong here.

Obama, we could use your help.

[BrotherIvan]

71. Absolutely

We have the most expensive education and then no path to employment. We don't require employers to train their employees any more. We have a government that works for corporations, not for people. And it shows in just about every area. Education is always a sound investment. In any area where we need skilled people who would not have gone into the field otherwise or as a way to get the country moving into the future. That's what these H1B countries are doing because they know it is competitive

We have a shortage of
Doctors GP, child physicians
Nurses
Teachers
STEM Workers
Workers trained in new energy
Farmers trained in new growing techniques

The list goes on and on. I have no idea what our leaders see as the future of jobs in this country as our manufacturing base disappears. They keep promising that people will be trained in better technology and better paying jobs for the future, but that never materializes. So we have towns and cities that collapse when a factory moves out. We have students with an education that can't find anything but two minimum wage jobs. We claim to be at full employment while everyone knows that low wage jobs have replaced middle class ones. It's all bait and switch and I hope people are tired enough of it to actually do something about it.

[Baitball Blogger]

72. We also need to look at what is happening with the increased tuition in Education.

We are constantly told that an education can solve all our problems, so the tuition keeps going up and we keep paying the bills.

At some point you have to notice the obvious. Rising tuition is part of a racket.

[BrotherIvan]

74. That's why free state schools or improved access to community college is important

But we have no public trade schools. The European model has had them for a long time and Canada too.

Tuition doesn't need to cost anywhere near what it does so the deans can be paid millions. Rising tuition is a scary prospect and people are going into debt unnecessarily and then coming out without any real skills.

There's so many things we can do better in this country, and I fear that none of them will get done as we keep sliding into neo-feudalism.

[mia]

12. Probably true, except that sometimes US companies hire foreign interns to market products

to their home countries. I recently had a student from Taiwan living with me who was doing just that.

[Skittles]

22. of course they do

anyone who says otherwise is BENEFITING from that bullshit

[madfloridian]

24. I read that thread. Having H1B workers replace American workers can't be a helpful thing.

It simply can not be.

[BrotherIvan]

33. Here'e a solution that you might agree with: EDUCATION!

If there is a shortage of skilled workers, why not build trade schools that are subsidized the the corporations for tax credits or some other way? Why doesn't Bill Gates? Oh yeah, he wouldn't want to interfere with the meme that we don't have highly skilled workers.

Or when I worked for a corporation, they paid for law school or an MBA as long as you signed a contract that stated you wouldn't leave for three years after you got your degree. Probably a tax right-off for the company and cheap highly skilled labor for a few years.

Right now we only have vulture for-profit tech schools that don't teach anything. We have no path to become a lower level STEM worker or we saddle people with enormous debt for colleges. We don't beef up tech departments in public high schools. We as a country will fall very far behind if we can't produce STEM workers, and a steady flow of the most advanced people, ourselves.

Now that's an idea that this Democrat can get behind.

[liberal_at_heart]

35. These companies are not looking for skilled American workers. American workers expect a living wage.

Companies are looking for ways to cut costs on salaries. The best way for them to do that is to hire skilled workers from countries where the workers are used to much lower wages.

[BrotherIvan]

38. And this is the heart of the matter and why I oppose them

I am not against immigration by any stretch. I am against the exploitation of workers. And any Democrat who says H-1B visas are no biggie are woefully ignorant or just don't care. We are now hearing we're at "full employment" and yet anyone with two brain cells knows that higher paying jobs have been replaced by much lower wages. It's a race to the bottom and trade deals just grease the skids.

[liberal_at_heart]

41. I completely agree with what you are saying.

[BrotherIvan]

42. ...

[madfloridian]

36. I'm going to look up a post I wrote about the huge number of H1B teachers...

esp. from the Philippines. They are treated badly in many cases, and teachers here are out of a job.

[BrotherIvan]

39. I didn't know they were doing it for teachers

Because we don't have enough people that want to be teachers in this country or because we don't have enough people that want to be used and abused? Sheesh.

[madfloridian]

46. Here's an article...60,000 H1B visa teachers last couple of years.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/editorials/2013/06/11/your-child-teacher-victim-human-trafficking/dQz2fYPwg6Xkgt1aV6HaiL/story.html

First, a $50 interview fee. Then, $5,000 to process their H-1B guest worker visas. After they borrowed the money — a year’s salary in the Philippines — she demanded an additional, unexpected fee: $7,500. The teachers were shocked, but they paid, lest they lose what they had already invested. This whole pattern of exploitation, spelled out in court documents, didn’t stop there. Hours after they landed in the United States, she forced them to sign a contract agreeing to hand over 10 percent of their salary during their second year on the job.

...Since then, more than 60,000 H-1B visas have been approved for school teachers, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services data. There are 600 Filipino teachers who paid up to $8,000 each in fees to work in Baltimore schools. In El Paso, two school administrators were sentenced to probation for their role in a human trafficking case in which 273 Filipinos paid $10,000 apiece for teaching jobs, but arrived to find fewer than 100 positions available.

In East Baton Rouge, at least, the story has a happy ending. With support from the American Federation of Teachers and the Southern Poverty Law Center, Cruz and her colleagues sued Navarro and won $4.5 million. Navarro claimed bankruptcy, so they don’t expect the money. But the verdict means they are free. They don’t owe her anymore.

[BrotherIvan]

66. Oh my god, that's horrible

I have read of slave like living conditions and their traffickers keeping all their money. I cannot believe they have H1B for teachers! I guess for small or rural populations, no one wants the job. And with the rush to privatization and bleeding the education budget for every last cent, I should not be shocked.

Any person who supports the exploitation of workers just to back their candidate better check with their conscience.

[liberal_at_heart]

25. We must hold the Democratic leaders accountable on this. The Democratic party talks about

wanting to fund math and science in schools. They talk about wanting good wages for workers, but what do they do to prevent companies from using the cheapest forms of labor available? All they do is talk. Talk, talk, talk, talk. The time for talk is over. It is time to restore American unions and American wages.

[hollowdweller]

30. All they would need to do is pass a law.

That would add a tax that would make the expense to the company say, 20% higher than the average salary of workers. That way they would really be about filling hard to fill jobs because they'd be paying for it.

[liberal_at_heart]

31. good idea. I like it. Make it just as expensive or even more expensive to higher cheap foreign labor

than to pay living wages American workers should be earning.

[BrotherIvan]

34. Or they could "plant a tree"

That tax goes to funding schools to train STEM workers. Thereby filling all those open jobs they say they can't fill any other way.

[whereisjustice]

32. Watched H1Bs kill companies with low quality work, turn American workers into minorities

learn everything they can, convince CEO to layoff American workers and open offices in India - then head back to India to run the office, but just for a while before leaving to work at Indian company that is competitive taking trade secrets with them.

This is happening over and over and over.

[BrotherIvan]

37. In manufacturing it's called "third shift"

and it's becoming a huge problem. US companies are giving foreign firms their blueprints and helping to build the infrastructure and sourcing. Some foreign companies are then using this on what they call a third shift to make counterfeit, or in most cases, indistinguishable products. So the companies are losing their trade secrets because of pure greed and wanting the highest return for shareholders. It's not sustainable in the long term.

[BrotherIvan]

40. Unfortunately, the thread where this discussion originated has been locked

[Starry Messenger]

43. IT workers need to fix their allergy to the U word.

[hootinholler]

49. It is incredibly hard to unionize IT work.

IT is also a special class in FLSA and are exempt from overtime rules.

[Starry Messenger]

50. Where do the difficulties in organizing arise from?

My husband works in IT and would love a union. Most of his coworkers think the meritocracy fairies will handle everything.

[hootinholler]

52. We are not well covered by labor laws

Back in the day IBM was able to lobby for and got a carve out exemption from overtime in the FLSA.

Second, management pays fairly well, but not as much as we should get, it's hard to build steam for a union when that's the case.

Third, every IT position that I'm aware of is governed by an "at will" clause. We don't get a real contract that's called a contract, but the at will is clear, which allows the employee (organizer, striker, etc) to be summarily fired. We have zero protections from being fired for a strike, or from scabs being hired. Unless you can show an EEOC cause, you lose.

Fourth, it's a young crowd. Most don't understand what unions are all about. A few of us graybeards know and grew up in a time when everyone was unionized, not just service employees, etc.

[Starry Messenger]

53. Aren't most non-union jobs at-will?

I've never heard of any non-union job that wasn't at-will.

Contracts only come from organization.

Young workers and pay incentives generating indifference to unions are organizing challenges, but do result in the attitude about unions that I was referring to.

[hootinholler]

57. I don't think so

Most need cause under the labor laws. It's been a long time since I've been in that category, so things may be different now especially in right to work states, but my understanding is that you can't be fired for organizing. In IT you can be fired under at will.

[Starry Messenger]

59. People get fired for organizing in other jobs.

Lawmakers are trying to create a law to prevent it, but it happens. I've met some of the people fired for organizing.

http://www.jwj.org/fired-for-organizing-theres-a-new-bill-for-that

As of now, getting redress for getting fired unlawfully takes huge resources, so most low-wage workers who get fired for organizing (or any other reason) cannot get their jobs back.

[Marr]

44. It's had an enormous impact. I've watched it up close for 20 years now.

The tech industry is consistently hollowed out by this practice, and salaries held way down.

They also wreck the quality of work. Seriously, it just goes right through the floor.

[BrotherIvan]

45. It's how they pit workers against each other

They will even interview qualified people for the job, not even discuss salary, but then claim they need an H-1B visa. And each year they are allowed more, and because they last for three years, the number just grows and grows. And that's when they're not gaming the system. As I said, they were cycling out workers much faster or bouncing them around to different departments so their visa didn't run out.

I'm so tired of being told to swallow some neoliberal bullshit and smile. Enough.

[Scuba]

48. H1B Visas are a key element in the race to the bottom. Unfathomable that a Democratic ...

... candidate for President would support more of them. Yet as we see here ...

[1StrongBlackMan]

51. Yes, H-1Bs, not only cost, American workers jobs ...

(unless you subscribe to the belief that the work should work for whatever the employer is willing to pay), H-1Bs artificially depress wages, for everyone, and work to serve as a form of indentured servitude, where the foreign workers have little to no workplace protections/rights.

I've seen where H-1B workers were "required" to work 14 hour days, 6 days a week ("because the research protocol had to be closely and consistently monitored, and we can't afford another researcher"-said the Primary Investigator) for less than $40,000 a year.

Me to the PI: "I completely understand! Perhaps we should revisit your lab resource model ... maybe we can shift some of your $700,000 salary to fund 2 more researchers?"

[BrotherIvan]

67. Exactly

The system allows for too much abuse. God forbid someone reevaluate what a project actually needs and takes even a small percentage less. The place where I worked the principles were driving a Bentley and a Ferrari and one can only imagine how every penny was siphoned off while people were working 20 hour shifts at a flat 10 hour rate.

[JonLP24]

54. The bring down the overall wages -- not good for the H1B1 nor the American Worker

A H1B1 who founded a company was unable to work for it when he switched to the Student Visa. You bring in the worker, the competing wages or the term used for wages paid is artificial and that is if you're using the right one (I think there are 4 options) because the company has the H1b1 worker on this wage that can't leave Microsoft for Apple if they're offering better wages or benefits which the companies favor driving down the overall tech-related labor marketing not to mention the power over the worker and their less likely to revel in instances of fraud, abuse, or waste.

Companies began to favor the H1B1 Visa & lobby Congress for more -- don't buy the hype of needing to find & acquire the best talent to compete in a global economy like Bill Gates argued when he opened up Microsoft Vancouver as an idle threat of what he'll be forced too if they don't increase the cap.

If Bill Gates was genuine he'd ask for Green Cards which comes with full labor rights to transfer companies & there is a backlog of applicants from India & China. Something he could speak in favor of addressing. Plus, many companies train the H1B1 to later supervise an off-shoring plant.

H1B1 often reminds me of the overall shifting problem during a globalized economy in part of free trade is companies have significant freedoms to move around the around to find the cheap labor but labor doesn't have similar freedom to move around where the better wages are especially with many Western nation politicians campaign on xenophobic anti-immigration rhetoric under the cover for populist reasons. I think, we should be making an effort of either counter addressing this or moving to improve labor relations around the world because what it is bad for labor elsewhere is bad for labor here.

Because there are problems in China with some companies copycatting our manufacturing techniques & designs, Malaysia is more copyright friendly with manufacturing dominating their economy but the US wants copyright protections on steroids plus either them or Singapore has a thriving pharmaceutical sector -- I imagine US would like to take advantage of those networks with only certain companies allowed to market their drugs. You began to see the type of problems that are important for the US corporate states to address.

[Sunlei]

55. yes visa workers displace usa citizens from all the 'jobs' that traditionally used to be filled by

American citizens. Florida is a great example, all the seasonal resorts, large hotels, hospital staff are all foreign workers today.
Florida had the highest unemployment in America in about 2009 due to this change of importing 'worker crews' over about the past 20 years.

Some Foreigners even pay the contractors to get on the 'work in America' crews.

[DCBob]

56. Companies like H1-B workers because most are desperate, work hard, experienced and smart.

I don't like the program but I do understand the attraction.

[bettyellen]

58. Yes, and I am hoping Sanders brings the issue to national attention

[BillZBubb]

61. It is very simple really.

Supply and demand. If there is a "shortage" of candidates demand should lead to higher wages to fill the gap. It would incentivize more people to enter the field.

What the big money guys are doing, with the help of corrupt politicians, is to circumvent demand driven wage increases by creating an endless supply of cheaper alternatives.

If they were truly concerned about a national shortage of employable people in certain fields they, the free market advocates, would let wages rise and the supply of capable people would without a doubt increase to meet the demand. Instead they are doing just the opposite--they are holding wages down and dis-incentivizing people from entering those fields. So it is a downward spiral in US supply having to be augmented by more foreign hires.

[on point]

62. There is no shortage of US STEM workers. It is a myth.

And a scam. There are plenty of STEM workers out there, but companies no longer are willing to pay for training or for older workers. Existing staff know version x of some software, but instead training them on x+1 the companies fire them and then hire in only those who know new version, until they too are 'obsolete'.

Furthermore, by outsourcing so many jobs college students do not see the value in a STEM job knowing they will outsourced at any moment drying up the supply.

For every H1b worker hired companies should be required to pay into a training fund at twice the rate of the job so following year that H1b worker will not be required. That would ensure it truly covers only temporary needs, and the situation is fixed. Also takes away incentives for companies to use the scam


From Silicon Valley.

[BrotherIvan]

68. Asolutely on point (pun intended)

Employers getting into the H1B visa program MUST be forced to pay the difference in wages toward training and educating a US worker. That is the ONLY way to hold them to their word that they couldn't find a qualified applicant.

Unfortunately, though our leaders give lip service to the fact that they want to have Americans in those jobs, they don't actually do anything about it. They give a nice speech for the rest of us, then in the ballrooms and fundraiser dinners, wink and smile to their real constituents. It's a politicians job to make as much money as possible for their donors, plain and simple. All the rest is just theatre.

[lumberjack_jeff]

63. There seems broad consensus here that regulated (H1B) immigration costs tech jobs.

Why is the idea that unregulated immigration costs blue collar jobs dismissed as nationalism and racism? Doesn't everyone have a human right to come here and take jobs?

A cynic would suggest that it reflects a bias against american blue collar workers.

Besides... the way to increase american STEM degrees and limit H1B immigration is to tighten up education visas. The H1B workers were almost all educated in US schools.

[Throd]

65. I noticed that double standard too.

Imported workers cost me my IT job = legitimate complaint

Imported workers cost me my construction job = racist whining

[BrotherIvan]

69. The difference is that H1B visas are meant to make the person leave in 3 years

Undocumented workers live here and build roots. They pay taxes, even if they are being paid under the table, in the form of sales taxes. Their children go to school and grow up identifying as Americans.

What I do disagree with is not having a path for undocumented workers which is what employers want. They want to keep people scared and hidden. They steal from their paychecks and do every kind of dirty trick possible. I want to make sure that workers are not exploited which is an entirely different way of looking at it.

And I'm not sure what the answer is because I do hear construction is an area where Americans are losing jobs and wages are being pushed to the bottom with the use of undocumented workers. The only answer I can think of is raising the minimum wage to at least a living wage and then making sure every company complies or loses its license.

Any more ideas?

[on point]

75. Employers must pay a severe penalty if they hire illegal workers

First financial penalties (say 10x the normal rate of the job), then jail time plus penalties. Put them out of business.

I am sorry to say illegal workers (not here via legitimate means) should not be allowed to work. We should not support increases in immigration so employers can keep supply up (and wages down). Allow immigration, whatever their ethnic background (not relevant), only to the degree we stay at existing population levels (or better start to decrease population levels to better support sustainable world).

This is counter to current Dem meme, and a desire to rename facts - illegals, as opposed to undocumented, I know but is the reality. The current meme is not logical, sensible or sustainable. It has taken a reasonable desire to help the unfortunate and created an unworkable illogical process.

It is not possible to have open borders and still be a country. It is also not possible to enforce borders perfectly (or deal with visa over-stayers who are already inside). The only process answer is to take away the employers game to hire illegals (and yes they are illegal, not caught in some Kafkaesque bureaucracy where they can't get documents - they are NOT entitled to them. End of story). The employers want continued immigration, and especially illegals, so they can drive down wages, including for Blue collars.

This is NOT racist, it is economics.

I fully appreciate that many illegals are here for a better life, and may be desperate. The real way to help them is not to help them work in this country, the way is to help them in their native country improve working conditions and pay so they reach parity with us (not we decline to reach parity with them), so they don't need to come here. That means tariffs, NOT free trade, that will penalize countries with lowstandards.

[BrotherIvan]

76. It's very tough to say

I don't have all the answers, that is for sure. But as the child of an immigrant who came to this country for graduate school and then became a US citizen, I will not be the first to say we should close our borders. Nor can we. I do agree there should be stiff penalties for companies hiring undocumented workers. As I said, those workers are most likely to be exploited.

But the way we can handle the problem of scarcity of jobs is to create a booming economy. At true full employment (not employment in crappy low wage jobs) then wages go up. Why do you think corporations created this problem? They reap massive profits from it and it never has to trickle down.

In countries with better education and training, citizens are not competing with low wage workers for jobs to the same extent they are in the US. If we are truly to move onto this new economy everyone is promising, I'd like to hear what the plan is because I've never heard it. THEY WON'T TELL US. Because they're making back room deals while trying to claim the mantle of liberal icon. We're getting screwn every which way.

[on point]

77. Limiting to legal immigration is not same as closing borders

1. I too am a child of immigrants.
2. Sounds like your parents did it the legal way all power to them. (as did mine)
3. We cannot have 'open' borders where everyone who wants to come, can. Not same as limiting borders.
4. There is no labor shortage in this country that requires immigrants to work jobs here. Employers say that to increase supply so they can pay down wages. If they believe in supply and demand, let them increase wages for given supply.
5. The current economic system depends on ever increasing 'growth', in a limited system. This is a Ponzi scheme bound to crash. Growth has its limits and we are reaching the end. Therefore we must deal with limits, and that includes population limits. We should actively be trying to reduce populations worldwide to help the planet, given we are already past our sustainable footprint and drawing down on the 'principle' and not living on the 'interest'.
6. We need to help people in their own countries to raise the entire world up, and not just some lucky ones who make it to a developed country like the USA.
7. Of course the PTB don't want to discuss any of this, or deal with the reality because they internalize an ever greater share of profits in their walled off world, while externalizing costs and misery on the rest of us. It is not sustainable, no matter how high their walls are.

[Throd]

78. Very well reasoned points.

Sooner or later someone will show up to point out how horribly racist you are.

(sarcasm)

[BrotherIvan]

79. I largely agree with you

It would take a global shift in thinking as powerful countries treat poor countries as fields for fodder in essence. I honestly don't know how to fix it within capitalism. But I honestly don't see how the current system is sustainable.

I do really, really agree with you about population growth worldwide. It's a taboo subject to bring up, but we need to start talking about it. The idea of unlimited population growth and that multiplying is the only meaning in life is rooted in religion and superstition. There is a huge pro-natalism push in an effort to sell more products. We need to make huge cultural shifts in our ideas of reproduction and we need to do it now. Population at the current number is completely unsustainable, not to mention our lifestyle of lavish overconsumption. The fact that there is a television show celebrating a family with 19 children, I hope, will be looked on by future generations as the sick joke that it is.

[AzDar]

80. Yes.

eom