Appreciating our Immigration System

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:14:54 GMT

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re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:14:20 GMT

High-skilled workers, from all backgrounds and from all across America and around the world, have made America’s high-tech companies the envy of the world. Their importance has not changed despite the dramatic changes in our economy. Talented and knowledgeable people are what America needs most to restart our economy and keep American companies at the forefront of the technology revolution that will transform health care, energy, and education in the years to come.

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:13:49 GMT

Harry, you should really read Brad's post and replies more carefully before lambasting him and his legal knowledge. Brad noted that Microsoft is applying for H-1Bs for many individuals who are in the US presently on soon to expire L1 visas and have not yet received their green cards since that process often takes longer than the 5 year L1 period. Considering your major fail your first challenge point, I pretty much stopped reading the rest of your long post since it is probably full of more inaccuracies since you stated a huge one just coming out of the gate.

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:13:15 GMT

Brad: I am disappointed that as a General Counsel you are not familiar with H-1B visa laws. Every point you make is flawed. [1] You said “a solid majority of our applications this year are for employees who are already working for Microsoft in the United States,..” [rebuttal] if they are already here on H-1B, then they are being renewed. Renewal does not count against the visa cap and so is not relevant to this discussion. Instead of renewing their visa, send them home and hire a qualified American worker. And we both know and understand what law firm Cohen and Grigsby said regarding the Labor Certification process: “the goal is to disqualify every willing and qualified American worker”. Every single study produced by honest think tanks shows H-1Bs make, on the average, 25 to 30K less than their American counterparts. [2] You said “so we can retain their talent and specialized skills in this country rather than risk losing them to a foreign competitor. “ [rebuttal] who are we kidding? Over 50% of H-1B visa workers seek the big carrot on the stick: the green card (which is the first step to citizenship). This is why they come to school here: (a) because the F-1 visa buys them time to clamor for a job with either the H-1B from the 65,000 cap, or from the special exemptions of 20,000 for higher degreed foreign students at American university – and every one of those 20,000 (repeat: every one) of these is snapped up on day one by them. The rest use their 1-yr OPT extension to buy more time to get companies like Microsoft to use one of their H-1B tokens to bring them aboard. Lose them to foreign competition? If that were true, they wouldn’t even come here in the first place. And by the way: the fact that half of graduate students are foreign temporary residents is exactly why the college education lobbyists clamor for more H-1B visas: it helps them keep their job. You know it, I know it, and it’s time others know it. The fact is that today, with obtainment of knowledge through self-training over the Internet, going to graduate school is a huge financial loss. The information learned there becomes outdated in three or less years. And the number of years it will take to make up the loss staggering and will take over 20 or more years to recover. You know it and I know it. Of course today this is no longer true – bright American IT workers graduating from college are finding they are being replaced by cheaper foreign workers. And older more expensive workers are being subjected to a subtle form of unprovable age discrimination (a common and natural occurrence which is unfair to the best and the brightest who happen to be old). [3] you said: “Microsoft and other U.S. companies must be able to hire top talent wherever it is located.” – it can be proved by the Discovery process in Human Resources and the immigration lawyers Microsoft hires. Verbally, these folks fear loss of their jobs by stating the unspoken knowledge of hiring cheaper workers. Skilled? The many F-1s coming here to attend graduate school are admitted to colleges which are middle-and-bottom heavy as far as the distribution of how stringent admission standards are in American colleges: that distribution is mostly in the 2nd through fourth quartiles – i.e., seeped in mediocrity. Furthermore, in India, there is a well-documented culture of cheating on standardized tests like the GRE, etc. It reached scandalous proportions a few years ago (American students are no better – they are seeped in their own culture of cheating – and many leverage that to prepare themselves to lobby and lie about these types of points you make). It takes courage to speak the irrefutable truth – and it will take foolishness to rebut what I am saying. Be my guest if you so choose. [4] You said: “these individuals make a vital contribution to U.S. technology and competitiveness.” [comment] I think it would be more important to say they destroy American workers jobs. As famous immigration attorney Joel Stewart himself discloses “As immigration attorney Joel Stewart infamously said, "Employers who favor aliens have an arsenal of legal means to reject all U.S. workers who apply" “ [5] you said: “While there are some glimmers of hope that American enrollment in computer science programs may be increasing, it will take years of sustained progress.” [rebuttal] American students are not stupid. Through the efforts of anti-shill activists like Norm Matloff (UC-Davis, subject matter expert on exposing H-1B shills), the Programmers Guild (John Mion, etc.), the Center for Immigration Studies, American students are being deprogrammed from the kind of brainwashing being spewed everywhere by shills like the pro-cheap-labor Chamber of Commerce (where you spoke), or the laughable “Compete America” consortium which Microsoft is a member of. The brainwashing is working – I met and spoke to Microsoft’s top lobbyists a few months ago and I saw that he genuinely believes what his higher ups are preaching. I was shocked. Perhaps you are among such folks yourself. Remember, people who have invested many years at a job begin to internalize the very beliefs they have been mind controlled with articles like yours or Compete America editorials, etc, to the point where it is difficult to prove them wrong – not only is their pride at stake, but what are they to do? Quit their job? What would you do? This is where and why Lord Aston came up with his famous saying in the late 1890s: “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely”. Regards, Harry [5] you said ” Contrary to popular belief, many H-1B filings are for employees who are already in the U.S. but who would have to leave the country in the relatively near future if they cannot secure an H-1B visa” [rebuttal]: again, check your facts – the fact is renewal is a rubberstamping process after 3 years and DOES NOT DOES NOT DOES NOT count against the H-1B visa cap. Period. Plain and simple. It’s shameful, in my opinion, that you either don’t know this or don’t say it straight out. That’s what I was referring to with “mind control”. After 6 years, they can get a one-year extension. Any time during those 7 years, their sponsoring corporation can INDEPENDENT OF THE H-1B VISA file for Labor Certification, a completely different issue but also subject to the lies that Cohen and Grigsby spewed on YouTube or Joel Stewart said. [6] You said ”In limited cases, an H-1B visa represents a new high-skilled employee coming to the U.S. to fill a role for which there is a continuing shortage of top-tier scientific and engineering talent.” [rebuttal] No rebuttal here – you spoke the truth. The very highly skilled worker you speak of is of a rare classification within H-1B and makes up less than ½ of 1 percent of all H-1B classifications. So saieth the government web sites. And notice that by speaking a truth here you actually contradict yourself in all those earlier statements where you talk about how highly talented they are. Or were you talking about those ½ of 1 percent H-1Bs all along? I don’t believe you did that – I recall you giving people the impression the vast majority of H-1Bs are among the best and brightest. [7] You said “Some critics have suggested that the H-1B program provides a way for U.S. companies to hire less expensive foreign workers instead of equally qualified Americans. This is simply not the case. The law specifically requires that H-1B workers be paid salaries that are at least equal to similar American workers. Microsoft supports strong enforcement of the H-1B rules and strong action against employers who violate the rules.” [rebuttal] for those who do not know it, the wages are said based on the level of qualification assigned to the candidate. So imagine a scale of Software Dveloper 1, 2 and 3 where 3 is to be paid the most. What stops you from labeling that developer of Level3 a “Level 2”? Or labeling a Level2 a Level1? There are other flaws. Nothing stops employers because we both know it is nearly impossible to prove and there are too many loopholes. But that is how it works. Want some indirect proof? When H-1Bs who are sponsored by a corporation finally get their green card and are no longer subjected to the de facto slave labor (wages wise), do you have any idea what the attrition rate is at that point? It’s been published – and it’s about 30%. I wonder why? Because they have been unleashed and are tired of being underpaid. During those 7 years of saving about $20 to 25K per year you saved over $150,000 – and if there is a sharp cookie among them you will bring their salary up to where it needs to be to hopefully retain them. 30%.. this would be unheard of in American corporations (and I am speaking about those “good” economic times). As Forrest Gump said: “I’m tired! I think I’ll go home now”. Harry

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:12:44 GMT

In my experience there are 2 types of companies hiring people on H1 Visas: The honest and the dishonest. There are honest companies such as Microsoft, Google, Oracle, etc hiring legitimate H1's, and paying proper wages, to complement their US work force. And there are countless dishonest companies (TCS, InfoSys, Wipro) using H1's as legal slavery to bring in people at low cost that they re-sell as consultants for 10x what they pay in salary. These companies are committing immigration fraud as they lie to the employees and they lie to USCIS on the wages they're paying. For an honest company paying legitimate wages, a US worker is always prefered to an immigrant for the simple reason that it's cheaper. (Immigration costs, relocation costs and legal fees are really high) For a dishonest company, an underpaid emmigrant is more profitable because even with immigration costs they can make money by paying less than what they should in wages. The system is clearly broken, but don't blame the legimitate companies like MSFT

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:12:00 GMT

Some H1Bs in IT are probably needed. But many of them are not being used for essential purposes, as other commenters have attested. There are many problems that have been affecting employment in the IT field, and H1Bs are just one of several off-kilter aspects. There are far too many people in IT who have a degree *and* experience *and* certification, who've had to go for months and months between proper jobs.

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:10:51 GMT

Bill Gates, there is a limited number of people capable of doing a certain job in America, and doing it to the best ability as compared to internationally. Paying these people higher wages is not really going to change that fact. You could argue that it'd make the occupation in the future more lucrative so students would educate themselves, but America already pays some of the highest wages on the tech sector, so such exorbitant costs would only decrease the competitiveness internationally in the future. Microsoft is not trying to artificially bring people in, YOU and the kin are trying to artificially keep people out, and say the companies must take the next best employee based on nationality, not talent.

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:09:40 GMT

No the US does not have a shortage of skilled workers. They do have a shortage of skilled workers willing to work for the low-end wages that tech firms are wanting to pay for skilled labor. Otherwise we would have H1B visas for all of those Mexican gardeners, landscapers and construction workers to they can fill the need for a shortage of landscapers and construction workers. What we have here is simple market manipulation by the likes of Microsoft. They do not want to pay the fair market wage (of tech workers physically present at this location) as determined by supply and demand, so they attempt to modify the market by artificially increasing the supply form a separate market.

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:09:09 GMT

Companies, like Microsoft, are profit centric entities. Their ultimate purpose is to make money. H-1B visas serve a purpose no one appears to have mentioned here- they keep the jobs in the U.S. instead of sending them overseas. For now, the infrastructure (buildings, networks, etc), leadership, and core talent are in the U.S. and it is cheaper, and therefore more productive, to bring the necessary talent to the U.S. than it is to move the infrastructure, etc. abroad. However, the calculus changes if companies become unable to avail themselves of the necessary talent. Microsoft and others already have a large presence in places like India. If they cannot bring the talent they need to the U.S., they may well bring the infrastructure and operational components to India, because the cost-benefit analysis changes when the forign talent needed to remain competitive cannot come to the U.S. While I certianly favor employing U.S. workers over imported labor, I would rather some foreign workers come to the U.S. than many U.S. jobs go abroad.

re: Appreciating our Immigration System

Anonymous — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:08:33 GMT

Your argument is that you do not care for a country you live in as long as long you make profits !! This is the whole attitude of mega companies and see where it took us. This same argument will bite you back when your Indian children who are born here like other Americans and have to face same consequences. Do you allow your son's or daughter's job is taken away from distant cousins from India at this time and may be in the future from some other land like Romania or Russia? Yes I agree the people who makes the argument against H1B do not have moral authority. Oakland few miles from Silicon Valley never felt any stake in their neigbour. The poor African American kids remained as spectators as the wealth passing by. India is closer to Silicon Valley than Oakland.. This moral atrocity is perpetuated by companies is unconscionable. I am sure some of the H1B haters did the same thing to those African Americans and did not apply their "nationalism" to them. They took easy route without taking responsibility of educating and training the community around them! I may be critical of H1 B hater's motivation but do not think I am on your side @subbu. If your comany has no customers that can not afford to buy your product, what good it is bringing people from other countries. Information has no meaning without sender AND receiver. Every one's else house is buring but as long as my house is ok is like emperor with out clothes!! clothes. Whatever the reasons and situations are , whites ,blacks, Indians, Chinese and Hispanic ... we are all bound together by destiny. Good neighbor, prosperous community and conscious country is good for all of us!!! PS: by the way I am an Indian...