How the 'Tech Worker Visa' Is Remaking IT In America 436
theodp writes "Back in 2008, the Department of Homeland Security enacted a controversial 'emergency' rule to allow foreign students earning tech-related degrees in the US to work for American employers for 29 months after graduation without a work visa. The program would allow US companies to recruit and retain the 'best' science and tech students educated at the top US universities, explained Microsoft. But two-and-a-half years later, it turns out the top US universities are getting schooled by less-renowned institutions. Computerworld reports the DHS program is dominated by little-known, for-profit Stratford University, whose 727 approved requests for post-graduate Optional Practical Training (OPT) STEM extensions tops all schools and is more than twice the combined total of the entire Ivy League — Brown (26), Columbia (105), Cornell (90), Dartmouth (18), Harvard (27), Princeton (16), Penn (50), and Yale (9). In second place, with 533 approved requests, is the University of Bridgeport. In another twist, the program's employers include IT outsourcing and offshoring 'body shops' like Kelly Services, whose entities snagged about 50 approvals, more than twice the combined total of tech stalwarts Google (15), Amazon.com (2), Yahoo (2), and Facebook (3)."
Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:3, Insightful)
"Back in 2008, the Department of Homeland Security enacted a controversial 'emergency' rule to allow foreign students earning tech-related degrees in the U.S. to work for American employers for 29 months after graduation without a work visa.
While citizens who could use the training and work, are given the short shaft, thanks to various loopholes in need of closure. They have the skills, it's time we made companies actually recognize that.
Think about it before you throw your exception to the rule about a specific thing not being found.
The program would allow U.S. companies to recruit and retain the 'best' science and tech students
Bullshit. We have all the people we need, we just aren't willing to engage in fraud. Businesses however, are.
But two-and-a-half years later, it turns out the top U.S. universities are getting schooled by less-renowned institutions. Computerworld reports the DHS program is dominated by little-known, for-profit Stratford University, whose 727 approved requests for post-graduate Optional Practical Training (OPT) STEM extensions tops all schools and is more than twice the combined total of the entire Ivy League -- Brown (26), Columbia (105), Cornell (90), Dartmouth (18), Harvard (27), Princeton (16), Penn (50), and Yale (9). In second place, with 533 approved requests, is the University of Bridgeport. In another twist, the program's employers include IT outsourcing and offshoring 'body shops' like Kelly Services, whose entities snagged about 50 approvals, more than twice the combined total of tech stalwarts Google (15), Amazon.com (2), Yahoo (2), and Facebook (3)."
This might be the real story. Either the fraud's moved over to those universities, or the fraud shops got seriously blindsided.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:5, Insightful)
We have all the people we need
I'd kind of prefer if the US had more smart people, even if we have to import them...
hmmm (Score:2, Insightful)
This reminds me of the Stephen Colbert + Mexican farm workers demonstrating how even when offered US workers didnt take the farming jobs. It is not that Americans dont have the skills - it is just that the ones with the skills didnt want to do the back breaking work for the pay offered.
IT consulting is a legitimate need. You may not think so - but most companies dont want a hoard of IT employees. Most of them want a few dozen when starting on some boring implementation (Say Oracle ERP.. or SAP), and once done - they want these dozens to leave. They dont want to train them - they want consultants who can come do the job and then leave. Google etc. do cool stuff and get the best - unfortunately such jobs are few - most IT jobs are now boring jobs which involve pedestrian work.
Most americans want to join Deloitte and Accenture and become 'Functional Consultants' not coders - or they want jobs where they can code something interesting - and at a good wage. They get paid a starting salary of 60K-70K to be analysts who neither program, nor know the applications. All the boring coding is done by Kelly services or other 'body shop' consultants who are here on H1B or F1-Opt, and they get paid around $40-50K. These jobs which involve travelling 4-5 days a week, coding something in PLSQL or JAVA or even just testing are not usually taken by Americans because most americans CS grads want a 'programming cool stuff' job without any travel.
Give these indians and chinese H1Bs.. or watch the coding completely move offshore. Virtualization and companies like oDesk have already provided enuff technology to make coding offshore completely viable. Then - the result will be what happend with manufacturing - nothing here at home! You cant expect to get paid 2x-4x for similar skills and productivity.
As long as mexicans are required to pluck fruits in Cali... you can be sure there will be indians here to do testing and boring IT coding. And just like a Stanford degree doesnt help much in plucking fruits - ditto with basic dirty IT jobs - you need warm bodies ... not ultra innovative geniuses to do the job!
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd kind of prefer if the US had more smart people, even if we have to import them...
So would I, but this program doesn't accomplish that. It just gives the offshoring companies a couple of years to train the "graduate" before sending the job to Asia.
Been there. (Score:5, Insightful)
The contractor that Serrano trained at IBM was from China, but Serrano didn't know her immigration status. And despite having to train her replacement, ...
I had to do the same thing at another company and he was the one who asked me what the '*' by variables mean and "what's a pointer?"
That's why when I hear some big shot at Intel, IBM or any other big corp says that they are hiring overseas because 'they can't find qualified Americans", I have to go off and mumble "Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit. Bullshit. ... "
Just tell the fucking truth. They want cheaper labor. That's why as Indian salaries go up, they move to other countries.
Nope. It's corporate America. How do you tell when a PR person is lying? Their lips move.
Of course the economists will say this is good for the entire economy. Really? Then why have real wages been stagnant for over a decade - for everyone?
Go up the food chain? How can we when even the upper food chain jobs are leaving. Except of course upper management. But that will change. Some foreign based company without the obscene upper management pay of IBM or Intel is going to come in and eat their lunches - you'll see.
I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:5, Insightful)
How about we eliminate H1-B and L-1 visas and start hiring Americans again?
The economy is going down the tubes because greedy corporations aren't willing to pay a living wage. They don't even want to hire Americans, because the indentured servitude of the H1-B visa is too attractive to them. This is the primary reason why the middle class is shrinking: there aren't that many good jobs left (unless you're an ivy-league child of the rich, in which case "daddy" or one of his friends will make room for you somewhere).
Between the end of WWII and the start of this outsourcing nonsense, spending by the middle class was the engine that drove our economy. Now that the middle class is in rapid decline, corporations are trying to expand third-world markets to preserve their profits. So Congress is writing love letters to India and China by doing things like expanding foreign-worker visa programs.
This in turn is eliminating any desire for young people to study science or technology. Why should they, when all those jobs have moved overseas or are being handed out to visa holders? The kids are going to study law or business, things they can use in a third world economy (i.e. the future America).
The corporations are run by idiots who think the executive levels are the only important parts of the corporation to keep in the U.S. They are going to find out the hard way that they should have kept their tech staff on board, when India Inc. and China realize that they can manufacture their own executives TOO. All they have to do is drop-kick American corporations out of the country, and replace them with home-grown alternatives. This will happen within a decade, I think.
By then, there won't be ANY Americans bothering to study STEM subjects in our schools -- it'll be nothing but foreign kids, who will go right back where they came from when they graduate. We Americans are already a minority in graduate programs here. And it'll simply be too late. The professors are all foreign. The kids are all foreign. When they all go home, we won't have anything left at all.
It's all so pathetic. Rich people are so petty and stingy they're destroying their own future to make a little extra bread in the present. If they weren't destroying our future as well, I'd wish them bon voyage, but as it is they're taking the whole country down the tubes.
The only ones among us who will still know anything are hobbyists and small-scale manufacturers and hackers. And we aren't going to be inclined to try and help the corporations when they finally realize they need us.
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't this just a free market? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's amazing how Slashdot's usual libertarian attitude to just about everything develops a strong protectionist bent as soon as American tech jobs are on the line.
extinct - made in usa (Score:3, Insightful)
how about starting by moving the manufacturing sector back to the USA, it will definitely create millions of more jobs (compared to a very few thousand in IT) leading to a flourishing middle class and turn the economy around like a miracle... when was the last time you saw something made in u.s.a.?
Like the old saying goes - penny wise pound foolish, there are bigger things we should be worrying about..
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:3, Insightful)
That's true, but the idle rich tend to not take technical courses... It's a safe bet that Ivy League CS are smarter (on average).
But that's tangential; even if intelligence were the same, the training is totally different. These private mills are turning out day laborers (of whatever intelligence) and, as the original poster pointed out, not a whole lot of them.
Still, that there is more demand (in raw numbers) for code monkeys than theoretical computer scientists in the DHS (which I can imagine is a true bastion of intellectualism...) shouldn't be particularly surprising to anyone. It follows immediately that a program for generating the former would be more successful.
If one were from Mars, it would seem a little bit strange that the US is running a welfare program (DHS) whose principal recipients are private companies and foreigners, but for anyone living here it ought not be surprising.
Re:...because they'll work for even less than wome (Score:3, Insightful)
Dude. Nuclear stuff would be top secret - meaning foreign scientists wouldn't be allowed to work on them.
Uh, dude, nuclear weapons were largely developed by foreign scientists in America.
Re:Isn't this just a free market? (Score:5, Insightful)
it's easy to have ideals, until it starts costing you.
Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:5, Insightful)
And it is even worse if that student wants to visit their birth country while studying here or immediately after finishing. I know someone from an Eastern European country who did her PhD here and was told if she went back to see her family after finishing she would not be allowed back into the US for 6-9 months minimum. She has spoken English since she was about 3 years old. Why should we punish her for doing her research (and contributing to American science) here?
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:5, Insightful)
Note that I absolutely agree with you.
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:3, Insightful)
No, but your chances of being able to afford it would've been significantly less. Good for you that you were motivated to bust your butt to get in. But for every Ivy League student, there are a hundred other students who are just as smart who are attending other schools because they couldn't afford the tuition.
What I object to is the implication (as embodied in the post I responded to) that Ivy Leaguers are somehow automatically better than everyone else.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:4, Insightful)
You're correct about the effect but mistaken about the motivation.
... at that point only one thing remains: political power.
Yes, the ruling elite in America are destroying the middle class. No, they aren't doing that because they're stupid or can't figure out what that will do to the country. Destroying the middle class has taken generations of effort that is only just now coming to fruition.
They're acting in their own long-term interests, as usual. You see, when you already have a stranglehold on most of the wealth in a country, and can already buy anything you please, and can already secure the financial future of your great-great-great grandchildren, and you still aren't satisfied and you still want more and more and more
A strong, independent middle class is a gigantic barrier to this. When most of the country's population is a strong, independent middle class they want government to take care of what is reasonable and then to stay out of their lives and their wallets as much as possible. For those who don't think the US Federal Government is already more than powerful enough, that won't do. It won't do at all. People who can house themselves, feed themselves, and take care of their own children don't want the kind of "help" (dependency) that government can offer. People who have not just material and financial independence, but an independent spirit, well to the elites they also have this annoying habit of not easily cowering in the face of every little crisis.
For those reasons and many more, a society like that is easy to govern but incredibly difficult to rule.
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:0, Insightful)
I find it hard to believe that there are not enough smart domestic students who could use a scholarship.
I don't. Not after seeing the people that come in to interview for job openings.
Look, kids, it's just like /.'s view of musicians and the RIAA: the world doesn't owe you a living working in IT just because you want it. I hire the best I can get and if some non-American is better than you, I'm going to get them a visa and hire him/her without batting an eyelash.
Re:hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Incidentally, most cities have places you can go to get day labor work. The WSJ did an analysis a few months ago of the kinds of jobs that are available now. They found that there are lots of jobs for unskilled workers, and lots of jobs for highly skilled workers (like programmers), but not much demand for medium skilled workers (like middle managers). And that matches my experience. If anyone is having trouble finding a programming job, it is because A) they suck, B) they have no clue how to find a job (one of my friends is like this: every time he goes in for a job interview he tells them he doesn't want to work hard. And yet he still has an ok job....at a university). or C) you are looking in the wrong place. You won't find many programming jobs in Modesto, California.
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:4, Insightful)
People are very anti-immigrant in the US (and elsewhere as well). Especially if the immigrants in question have dark skin.
Sorry we haven't gotten over old prejudices so easily.
US Science really took off when we imported all those Germans during and after WW2. This made the US the technological leader of the world.
Maybe we shouldn't listen too much to old prejudices and do what is better for the country: attract the best minds, it doesn't matter what skin color they have.
Re:Been there. (Score:5, Insightful)
'they can't find qualified Americans"
They aren't lying, they just aren't saying the rest of that phrase, "for what we are willing to pay."
It aint all about the money (Score:5, Insightful)
While foreign IT workers come cheap, I don't think that is the biggest draw.
They are deportable indentured servants, who are dependent on their sponsoring companies for their right to pursue a visa and remain in the US. Companies like employees who will put up with anything, and not complain. I doubt that they have the same labor rights as citizens, and even where they do, are they going to try to enforce them against their sponsor? And how would they go about enforcing any rights they actually have after they've lost their right to live and work in the US?
Importing labor doesn't just import a worker, it imports entirely new labor rules.
But more importantly, don't think of a corporation and treat it like it is one entity with integrated goals.
Sub contracting firms provide one big advantage - huge opportunities for kickbacks and corruption. If your company hires individual citizens, it's unlikely that kickbacks are paid, and they're certainly difficult to concentrate. Sure, friends, family, and former coworkers get hired, but that is more an issue of limiting risk through trust and knowledge. But if you subcontract a dozen positions to a head shop, the relationship with the headshop is now associated with a continuing revenue stream that is worth a good chunk of change, and those who make the decisions about the relationship with the head shop have concentrated power over that revenue stream.
So if you're a crook and in a position of power to make the decision, do you want to hire a bunch of random citizens, or do you want to have a relationship with a head shop where a fat revenue stream is entirely dependent on your decisions of which head shop to choose?
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:2, Insightful)
Remember folks, "just following orders" is a perfectly valid excuse as long as you're not working for the Nazis.
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not the ones who are the best who are the problem. Maybe 1% of the H-1Bs are among the best. The other 99% are code monkeys who went to the local equivalent of a tech school, know barely enough Java or whatever to get by, and have resumes "enhanced" by agencies who specialize in such things (because their qualifications are foreign, they are unlikely to be verified by a US company). This has all sorts of bad effects, including cutting off the bottom rungs of the ladder for American grads. Why hire an unproven new grad from a non-top-10 school when for the same price or cheaper, you can get an H-1B with "5 years experience" in anything you like?
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:3, Insightful)
I know someone from an Eastern European country who did her PhD here and was told if she went back to see her family after finishing she would not be allowed back into the US for 6-9 months minimum. She has spoken English since she was about 3 years old. Why should we punish her for doing her research (and contributing to American science) here?
Going a bit off topic here, but as a FYI ...
My understanding (from personal experience) is that once you open an application, you are not[1] allowed to leave the country until it's finalised. The length of time for the process (whatever form it takes) to run its course is highly variable, and it isn't at all unusual for it to exceed statutory or reasonableness standards (think 15 years for a green card and you'll get the picture). However, one can put through a parole request (yes, the form really does say PAROLE OF AN ALIEN or some such nonsense in all caps and in bold at the very top). If granted, you are allowed to leave for a short duration. IIRC, it's a "once-only for family emergencies" type of thing.
As for fast-tracking those coming to the US for doctoral research, tbat's an excellent idea. In the interim, however, I'd happily settle for not seeing high school honour students detained or deported for immigration violations^H^H^H^H^H^H paperwork errors. The system is rife with inequities, and the climate so political, that I see little hope for any sane merit-based policy to prevail.
-----------
1. Actually, you're free to leave at any time, but doing so typically terminates your application, leaving with you no practical hope of obtaining legal residency in the future.
Re:Isn't this just a free market? (Score:1, Insightful)
The H-1B program causes foreigners to serve as indentured servants. If they want to switch jobs, they have to get the new employer to sponsor their visa, *and* their green card application resets. Nobody is willing to lose five years of waiting on a green card, so they won't switch jobs. So they'll put up with any conditions. It creates an uneven playing field.
If you gave H-1B workers green cards, or at least let the apps not reset if the employee switched employers, it could be a reasonable thing. As is, it makes Americans compete with slaves, and employers prefer having slaves.
It's entirely possible to take a principled stance against the system for other than selfish paycheck related reasons, it's downright inhumane as it is implemented.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:5, Insightful)
"IT worker shortage"
Marketing-speak to English translation: The market is full of highly experienced and expensive talent. We're looking for cheap talent, and nobody wants to work for what we're paying.
See also: Teacher Shortage; Pilot Shortage; Nurse Shortage; [________] Shortage.
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:3, Insightful)
Mod parent up. There was a good article posted here on slashdot recently where Fareed Zakaria in Time magazine makes the argument that often the best and brightest come from other countries to get trained at American institutions, only to go back to their home countries and make technological innovations that benefit those societies. We should be doing everything we can to keep those smart folks HERE so the US can more directly benefit from their intelligence and work ethic (example - see Vinod Khosla).
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:1, Insightful)
Your so absolutely right, its better to import these lowly Indian and Chinese techs to do work that Americans can do. If its something we cant do, if they are adding something to our country I have no issue with it. We have people come here and take jobs that we can do, that we have people ready to do, that are educated enough. If you have 300 American qualified applicants, and one qualified Chinese applicant. Well for fucks sake, pick an American.
I don't care if they are Indian, Chinese, German, Sudanese, Irish, Brazilian, or Mexican.. I don't care what color their skin is. Shouldn't we give our own citizens a job before we pass them out like candy to some low waged, non English speaking, minimally trained, shipped over candidate? (note: there are plenty of dark skinned citizens who need jobs as well)
If they are truly the best and the brightest, indeed invite them over, if they want to stay give them citizenship. We don't need to hand out citizenship to every one who can manage a web page, or write an applet. We have plenty of citizens who can handle that.
Don't try to boil this down to racism. This is us fighting for our life, fighting for a job to make money to live. If all the republinazis want to ship the jobs overseas, then they shouldn't be allowed to bitch when they have to pay for food stamps.
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:3, Insightful)
I disagree. Most of the reactions on /. sound like they're not against immigration, they're against the current corporate masters from abusing the H1B and what not programs to ARTIFICIALLY DEFLATE the salaries of citizens and, if anything, fast-tracking PhD candidates to citizenship would do wonders to help alleviate those salary discrepancies.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Been there. (Score:3, Insightful)
It's a case of the free market that they use to justify no oversight being inconvenient when it comes to hiring talent. They need to ship people in on the H1-B visa as a way of adding additional competition, not as a way of filling positions that would go unfilled.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:3, Insightful)
How about you cut this 'anti-legal-immigration' crap and fix illegal immigration instead?
I am a legal immigrant. I came to the US more than 10 years ago and had two master degrees in an Ivy League school. It took me about 3.5 years to get a greencard, and I considered myself bloody lucky. Many people waited for more than 5 years and counting.
While at the same time, all the politicians are talking about 'comprehensive immigraiton reform', the core of which is to give ILLEGAL immigrants a legal path. Great, nobody really cares about the legal ones and how to help THEM get permanent residence in the US, which is good for both the individual and the country.
10 years ago, most of us who came to the US to study wanted to stay. 10 years later, many of us actually prefer going back. So, there is no need for you to shout 'go back to XXX', they'll make their own choice, but do you really think that's good for the US that it's no longer the No.1 place talented people want to go?
Re:Ivy League schools... (Score:3, Insightful)
We couldn't count on obtaining an H1-B and had to turn down a few very talented people. And, no, at the time we did not find as many U.S. citizens available.
Maybe that is because smart American's would have to stupid to study for a STEM career. US companies are offshoring as many STEM jobs as they can, and what jobs can not be offshored, are being filled by guest workers. Do you really expect that Americans would get an MSEE, only to train his/her H1B replacement two years later?
When US companies stop offshoring/inshoring at furious pace, and start hiring Americans, then maybe the field will be attractive to Americans again.
You are complaining about a situation that you are helping to create.
FACT: less the 25% of IBM employees were born in the USA.
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:5, Insightful)
There really isn't any racism involved with it. It would be totally different if the applications weren't based on a quota system but required the corporations to demonstrate that they couldn't find the qualified individuals after a good faith search.
Re:I'm not interested in where these students go.. (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not a case like with agriculture where by the time you can prove that you need guest workers the season is over. There at least is a quasi legitimate problem in need of solving. This is a case of companies using the H-1B visa to artificially deflate wages while claiming that they can't find qualified applicants here. If you don't believe me, look at the job requirements they post. They tend to inflate them way beyond what the jobs really require just so that they can claim that they looked and couldn't find anybody.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:H1Bs aren't cheap, don't take up American jobs (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think there is a single qualified and skilled American who is unemployed in sectors where H1Bs are applicable.
You clearly do not know what you are posting about. I could introduce you to a woman who has twice had to train her H1B replacement, even though nobody denied that she was doing a good job. Now, she is unemployed again because her entire department was offshored - which is the end game to all this H1B non-sense.
And in case you have not heard, US tech workers were laid off by the hundreds of thousands in 2009. Practically every major tech employer laid off thousands of US workers. And the USA is suffering it's worse unemployment since the great depression.
Re:Scary aliens (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a *constant* shortage of good people.
I'm sorry, but the only explanation is that you don't want to pay enough. The idea of a *constant* shortage makes no sense. It defies the basic laws of economics.
If there was a real shortages, then wages would spike up sharply (which has not happened since 1999 btw), that would attract more people to field, and everything would normalize.
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:3, Insightful)
I think that's a point that a lot of the upper class and other folks that go to those schools fail to grasp. It's a luxury that a lot of folks don't have to spend that much time with nose stuck in a book doing homework.
Some of us had to settle for an equally good education at a state school that we could both get into and afford because we were too busy picking up the slack for our parents as kids.
And even I getting the degree at all have to acknowledge having it easier than some others, that didn't live to see 22 let alone 18 for their high school diploma.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:3, Insightful)
Between the end of WWII and the start of this outsourcing nonsense, spending by the middle class was the engine that drove our economy
Between 1860 and 1930, immigration was the engine that drove out economy...perhaps we should go back to allowing easier immigration so we can attract the best workers of the world again.
After WWII, the destruction of Europe's industries was what drove the US industrial economy. Once Europe recovered, we had little manufacturing advantage, only a slightly better sense of selling consumerism to a global marketplace.
Re:No. It's the hypocrisy. (Score:4, Insightful)
Theoretically that's how the free market is supposed to function, if you're not offering enough pay and benefits to attract workers you have to either raise your offer or do without. None of this pulling in folks from over seas because you don't feel like paying a living wage.
Considering that a lot of those firms are receiving tax incentives from the government to be here, it seems to be lacking any sort of gratitude for the perks.
Re:Immigration (Score:3, Insightful)
So, let me see if I got this right: you're -against- allowing educated college graduates to stay in the US and perhaps immigrate because they're merely generic graduates not ivy league graduates?
US companies claim they need more H1Bs because the H1Bs are the "best and brightest." In fact, they use that very expression in practically propaganda article that they use to flood the pop-media. But, now it seems that the truth is: H1B's are just ordinary people, doing ordinary jobs - jobs that could be done by US STEM workers.
BTW: if the H1B nations are so full of geniuses, then why don't they have anything to show for it? Are why isn't the O-1 visa enough for the H1B hogs?
Re:Data viewer + entry must have been outsourced (Score:3, Insightful)
There are 75K openings on Dice right now. 20K over 2 years is a drop in a ocean.
There are 75k listings on Dice. Most of those are duplicates of the same job listed by 3 or 4 different head hunters. So you are talking more like 25k unique listings. Then you have to count out the listings that are in place specifically to meet the requirements that allow the company to hire foreign works, by creating unrealistic requirements. This ranges from asking for more experience than is possible (10 years experience with something that has only been around for five), or setting unnecessary requirements (Master Degree required for a job that can be accomplished by a high school drop out).
Now I don't know the actual numbers, but if you take the time you will find out that your short analysis is certainly far from accurate, or even useful.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:5, Insightful)
Forgive me for stating the obvious, but if you're still at college, look for internships, part time work and graduate roles, where experience isn't a criteria. If you're out of college but looking to change careers, or just plain out of a job, volunteer with local NGOs, charities and associations. You might not get the 3 years experience they're looking for exactly in the roles you want exactly, but often you can get your foot in the door with less experience but a demonstrated ability to go out and chase opportunities yourself.
And remember at all times, the criteria listed is for "ideal" candidates, so if the same job is still listed a month later, chances are if you hit some of the requirements you're in with a pretty strong chance - basically, don't let the listed requirements put you off.
It's not just remaking IT... (Score:2, Insightful)
It's gutting engineering and science in general, not just IT.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:3, Insightful)
None of the jobs I saw specified anything to do with sallary, nor was sallary specified anywhere by me. If they wanted someone cheap, they should stop preteding and just go hire some Indians or Chinese and get it over wirh.
Re:hmmm (Score:1, Insightful)
Which is why I advocate increasing the number of work visas. I make enough, let's spread the wealth.
Case in point, YOU have the wealth. many of us americans do NOT. we should have prio access to any job on american soil before any immigrant, legal or otherwise.
Re:hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)
and most american employers expect submissive, exacting, dress-code clique conforming 'team players' who simply accept whatever bone's thrown at them, who are also, paradoxically, brilliantly innovative 'go-getters' who actually care about their jobs.
Re:Win for the free market. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)
I was just pointing out how inane it is to suggest someone actually commute 3 hours to work on a farm.
Re:Been there. (Score:5, Insightful)
The answer is require guest worked be hired at 130% of prevailing wages. If we have to hire guest worker because of local shortages, that will give companies incentive to hire locally while pushing up wages to encourage more local talent.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yet a huge number of technology people are opposed to both organized labor and government regulation, all in the name of libertarianism? And you vote Republican?
The world wonders.
Re:hmmm (Score:4, Insightful)
A lot of these jobs aren't going based on skill. Sure, some of the H1B's are legit. But there are are lot of them out there like the two guys I trained who turned out not to be additions to the team, but my replacement at under $25 an hour. Now supposedly they have to be paid market rate, but they never are.
You say develop the skill. What you should be saying is, "Develop the credentials (legit or not) and work for half as much even though legally you should be offered fair market value."
You see the same thing competing against grad students in college. There is cheating on a massive scale in foreign countries to place students here as is easily evidenced by the large numbers that seemingly speak no English at all.
Of course, those grad students typically pay full rates, so nobody will be kicking them out any time soon.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:4, Insightful)
That is not accomplished by the current visa legislation. Just the opposite.
To be more specific US is the only developed country whose immigration legislation prohibits the spouses of people on high-skill labour visas from working. The ones that are not prohibited have to go through so many demeaning and outright stupid hurdles that they do not want to even consider it. For example for L2 visa (in-company qualified labour transfer) you have to supply 5 pictures of your wedding ceremony and they have to be approved by the immigration officials. What's next? Pictures of your sex life?
This ultra conservative approach means that USA will be getting only a small fraction of smart people out there. Smart people nowdays have smart wives (and husbands) with careers of their own so they are not coming. These restrictions specifically exclude them in favour of slave labour from countries where the wife is draped top to bottom and is a dedicated child production and home cleaning device with no other functionality. Call me biased, but I have my doubts about anyone in this category being "qualified labour".
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:3, Insightful)
If it's left to an amoral business and all choices are equal then every time they can will employ the person from China whose residency is at the whim of the company and thus can be convinced to put up with conditions a resident would not tolerate and who will be deported if they quit.
"Stricter" immigration controls have made the situation far worse for everyone apart from the employer.
It's just a modern form of indentured labour and a business that cares for nothing but the bottom line is going to do it as much as they can.
A more lax immigration policy would get rid of the incentive to bring in indentured labour. If the company has no more hold over a temporary migrant than over a local then merit becomes an issue again and work conditions will not necessarily decline.
Re:You're obviously "not too smart" then (Score:2, Insightful)
OK executive, do your foreign nationals get paid as much as your US nationals?
Yes or no? Don't equivocate.
Re:727 whole jobs? The sky is falling! (Score:2, Insightful)
Going to an Ivy League school doesn't necessarily mean you're smarter; it just means your parents have a lot of money.
Or very little money.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:3, Insightful)
The kids are all foreign. When they all go home, we won't have anything left at all.
If we didn't drive them out, they would say here. You're right that we should eliminate the H1-B visas, instead we should just let the smart people live here indefinitely.
The mere act of immigrating means that you are willing to take risks and try new things. That you are willing to make sacrifices. That you are highly motivated. These are the people we need to build the economy.
Unfortunately, the H1-B visa is business unfriendly because it doesn't let immigrants create their own start-ups. It's also worker unfriendly. H1-B workers know they have can't afford to get fired so they take all kinds of abuse at work. And we have to do it too because we have to compete with them.
When we boot them out of the country, most of them don't go home. Once they have immigrated the first time, it's easy to do it again. Most go to Canada, Germany or Switzerland. They only go home when they want to. But when they do you're right that we're screwed. These days anything can be made anywhere and sold anywhere. They'll compete with us directly. They'll have a lower cost of living. They'll pay taxes to their government instead of to ours. When our company goes out of business, we'll have to learn Mandarin or retire early.
Re:Remaking IT to be an anti-citizen? (Score:3, Insightful)
The best way to get more educated people is to educate more people. But western countries try to outsource this to other countries. But in the end the jobs go where the people are rather than the people go where the jobs are. Especially in technology and sciences.
Eheh, (Score:3, Insightful)
How about the ticket? You are aware that Disney is an American company? So you bought an American product the moment you entered. How about the food? The drinks?
The rides themselves? The movies the rides are based on?
Sorry, but next time try a bit harder. For instance, go into an Apple store and try to buy a product build in the US. A lot harder. But you just have to buy non-Apple to get a piece of hardware not made in a dictatorship. But that would mean giving up the shiny. Oh and if you dislike Disney for outsourcing its toy production, don't buy Disney. There are still locally made toys. Even handmade ones. Cost a bit more but that shouldn't be a problem. Unless you are focused on cheap as well.
Re:I've got a BETTER emergency rule for you... (Score:3, Insightful)
How about we eliminate H1-B and L-1 visas and start hiring Americans again?
Do you know why the US has (most of) the best universities in the world (and the same holds for the high-tech industry sector)? You think it's because americans are somehow magically smarter than everyone else? It's because the US has attracted the top talent from all over the world. Stop letting talent in (while the rest of the world has started to compete to get it), and america will become a backwards and remote province in a matter of decades. But don't worry, outsourcing will stop once your standards of living are as low as china's.
The economy is going down the tubes because greedy corporations aren't willing to pay a living wage. They don't even want to hire Americans, because the indentured servitude of the H1-B visa is too attractive to them
Then give them a green card or a visa that allows them to change employer at will, without compromising their chances for a green card. That will give them the market power they need to demand decent wages like everyone else.
Re:Been there. (Score:1, Insightful)
No, the answer is stop being a f*cking douche. Let companies hire whoever they want.
This American notion of "they took or jobs" is beyond stupid. Every qualified worker that enters your country and pays taxes there makes you richer. You should be happy for every single educated person you manage to get. If you are American and really qualified you _will_ find another job anyway. Stop being a retard, stop blaming foreign countries for your inability to compete.
Wanting to give companies an incentive to hire locally is nationalistic backwards thinking. Try arriving in the 21st century.
Re:Why Is This So Fucking Complicated? (Score:3, Insightful)
Lots of appeals to emotion and entitlement there, but little rational argument. The problem is that you are importing people, spending 10 years educating and training them (PhD + postdoc), and then deporting them. What do you think this is doing to your economy? Why do you think companies like Intel and IBM are setting up big R&D centres in places like India? It's because there are a lot of American-trained, highly qualified researchers there.
Re:You're obviously "not too smart" then (Score:3, Insightful)
But you're still hiring the cheapest you can find. Given you have two candidates of equal qualifications (more or less; no one's exactly the same), you'll still hire the one who'll accept the least money.
[John]
Re:Win for the free market. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)
And then at the end of the day getting paid almost nothing because you are too slow to keep up with everyone. That's how it starts out. After a month or so you get a lot better at it, your stamina goes up, and if you are lucky, you'll get paid $8 an hour.
You've unknowingly hit on the single most important point. Americans are not willing to do that labor at that price. There's plenty of Americans in Florida laying pitch for roads, roofing, putting up fences, etc. All miserable jobs in the 100+ degree Florida heat. All pay more than $8/hr.
Re:hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)
Spoken like someone who's never had to deal with an abusive, insulting, arrogant jerk on their team. One destructive person can ruin the productivity of a half dozen people really quickly. Like it or not, how you work with other people matters.
Re:Win for the free market. (Score:3, Insightful)
They won't do that. The whole reason they are "competitive" is that they are going back to their homeland with a lower quality and cost of living, thus allowing them to get more bang for their buck. This, in turn, allows employers to depress wages using them as an excuse.
As I said, the practice lowers wages for everyone. Good for the owning class, bad for the working class.
You could simply refuse both, and use tariffs to protect domestic industry from offshoring.
Re:Their majority was not deep. (Score:3, Insightful)