Should Techies Trump All Others In Immigration Reform? 231
theodp writes "In an open letter on TechCrunch, Vivek Wadhwa calls on Congressman Luis Gutierrez to lift his 'hold on Silicon Valley' and stop tying immigration reform for highly-skilled STEM immigrants to the plight of undocumented immigrants. So, why should the STEM set get first dibs? 'The issues of high-skilled and undocumented immigrants are both equally important,' says Wadhwa, but 'the difference is that the skilled workers have mobility and are in great demand all over the world. They are getting frustrated and are leaving in droves.' Commenting on Gutierrez's voting record, Wadhwa adds, 'I would have voted for visas for 50,000 smart foreign students graduating with STEM degrees from U.S. universities over bringing in 55,000 randomly selected high-school graduates from abroad. The STEM graduates would have created jobs and boosted our economy. The lottery winners will come to the U.S. with high hopes, but will face certain unemployment and misery because of our weak economy.' So, should Gutierrez cede to Wadhwa's techies-before-Latinos proposal, or would this be an example of the paradox of virtuous meritocracy undermining equality of opportunity?"
Re:undocumented immigrants? (Score:5, Funny)
I have some...potentially startling... news for you about the efficiency and thoroughness of immigration enforcement procedures worldwide.
This hardly means that the US is at the top of the class; but the only mechanism with a genuinely notable success rate is to be so squalid and miserable at home that nobody even tries to jump the fence...
Re:How about... (Score:5, Funny)
Are you suggesting that we clone Hitler in the hopes of driving competent techies to the U.S.?
Re:How about... (Score:3, Funny)
Yes, folks like Alexander Graham Bell, Nikola Tesla, Albert Einstein, Enrico Fermi, An Wang, Sergey Brin, Vinod Khosla, and Bjarne Stroustrup
OK, that settles it. Immediately cancel all visa programs and deport every single foreign techie - the world simply cannot afford another disaster of the same scale as C++!