Tech Takes Its K-12 CS Education and Immigration Crisis To the DNC (cnet.com) 118
theodp writes: In early 2013, Code.org and FWD.us coincidentally emerged after Microsoft suggested tech's agenda could be furthered by creating a crisis linking U.S. kids' lack of computer science savvy to tech's need for tech worker visas. Three years later, CNET's Marguerite Reardon reports that tech took its K-12 computer science and immigration crisis to the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday, where representatives from Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon called for the federal government to invest in more STEM education and reform immigration policies -- recurring themes the industry hopes to influence in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election. "We believe in the importance of high-skilled immigration coupled with investments in education," said Microsoft President Brad Smith, repeating the Microsoft National Talent Strategy. The mini-tech conference also received some coverage in the New Republic, where David Dayen argues that the DNC is one big corporate bride.
Translation: More H-1Bs (Score:5, Insightful)
For all that verbiage, what I got out of it is that they just want to bring more H-1Bs into the US to bring down wages. STEM education is definitely nothing more than a PR stunt.
Re:Translation: More H-1Bs (Score:5, Insightful)
Bingo. H-1B's exist for one purpose: To provide indentured workers that can be treated as wage slaves and undercut american labor.
Re: Translation: More H-1Bs (Score:4, Insightful)
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That won't make a meaningful difference, you'll still have companies crowding out American workers with much cheaper foreign labor. The best solution is to reverse the indeture. If a company REALLY claims that it's utterly impossible to find an American worker and they absolutely must bring someone in force them to pay that person a princely sum and killer benefits for a mandatory minimum period.
Make it so that bringing in an H-1B is outright painful. If they legitimately can't find an American worker they'
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You glossed over parent's solution pretty quickly and did not explain why it would not make a "meaningful difference". There are two things going on here. First, there is the problem with H1-Bs and similar visas being strongly attached to an employer and requiring a somewhat painful process to transfer to another employer if he employee wants to change employers. This encumberment probably does depress H1-B wages.
But second, there is what most people here are actually bitching about but won't admit it: "dey
Re: Translation: More H-1Bs (Score:4, Insightful)
Hold on a second. A corporation is saying it can not find skilled local workers, so why the fuck do they not train some. So when anyone, has to go for that training, they have to take on a massive debt to pay for the skill corporations want to exploit. So why the fuck do the corporations get that skill for fucking free. Why are not the corporations paying for training, why are those cheap arse bastards, demanding that the government pays, or the individual pays. Whilst those self same corporations refuse to pay for training and to top it all off, what to pay lower wages to those individuals who pay for that training and in addition those self same corporations cheap on their taxes by offshoring profits in tax havens. The should take the D out of DNC and just have changed it to the CNC the Corporate National Convention.
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Here's the deal with Training. You have a choice when training your employees. You can train American workers, and when they are fully trained, they leave for greener pastures OR you can train H1B visa holders, and they can't leave, without having to go home.
Economically speaking, the ONLY real choice is to hire H1B workers, and train them, because they can't leave. This is only ONE of many reasons why H1B rules favors Corporations and hurt workers. This is also why Government should NOT be messing with the
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This is also why Government should NOT be messing with the economy at all, and let the market forces work things out. Artificial rules create artificial supply and demand problems, interrupting normal economic activity.
The very existence of a government is going to "mess" with the economy. What would be a neutral position on immigration? Can economic activity be reduced to natural rules?
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Would a neutral policy towards immigration allow unlimited immigration? Would there be limits by country? If immigration is limited, how do we decide who gets in?
Re: Translation: More H-1Bs (Score:4, Interesting)
All of that is true, except when Government interferes with consensual agreements, in the name of "protecting" one party or another. Unfortunately, those with power end up with unlimited amount of "protection" and those without have none. The battle ground for power is where the fight actually resides, and the "average" person has no power.
And therein is one of the big reasons why I am a Libertarian. Group Power is tyranny. Liberty is for one and for all, or it is for none.
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We don't need a strong push for more
Make the H-1B min wage 80k-150K + COL + OT pay (Score:3)
Make the H-1B min wage 80k-150K + COL + X2 OT pay at 60-80+ hours a week. That will fix it.
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How about we stop making economic decisions based on political whims?
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Government can't even run itself, how can we trust it to run anything else?
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Exactly. So kill the indenture part, then they will work at about market price. Suddenly, hiring H1-Bs becomes way less economical, since you can't pay them artificially low wages.
I'm sure you believe that, but it simply isn't the case. You are talking about companies with a seemingly suicidal PC tact [businessinsider.com]. You really have to take a step back when seeing something like that and ask yourself "if this greedy megacorp is out for every dollar why would they take such a massively racist stance when it hurts their profit?"
The answer is actually pretty straightforward, as Warren Buffet said: "There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making w
Re: Translation: More H-1Bs (Score:4, Interesting)
You are exactly right - MOD PARENT UP.
In fact the ultimate goal is much more insidious. Currently, the global median household income is at $9,733, and the goal is to level wages in ALL countries to the same place. Ultimately, some country's income will rise (where the multinational corporations are building factories and offices right now), but in most countries of the West is must be significantly be reduced. Note that's household income, which in many cases is two earners per household.
Workers wages are, in fact, the ONLY commodity price that is being depressed right now. All others (food, energy, housing, etc.) is on the rise. You can argue by how much by citing ShadowStats vs. the US BLS, but you still see the same trend.
Interesting the globalist party (a.k.a. the Democrats) continue to push this agenda. The symbolism during the convention was really in-your-face. More bridges, less borders, more flow, faster equalization of wages. While the elites continue to amass wealth and ignore countries (the wealthy don't NEED countries - their wealth provides them ultimate mobility, influence, and protection).
They don't really need the middle class at all. Sure, they are using them right now as a cash cow to keep the funds flowing, but ultimately they are more trouble than they are worth. Better to reduce them to nothing and get as quickly as possible to a 2-class system. With the cost of living increasing and wages being "globally equalized" as quickly as possible, soon that's what they will have. The important thing to do now is to demonize the nationalists as racist, xenophobic, uneducated neanderthals clinging to sky-fairy religions, to avoid things like voting for a Brexit and electing nationalists like Trump.
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The thing is, I don't see a lack of supply. Whenever there is a job opening there are a bunch of candidates available. The problem is companies have poor understanding on what the techies do. They normally fail to understand that this is a professional occupation, with professional responsibilities and requires professional pay to get it correctly done.
You can get someone who can code for cheap from another country or right out of school. However they don't know how to ask the right questions or deal wit
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The problem is companies have poor understanding on what the techies do
That's a large part of it. Upper management listens to the offshore companies telling them how much experience their people have in the area. Labor rates are cheap and there are tax advantages to contractors vs. employees. But when the contractors show up and start asking questions which make it obvious that they have no experience at all it's too late. I've seen it happen multiple times.
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And you know why? The people who are good get hired.
Our company has hired a number of Indians the past couple of years -
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I definitely fully agree. The whole thing is a scam and the democratic party is as corrupt as any other, totally infatuated with enriching itself, and basically doesnt care about the country one bit.
The idea that there is an IT worker shortage is a documented lie and that this is a fact. You have Tech giants who have billions and want billions more who want cheap low wage labor to increase their profit margin. The main way the democrats get elected is promising more welfare giveaways and free college. They
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Support bacteria. Its the only culture some people have.
Translation (Score:5, Insightful)
invest in more STEM education and reform immigration policies
Really means;
ensure we can get cheap labour from poor countries while making it look like there's another reason for it besides profit
How about a plan to let those companies temporarily (until their domestic replacements finish school) hire immigrant workers at tenfold cost of domestic workers, with the extra money invested in STEM education? That would fix the "crisis" long term and short term, right?
Re:Translation (Score:4, Informative)
Precisely. Lower our costs and increase our profits using cheap labour. "High skilled", so we don't have to do any training, thereby cutting costs further. Get handouts from government for whatever training we find we still have to do. And the profits go up and up!!!
Shame about all the unemployed Americans, tho. Can someone make sure they are moved away from my mansion?
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The TPP isn't going to fix this? really? I mean Nafta was fantastic, look at the manufacturing in this country, its so much better!!
Seriously, if you can't figure out how to make sure those black box voting machines, that are so wonderful you do not need to see the code or how they work, are safe, this is game over. Hillary and the DNC will steal this election with the help of a few of the RNC folks. Epstein an
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Signed,
Typical Slashdot "Libertarian"
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I can't speak for everywhere, but in Austin the tech market has experienced serious wage inflation, and it is entirely due to restricted supply. My girlfriend is a technical recruiter here and would agree with me. Educating more Americans in STEM could solve that, but I'm a bit skeptical about that. If super high wages doesn't attract more entrants into that job market segment, how is having an extra CS course or two available make a difference? Is unavailability of STEM courses really the problem? Maybe no
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The government shouldn't artificially restrict the number of tech people but neither should it artificially increase it via the H1B program.
The H1B program does not "artificially increase" the supply. It artificially restricts it. There are a limited number of H1B quotas. The "free market" solution would be unrestricted movement of labor, which would almost certainly result in far more techie immigrants.
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The government shouldn't artificially restrict the number of tech people but neither should it artificially increase it via the H1B program.
The H1B program does not "artificially increase" the supply. It artificially restricts it. There are a limited number of H1B quotas. The "free market" solution would be unrestricted movement of labor, which would almost certainly result in far more techie immigrants.
Well there's the free market, and then there's the free market. International trade is typically not free without serious negotiation between countries to create it. The fact of the matter is, a free market only exists where all players are subject to the same rules. That is not the case between countries, which compete with each other to produce a trade advantage.
Even if you have both free-flowing goods and free-flowing labor you still do not have a free market, only one distorted by disparate regulation,
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Yes. You're technically correct.
Technically correct is the best kind of correct.
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Why do we only look at supply and demand for the price of labor? I have no idea how to answer that question..,
You seem to wish pricing worked on some personal value system or profit sharing. Profit sharing is an option for tech people, but it involves risking your own limited capital or risking your base salary. Most employees are the opposite of risk takers. People don't like to think of themselves as gutless, but 90% of people are. It's actually quite strange, because humans underestimate almost every typ
Dear Slashdot... (Score:1, Funny)
(..) the DNC is one big corporate bride.
Okay, we already knew that correct spelling isn't a job requirement for /. editors.
But FAILing to do a simple copy & paste of an article's title? Hell, even some 6y olds can handle that...
Can't /. editors take themselves out of the process, or something? Just write up a couple of scripts to automate the 'editing' and be done with it?
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the DNC is one big corporate bride.
Okay, we already knew that correct spelling isn't a job requirement for /. editors.
Perhaps it was a freudian slip, and they were thinking of the word "whore"?
"Bride" (Score:1)
Sorry, I'm an old fart and hence don't really always stay current with the neologisms, but since when are the Republicans big on political correctness? Or do they have some sort of problem with the word 'cause it gives the religious nuts a heart attack?
"Corporate Whore" is the correct term.
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Sorry, NewRepublic sounded like it belongs to some GOP goop.
I shouldn't post before my first coffee...
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From over here in Europe they look like one party anyway.
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Trump reminds me of the times when we were voting for the class president. Two overachieving geeks were running for the position that nobody could stand, so everyone voted for the class clown, only to complain later that the only reason he wanted to get elected was to skip class and he doesn't do jack for us.
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... wouldn't that be just AWFUL. (sarcasm)
Speaking as a white person it would be, actually. Our culture and society would be completely different. No rock music, no jazz. No Mexican food, Chinese/Japanese/Thai food. A lot of popular Southern foods originate in Africa, and Creole food/culture has some African roots as well. I won't even go into the myriad inventions and technological innovations that non-white people have contributed to society.
Re:Computers are for chumps (Score:5, Interesting)
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Pray do tell, what do you do for a living then, genius?
I think you'll find that IT is a broad field and it's more than just coding and IT support. You also might find that despite tech becoming easier for people they still need help and when things go wrong they have no idea how to fix it.
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IT is a shitty career choice, always has been and always will be.
That's what my friends told me 20+ years ago. They went into healthcare to make money. Flash forward to now, I'm enjoying my "shitty career" in IT while my friends hate their jobs because they're cleaning up someone else's shit. Ironically, hospitals have been my best paying IT jobs.
People I know who insisted in staying with IT ended up making ends meet by moonlighting as "troubleshooters" but modern OSs, smartphones and tablets means they're not needed anymore.
I work full-time in government IT, make $50K per year and save 20% of what I earned. I also live in Silicon Valley. I have no need to moonlight to make extra money.
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Please tell me you meant $150K a year.
Nope. It's $50K per year. Government IT doesn't pay that much. I've been trying to get a cost of living adjustment for being in Silicon Valley. No dice.
If not, I will gladly hire you today for 2x your current salary.
I doubt you can match my benefit package: paid federal holidays off, 20 Paid Time Off (PTO), 401K and healthcare package, and a fully funded contract for the next three years.
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I doubt you can match my benefit package: paid federal holidays off, 20 Paid Time Off (PTO), 401K and healthcare package, and a fully funded contract for the next three years.
20 PTO days (plus approx. 10 holidays) is a little high, but only a little. 15 days is standard at most companies and I've never had trouble negotiating for 5 extra PTO days (I did exactly that for my current job). I've never worked at a company without a 401k plan and the match has always been 3-4%. Health care plans can certainly range, but the difference between a Cadillac plan and a crappy plan can be covered with a $10k bump in salary.
As for job security, I could certainly see that being worth $10-20k
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Do you really think you would be unemployed 7 months out of 12?
Prior to my current government IT job, I was out of work for eight months (2013-2014) and unemployed for two years (2009-2010). As an IT support contractor, my income varied between $25K to $50K per year for most of my career. I'm two years into a five-year contract with full pay and benefits. That's a nice break from the IT rat race.
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Fresh grads are usually hired at at least 80k and well over 100k at places like FB or Google, not counting benefits.
Except I don't have a BA/BS degree. I got an AA degree in General Education (1994) and AS degree in Computer Programming (2007). I'm also 20+ years into my career.
So yeah, it shouldn't be hard to double that assuming you don't get trapped by your previous salary.
I'm studying for InfoSec certifications. My next job should double or triple my current pay rate.
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Except I don't have a BA/BS degree. I got an AA degree
It doesn't matter. I got a BS in CS, and I always hide it at the bottom of my resume because no one cares. Once you have the experience, it's more important than degree (except maybe at government places, I don't know).
I'm studying for InfoSec certifications. My next job should double or triple my current pay rate.
Sounds like you have it handled.
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Your career is government, not IT.
My career is in IT. My current contract is for the government.
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The benefits are fantastic by any measure but the sociopaths and maladjusted high school bullies despite being out of school for decades make it a living hell.
That describes all my IT coworkers in Fortune 500 companies. The government IT workers I work with are all ex-military and very professional.
Not tech crisis - it's a general crisis (Score:3)
What skills are lacking in the first place? I would argue that it's not lack of 'tech' skills - there are many people who can read specs and often obtuse community posts and write software that meets some specs.
What is lacking is critical thinking, ability and desire to refine existing technologies (rather than reinvent things or try to come up with the next biggest thing), and failing to look at how everything is interconnected over the long term.
We don't need more computer science in schools, we need more critical thinking classes. I'd also say we need more classes in "how practice is different than theory" but that doesn't sound glamorous.
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a million times this.
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I've seen quite a few research topics on how practicing Dual N-Back or what-not can increase your working memo
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Interesting - thanks for that. It nicely addresses what I was going for with my "what kind of skills...?" question. It's also kind of telling that it belies the idea that you can teach everyone anything - forgetting that there are inherent capabilities and limitations that are different for each individual (I, for instance, will always be at a disadvantage in a height-dominated sport because "you can't teach tall").
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Which do you believe is the cause? Do you believe such people resorted to reason when their natural behavior was not accepted or that their natural behavior was not accepted because they reasoned through their decisions? Which you assume will greatly affect how you perceive the world.
Probably like the nature vs nurture, a mix of both.
I have been starting to believe that the main difference is personality. Potential be damned, if you don't have the obsession or passion, you'll never exercise your ability. Hypothetical. Two people with equal potential, but one has been fervently exercising their ability to critically think since the age of two and the other just started to notice at the age of 20 and even so only exercises their ability when required or forced. Will the later ever catch
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If critical thinking is the problem, every H1B I've had the displeasure of working with is no answer.
The vast majority I've met are no better than a just-out-of school coder with an associates degree. I've found code they've written that was obviously directly copy-and-pasted from something they found on a Google search, without even understanding how it worked. Same thing with "documentation" they've written.
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What is lacking is critical thinking
What do you mean by "critical thinking"? How does it differ from "normal" thinking?
According to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org], critical thinking is "the commitment to the social and political practice of participatory democracy". Do you really think that is what is missing in tech employees?
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Critical Thinking is rather important, more so than learning how to program in high school.
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What is lacking is critical thinking
We've got all these women and minorities taking Gender Studies, recruited to protest the lack of women and minorities taking STEM subjects.
A critical thinking class would undermine many of the useless classes and ideas that are pushed.
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Logic, applied mathematics, problem solving, etc. Please get this stuff back in our schools.
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we need more critical thinking classes
"I don't want a nation of thinkers, I want a nation of workers." - attributed to John D. Rockefeller
Another theodp screed... (Score:1)
Crappy election year (Score:2)
2016 is a BITCH (Score:2)
Davie Bowie, dead.
Alan Rickman, dead.
Glen Frey, dead.
George Kennedy, dead.
Abe Vigoda, dead. (verified)
Muhammad Ali, dead.
Umberto Eco, dead.
Harper Lee, dead.
Garry Marshal, dead.
Amber Rayne, dead.
Keith Emerson, dead.
Rob Ford, dead.
Patty Duke, dead.
Chyna, dead.
Prince, dead.
Kimbo Slice, dead.
Alvin Toffler, dead.
It's almost like our beloved celebrities know what a shitstorm's coming and are checking out while the gettin's good.
We'v
Want more STEM workers? Stop stomping them. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think it's fair to say that a STEM degrees are not easy to get.
So why bother getting one, if you are just going to have your job offshored, or get replaced by a visa worker?
If you really want more STEM workers: stop sending the message that are you going to stomp the crap out of them.
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nah, we have corporate fascism. the difference is who owns your butt