This Year's H-1B Visa Applications Look A Lot Like Last Year's (newsweek.com) 310
"This year's round of H-1B visa program applications was scheduled to launch Monday, and it was largely absent of President Donald Trump's proposed policy changes," writes Newsweek. An anonymous reader quotes their report:
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services last updated its online page dedicated to the program, which granted visas to skilled foreign workers, Wednesday with the rules mostly similar to those of last year and quotas remaining the same. These requirements were set to launch despite Trump's vow to reform the program on the grounds that companies exploited it to fill jobs once held by U.S. citizens who earned higher wages.
An alleged draft of an executive order was leaked last month and widely circulated, raising fears that the administration was preparing to gut the program. These measures were never announced. "There was a window in which the White House could have made serious reforms," Russ Harrison, head of government relations for the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers-USA, told The Wall Street Journal. "For whatever reason, they decided not to take it."
An alleged draft of an executive order was leaked last month and widely circulated, raising fears that the administration was preparing to gut the program. These measures were never announced. "There was a window in which the White House could have made serious reforms," Russ Harrison, head of government relations for the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers-USA, told The Wall Street Journal. "For whatever reason, they decided not to take it."
Sell out (Score:3, Insightful)
Imagine that, trump sold out his voters.
Re: Sell out (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not even 100 days yet. He's already accomplished more than I expected from a full 4 years of Jeb. And we don't have a hot war with Russia like we would have had with Hillary. Things are great.
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Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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I think of a sport analogy more like the World Series, points equals votes and games equals states. If if's team HRC vs team DJT and you get a score like 9-1, 9-1, 9-1, for wins for HRC followed by DJT wins by 3-4, 3-4, 3-4, 3-4 then team DJT wins 4 games to HRC's 3 wins. HRC got 39 total point compared to DJT having 15. Quite the spread there in points and one might argue that team HRC is in fact the better team based upon that. The narrow wins by DJT can be considered flukes, luck, and this can bring
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You're a retard. Even adding those numbers together, you don't get "most Americans".
X voted for HRC. {ALL AMERICANS} - X did not. X {ALL AMERICANS}/2. MOST AMERICANS didn't vote for her.
Why is this bad? (Score:5, Insightful)
The story is framed as bad but isn't it better that they take some time to craft a reasonable update to the policy? Trump has been president just a bit over two months now!
Re:Why is this bad? (Score:4, Insightful)
Trump announced his presidential campaign in June of 2015 and came into office with the established policy of putting American workers first. He and his team have had over a year to "craft a reasonable update to the policy". Trump was elected on the promise that he would get to work for America on day one, not get elected then figure out how things work. The administration should have started action on H1B in January.
Re: Why is this bad? (Score:2)
You do realize presidents aren't really suppose to legislate, right? Congress should fix this problem. Trump and his team are suppose to govern.
Re: Why is this bad? (Score:4, Insightful)
Please. I didn't say legislate. This is about having a policy which can be implemented by Congress. The Congress which is controlled by Republicans in the House and Senate. The Republicans who are led by Trump. Any major legislation which gets passed will be, at a minimum, strongly influenced by the President.
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I think he just assumed that government was like a large business empire, with him as the CEO. Replace some staff with his family and friends, do a few deals, everyone thinks they are getting rich, problem solved.
Re:Why is this bad? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re: Why is this bad? (Score:2)
Trump announced his presidential campaign in June of 2015 and came into office with the established policy of putting American workers first. He and his team have had over a year to "craft a reasonable update to the policy".
No he didn't. He ran for the office as a total outsider. Basically whole Washington elite was against him. This means that he didn't get much or any support from them for running. He had to digure it out by himself. It is pretty obvious that he was running full time and he didn't have ti
Re:Why is this bad? (Score:5, Insightful)
A reasonable update to the policy would be something very simple like requiring a minimum wage of H1-B workers to be $150K (adjusted for inflation). It's very simple because doesn't take much to deal a fatal blow to abuse while keeping it available for the people that it was originally intended to help bring into the country.
Everything we've seen so far from the Mango in Chief has only benefitted businesses, the wealthy and bigots at the expense of everyone and everything else.
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That's good for industry but too high for a lot of academic posts. Though they could make those a different category, I suppose.
Is there an H-1D? You could get an H-1D with your PhD!
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That's good for industry but too high for a lot of academic posts. Though they could make those a different category,
Make an exception for positions at a university funded by a non-profit or federal research grant for education, public, or university academic research.
US wants immigration (Score:2)
Look, the harsh reality is that every western government in the world needs 20-40 year olds to pile into their nations. Why? Because for the last 30 years politicians and corporations have made a succession of unrealistic pension promises to the current crop of workers, and those workers didn't have enough babies to pay for those promises in the future.
Your retirement contributions now pay for current retirees - not your future retirement. That will be paid for by whoever is working at the point you retire.
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Your retirement contributions now pay for current retirees - not your future retirement
Social Security has always been a flow-through system. Money has a short half-life and is not a good store of value. The Social Security administration wasn't designed to use 40 working-years of your life in which you had to pay a mortgage, health insurance, car payments, and so forth, as well as build up your luxurious lifestyle with the large amount of unnecessary income you collect, to pay for the 15-20 years of your life when you have a house and get medicare (a separately-funded program); it was des
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He's followed through on many of his promises
No, President Mango has not.
Drain the swamp? It's swampier than ever.
Lock her up? Zero follow up.
Repeal and replace the ACA with something better and cheaper? Tried to replace it with something vastly inferior and failed at it.
Quickly defeat ISIS with some magically awesome plan? Didn't happen.
Muslim ban? Completely unconstitutional so it never had a chance.
Bring back coal jobs? They aren't coming back.
Build a wall and make mexico pay for it? Downgraded to a fence and US consumers will be paying for
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Trump has been president just a bit over two months now!
He claimed that he already had a plan. So either he lied about having a plan, or he lied about what his plan was. Either way, he's a liar, and there's no third way.
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There is a third way: he doesn't/didn't know whether he has a plan or not.
Technically it's not lying when you're so mentally deranged you don't know what you're saying. That might not reassure you much, given that he's the one with his finger on the big red button.
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Or he had ans still has a plan and the plan is leaving the program in place but actually enforcing it and letting people only hire foreigners when Americans with those skills can't be found. Or the existing plan isn't ready for immediate deployment. Or the existing plan involved legislation that has to go through Congress and will just kill the program entirely. Or the existing plan is to issue an executive order at any point in time and call for the immediate halt of the program. Or...
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Re:Why is this bad? (Score:5, Interesting)
The story is framed as bad but isn't it better that they take some time to craft a reasonable update to the policy? Trump has been president just a bit over two months now!
You speak as if he's actually been busy on this for the past few months. While an early draft EO in January mentioned H1-B reform, since then Trump's ADHD has brought all progress to a halt.
There is huge support in Congress for cracking down on H1-B abuse- this is one of those rare issues where which both parties agree. But actually getting something accomplished takes time away from tweeting, golfing, and monitoring Fox and Friends for intelligence updates. In desperation Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) went on twitter himself two weeks ago and begged for Trump to call his office about H1-B reform. One tweet read "I've been waiting for six yrs for a president interested in fixing H1B and that person has finally arrived/DRAIN SWAMP". Six down, four to go!
Because Trump promised action day 1 (Score:3)
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Basically, it looks like the administration knows changing the H1-B policy to a protectionist policy will result in higher prices and lower growth for Americans, a decrease of middle-class wealth, and a general economic recession, so they don't want to open by screwing up the economy until they have a way to somehow blame Obama.
What Trump most wants is a $36 million annual decrease in his personal tax burden, hence his proposed tax policies. $400,000 presidental salary is nothing compared to what he can
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60-something million people tossed coins, and they all landed asshole side up?
Or perhaps the USA is full of time lords.
I'm sure you can come up with something even more ludicrous - without trying and without knowing.
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his FOUR YEARS of dong things
I guess that's one way to look at it...
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Because statistically at least half of them will be smarter than you.
Money talks (Score:2)
Told ya so (Score:5, Informative)
He only wanted your votes. He hires Mexicans to build his properties and uses shady contractors to cut costs doing so maintaining them.
Joke is on you for thinking he would be different. You can't be pro automation and pro free market and libertarian and cry wahaha it's not fair ai have to compete too?
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Joke is on you for thinking he would be different. You can't be pro automation and pro free market and libertarian and cry wahaha it's not fair ai have to compete too?
Most Trump voters are none of those things, although most of them they like to claim that they are in favor of a free market. In reality, they want a market which is manipulated in their favor, and the next guy can go fuck himself. Trump voters could not possibly be farther from supporting the free market.
Re:Told ya so (Score:4, Insightful)
They support the free market unless it applies to them. They want the government to bud out and have open competition and less regulation ... Except at the factory they work at.
But my post was referring to slashdotters who say vote for Trump as Clinton is not on your side on with h1b1 visas. Then in the next story the same posters go on how the free market dictates no increase in minimum wages and that automation increases jobs
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Most Trump supporters don't understand the difference between a free market and an unfree market. When the economy of the U.S. was changing, they never popped up their heads and looked around and thought, maybe I should get more education...if they could afford it. They continued to vote in jokers who complained they couldn't afford to give their voters more education because that would require the federal government spend money on them and possibly raise taxes to do it. They were perfectly potty with their
Wow, once again he goes above and beyond (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, are you telling me that once again Trump *didn't* help his voters in favor of his rich business associates? You know, this together with the gutting of the FCC and the EPA almost, *almost*, makes me think that he's not trying that hard to make America great again.
I know you can't see my face right now, but if you could, it would have a look of surprise.
But but but (Score:4, Funny)
But but but Trump said he was going to "eliminate" or "radically scale back" the H1-B program. Don't tell me he was fibbing!
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No. I don't want to keep that in mind. Indians should fix India. I see little reason to give a damn that Indians can't be bothered to take a shot at a first rate society while they leech ours, driving down our standard of living.
The program is repeatedly lobbied for by these companies. It needs to go. That, or these companies should relocate to Mumbai and America should embargo their goods/services and release their patents to the public so that new startups can fill the void. Infosys and friends can se
Re:#MAGA (Score:4, Funny)
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Perhaps you are but others may not be able to afford such a luxury.
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You're free to donate if you choose. You shouldn't impose that choice on others.
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What about the people who aren't privileged enough to have the high-end education and class benefits to make $100k in IT but have still worked their entire lives to get what they have and develop amazing skillsets? What about the people in the $40k-$60k range in the small to mid-sized businesses who have now lost their niche due to overseas outsourcing to India for pennies on the dollar or at the very least are subject to greater abuse and reduced benefits due to the THREAT of being outsourced?
A lot of peo
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Those guys were outsourced ages ago.
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So you want to help Indians get out of the muck by trading their places with low income americans? Like I said, maybe you should just pack up shop and move there. You're welcome to make that choice with your own life. You are not welcome to make that choice for others.
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You are not welcome to make that choice for others.
I don't think you understand how government works. Governments do exactly that every day: they make choices for people that they themselves wouldn't make, and don't want.
In other words, if the government agrees with me, then that choice will be made for others.
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Actually, I think we both understand it quite well. Thankfully, you are not the government. The problem with these faux bleeding hearts is that they're always justifying why the take needs to be a greater percentage than last year. Then they wonder why the jobs go over seas to shitholes with no human rights in the first place.
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The robin hood act is getting a bit old. That's an arbitrary number too. You don't know whether I make that much or not, or for how long, how much debt I might have accrued, how many dependents I have, or how much I've saved for retirement. It's quite selfish to suddenly impose a substantial tariff on everyone just so you can feel better about yourself/virtue signal to others how much you care. If you really give that much of a shit, donate your entire future income to them and move there to help build that
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False dilemma. Actually, what I said was I don't agree with using force. That is not equivalent to selfishness.
Follow your own advice. If that's what you expect of others, go first. Show the world how it's done. Assuage your guilt at being 'rich'. Take the initiative and donate some large percentage of your future income to the relevant charities. I don't think you'd do it so why should anyone else?
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Have you considered the possibility that lowering the number of technology workers coming to the USA from India would help India?
Think about it this way, these people coming to the USA for work are supposed to be the best and brightest in the world. If they weren't the best in the world then employers would find someone better elsewhere. If these people leave India then we've now deprived India of their intelligence, education, and work ethic.
These visiting workers might send money home for their family b
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I don't have numbers, at least not all of them. Here's a few to consider, the average IQ in the USA is 98, in India it's 81.
I'm sure India has a lot of very smart people, if only because of their large population and the way the bell curve works. So even with an average IQ of 81 there's probably more geniuses in India than the USA. However, if the smartest people in India keep leaving for places like the USA then one can expect India to have a brain drain over time.
It would be in India's best interest to
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Why should any other country take US made goods ?
Its only worth $2 Trillion to the US economy
Likewise, people from all around the world are avoiding the USA now, hundreds of billion is lost revenue from Tourists
The USA makes up 4% of the worlds population and 20% of the worlds GDP, Asia makes up over 60% of the population, Chinas GDP is already bigger than the US and it will not be too many yea
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I'll take my chances. The current situation simply means most americans will end up being as poor and as miserable as most of the people in those countries you listed. If it's so great there those companies are welcome to try selling thousand dollar cell phones to people who make $2/week. I'll pass, thanks.
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So will slavish acceptance of unchecked immigration.
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Perhaps we should focus on why that is and fix it instead of opening the floodgates to people looking for quick handouts, people who hate everything our society stands for (or is supposed to stand for), and those who otherwise have no intention of integrating.
Re: #MAGA (Score:2)
THIS IS GREAT!
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it will not be too many years before the EU is bigger too
That is highly doubtful. The UK is outright leaving with Netherlands and Denmark populace showing strong interest in doing the same, while Switzerland and Iceland both withdrew their applications. And as for the remaining states, Greece, Italy, and Portugal are all bordering on insolvent.
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I see little reason to give a damn that Indians can't be bothered to take a shot at a first rate society while they leech ours, driving down our standard of living.
Here's the thing: One of the reasons you enjoy a privileged life in the west today is your forefathers ran roughshod over places like India, Asia, South America and the Middle and Far East - Extracting resources, using cheap labour, installing corrupt governments - You name it. America, Canada, the UK - Your way of life was built on the backs
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I can't speak for the others, but I think people who are here illegally should be sent home and that the H1B program should be heavily modified or scrapped. Race has nothing to do with it.
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UK fucks up India
UK spawns another nation
You realize you have this chronologically backwards, right?
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but all you're doing is crying about how you can't shit on other people without consequences.
How is declining visitors the same as "shit on other people"? Are you actually clinically insane, to equivocate in this manner, or are you simply attacking the posters character?
Re: #MAGA (Score:4, Interesting)
In that case nobody should ever emigrate anywhere.
Why did your ancestors go to the country you are in now?
Re: #MAGA (Score:2)
Epy pleeease, immigrate to India
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Surprisingly drinkypoo just literally illustrated the cuckolding of a nation
Even if that were true (it's not)...
and is happy about it.
point to where I said I was happy.
On the other hand, if we don't share our wealth with them, they will share their poverty with us. Perhaps we should find a way to do that which doesn't involve putting American citizens out on the street.
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It's likely your HR dept is more concerned with meeting racial quotas than hiring on relevant attributes like reading comprehension. I didn't say that Infosys management shits on beaches. I said that Indians do. Public defecation is quite common there because they've got nowhere else to go. Companies that outsource to save money typically end up paying 'insource' consultants multiple times what they paid originally to clean up the mess.
Like I said, try selling your overpriced services to people making $2/we
Re:#MAGA (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:#MAGA (Score:5, Insightful)
Bullshit!!!!!
You haven't actually talked to those Indians about their backgrounds.
All those H1B Indians come from wealthy Indian families. Those dirt poor Indians simply don't have the opportunity to get a degree and get to the USA.
Re:#WILLSAYIMADEITUPHAHATRAP (Score:4, Insightful)
I haven't heard of French parents scaling the walls of a school to help their kids cheat in exams.
That's not who's getting H1-Bs (Score:5, Insightful)
These aren't refugees from poverty, they're mostly folks coming over here to take advantage of the currency differences with the plan to go back home with fat stacks of cash. A lot don't because they have kids, they kids put down roots and they stay around. But they're not escaping poverty. If you want those guys than ban the Indians are let the Syrians in. They're not just escaping poverty, they're escaping genocide.
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If you want those guys than ban the Indians are let the Syrians in. They're not just escaping poverty, they're escaping genocide.
Indians may be the wrong colour, but Syrians are the wrong religion and that makes them worse.
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The people getting degrees are mostly coming from the new middle class, not the slums. The slums don't offer much opportunity for pre-university education and learning English.
Focusing on the abuse? (Score:4, Interesting)
Problem is.... the H1B program is really only valuable to a company that plans on abusing it.
If you're a typical small or mid-sized business with a need for technical employees, it doesn't make sense to try to hire foreigners who have thick accents / language barriers, as well as a work history that's often a total "unknown" (since you can't just skim a resume and get an idea of their skills and knowledge based on who they worked for previously -- because you're likely not that familiar with any foreign firms they worked for).
I've worked my whole life in I.T. and know for a fact there are plenty of Americans with solid expertise in various parts of the field. I can barely imagine a scenario where nobody in America is competent in what's needed, while someone from over in India is just who they need? It's all about getting budget priced labor and nothing more.
At the end of the day, sure -- we're all human beings and have similar wants, needs, and hopes / desires. You can make an appeal to emotions about someone, anywhere in the world, who is in an unfortunate situation. But most of those are the result of the government their country is ruled by. America, for all of its faults, is still pretty good about ensuring its citizens enjoy a top-tier lifestyle. That doesn't mean we "owe" it to everyone else on the planet who'd like to come here and get in on the action.
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Imagine this: you live in the slums in Chicago. Your father goes thru trash every day, hoping to find tin cans to sell, and your mother tries to sell home-made bread on the market to feed all of your 6 brothers and sisters. Now you get the opportunity to get a three year degree in software engineering and work for a tech company.
Who would not take this opportunity with both hands?
Every one in the US would like to take opportunity, but they can't because most of the available positions are filled with people from Mumbai.
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I think that the more recent immigrants from India want to eventually go back, but the ones who have been here a couple of decades are more likely to want to stay.
The Indian government doesn't make its expats welcome to return. India does not allow dual nationa
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Most of those people are only fleeing from themselves, and bringing their problems to other nations.
Re:So now Trump is to blame for applications (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh that patronizing response again. I don't remember your side "getting over it" when you were the losers. We got to look at your "Impeach Obama" bumper stickers and the rest of your crap for eight years.
Guess what. We're not going away. So you can just Shut The Fuck Up with your "get over it" crap. We're totally going to be in your fucking face for the next 45 months. Get used to it.
I wish all we got was "Impeach Obama"... (Score:2)
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We got to look at your "Impeach Obama" bumper stickers and the rest of your crap for eight years... Get used to it.
Yeah, after listening to you crybabies saying "Shrub" stole the election for eight years, everyone is used to your whining already.
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Putting an "Impeach Trump" bumper sticker on your car won't get it keyed - it takes no balls to do that.
But putting a "Darwin" fish on my first car (a 1960 Dodge Dart) was enough to get my car scratched up by the fuckhead who stole it, presumably because they were offended that I put some reality on the back of a classic American car.
Get it straight, if conservatives had balls, they wouldn't be afraid of equality.
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If progtards had brains, they wouldn't equate racial and sexual quotas with equality.
Oh, we've gone from libtards to progtards. How droll. Shall I call you a conservitard in return? How about I just cut to the chase and call you a plain old retard? (Thanks to Twitler we're long past the need to be politically correct.)
I'm happy to have you call me a libtard or a progtard because I know it means instead of spouting whatever tripe President Brannon, Kellyann, and Vladimir tell you to think, I can think for my
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Otherwise you'd try to refute your own null hypothesis -- perhaps the car wasn't stolen or defaced because of the Darwin emblem.
Right, that's why they removed the Darwin emblem. What a bullshit douchebag you are.
Unlike you, I require pics or it didn't happen.
Unlike you, I can see that someone damaged my car removing my Darwin fish, and put two and two together.
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Everybody knows it is not about "better" candidates, it is about "cheaper" candidates. You are nothing but an Infosys, TCS, [fill in any staffing agency here] shill.
STFU
Re:Thats the free market..... (Score:5, Insightful)
Why do slashdotters hate government clampdowns on freedoms except when it comes to H1B visas? I fucking hate the hypocrisy of it all.
Unrestrained capitalism is frankly an insane idea. What businesses are allowed to do should be well regulated to prevent disastrous outcomes like rivers catching fire. What people want is the government to keep them safe from corporations that frankly wouldn't mind if you died suffering as a direct result of their actions. What people don't want is the government interfering with the civil liberties of individuals.
If you have a problem with H1B tech workers then make yourself a better candidate, FFS.
If you bring the individual worker having to compete on a global scale to it's logical conclusion, it means that Americans have accept the lowest standard of living of any country. That doesn't seem like a good thing for anyone but the rich.
That's the trouble (Score:5, Insightful)
The best quote I've heard in years came from a CNN pundit calling Rick Santorum to task over his opposition to Medicaid for the poor. She said Nobody's a Conservative when it comes to their family. She was right, too.
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Unrestrained capitalism is frankly an insane idea.
It's interesting, really. Every time I see some left-winger bitching about the terrible effects of unrestrained capitalism or such they're actually bitching about cronyism, which is a very different beast.
H-1B visas aren't issued by business. They're government interference in a market. In a truly free market (and we're really talking about "free markets" rather than "capitalism") there aren't enough tech people so the salaries go up until more people want to get into the field and it reaches a sort of s
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Unrestrained capitalism is frankly an insane idea.
It's interesting, really. Every time I see some left-winger bitching about the terrible effects of unrestrained capitalism or such they're actually bitching about cronyism
Which part of "disastrous outcomes like rivers catching fire" is about cronyism? You don't need corruption for unrestrained capitalism to be an insane idea. Secondly, why would you exclude cronyism from capitalism when laws and regulations become commodities that can be bought and sold? Cronyism is just a branch of capitalism.
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Why do slashdotters hate government clampdowns on freedoms except when it comes to H1B visas?
Tee hee. You're cute, little guy.
I fucking hate the hypocrisy of it all.
Who the fuck are you?
Our company
What company? You and the other cowards? Cowards 'R Us?
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A better candidate or a cheaper candidate? I'm not willing to live with 6 people in a two bedroom apartment while working 60 hours a week.
Be honest, H1Bs are not about quality, they are about applying minimal talent on a mass scale. For the kind of results one would naturally expect when quantity is a quality all it's own.
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It's not even as much about quality as perception of quality.
I work for a SMB consultancy we've had success with exactly one Asian guy who is Korean by his parents, but in general is whiter than I am in every cultural respect.
The other non-whites have bombed because the clients hated them for mostly made-up reasons, but it kind of boils down to what do you do when your client wants a white male on the job.