For example, I live in a small town with 3 high end customer service call centers that I know about (there's probably more I don't), and the rates they pay are well below national average because the cost of living is low here. In my area one could build a team of world-class customer service reps in a matter of weeks, pay them better than any place in the area, and have an experienced and high quality staff immediately available when more staff are needed.
Of course I'm not knocking Santiago; having the ability and the qualities necessary to build a quality customer service team is extremely valuable no matter where you are.
Have to is the wrong way to look at it. He hired this person because he thought he would be the best at the job. Why should he have to prefer the talent in the US?
The freedom lover inside me gets your point though.
For instance it is estimated that during the recession over 200,000 jobs for US-born workers weren't created due to immigration policy restrictions: http://www.renewoureconomy.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/pn...
Do you have a citation from a more neutral ideally peer reviewed source? I don't trust The Partnership For a New American Economy. They are attempting to advance a particular political agenda on immigration and should not be considered a reliable or unbiased source for information.
The Partnership for a New American Economy is a coalition of business leaders and mayors launched by Michael Bloomberg and Rupert Murdoch to influence public opinion and policymakers toward comprehensive immigration reform. "The partnership will enable Mayors and CEOs to demonstrate to policymakers the vital role that immigration plays in our economy by publishing studies, conducting polls, convening forums, and sponsoring public education campaigns." Among other goals, the partnership will pursue Congress and the White House to enact legislation which will create "a path to legal status for all undocumented immigrants now in the United States". The partnership will seek to influence "by publishing studies, conducting polls, convening forums, and sponsoring public education campaigns".
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partnership_for_a_New_American_...)
Everybody is pushing one agenda or another. Hopefully, in a humanist, rational society, you wouldn't get put on mute on the basis of having an opinion, especially if you have hard data to present.
People are concerned with inequality between nations, but policies like this prevent opportunity worldwide and hurt US workers and consumers for the sake of "protecting US workers".
And for the wifes part: my wife has the same qualification as I have (two MSc in CS/IT), yet, she is not allowed to work. Not even with the proposed change in the law, as it requires to have ongoing greencard process, which itself may take years. So if you think that those shobby cheap visa workers just bring their freeriders with them, you are very far away from the reality.
H1bs on average earn more than us-born workers.
False. Maybe in some situations, but not in general if you consider _all_ the costs.
I don't see the connection. You wanted to hire someone on a visa - not a US citizen. You couldn't, so instead of looking for one person within the country (possibly somewhere cheaper than where your business is), you decided to hire him and 15 other non-citizens.
I don't think that has anything to do with immigration law being messed up. That has to do with you making a decision to hire 16 people in another country.
That's not a bad thing, but it's just not what you're claiming it is.
Apart from the people complaining about the restrictions of H-1B's their guy was willing to accede to those restrictions.
These regulations are designed to let people like this guy come work in these situations.
The issue was that too many requests were filed so an unfair system (lottery) was used to determine who would even be evaluated. Because of this high volume of requests, two things happen. First of all, you can't properly verify if the requests are legitimate (a specialized worker, unrivaled in this position) or illegitimate (a cheaper worker, willing to put up with under-market conditions for the benefit of leaving a worse foreign situation). Secondly, when the validity of a request isn't checked thoroughly, it's too easy to abuse and the number of illegitimate requests go up, making it take even more resources to get through requests.
It sucks. The better solution is to make fair rules, and have the resources to apply them fairly. Unfortunately, hiring more government workers to be able to better process and make sure good foreign workers don't get left out of the country is not a politically safe move to make, while keeping them foreigners from stealing American jobs is more appealing to a public worried about unemployment. Trying to convince them that being able to hire a guy from out of the country means that more jobs will open up is not a straightforward thing to do.
No, the better solution is to just open the borders and let everybody in who wants to work. Bigotry against foreigners is no less ugly than bigotry against any other arbitrary group. Letting in people who are willing to work cheaply isn't "illegitimate" or "abuse", it benefits everyone involved.
Here's a good short video on "anti-foreign bias": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXMnAPGY1uE
This, in fact, has created the immigration supply and demand problem that the OP finds frustrating.
Build your business in columbia. Sell things over the internet or whatever your crashed ass website does, and live a happy life.
stop whining.
Why does imperialism/nationalism still exist? Why does it matter where you came out of a vagina - why should that determine your opportunities (through limiting where you can work)?
In the modern world, we'd be better off considering everyone citizens of the world and dropping the attitude we have about our borders.
If New Zealand opened its borders, how quickly do you think it could grow its population? My guess is that within a couple of decades, they probably could add maybe 20 million? The US currently takes about 1.2 million immigrants a year, and demand is far higher than that.
Do you feel that immigration on this scale would be a good thing for the 4.5 million citizens who currently reside in New Zealand? Or, even if it isn't, that they have a moral obligation to allow it?
You can get work visas for lots of interesting places (Canada, Europe, etc) in a much shorter time and for a smaller cost
So, yeah, I wouldn't bother with Silicon Valley
Unfortunately, hiring is just one piece of many puzzles that have to be solved when building your business. In 3 to 5 years, or at his first big 'liquidity' event (acquisition or what ever), where he switches over from 'startup' to 'S&P 500 material', that is when the other externalities of these decisions will be visible, in the future looking back. At that time, and that will be a good data point going forward. The cautionary tale is to let a decision that is working for you now define its total value. Business decisions have very long tails that stretch into the future.
From what I have heard from friends abroad is that its just as hard if not harder in other places.
For example in Costa Rica, just to be able to legally get a cellphone for yourself you must: be a citizen, a legal resident, or own/start a business. And we arent talking about a job here, just getting a cellphone.
On the other hand, a close relative went to Singapore about the same time, and their immigration procedure was smooth, straighforward, everything in place, no barriers anywhere. Singapore wants to have qualified professionals, the US see them as numbers.
Thats horrible! You could go buy a pre paid phone with out having all of the overhead from T-Mobile.
The difference is that it was probably a T-Mobile policy, not a law or mandate by the government (like in Costa Rica).
>the US see them as numbers.
Exactly. I wish we were like Singapore but its much easier for a smaller Country. They see a person as an investvent in the future, the US sees you as a number and wants your taxes.
So, the poster build a team of Colombians, but I guess it's not a truly international team.
Could you back that up with some hard data? As far as I know, the whole point behind the H-1Bs is that the companies are not allowed to pay the immigrants less than you would pay the local talent.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/modeledbehavior/2012/11/18/is-th...
That article tries to make the argument that the US is still not doing well with immigration because the total population of immigrants compared to the general population ranks about 23d. But still, if you look at absolute numbers, the US still allows the most immigrants of any other country. Those who try to argue that our immigration system is broken simply have some alternate agenda or hold some sort of spite toward the US, if you ask me.
Please submit a public comment: http://www.regulations.gov/#!documentDetail;D=DHS_FRDOC_0001...
So no, the system isn't broken.
The decision was for the first strategic hire. All of the remaining hires were just an offshoot from that initial decision as to where to locate the new team.
US citizen or not, they'll be paying US tax. As it is, the country has lost out on potential tax income from those employees.
I just don't get why the US wouldn't want qualified workers to get in the US. Singapore had this lesson learned well.
Disclaimer: I'm on H1B myself.
Employing people overseas means we pay less, but the money goes out of the country. That means that, in the long run, we are voting against our standard of living and in favor of someone with a smaller cost of living than us, perhaps much less extensive social safety nets, etc. So in the long term, our workers' wages will be repressed in a race to the bottom with others. And our cities will have to cut their social programs to match whatever happens in the countries we outsource to. This occurs not just in the US but any countries with a high cost of living.
This is just mean reversion, and in the end of the day it's hard to fight against this. Things tend to equal out and the wages in the US will eventually approach the world average if the US stops being the main reserve currency of the world, and the dollar becomes weaker.
All the large tech firms are hiring as quickly as they can, and are still starving for devs. Ignoring the education problem, the next best approach is to hire from overseas; and that's also extremely difficult due to immigration law.
Can you provide some proof? I hear people say this, but I'd love to see real data to back it up
Wages are more or less stagnant (source: http://www.epi.org/publication/bp359-guestworkers-high-skill...) and many of the big companies Silicon Valley just got spanked for illegal no poach hiring agreements.
Are the large tech firms REALLY hiring as quickly as they can? Or do they just prefer guest workers they can pay less and exert greater control over via their worker visas?
Now, say you're a company and you have multiple locations. You apply for the employee at the cheapest location, then pick a title that will get a lower prevailing wage, and say they are entry level when really they have 5 years of experience. So the prevailing wage determination is skewed. This is what I mean about telling a white lie. Anything that is available to companies that has a monetary reward for telling "white lies" to the government and depends on the companies "being honest" let alone understanding or agreeing with the overarching intent of the legislation -- is going to have the absolute shit abused out of it eventually.
If a Software Engineer gets a higher prevailing wage than a Software Developer (or vice versa) according to the DOL. Which title do you think the employer will pick to apply under? The answer is obvious.
[note]: This may have been true for a long time in the history. People were going to the US mainland because their conditions were bad enough, and anything would have been better elsewhere. I can understand that point of view, although e.g. my situation is on equal terms in the US vs my home country. However, I don't think it'll serve the US interest in the long run.
Learn to use google, people.
http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2013/05/10-h1b-visa...
Software wages are trending up
http://s2.epi.org/files/charts/IT-Guestworkers_Figure-O.png....
and judging from the spikes in that graph, the data is bunk anyway, including IPO millionaires in the average, instead of using median.
0, which is why salaries and rents are incredibly high.
I feel for your town and I hope everyone there gets a good job; I just don't think "but we're American!" is the advantage that should get them there.
But on your bigger point, remember this guy was going to move to the US to do this work until he was told no by our government. I want him to work here instead of in Columbia because I care about the US economy and I want it to do well [1]. The question is really about whether this job in San Francisco should go to someone who was born in the US or elsewhere (with, like you said, everything else being equal). I find it really hard to have a pro-natural-born-American job bias when my (and I'm guessing your) ancestors also came here from other countries seeking work, and more generally, I just don't think foreigners are less deserving of good things than people who happen to have been born here. I guess you'd say that's not supporting my own countrymen, and if so, I'm OK with that.
[1] Wait, why do I care about the US economy more than the Colombian economy? I'm not sure, and I struggle with this. Selfishness, I suspect--I live in the US.
Hardest doesn't equal most productive. Furthermore, there were less obstacles to him hiring Columbians. I don't see what the problem is here.
Do some employers game this system? Sure. But doing so is risky and repeat offenders can get blacklisted by the USCIS.
I saw that page, but I was looking for the actual wage stats and kept running into 404s (including one from that page).
Anyway, silly patriotism? Nah, real patriotism. There's more to being an American than paying your taxes. That said, I'm not some patriotic radical. I can see why it would be better to hire a team abroad. Just not in this case.
My issue is how the article's framed, like it's somehow America's fault! I don't buy it!
Why should we discriminate against someone who is poorer and better skilled in favor of someone who is richer, privileged, and less skilled, just because of the quirk of geographic origin?
Morally I find that abhorrent, and personally it drives me insane that I don't get to work with the best people in the world.
I get that there are political barriers to following that moral claim to its logical conclusion, but they shouldn't mean we discard that moral claim; we should try to remove the political obstacles.
Unfortunately, this doesn't work as well in practice: the fact that the H-1B is completely tied to a particular employer makes it the modern equivalent of indentured servitude and the H-4 makes things worse by not allowing your family members to work.
Therefore, when people say "H1 transfer", it is actually just a new H-1B petition, all over again, without the restriction of the H-1B cap.
So the only thing this allows you is to skip the cap. Every other bit of bureaucracy is still there.
Promoting US citizens just because they are US citizens may work for a while, but I doubt that it is a good long-term strategy.
That's still how the bulk of H-1Bs are used. The majority of them are granted to companies like Cognizant, Infosys, TCS, and several others. For example:
>The two largest H-1B users are Indian-based, Infosys, with 6,298 visas, and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), with 6,258. In third place is Cognizant, which is based in New Jersey, but runs large offshore centers. These firms have long dominated the top H-1B list spots.
>Hira points out that over the last four years, Cognizant has received about 23,000 new H-1B workers with visas valid for up to 6 years, and has a number of workers on L-1s. (L-1 visas are used by multinational firms to transfer employees between countries.) "So, most, if not nearly all, of Cognizant's employees in the US are on some guest-worker visa," said Hira.
From: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9247241/Offshore_firm...
I would particularly be happier with something based on automatic worker visas for graduates of US universities, applying the permit to the spouse also, and no specific company assignment. This sponsored stuff keeps everyones wages down by not providing H-1B movement.
Granted there is some bureaucracy (which is largely handled by lawyers hired by the new employer, as it should be), and as with any bureaucratic system there is always a (low) probability of (unwarranted) rejection.
The H-1B is a far cry from "the modern equivalent of indentured servitude". I wonder how many "free men" wouldn't love to be "modern indentured servants" while getting paid 6 figures (and unlike the 18th century version, without being subject to physical punishment and having the opportunity to leave whenever they desire).
I agree wholeheartedly with your statement about the H-4, that's just sad.
Not sure how it happened, but maybe it's not so hard after all (especially if they lawyer up)
