Comment by kccqzy
3 hours ago
The lure of H-1B is not really the money savings. Go look at the graduating class of computer science students at large universities. A large fraction are international students. Universities thrive on them since they pay the most tuition and are generally not allowed any financial aid. Companies want to hire them in addition to U.S. citizens. That's it. No Silicon Valley company that I know of pays H-1B and citizens different wages on that basis.
The difficulty of switching jobs on H1-B has always been a myth. Voluntary job switches are just as easy as U.S. citizens. You just line up things well without the possibility of taking a long break in between jobs. Dealing with unexpected job terminations (fired or laid off) is the problem.
It's not strictly about the money. (Though it is absolutely also about that)
> Dealing with unexpected job terminations (fired or laid off) is the problem.
Herein lies the problem. This gives employers absolutely massive leverage over the employees, which lets them coerce things like ridiculous unpaid overtime and downright abuse.
Even if you pay the same nominal salary, the H-1B is "cheaper" if you can force them to work 60-80h whereas a top-class American is just going to demand 40h weeks. (Though in practice, those extra hours rarely see increased productivity, so whether it's actually cheaper for outputs obtained is up for debate.)
Contrast: Europe. Tech salaries are low by US standards, but you don't see as much of the outsourcing & migrant worker hype around it. European labour laws mean you can't set up a sweatshop in your branch office, and European migrants to the US won't put up with labour abuses as much.
> Contrast: Europe. Tech salaries are low by US standards, but you don't see as much of the outsourcing & migrant worker hype around it. European labour laws mean you can't set up a sweatshop in your branch office, and European migrants to the US won't put up with labour abuses as much.
Europe actually has had more direct export of the jobs. No need of specialist visas when the jobs were already exported away to EE. The EU allowed for companies to arbitrage away tech jobs to relatively poorer countries in the EU. And there's very little need for native top talent as there's very little native innovation happening within the EU in software - it's only a fraction of the amount happening in the US. And that's why those who can often tend to work for American companies in the EU, or migrate if they can.
> Voluntary job switches are just as easy as U.S. citizens.
Then why did my wife's friends that lost their H-1B jobs have to leave America?
American citizens don't face deportation with job loss.
Also, as a US citizen, I'm free to quit my job anytime I want. If I don't like putting up with my job because of some bullshit my employer pulls, I can easily leave. That is absolutely not the case for sponsored workers.
H-1B workers are stressed out and paranoid about their employment. They'll put up with far more, for far longer, with less compensation.
Econ 101: increased supply lowers prices (wages).
A healthy labor pool increase business growth that in turn can push average industry wages higher however.
It’s real phenomena too - US developer wages are so high in part due to the business ecosystem which depends on part on recent graduates and a flexible labor pool.
That is, your analysis is only true in the static case. Starve US startups of talented junior developers and you might kill the next Facebook in the process.
Thats some Wealth of Nations every worker can move the same number of bricks reductive thinking.
I have been in the valley for 25+ years, and worked with a ton of visa holders.
The majority of them were better educated and all well compensated for the work they did. The fact that many of them stayed for green cards and citizenship says a LOT. There is a reason that the boss of both google, and MS came through these programs.
No it isn’t.
There are two instances on this website where supply and demand seemingly do not apply. Wages in tech engineering, and housing costs. Specific carve outs are always made to make the conclusion that, for some reason, this positive supply (workers) and demand (housing) shock has no or marginal impact on wages and housing respectively. It’s very odd since most here work in roles where supply and demand of course apply so it’s not like people are unfamiliar with the math here.
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> No Silicon Valley company that I know of pays H-1B and citizens different wages on that basis.
larger pool means lower wages. this is so fundamental and obvious that it feels like i'm being gaslit when i see shit like this.
Well it's because by this logic we should just stop Americans from studying for computing jobs as well, that way those who remain will have higher wages. Just as the Luddites tried to stop the rise of industrialization that threatened to bring the skills they used to employ to the wider public at lower costs.
The real answer is that immigrants create enough economic demand to be net positive even for Americans, for much the same reason as Americans are generally more prosperous when there's more of us.
Seriously, you live in some dumpy parts of the country and you can have the exclusive rights on being the town cloud guru locked down and in principle get higher wages in a smaller labor pool, but for some strange reason few of us want to do that.
> Well it's because by this logic we should just stop Americans from studying for computing jobs as well, that way those who remain will have higher wages.
At least if these other Americans are from a different "tribe" than your own, this does not sound like a dumb strategy if people from your own "tribe" are deeply ingrained in programming jobs. :-D
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The US needs immigrants. We need the best and the brightest. Those are the folks starting the new job creating companies. That’s what keeps us so innovative. The H1B is a good gauntlet through which we can get those immigrants. Ended it is shortsighted.
> The US needs immigrants.
At the expense of the citizenry?
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> Companies want to hire them in addition to U.S. citizens. That's it.
As opposed to the rest of the graduating class that is already considered a legal citizen?
Your logic doesn’t make sense. “In addition to every option available that doesn’t have additional legal framework attached, these specific people are also desirable.”
Why?
In addition to the U.S. citizens in that graduating class.
Basically large tech companies want to hire whomever passes their interviews, regardless of whether they are citizens or not. The hiring process is intentionally blind on their immigration status.
Small companies will ask you in the application form "will you now or in the future require sponsorship to work in the U.S." and larger companies simply don't ask.
> The hiring process is intentionally blind on their immigration status.
You can't be serious. On every job application I've ever filled out the last question is always a variation of: "Do you now or will you in the future require employer sponsorship to work in this country?"
> The hiring process is intentionally blind on their immigration status.
This might be the most amusing thing I’ve read all day.
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