Should the US issue fewer H1Bs and accept fewer guest workers?

[LBJDemocrat]

Poll question: Should the US issue fewer H1Bs and accept fewer guest workers?

I want to see where DU stands on average. From what I've seen, the forum is split.

I understand that the binary poll does not give anyone an opportunity for a nuanced response, but you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette.


As for myself, I think immigration policy should be radically tightened because it's costing working Americans their tax money and their wages.

[Greyhound]

1. Other, it should be completely re-worked. Our immigration (what's the antonym of policy?)

is just insane, so it's not a matter of loosening or tightening, a complete reconstruction is what we need, IMO.

[LBJDemocrat]

2. Ummm, crap

I changed the wording of the question and "Yes" meant the opposite thing. Now I made it back to how it was more or less, but the current answers don't mean s***.

[Deja Q]

3. Convince them to stay here as American citizens instead of going back home...

Of course, always bite the hand that feeds and it's quite clear there are far more opportunities in these other countries. There is little incentive to stay in America, if everybody is shipped in, trained, then happy to go back home.

Now, what's their take on immigration, the home countries currently getting such a good deal? Oh dear...

Just like my own bosses saying in bringing in fresh blood will allow them to train us on newer technologies, they bring in new people, train them, and then they quit too... sometimes before the probation period ends. Regardless, the new people keep their secrets as much as everyone else.

Unless peak oil is an incentive in all this too... but find me any tangent and I'll shove it in here too.

[LBJDemocrat]

4. kick

[TahitiNut]

5. Gee ... Is Dubai our model economy?? Should we have a huge source of cheaper, non-voting labor?

:eyes:

Read "Paul Krugman: The Road to Dubai"

<snip>
Imagine ... a future in which America becomes like Kuwait or Dubai, a country where a large fraction of the work force consists of illegal immigrants or foreigners on temporary visas — and neither group has the right to vote. Surely this would be a betrayal of our democratic ideals, of government of the people, by the people. Moreover, a political system in which many workers don't count is likely to ... have a weak social safety net and to spend too little on services like health care and education.
<snip>

As I've said ...
Exploitative employers have several sources of cheap(er) labor that cannot vote and exercise their political rights of self-determination in this country:
(1) illegal aliens who have no intention of immigrating or bringing their families (i.e. "undocumented" guest workers)
(2) illegal 'immigrants' who live under the radar with some immediate or extended family who may or may not be legal residents
(3) "guest workers" admitted under poorly-run programs
(4) incarcerated felons serving time in a prison and working in "prison industry"
(5) ex-felons from our over-populated prison system who've been denied the entitlement to vote
(6) legal residents under a variety of work visas (e.g. H-1B) who allege no intention to immigrate
(7) permanent resident aliens ("green card") who have not applied for citizenship for a variety of reasons including language skills

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/TahitiNut/386


To grant citizenship wholesale is not the answer. Unless people have a vested interest in the future direction of the body politic ... a deep concern for the nation in which their children, their family's children, and their children's children will inherit ... I'm not interested in more short-term, sell-out voters. Political self-determination is meaningless without a legacy perspective. It's one of the more tangible manifestations of Rawls' "Veil Of Ignorance," the paradigm of political fairness and the extension of one of our more familiar tactics for achieving equity between two children and one candybar: One child gets to cut it in half and the other child gets to pick which half they want. If we could only draft our laws and regulate our economy in the same way ... without knowedge of how we would gain a narrow advantage by the choices we make.