US making law to increase India's share in H-1B visa

[OhioChick]

12 Jan, 2012, 07.43PM IST, PTI

HYDERABAD: The US is in the process of making a law to increase India's share in the much sought after H-1B visas, an American Senator said here on Thursday.

According to a report, nearly half of H-1B visa holders in the US are Indians who are hired mostly in the IT industry. Between 2000 and 2009, 46.9 percent of the total approved H-1B visa holders had India as their country of birth.

"We are working on a legislation right now of increasing India's share in H1B visa," Senator Mark Warner, who is co-chairing Senate India Caucus, said.

India has been conveying its concern to the over increasing number of rejections of the H1B visa applications of professionals. Besides, America has also raised fee for these visas, the move which was strongly criticised by the Indian government.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/visa-and-immigration/us-making-law-to-increase-indias-share-in-h-1b-visa/articleshow/11464188.cms

Just reported 2 days ago: "U.S. Shelves H-1B Visa Talks With India"

http://www.democraticunderground.com/101422708

[ihavenobias]

1. Unemployment rate is going down, we need more workers

[totodeinhere]

20. It hasn't gone down enough yet to justify bringing in more foreign workers.

And remember that the real unemployment rate is much higher than the government's figure. Train Americans for those jobs first.

[backtomn]

32. I think you are missing the point

They are increasing India's SHARE of visas, not increasing the overall number of visas that are given. Speaking as a person living in a town that is now nearly 30% from India, I am not sure that we can find better immigrants for the community. They do their own religious and cultural things, but vote, are part of the community, are business owners, participate in school and community activities.

If you want to address the issue of the total number of visas granted, fine....but I think that the total number of uneducated illegals is more of a problem. However, if we keep the same number of visas and more are from India, it will likely be a good thing......just one man's opinion.

[ChromeFoundry]

3. Well that's stupid

From Mark Warner, a Democrat, no less.

If 1/2 of all are already from the place they are trying to increase... how does that even make sense? Seems like India is making its fair share of criticism about US Policy lately... Maybe they should try China instead.

Those of you in Virginia, Vote this turd out of office when his term is up. Obviously he doesn't realize that there is an unemployment crisis going on right now, because is head is buried to far up his ass.

Here are his top 5 corporate sponsors:
Altria Group
JPMorgan Chase & Co
Dominion Resources
Norfolk Southern
Covington & Burling

[FreakinDJ]

6. They should vote that Jack Arse out of office

I don't know which is more insensitive Sen Warner or the GSElevator tweets

[sendero]

24. Yeah..

... but the Dems are SOOOOOO.... different than the Republicans, they would never undermine the middle class!

[limpyhobbler]

4. Why not retrain unemployed US nationals to do some of these jobs?

Because that would make too much sense.

[LibDemAlways]

15. Americans want to be paid a decent wage. Employers want to hire cheap labor.

And there's really no retraining necessary. There are plenty of Americans capable of doing the job, but the cheap bastards running the companies don't want to pay them what they're worth.

[limpyhobbler]

21. I agree that's a big part of it, but

I agree that's a big part of it, but some of the H1-B workers that come here are making $50-$90k / yr.

I bet a lot of US nationals would be willing to do those jobs at the same pay or even for less, if they only had the required training and experience.

The Indian government has invested in educating and training its people in these high-demand skills, where the US government has not done this. This result is companies are importing workers from overseas. Companies don't perceive it as their job to engage in training. And we don't really have much of national education policy, or any real life long learning opportunities. We pay lip service to it, but that's about all.

[OhioChick]

26. As for the Indian Government/Education....

From April 2011:

Only 25 % IT graduates readily employable: Nasscom

DELHI I BANGALORE: At 25, and with a computer science degree from one of the top regional engineering colleges , Sandesh Kumar considered himself to be the luckiest among all his batch mates when he was picked by Infosys Technologies last year. But within three months, Kumar realised the initial training at Infosys' sprawling Mysore campus was getting nowhere. "I actually sucked at everything — communications, language and understanding about some of the latest development tools," Kumar says. "The company was kind enough to flag early that I might face hurdles ahead and I decided to quit," he adds.

http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2011-04-07/news/29392668_1_engineering-colleges-employability-study-nasscom

From May 2009:

U.S.: H-1B workers outnumber unemployed techies

Computerworld - WASHINGTON -- As unemployment among tech workers increases with the recession, the U.S. government is raising broad questions as part of a federal case over H-1Bs about the connection of visa fraud to the unemployment of IT workers.

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9133529/U.S._H_1B_workers_outnumber_unemployed_techies

We have qualified tech workers here in the US. It's all about the cheapest labor.

[limpyhobbler]

27. I agree with you that companies want cheaper labor and that is what drives it, but

I know some guys that are on H1-B visas and they make $55,000 as entry level engineers.

That's nothing to sneeze at.

How much do you think H1-B information technology workers are making, since you think it's a low wage I guess?
That's not to be snarky, it just a legit question, I'm trying to learn more about the issue.

I totally agree we ought to scale back H1-B's, if that's what you're trying to say.

I can understand if an engineer was making $100,000 and got replaced by a guy making $50,000, he might be upset about it.
I know some people in that boat too. I know some skilled engineers who were making close to $100K 15 years ago, who are working at gas stations making just above minimum wage now.

I understand it sucks. That's not fair and we need to look out for those guys definitely.

In my opinion, we ought to have programs to pipeline inner high school city kids into jobs as computer engineers, high tech etc.
Instead of what we have now, which is a pipeline to prison, or a job at McDonalds, or onto welfare, or they are on their own.

Because we don't have an education policy really, so that's what I was trying to get at there, but I didn't do a very good job of expressing myself I guess. Ooops!

[ChromeFoundry]

29. Base salary is only part of the reason

It's very well known that H-1B workers get paid less than their US National counterparts, and depending on the company, this can be as much as 50% less. Since the company is also their sponsor of the H-1b visa, they can hold that over the workers head as an unspoken threat to work longer hours. Hint: Find an H-1b worker that makes a decent hourly wage; They are paid on salary and exempt from working a 40 hr week. Look into the health, dental, vision and savings plan benefits package they are offered. How many are married and bring over their families, and are added to the health plans? Also, how freely are these workers able to complain about working conditions and safety, against the company, when the company holds the sponsorship? If an H-1b worker brings their spouse over with them, the spouse is not eligible to work in this country.

Armed with those facts and seeing first had how corporation of this country game the system, lobby politicians to pass legislation benefiting their interests, fudge prevailing wage values, illegally dispose of hazardous waste and pesticides, among other sketchy practices.... You draw your own conclusions as to why these same companies want to hire easily disposable indentured servants. It's less about education than you think it is.

[cyberpj]

5. Wow. 2 days apart. 2 opposing headlines. So which is it? Also, I don't believe

there aren't enough qualified US applicants.

Only that there aren't enough companies willing to pay for qualified US applicants.

That being said with a spouse in the industry since 1980's.

It seems they like paying cheaper wages so much overseas that they just want to keep expanding the ability to pay less to those they bring into the country who are willing to work for less here.

And since 'they' have OUR Congress by the balls, er... pockets, stopping it feels undoable until more citizens are educated enough to exercise their voting rights properly.

Sigh...........

[FreakinDJ]

8. Cognizant charged with H1-B visa abuse by US staff

Eighteen American information technology professionals have filed a civil lawsuit against its former employer, Cognizant, for replacing them with people from India who were hired by the IT major on H-1B visas.

The case was filed in April this year at the Superior Court for the State Of California County of Los Angeles - South District against Molina Healthcare Inc., and its outsourcer Cognizant Technology Solution on charges of national origin discrimination, intentional infliction of emotional distress, wrongful termination in violation of public policy, negligence, tortuous interference with economic advantage, violation of Unfair Business Practices Act, fraud in the inducement, age discrimination, failure to take all reasonable steps to prevent discrimination, retaliation, violation of the labour code and failure to pay overtime pay.

http://www.rediff.com/business/slide-show/slide-show-1-tech-us-staff-charges-cognizant-with-h1-b-visa-abuse/20110722.htm

There is an almost ENDLESS amount of evidence proving they are displacing High Paid American Workers

[cyberpj]

9. Two things. Thank God it's finally happening. And what TOOK so long?

Thanks for sharing that. I'm gonna love passing it on to my IT friends.

[SixthSense]

12. generally you can believe

the story which indicates we've been fucked over

that's always where we end up

[sharp_stick]

7. Does anyone know

what legislation this is?

As of now there is no quota or limit based on country to H1B numbers and anything to change that would likely be a pretty large change to current policy.

The current system is pretty much a first past the post application and everyone has to compete with the damned Indian IT companies in FedEx'ing H1B applications to DHS on opening day.

Every year our immigration attorneys get a special FedEx pickup just to make sure that our few applications make it in on time. We hire scientists from around the world and it's getting tough to get them in with the Indian IT companies hoarding the fucking VISA's

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

10. I'm curious about this one as well

because I have not seen it reported on U.S. sites. Right now, there is no country allotment for H-1Bs (with the exception of Singapore/Philippines and Master/Ph.D.s from U.S. universities, but these do not represent big numbers and are separate from the 50,000 or so H-1B visas per fiscal year), so what your attorney is doing is filing all the new H-1Bs on April 1, since you can only file no more than 6 months prior to the start date which in this case has to be October 1, the start of the fiscal year (extensions are not counted against the cap).

I've done plenty of visas for scientists and sometimes a good lawyer will suggest other strategies for them rather than H visas. Usually lawyers will automatically turn to Hs because they are easier (as in, more $$ and less time) than, say, the O visas which require more creativity and time, but a lot of scientists who thought they would never qualify for an O, indeed can and will. Os are a good way for quality scientists to avoid the H issue and they do allow for dual intent (i.e., seeking permanent residence and maintaining O visa non-immigrant status at the same time).

The one visa category that I've seen abused by IT companies has been the L-1B, which has no wage/benefits requirements, no education requirements and none of the cap issue that Hs have. The downside is the worker must have worked at a foreign counterpart.

[a2liberal]

11. TPTB are really eager to suppress IT wages (n/t)

[patrice]

14. Would that be the ones who love "being able to fire" folks? Or the ones who (SHOULD) support

the right to organize.

[a2liberal]

19. both (n/t)

[patrice]

13. Any good national level groups working on this??? The broad picture would seem to indicate that it's

up for bids.

Especially with so many Republicans around who just love "being able to fire" folks.

Mic check? Mic check?

[patrice]

16. Is probably devolving to a "states' rights" issue??? Fuck America :-(((((

[musette_sf]

17. K&O (Kick and OUTRAGE)

[alp227]

18. If the government really cared about us, H1B quotas would be tied to the unemployment rate.

But of course...they can't afford to lose those campaign donations from the greedy CEOs who spend money that could be used to pay a living wage to workers instead on political lobbying or a vacation home in the Bahamas.

[pampango]

22. Seems like it's not changing the number of visas, just reallocating which countries

people come from.

[sybylla]

23. That's exactly how I'm reading it.

Not really a contradiction of what was reported 2 days ago. Just a change that might get the Indian government to shut up for ten minutes.

[sendero]

25. The number should be ZERO.

.... we are in a depression.

[ChromeFoundry]

28. +1 - exactly. n/t

[valerief]

30. Yes, because not enough Indians are employed in US IT already. Fuck the Americans like me

laid off from IT jobs.

[Lucky Luciano]

31. Unemployed American IT workers should look into "Big Data."

There are fucking fortunes being made in Silicon Valley in this hot field. Look up Data Scientist - look up Hadoop and a company called Cloudera. Read their blog. Then go to Kaggle.com where IT badasses compete for large prizes to best analyze data that kaggle's clients want analyzed. Even if you don't win the prizes, you get much better at analyzing mountains of data. That WILL get you paid these days.