Posted on 02/05/2009 12:17:00 AM PST by bruinbirdman
US President Barack Obama's new pick as commerce secretary, Senator Judd Gregg, may well become the White House lead for expanding the cap on H-1B visas, a bulk of which go to Indian firms.
Gregg, who strongly supported expanding the H-1B visa programme in the Senate, is among a group of people in top White House posts that also see offshore outsourcing as a plus for the US economy, the Computer World magazine reported.
Obama himself voiced support early in his campaign for increasing the 85,000-visa cap, which includes 20,000 visas set aside for advanced-degree graduates from US universities. But he has not addressed the issue in recent months.
In a talk last April at the Cato Institute, a libertarian policy research group, Gregg pointed to comments by Bill Gates that for every H-1B worker who comes to the US, five jobs are created, the tech publication noted.
"It's not like... we are taking jobs from Americans, which is what you hear from labour unions. We're actually creating jobs by bringing bright people into this country," Gregg said.
Many in Congress are divided on the H-1B issue. For instance, Republican Senator Chuck Grassley believes H-1B workers are being used to displace Americans.
Gregg acknowledged that there has been some abuse in the H-1B programme, "especially involving Indian-related companies and their basic flooding of the market in this area and then having people return to India with knowledge that they gained here."
But, he argued, that's an issue "that can be corrected fairly easily with minor adjustments in the programme."
Indian offshore firms are the largest users of H-1B visas and consider it critical to their delivery model for moving IT functions offshore. It's a point they have made repeatedly in US Security and Exchange Commission filings.
Apart from Gregg another one of Obama's choices, Diana Farrell, may be just as important in shaping White House policy, the Computer World said.
The former director of the McKinsey Global Institute, McKinsey & Co.'s economics research arm, Farrell has been tapped to serve on the National Economic Council and as deputy economic adviser to the president.
McKinsey, a management consulting firm, has published research that argues that offshore outsourcing to low-wage countries brings "substantial benefits" to the US. Its studies and reports have been cited by the tech industry in support of the H-1B visa programme.
Tech industry groups praised Gregg's appointment in statements. TechNet, a bipartisan political network of tech-centric CEOs, said Gregg "will no doubt be a strong ambassador for America's workers, businesses and our dynamic economy."
Oh thank heaven. I was thinking this economic downturn was going to be so unfair to foreign H1-B candidates. Whew.
Imagine, our own citizens taking precedence in situations like this. Talk about a quaint outmoded mindset.
Screw our workers. Let them follow IBM to India or something. Geez... what lightweights!
/s
This is exactly what American needs—more non-whites! /s
Makes sense when you realize that labor is merely a fungible commodity like any other commodity traded in the international market place.
Yup, what America needs in these times of skyrocketing unemployment is more foreign workers to do the jobs Americans just won´t do*! (Like computer programming, etc.)
*at sweatshop wages
No it isn´t. Take a look at a tomato or a crate of chinese baby formula. Now take a look at a human being. There are fundamental differences between these “commodities”.
This is not hard to understand - indeed, it is so easy to understand that it takes a serious amount of education in order to *not* understand it.
I’m sure you’ll find a lot of folks who agree with you on that. I don’t view humans as just another commodity.
Seems Obama is trying to top Bush here.
Lets import thousands more foreigners and give them jobs while hundreds of thousands of Americans gawk at their piece of the dream circling the drain..Next the government tells ya this would certainly be shot in the arm for the U.S. job market...
Like freezing your ass off while the freaks running government tells us frigid weather is consistent with global warming events.
Then hypocrites like Bill Gates go out and do speeches were they complain that the US is loosing its technological edge because not enough americans are going into computer science programs at universities.
I have to disagree with the consensus. We need high tech
employees. Our schools have not furnished enough engineers,
mathematicians and advanced degree candidates to fill
high tech jobs.
Why is this bad?
I hire whoever I want. Got a problem with that?
Just wha we need, 85,000 more unemployed.
please explain...
Having worked in the tech industry, I’ll tell you why it is bad:
1. It is a security risk. We no longer have a talent pool of “US-born” engineers, scientists, etc. Why? because...
2. The companies that employ H1B people are using the program to supply them with indentured servants. These people can’t make waves, they don’t talk back, they will do any stupid, short-sighted, idiotic thing that management wants, because they don’t dare rock the boat. If they’re fired, then they must return to the country from which they came.
3. I could go back into industry. I won’t. I now counsel young people to not go into the industry because there is no point in some kid putting in the sort of work necessary in hard science, math, etc to become highly skilled and knowledgeable about technology (of whatever sort) only to be managed by some idiotic boss, many times who understands little about the technology.
My requirements for going back into the tech industry is that I’m not going to break my back to bail the boss out of a schedule jam because he (or she) lied about the schedule, or the staffing requirements, or the budget. I’m not going to explain a future problem, explain how to avoid the future problem and then be asked to clean up the problem in the future when management didn’t listen.
The reason why the US wants H1B employees is because they don’t talk back the way US engineers do. When the boss is an idiot, the foreigners just do as their told. US engineers tell the boss he’s an idiot. Which do you think the boss prefers?
“... do as they’re told...”
I hate those sorts of mistakes.
In the early 90s I knew my job with a defense contractor was coming to an end. I applied at the two state universities for a RA/TA in engineering (both Biomedical and Mechanical). While I did not have the strongest undergraduate transcript, I had been working for 7 years, done quite well in my GRE, and taken and received As in a bunch of MBA and Engineering courses while working full time.
I did not receive my dime of Assistantship money, and I went back to school on my own resources. I ended up getting a very high GPA for my M.S. work along with having the highest or second highest grade in the class in several classes.
Well over half (probably 2/3s) of the Assistantships in my department were held by foreign nationals. Think about it for a second. I had been a U.S. citizen all my life, lived in my state and paid state income taxes for 7 years, proved my ability to do graduate level work, and I was less regarded than an engineer from India or China.
Another dirty little secret about RA/TAs - the department only has to pay in state tuition for them. Changing that rule alone would help to favor U.S. citizens.
I have been denied the opportunity to even interview for two positions that were later filled by sponsored candidates in my company.
If H1-B Visas are such a great idea, then make them cost $50,000/yr. Not only would it generate revenue for the government, it would ensure that only truly unique talent is sponsored or pays its own way.
Remember the clips from the Law firm that specifically told companies how to avoid hiring Americans for H1-B positions.
It is bad because you have a generation of kids not interested in math/science because they have heard these war stories from their parents. I am at a loss to advise my daughters other than to take as much and as hard of math, science, and English as you can. What careers will be available on the backend I am not sure of? At this point I would not advise engineering.
Sad. The rate of college-attendance in the US has been rising steadily for the last generation yet we still have critical shortages in many high-tech sectors because these yahoos are going into college and majoring in useless crap like art history.
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