They do all their recruiting in India, then pay the fee for each they are able to place.
The outsource company pays the worker's transport and temporary accommodations in the US and keeps at least 30% off the top for profit.
They will bill $100 an hour for top talent (US IT Pro firms bill $200+/hr).
The Indian worker will get $30-$40/hr. And they cannot work for anyone but the original firm that paid the fee.
So that gives the company INCREDIBLE leverage over the candidate.
Primarily I feel sorry for the unseen American victim, but that must be sheer hell for the placed worker.
Usually I reject terms like “exploitation” or “usury”, but that does seem usurious to me, egregiously so.
If programmers can cost $200 per hour, clearly we need a large supply to meet such a demand. Programming is not a high level skill, compared to, say, a pharmacist, chemical engineer, scientist or a EE. That they command such high hourly fees means that the skills are scarce, not that they are high. If so, the IT industry is right to lobby for more workers.
I think some of them make them pay back the fee.