Posted on 08/01/2009 4:31:43 PM PDT by yoe
Senate Immigration Subcommittee Chair Senator Chuck Schumer has not said anything about increasing the H-1B cap, so far as I can tell. There have been news articles on this in the last few weeks, and to my knowledge Schumer has made no public statements in this regard.
The quote included in the (Computer World Article) is:
"We must encourage the world's best and brightest individuals to come to the United States and create new technologies and business that will employ countless American workers, but must discourage businesses from using our immigration laws as a means to obtain temporary and less-expensive foreign labor to replace capable American workers."
It would appear to be similar to statements made during the last year by a number of Democrats, including Obama, supporting liberalization of the employment-based green card program. As I've written many times, I am just as strongly opposed to expansion of the green card program as I am to expansion of H-1B, as both have the effects of reducing job opportunities for U.S. citizens and permanent residents. Moreover, though I definitely support bringing "the world's best and brightest individuals" here, very few of the foreign workers are of that caliber.
So I'm not making the distinction between H-1B visas and green cards in order to say that I support, or at least do not mind, what Schumer is apparently planning to do. Nevertheless it is important to know what those plans are, and I believe the expansionary facets of them will focus on green cards, not H-1Bs.
Of course, the second half of Schumer's comments above is designed to give them impression that he wishes to take strong action to stop abuse of the H-1B program. My guess is that that is not the case at all. Instead, I believe his legislation will simply include provisions to stop fraud rather than abuse, via stepped-up enforcement measures. As I've stated so often, the main problem is loopholes in the law, not fraud, so anti-fraud measures would be of little value.
For example, it is a safe bet that Schumer will not propose that all employers be subject to the restrictions currently imposed on H-1B-dependent employers, such as a requirement that the employer attempt to fill the position with an American before hiring an H-1B. After those were temporarily extended to TARP recipients, i.e. the financial industry, earlier this year, Schumer vowed to overturn that legislation.
It is interesting that Schumer on the one hand claims to be opposed to using foreign workers as cheap labor, while on the other using Greenspan as his star witness, who has stated repeatedly that the goal of importing the foreign workers is to keep salaries down. Definitely an "emperor has no clothes" moment.
Greenspan has made such statements many times in the last year or so, and one has to wonder just what he's thinking. The median salary for a mid-career software developer is around $80,000, which while not subsistence-level is not particularly high. New law graduates, using a similar skill set (good analytical and problem-solving abilities, etc.) make $160K. I would assume that Greenspan is just ignorant, rather than flat out lying, but even ignorance would be highly disturbing. As the second article here points out, and as Greenspan himself has said, he had no inkling that the financial industry might implode. This is amazing, since anyone could have understood the danger of selling no-down-payment mortgages to people who can't afford them, selling "insurance" to investors on sliced-and-diced packages of those mortgages, etc.
Yup! That’s Up-Chuck Schumer alright.
“We must encourage the world’s best and brightest individuals to come to the United States and create new technologies and business that will employ countless American workers, but must discourage businesses from using our immigration laws as a means to obtain temporary and less-expensive foreign labor to replace capable American workers.”
Well Chuckie, how many of the best and brightest that are currently citizens of the U.S. cannot even afford to go to college, or cannot afford to go to the best university; but millions of dollars are being given away to foreign students to attend our colleges? You really know how to upset a mother don’t you.
WHAT is wrong with us?
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