H-1B Training Program to Be Axed

Wired ^ | Feb. 11, 2004 | Joanna Glasner

[anymouse]

Facing a drop in funding and a tough job market for technology professionals, the Department of Labor is poised to kill a program that trains Americans to fill positions held by foreign guest workers.

The department created the H-1B Training Program in the late 1990s as a way for Americans to learn skills in high demand by employers. The funding came from fees employers of foreign workers paid to get H-1B visas, which allowed the foreigners to take technical jobs that went unfilled during the dot-com boom. The Labor Department used those fees and other funding to pay $328 million in scholarships and grants to community groups to develop training programs for U.S. citizens and permanent residents.

[anymouse]

This article is written poorly and is confusing, but it looks like something is wrong here.

[EEDUDE]

There are PLENTY of trained American workers for these jobs.
This article is misleading. As an engineer with years of experience, I can assure you that this is not about any "shortage" of competent workers.

This is about being able to hire an H1-B worker for 50% less than what the high tech market normally pays for these workers.

The "shortage" is a myth.

[anymouse]

You got it.

[sixmil]

Of course the H1-B program itself will live on. Remember back when the corporate beggars said they would send H1-Bs back when the shortage subsided? More broken promises and lies from the corporate-government complex.

[sarasmom]

Kind of funny that you would say that on the internet.
ROTFLMAO!
Did you really think all the non-IT type people in the world would never be able to understand the complicated world of computer technology?
It aint exactly magic.
Magic is still a rarefied specialty field, few can learn how to produce magic, and even fewer can master the skills.
But returning back to the ups and downs of the IT field,we have a prime example of osmosis.
People dont need to be IT experts with extensive training to operate computer equipment anymore.
IT experts still have a valuable place and position in the workplace, just not one as lucrative as in the past.
OTOH,I am willing to pay my electrical installer/repairman and my plumbing installer/repairman several times over my own hourly wages, because I cant easilly physically reproduce the produce of their skills by what I can easilly learn by osmosis.

[sixmil]

Sounds like you forgot to take your meds today. I find it really ironic that the unilateral free trade / open borders club has the moral high ground on free markets. All I see is them putting extraordinary effort into freeing themselves from the burden of supply and demand. Government has become a proxy for business, which worries me just as much as it does that doctors regulate the medical industry and lawyers regulate the legal industry. You should be glad that no one has decided to let engineers regulate the engineering world, otherwise they would be sticking it to you instead of the other way around. My guess is that you will completely miss my point and accuse me of being a socialist.