Posted on 10/29/2005 7:25:40 AM PDT by vrwc0915
It appears there is hard evidence to prove that employers are using the H-1B visa program to hire cheap labor; that is, to pay lower wages than the national average for programming jobs.
According to “The Bottom of the Pay Scale: Wages for H-1B Computer Programmers — F.Y. 2004,” a report by Programmers Guild board member John Miano, non-U.S. citizens working in the United States on an H-1B visa are paid “significantly less than their American counterparts.” How much less? “On average, applications for H-1B workers in computer occupations were for wages $13,000 less than Americans in the same occupation and state.”
Miano based his report on OES (Occupational Employment Statistics) data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics which estimates wages for the entire country by state and metropolitan area. The report’s H-1B wage data came from the U.S. Department of Labor’s H-1B disclosure Web site.
Miano went out of his way to be balanced, and whenever possible he gave the benefit of the doubt to the employer. For example, he used OES data from 2003 because this is the wage information that would have been available to the employers when filing an LCA (labor condition application).
Miano had some difficulty matching OES job codes with LCA job titles, which employers typically create. Where both the OES and the LCA listed a job as “programmer/analyst,” Miano took the conservative approach of assuming that the LCA was describing a programmer, a job title that typically earns a lower wage than a systems analyst.
Nonetheless, Miano’s report shows that wages paid to H-1B workers in computer programming occupations had a mean salary of $52,312, while the OES mean was $67,700; a difference of $15,388. The report also lists the OES median salary as $65,003, or $12,691 higher than the H-1B median.
When you look at computer job titles by state, California has one of the biggest differentials between OES salaries and H-1B salaries. The average salary for a programmer in California is $73,960, according to the OES. The average salary paid to an H-1B visa worker for the same job is $53,387; a difference of $20,573.
Here are some other interesting national wage comparisons: The mean salary of an H-1B computer scientist is $78,169, versus $90,146 according to the OES. For an H-1B network analyst, the mean salary is $55,358, versus the OES mean salary of $64,799. And for the title “system administrator,” there was a $17,478 difference in salary between the H-1B mean and the OES mean.
H-1B visa workers were also concentrated at the bottom end of the wage scale, with the majority of H-1B visa workers in the 10-24 percentile range. “That means the largest concentration of H-1B workers make less than [the] highest 75 percent of the U.S. wage earners,” the report notes.
While it would be difficult to prove that any one particular employer is hiring foreign workers to pay less, the statistics show us that, for whatever reason, this is exactly what is happening on a nationwide basis. Miano says lobbyists will admit that a small number of companies are abusing the H-1B program, but what he has found in this research is that almost everyone is abusing it.
“Abuse is by far more common than legitimate use,” he says.
Globalism will lead to socialim...less than 60 % of Americans have health insurance now...globalism has played a huge role in this...guest workers, illegals and outsourcing. We will have national healthcare in five years if this continues. Globalism almost guarantees socialism in our lifetime. The Americans who are thrown out of work will demand it.
Apparently, you know. You should publish this finding.
less than 60 % of Americans have health insurance Source, please.
...globalism has played a huge role in this...
Garbage. You don't know what globalism is, and you have no idea about any connection with health care.
guest workers,
Really? How many of them do we have in this country?
illegals
What does this have to do with "globalism," as you call it? This is simply a result of not enforcing our own laws. Just as we did not enforce laws in in 1960s-70s and that led to a wave of crime, we now fail to enforce the sanctity of our borders. That's all.
and outsourcing. Outsourcing has always existed in this country. What does that have to do with health care?
Absolutely: and it is people like you, who have no clue about how their country functions and do not therefore know who the enemy is, will bring it about.
Yes, and global warming, too.
Socialism is brought about by a change in values and ignorance.
The Americans who are thrown out of work will demand it.
Yes, and even "conservatives" like you demand it now. You've chosen a convenient position: you want socialism and blame it on others at the same time. Very moral, very "conservarive." With people like you, who connect health care to "globalism" --- whatever you mean by that --- who needs leftists to bring about socialism. You'll vote for anybody that will giuarantee you a job and health care.
I have read more than once that about 40% of Americans have no insurance. If you check out jobs, you will see many do not offer healthcare. I work for a small company that offers no health insurance. My husband works for GM (management); he has healthcare so far. I know a great deal about globalism and American business because my husband works for an GM...makes cars. The reason socialism has failed to take root in the US is the strong middle class. Globalism cost American job; If enough people are thrown out of work, they will vote for national healthcare, greater welfare benefits etc. It will be the Republicans own fault. They encourage unfair trade practices, want to grant amnesty to illegals and want guest workers allowed in (take jobs away from Americans). I saw this during my stint with unemployment last years. I did security work in order to make a few dollars. American workers at Sprint in Marietta were laid off and the next thing you knew, Indian workers replaced them (guest workers). Corporate greed will usher in a new era of socialism.
"Well, Bush is allowing a flood of illegals in to do the work at the bottom of the labor chain, driving down wages for the unskilled Americans, I see no reason to favor any group."
I think we should destroy the politicians personally. Outsource their jobs, close down that cesspool we call Washington DC and move the Capitol a little further out west.
Scrap it and start over with the original Constitution and with people who are dedicated to preserving the Nation and it's sovereignty.
I understand that; we hear a great deal of misinformation from the media.
If you check out jobs, you will see many do not offer health care. That is very true, especially to part-time employees.
I work for a small company that offers no health insurance. My husband works for GM (management); he has health care so far.
So you DO have insurance: your husband's insurance covers you, doesn't it?
I know a great deal about globalism and American business because my husband works for an GM...makes cars. It's like saying, "I know a great deal about physics of combustion, which makes the car move, because I drive a lot."
You don't under To understand physics of combustion by driving. Similarly, you don't understand globalization by making cars or anything else. What we see in our daily lives are results of many factors, including globalization. That does not make us understand what those factors are and which of them causes what we observe.
What you see is that our workers are not as competitive globally as they were before. How do you know that this is caused by "globalization" (which is by the way is not new)? You don't. It may be caused by the fact that our workers are not as educated as they were before; it may be caused by the fact they are overpaid; it may be caused by lower work ethics; etc.
The reason socialism has failed to take root in the US is the strong middle class.
No. There was a strong middle class in Germany, and that middle class overwhelmingly voted for socialists in 1933 --- Nazis (the National Socialist Workers Party) led by Hitler. There is a large middle class now in Germany, France and Britain, but all of Europe is now socialist.
If enough people are thrown out of work, they will vote for national health care, greater welfare benefits etc. I agree: socialists always exploited ignorance. That is not the question. The question is, why are YOU, a conservative that participates on this board, are among them? Why do YOU believe that garbage.
The only way one can stay competitive --- in ANY economy, whether socialist or capitalist --- is by being worth his/her keep. You achieve that in two ways: by making yourself better and thus producing more, or getting paid less. THere are not miracles that socialists can invent here; they cannot change these facts.
Health care is just like food and other necessities: each of us is responsible for our own. The problem with present-day America is that socialism has already won: most people believe that someone else is responsible for their health care. Company owners (other Americans) or the government (via taxes paid by other Americans) must provide it for you and, moreover, in an unlimited quantity: as long as you are alive but ill, you are entitled to be in a hospital.
Why stop here? Why not extend that to housing and food and everything else we desire.
Other Americans are not responsible for my health: I am. I must pay for health care just as I do for food, out of my own pocket. That is how America always functioned.
But not any longer: everyone wants others to pay for their health. If all Americans were insured, where would the money come from, grow on trees? It is still our money; socialists cannot create it.
It will be the Republicans own fault. Well, as I said, you advocate socialism and blame Republicans for not being socialist enough.
It is people like you that bring socialists to power.
If you want to vote for the fascists, go ahead. Just don't blame others for the consequences.
y encourage unfair trade practices,
No they don't: they encourage competition. They don't do enough, perhaps, to ensure that trade is fair but they certainly don't encourage unfair trade. It is you who does that.
want to grant amnesty to illegals That is indeed an atrocity, and I am really furious about that. But this has nothing to do with "globalism," if by that we mean unobstructed international trade in goods and services.
and want guest workers allowed in (take jobs away from Americans).
That too is socialist, anti-corporate propaganda. The population of our country is dying: it has been decreasing since 1970. It's hard for you to believe, but there are indeed fewer people to do the jobs that we, Americans, want to be done.
I saw this during my stint with unemployment last years. I did security work in order to make a few dollars. American workers at Sprint in Marietta were laid off and the next thing you knew, Indian workers replaced them (guest workers).
Firstly, I am sorry to hear that you were down on luck for a few years and very much hope and wish that things will improve for you.
But, aside from personal issues, how are you different from guest workers, then? If I want $20,000 a year and someone can hire another for $15,000, what entitles me to $20,000? I should be paid that just because I want so?
We are more expensive than guest workers because we demand more but produce as much: we demand more health care and other benefits, as well as higher wages.
Like most socialists, you think that the company or the government simply go to the basement to get the money. They do not: they get the money for the goods you produce. If you don't produce more, where are they going to get the money to pay you more?
Corporate greed will usher in a new era of socialism.
Spoken by a true socialist. Does it occur to you that your husband and you are capitalists? He probably has a pension plan --- where do you think that money is being kept? Stocks and bonds. He owns several American and foreign corporations. Where do most retirees --- teachers, bus drivers, janitors --- keep their money? In stocks and bonds. What is corporate "greed," then, the desire to pay interest on those people's investments?
Like all socialists, you do not see real owners of the corporations behind the "bogey man" corporation.
You are a complete socialist, inside and out, seething with anger and ready for a revolt.
The question I have is, what are you doing on this board? There is does not seem to be a conservative bone in your body.
Your complaint against the cost and quality of programming and other IT staff is misdirected. Recruiting and contracting firms mark up the cost of programming 250% to 400% or more. Contracting firms make a higher margin by billing the client company at a premium while supplying the client firm with the least experienced and least qualified workers. This can only happen when the management is unqualified to manage and/or the management is unwilling to do their job, which is to efficiently and effectively manage the resources with which they have been entrusted.
Client managers could cut their IT costs by those same percentages if they would do their own advertising, interviewing, and hiring, instead of relying on recruiting and contracting firms to supply their technical staff. They would be more assured of getting the level of expertise and skillsets that meet their requirements, and they would eliminate the waste and fraud being perpetrated by recruiting firms. They would be better able to retain the intellectual capital that gets created when technical employees develop experience in their particular systems and applications.
Markets didn't create the problem and markets are not creating a solution; not for the client companies and not for the people doing the work. Management, or rather incompetent and unqualified management, created and perpetuates the problems of high-cost, low-quality staffing, massive rates of project failure, and massive under-employment of the most qualified technical professionals.
Managers who depend on recruiting and contracting firms will never see the resumes of the best qualified candidates. They will only be presented with the ones that can provide the widest margin to the recruiting firm.
In the past, I've worked in that industry. More importantly, my reference is not to personal experience but to statistics.
Recruiting and contracting firms mark up the cost of programming 250% to 400% or more. Contracting firms make a higher margin by billing the client company at a premium while supplying the client firm with the least experienced and least qualified workers. This can only happen when the management is unqualified to manage and/or the management is unwilling to do their job, which is to efficiently and effectively manage the resources with which they have been entrusted.
I was referring to wages that programmers themselves were paid, whether it be in-house ones or contractors (who prefer to call themselves consultants).
Client managers could cut their IT costs by those same percentages if they would do their own advertising, interviewing, and hiring, instead of relying on recruiting and contracting firms to supply their technical staff.
Not necessarily: isn't advertising, hiring and interviewing costly?
More importantly nowadays, don't they save on not paying benefits to outside contractors?
They would be more assured of getting the level of expertise and skillsets that meet their requirements,
There is no evidence that it does not. One or few managers may be unqualified or make a mistake. The very fact that this trend occurs industry-wide tells you and me that this course of action is currently best. and they would eliminate the waste and fraud being perpetrated by recruiting firms.
If you have evidence of fraud, you should bring them up.
Perhaps, you should reflect on the fact that this "fraud" somehow is unnoticed even by large companies, with in-house lawyers that could bring a lawsuit with no additional cost --- and yet, the do not do that. When one does not know what money is spent on, it looks like fraud.
They would be better able to retain the intellectual capital that gets created when technical employees develop experience in their particular systems and applications.
Would you like to pay to a great carpenter I know? He has a great deal of skills. You don't? Oh, it's probably because you have no USE for that capital.
What is of VALUE to you need not be capital: it becomes one only when it is put to productive use. As recently as a couple of decades ago, major banks had software development departments and created their custom packages. The great skill of those particular programmers and analysts was capital. Programming has become a commodity since then, and all that great capital was fired --- precisely because it was no longer capital. To be sure, most skilled one moved to software development firms, away from mainframes and into still nascent PC environment, There such skills were, and still are, capital.
You see the point: what seems to be of value to you need not be of value to the company. The recent industry trends are screaming loudly that things you mentioned are not capital.
Markets didn't create the problem Which problem?
and markets are not creating a solution; not for the client companies and not for the people doing the work.
It seems to me the solution is created every day. When it ceases to be a solution in the ever changing environment, the companies will adopt new methods.
In many marketing books you will find a paragrapg on the use of own sales force vs. brokers. In every accounting book you'll find a chapter on buying vs. leasing. In other words, there is nothing new with programming, and it is no exception: there are times and situations when one's own workforce is best, and there are times when an external one is better. That has been the case since times immemorial. It is the Leftist press that made it look like "outsourcing" is new.
There is no problem here: what you witness is maturation of the software development and maintenance as an industry.
Management, or rather incompetent and unqualified management, created and perpetuates the problems of high-cost, low-quality staffing, massive rates of project failure, and massive under-employment of the most qualified technical professionals.
Ah, and their CEOs with huge staffs of business-educated people have no clue about that. You do.
Is it possible, just possible, that you simply don't know how to compute costs and benefits?
Managers who depend on recruiting and contracting firms will never see the resumes of the best qualified candidates.
Again, does it occur to you that they simply do NOT WANT to see those? In most jibs ones does not see the best qualified candidate but the one that suffices. More qualified candidates cost more and leave sooner. Again, if you acquainted yourself with principles of business management --- of its personnel function in this case --- you would see that immediately.
You make a very common mistake of assuming that you can judge the quality of managers from the experience of working for them. As I said in earlier posts, you don't learn aerodynamics by driving a car or combustion engineering by looking at its engine. Similarly here: you can work for a company or companies all your life and learn absolutely nothing about management. People don't fancy themselves astrophysicist just because the see the moon almost every day. They don't fancy themselves chemists just because they swallow pills when they are ill. But, like you, many make an exception when it comes to administration, whether public (governments) or business. Like you, they KNOW what the managers should do; like you they KNOW what Greenspan should do with interest rates, etc. Like you, they will go so far as to declare management of the best American corporation stupid --- and, in addition, all those millions of people that invest in those companies: managers, financial analysts, private investors are all stupid, but thank G-d we have programmers to point that out.
All I can see from your reasoning is that you incorrectly conceptualize objectives of the business and them perform benefit-cost analysis of decisions. That does not help to arrive at a correct conclusion.
I could count on one hand, with fingers left over, the number of "managers" I've met in the last couple of decades who had undergraduate degrees in any business related field.
Following up on your point, people who fancy themselves "managers" don't make themselves thus qualified by regurgitating Mis-used Buzz-words and Acronyms, whether from a two-day seminar or from a premium MBA diploma mill.
Eventually, the market does have a correcting effect on companies that promote mis-management, because effective competition does eventually arise and eat their lunch, unless the mis-managed firms lobby and maintain enough political force to stifle competition.
...maybe...but were they from India? As an actual citizen of the US, I should enjoy some benefits over non-citizens. Or is that just worthless?
Worth is relative, and constantly changing. To paraphrase a FReeper from way back: if your job can be performed by someone with flies up his nose in Burkina Faso, then your job wasn't worth much to begin with.
Nowhere on this thread, nor ever in my life otherwise, did I say that. The very structure of the thought is totally foreign to me.
and that getting a degree in math, physics, engineering is "hard".
I was specifically referring to Ph.D.s, as I was talking about faculty to whom visas also go (people on these threads always talk about programmers).
You are about to start arguing against something I never said.
How would you characterize the value a good business manager brings to an organization? Very large and often critical. How is this related to what I said? What is the point?
Would you consider his/her education to be "easy" to obtain compared to the average digit head?
This is an ill-posed question. The level of education that counts nowadays is master's. A starting salary of an MBA from a good school (where education is by no means easy) is about $80/year.
Hardly any programmers outside of development has a college degree. Yes, it is much easier to attain. In 1990s, a smart kid without any degree could make $150,000; many with the college degree $200,000 (and that maintaining accounts receivable --- a real intellectual challenge).
If programmers take advanced math and science because they are smart enough to do so, what does that make a business major who washes out of the program? That most business majors do not have aptitude for quantitative reasoning. Why are you asking me this? I think you know that, too.
School doesn't make people smart,
You confound a gazillion of aspects into one: how hard it is to achieve something, how smart you becomes when you achieve that, how valuable it is in society, and how valuable it is to you. What a mess.
Education does not make one smart, it is true. But it gives reasoning skills, the ability to apply one's innate intelligence effectively. It also broadens the field where one can make applications. And, early education, does increase your innate intelligence (that is the true value of studying mathematics, which if lost on most: one forgets fairly quickly how to take integrals but the ability to think carefully stays for life). Once again, I have no idea what you are arguing for or against. You started with a question, but it is clearly rhetorical.
it just gives them an ego big enough to take risks. Patently untrue and really smells of envy on your part. (It has also long been viewed as smallness of one's caliber to deny true worthiness of others: you are diminishing the value of education in educated people, with no justification, either moral of factual). Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard just to take a risk. Most entrepreneurs in this country do not have higher education. These are out best risk-takers.
Sorry, I can discuss some reasonable things, but you try to engage me in naval-gazing. I told you before: it is for you to ask why you make statements and judgments about rather subtle issues in our society while lacking knowledge of what words mean. Do that first, please. I've wasted enough of my time giving answers that you can find in any book. And you don't even ask. You attempt to argue. Please do that with someone else on this thread.
Until we meet again, TQ.
If you have a degree in management, then why do you know know the difference between management and managers? Most people that work in management are not managers: they perform a management function (marketing, finance, accounting, strategic planning...).
If you have a degree in management, then why don't you know that not even a management expert can judge a manager's decision without seeing the data and options open to the manager at the time when that decision was made? Have you done a single case, in any of the subjects towards your degree?
Finally, I never said that you "know nothing about management:" how on earth can I possibly know what you know (although I can tell from the posts some things that you don't know)? What I said was that you cannot learn management by observing managers. Why do you confuse the two? Following up on your point, people who fancy themselves "managers" don't make themselves thus qualified by regurgitating Mis-used Buzz-words and Acronyms, whether from a two-day seminar or from a premium MBA diploma mill. By the "premium MBA diploma mill" do you mean places like the Harvard Business School, Wharton, the Graduate School of Business at Chicago? Have you been anywhere close to those places? Worked with any of those people? What a pathetic remark: smearing a group of people without any justification whatever does not make you look smart; on the contrary, you are screaming once again that you have no clue of what you are talking about.
Eventually, the market does have a correcting effect on companies that promote mis-management,
I don't know where your "management degree" is from, but in an average school you would fail an introductory course. Where on earth did you see a company that promotes mis-management? To get a degree in that area one must use the word "promotion" a thousand times (in marketing, strategic management, possibly accounting). You have no clue what the word means and what constitutes managerial decision-making.
I have no idea even how we got to this nonsense. You put words in my mouth and then went on to argue against them. Thank you, but you don't need me for this discussion: you are arguing against a straw man (and manage to be losing that argument by saying complete nonsense).
You don't have to take this conversation to mean anything more than you want it to mean. I am perfectly content with the interaction thus far.
I told you before: it is for you to ask why you make statements and judgments about rather subtle issues in our society while lacking knowledge of what words mean.
I got a good laugh from this, thank you.
You are welcome.
Go back and read your own posts, you twit. And get some help with your spelling and grammar -- you're foaming at the keyboard again.
Note that I characterized as pathetic a specific remark you had made; I did not call YOU names or characterized you as a person in any way.
More importantly, why don't YOU yourself go back to my posts and show me what terrible remarks I have made (and THEN characterize them in any way you want). If I am wrong, I'll be glad to admit my mistake and will thank you letting me learn something.
And get some help with your spelling and grammar.
Oh, both can be improved, I am sure. But what does that have to do with the issues we were discussing?
It's difficult to attack someone, my friend. When judging my command of the language as poor, for instance, how do you know that English is my native language? What if I am an immigrant and did not speak a word of it until 25 years of age --- would that qualify my command of the language as reasonable? And, incidentally, is your command of, say, Norwegian and Russian as good as mine of English?
You see, even attacking someone personally requires some thinking, which you have failed to do once again.
Have a good day.
Here is a tip for any young, up and comming Department of Labor folks who want to make a name for themselves. Investigate the Indian / Indian-American owned contract temporary technical firms. That is a major source of illegal H1Bs. By illegal I mean that they are not following the H1B rules at these firms but simply have not yet been caught.
What if the posting is not made at the end-employer, but at a contract firm who supplies temporary laborers to the end-employer. In some cases, the "firm" is a PC in the family room of some guy in the hills of Fremont, CA.
Mark my words. US will start to get the national health care system in 2008.
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