I've hired several software developers for my company for different projects. I got burned the first time with a young fresh out of school developer. Now I don't even speak to you unless you've been in the field for a minimum of 8 years.
There is no substitute for experience. Time is money, and I don't have time to develop programmer skills for the new kid. Good companies will bring their people up slow and not give them too much room to screw up.
One would think so. But in corporate America today experience counts for squat. H-1Bs are provided at a cheaper rate. They aren't better technically, they aren't better educated, they're just cheaper. I got tired of trying to break in the H-1B that the outsourcing vendor provided us with. They could code like crazy, but had absolutely no understanding of the business or the customers or the applications we had in place. The U.S. programmers who did know the business, who understood the customers, and who had been supporting the applications for years were expendable. Now you can't find a U.S. programmer for love nor money.