Posted on 02/04/2006 4:38:34 AM PST by Tyche
Making a strong pitch for America to stay competitive in the face of emerging economies such as India and China, President George W Bush has urged the Congress to raise the number of H-1B visas that allow companies to hire foreign workers for scientific and high tech jobs.
"Congress needs to understand that nations like India, China, Japan, Korea and Canada all offer tax incentives that are permanent. In other words, we live in a competitive world. We want to be the leader in this world," Bush said in a speech in Minnesota on Thursday.
To fill vacant jobs in the US, Bush urged the Congress to lift current limit on H-1B visas that allow foreign workers to get jobs in the United States. The Congress in 2005 capped at 65,000 the number of H-1B visas, a third of the 195,000 allowed during the technology boom.
"I think it's a mistake not to encourage more really bright folks who can fill the jobs that are having trouble being filled here in America, to limit their number. So I call upon Congress to be realistic and reasonable and raise that cap," Bush said, but did not say by how much he wanted the limit lifted.
He said that one part of the agenda to stay competitive was to study math and science, a theme he touched on in his State of the Union Address on Tuesday.
"It's one thing to research, but if you don't have somebody in that lab, well… And so I got some ideas for the Congress to consider. The first is to emphasize math and science early, and to make sure that the courses are rigorous enough that our children can compete globally," Bush said in a speech at the 3M Corporation.
He said there are more high-tech jobs in America today than people available to fill them. "So what do we do about that? And the reason it's important -- and the American citizen has got to understand it's important -- is if we don't do something about how to fill those high-tech jobs here, they'll go somewhere else where somebody can do the job."
"There are some who say, we can't worry about competition. It doesn't matter, it's here. It's a real aspect of the world in which we live," he said.
"And so one way to deal with this problem, and probably the most effective way, is to recognize that there's a lot of bright engineers and chemists and physicists from other lands that are either educated here, or received an education elsewhere but want to work here. And they come here under a programme called H1B visas," Bush said.
He said America should not fear competition. "It's important for us not to lose our confidence in changing times. It's important for us not to fear competition but welcome it."
Senior administration officials noted that the number of H-1B visas has fallen to 65,000 which in their estimation was 'too low' and that it was imperative 'to bump that up.'
". . . some of reports have called for increases of 10,000; others between 20,000 and 40,000. So there is a number of options on the table to be considered. But we'll work with Congress on that," said Claude Allen, assistant to the President for domestic policy.
You fell into that.
Congressional staffers are a dime a dozen. Even the ones who know where the sinks are.
This is the mantra of the one-world, globalist, new world order true believers, of which GWB is the standard bearer. Get used to it.
There are no American students studing engineering. Or at the very least, precious few of them. Pay a visit to your friendly, neighborhood university, mosey on down to the engineering and/or computer science departments, wait until the classes break and tell me if you hear the English language being spoken among the students between classes.
They're funded by their own government or ours. Their tuition is paid, in full in most cases, by the same sources with no massive student loan debt. They make the liberal, Dr. Feelgood university administrators feel good about overturning the injustice of the oppressed peoples of color of the third world. And they're willing to work for $0.15 a day and no bathroom breaks.
Universities go ape over foreign students. George Bush gets millions of dollars in corporate campaign contributions. And his corporate handlers get to enhance their bottom lines and stock prices by virtue of cheap labor.
Consider it the geopolitical hat trick. In the meantime, any kid worth his salt would be insane to tap dance down the engineering/hard science road to perdition. And they know it.
Well, all big businesses are international businesses, so that goes without saying. Also, small businesses are growing substantially, and have been for the past decade or so, both under Clinton and under Bush.
what he has failed to do is ... make us products more competitive abroad.
Since when is he supposed to do that? Also, while it is true that American businesses have been losing their competitive edge on traditional products, they are, at the same time, unsurpassed when it comes to innovative technological advances. I would point you to two companies which have profited immensely under Bush - Google and Apple. In the process, hundreds of their American employees have become millionaires, and thousands of their shareholders here have reaped enormous wealth. Would you give Bush credit for Google (went public in 2004) and Apple (skyrocketed after iPOD launch last year)?
Microsoft has over 1200 openings right now, most in the Redmond, WA area. That is another innovative American company prospering, and in the process, enriching Americans. Would you give Bush credit for that also?
Weak. No other word for it. Sorry. Unless.. examples from reliable sources?
RE: "what [of] the war on terror, or the state of our family lives, or our public morals?"
Good questions, I have only a partial response.
Here it's about labor arbitrage and a worldwide glut of "cheap labor" and the rush to get it now! Either "over there" or migrant labor here -- it matters not. Just get it.
It's about asking those American "cry babies" to don uniforms and fight the war against radical Muslim aggression but don't come home looking for a job unless you are willing to compete with Indian and Chinese cost-of-living wages. A mite overstated but in general, that's the direction IMO.
It's about comparative advantage. It's about free tradin' transfers of technology, wealth (FDI), and production to developing nations, especially, Red China.
What of comparative advantage vis-a-vis "free trade" and offshore outsourcing? Both are about production in a trading partner's homeland.
Years ago Professor Paul Samuelson wrote "all Ricardian bets are off" if wage differentials are too great and if one country's currency ends up at the wrong level. Comparative advantage retains its "vital social relevance" only when exchange rates, prices, and wages are appropriate.
That was at the time of "stagflation" and before what we are experiencing today. It was a 1983 Econ 101 text from a couple of decades after the one I used for Econ 101.
I agree with the President on this one. If US students are too lazy to pursue the sciences such as physics, math, chemistry, etc., let well-educated immigrants do those jobs.
Good point, I guess.
Well, India sure did not send any H1B workers to help the USA out in Afganistan or Iraq did they?? In fact, they sent an H1B to take the job of a relative of mine while he was over there in Iraq with the National Guard.
Course, my relative can get his job back later. He gets shot at on the battle field while a whimpy little India guy gets a nice safe job programming a computer. What a deal!
Well, Mr. President, you are a wonderful leader for India. I cannot in good conscience ever vote for a Republican president ever again. Thank you for this profound betrayal.
Many fully qualified people are in jobs that do not make use of their skills. Jobs for technical folks have gotten scarce. You simply aren't watching for the employment ads that were once plentiful. I know. I am.
Guys coming back from Iraq face the strongest labor market in my lifetime. Anybody able to work can work in America.
My other issues are examples of actual problems that require our actual attention as citizens and as conservatives. You can even toss in assimilation difficulties and illegals and I'll agree with you entirely. But the economy is not one of them.
There is --- wait for it --- nothing wrong with the US economy. Grok, already.
Greatest in history of world. Grok, already.
The dog alleging economic cancer and collapse won't hunt because there is nothing wrong. It is an enourmous amount of political passion chasing unnoticable economic minutae. The economy shouldn't even be a political issue at all.
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