Posted on 03/14/2006 8:24:36 PM PST by nickcarraway
US Congress is likely to take up a giant immigration bill this month, which recommends nearly doubling the number of H-1B skilled-worker temporary visas to 115,000.
The measures include not just increasing the number of visas but also add an option of raising the cap 20 per cent more each year.
If passed, the provisions buried in the Senate's giant immigration bill, would open the country's doors to highly skilled immigrants for science, math, technology and engineering jobs.
The provisions were sought by Silicon Valley tech companies and enjoy significant bipartisan support amid concern that the United States might lose its lead in technology.
They would broaden avenues to legal immigration for foreign tech workers and would put those with advanced degrees on an automatic path to permanent residence should they want it, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
H-1B visas were highly controversial in the Bay Area when their numbers reached a peak of 195,000 in 2003.
The new skilled immigration measures are part of a controversial 300-page bill by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa, now being rewritten by the committee with the goal of reaching the Senate floor by the end of the month.
Other provisions include a new F-4 visa category for students pursuing advanced degrees in science, technology, engineering or mathematics.
These students would be granted permanent residence if they find a job in their field and pay a $1,000 fee toward scholarships and training of US workers.
Congress had increased the visas during the late 1990s dot-com boom, when Silicon Valley complained of tech-worker shortages, although native-born engineers complained that their wages were undermined by cheap labour from India and China.
With the tech crash and the revelation that some of the September 11, 2001, hijackers had entered the country on student visas, the political climate for foreign workers darkened, and Congress quietly allowed the number of H-1B visas to plummet back to 65,000 a year.
The cap was reached in August -- in effect turning off the tap of the visas for 14 months. A special exemption of 20,000 visas for workers with advanced degrees was reached in January.
"We're in a bad crunch right now," said Laura Reiff, head of the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition, a business umbrella group backing more immigration. "We are totally jammed on immigrant visas, the green card category, and totally jammed on H-1B visas. You can't bring in tech workers right now."
The provisions for highly skilled workers enjoy support in both parties in the Senate and in the Bush administration after a raft of high-profile studies have warned that the United States is not producing enough math and science students and is in danger of losing its global edge in innovation to India and China.
However, opponents of broadening immigration for skilled workers said doing so would defeat efforts to get more Americans interested in science, math, engineering and other technological fields.
Thanks for the information on the H-1B visas. In these threads, I see a lot of arguing back and forth but few facts and didn't really know what these visas were about.
Personally, living in S. Cal, I'm a lot more worried about all the uneducated illegal aliens streaming across the border than I am the educated, legal immigrants that we can keep track of - and kick out if need be.
But then potential NBA stars and future players in American Idol will leave their critical positions and enter R&D. We'll need to import athletes and performers because American kids won't want to do those jobs!
That is what I am exactly thinking, pre 1965 immigration levels. Let the US have time to assimilate the immigrants that are here, and enforcethe laws rigidly so any employer who even tries to hire illegals will find it is not worth their while, while instead of US corps getting an easy way out with H1-B visas, have these corps do what they used to do before easy immigration, and have them train their employees.
Stylin19a has hit on a important topic. If you were building a house now, like I am, you would realize that framers, masons, dry wallers, electricians, plumbers, roofers etc. are a premium, many local builders have sent all of their teams to the south for government/insurance funded rebuilding. I am paying $8 a square foot for rock, the job will take one day a will cost about $3600....they should be able to get to me in the next 6-8 weeks, yes there is a list. Yes, the two workers are Mexican, they're considered skilled and pull in $16 an hour, the English speaking owner, after materials, pockets the rest. I haven't seen a single white American youth do these jobs, they're all at mcdonalds making minimum wage.
That's my main point. It is even more justified when you take into considerqation that roughly half of the graduate students in science and engineering are foreign students. It is in the U.S.'s best strategic interests to keep those graduates here rather then have them return to potentially rival countries with their newly gained expertise and leave the U.S. with a deficit in brain power.
Frankly, it doesn't matter whether you believe it or not.
"$35,709 Average starting gross annual salary / stipend
$40,398 Average current gross annual salary / stipend (all PDs)"
It's even worse than I thought - they start at $36k and reach $40k later.
Ug. $33,000 starters for new hires in the gas fields of Oklahoma, if you have experience double that......any Americans up for manual labor yet? Most of the takers are Mexican.....bilingual will get you more.
This isn't a nation-wide survey, nor does it even pertain to math/engineering/physics degrees - which is what the discussion was about.
I can believe that biologists, chemists, and physiologists with a PhD don't make much - because those with a BS in those areas don't make much on average. ($25-30K joboutlook.com again). The survey you posted is weighted heavily in those 3 areas. How about finding a nationwide survey that breaks down the salaries of PhD's according to field? You are finding obscure irrelevant data from a small cross-section and posting it as if it means something.
Most postdocs are also immigrants, though not from Mexico and they are not illegal although their visas are temporary ones. I think they could make more in the private sector, but their visas allow academic employment only.
Quit complaining and post a link to a national one. It's not as if Stanford is famous for being stingy - quite the opposite.
My point (and I'm living it) is that you can make more money, quicker, without government loans for education in a year than most "educated" Americans can conceive. You'll have to sweat, something most academia won't even consider. I have a new recruitment slogan for the high schoolers...."sweat equals money, college equals bills". I realize kids won't get their extra 4 years of indoctrination and beer drinkin' and tail chasing in but.....it is an option. Or they can whine about cheaper import engineers and doctors later......sheesh what the heck has happened to our youth?
The day of Mexicans working for $2.00 an hour is long gone. If you want immigrant labor to work now, double the minimum wage, if you're lucky. Lower end of the wage scale? FRiend, I consider $30,000-60,000 per year, tax free, good money. So do the Mexicans.....that's why we're knee deep in mexicans in every manual labor market in the US.
The sad truth is, jobs requiring manual labor have already gone to South and Central American countries.....now the same logic is being applied to the "high paying, academia jobs"....what a surprise. The college boys haven't minded South and Central American immigrants minding their children, tending gardens nor fixing their roofs....yet H1B immigrants scares them stupid....and it should..after all we're only worth the the market allows...LOL.
The flip of the flip side:
Every H1-B visa is an opportunity for a FOREIGN COUNTRY and its Businesses, State-Owned Enterprises etc. to 'bring a product to service to market...in the U.S...at a lower cost with a better chance of success...at putting the Americans out of business.
Anti-american bigotry on display for all to see. And anti-historical crap at that. You know nothing of your American industrial and technology history.
You're thinking in the wrong mind set my FRiend. I see 20 commercials a day about the NEED for high school students to attend college...."the Average college graduate earns 100 times what non-skilled labor can make in a lifetime"...
I can piece part this all day, but I'll say that a welder working on high pressure gas pipelines will make more money than your average engineer all day long...don't even get me into pipe fitting and reactor work. Send your kid to trade school if you want to see instant results.....
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