Posted on 10/25/2014 8:14:02 AM PDT by Hoodat
A Silicon Valley tech company that reportedly made $200 million last quarter was importing foreign workers from India and paying them $1.21 an hour.
According to the Labor Department, "about eight employees of Fremont-based Electronics For Imaging [EFI] were flown in from India and worked 120-hour weeks to help with the installation of computers at the company's headquarters." NBC Bay Area noted that "the employees were paid their regular hourly wage in Indian rupees, which translated to $1.21."
EFI claimed it "unintentionally overlooked laws that require even foreign employees to be paid based on local US standards." The company reportedly must pay "$40,000 in back wages to the employees" and was fined $3,500.
According to NBC Bay Area, another tech company last year "faced similar charges and was fined for underpaying employees from Mexico an hourly wage of $2.66," and "federal officials said both cases are particularly egregious, given the booming labor market and the wealth in Silicon Valley."
Even though there is a surplus of American high-tech workers, high-tech companies continue to clamor for more guest-worker visas to lower the wages of their workers. Companies like Microsoft have lobbied for massive increases in foreign workers even while laying off 18,000 American workers.
Importing foreign workers pushes wages downward for jobs that are available, which is why H-1B expert and Howard University professor Ron Hira has said that massive increases in guest-worker visas will "cut off" opportunities for more Americans to enter the middle class via tech jobs. Hira has repeatedly emphasized that "people who come from working-class backgrounds" have used technology jobs as a "way of getting into the middle class and the professional class," as Breitbart News has reported.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
As much as the low wage, it’s difficult to find people that will work 120 hours a week.....almost 18 hours a day, 7days/week.
I was thinking of the wages saved on this one project.
Whatever happened to companies just hiring local talent? To me this is just screwing over your fellow man.
Six days at 18 hours and only 12 on Sunday :)
they had to pay back wages. Fine should have been truly punitive. If it was of course the company might think twice about large political donations.
Yes, I figured they had to compensate for the wages.
Imagine making that decisions, that $1.21/hr was the moral thing to do.
“Honey, why aren’t you talking to me? What’s wrong?”
LOL
The fine should have been larger. I agree. And who knows about their donations. Could be right on target.
How far is this from slavery? Seriously.
Wiggin, if you consider what they would have been paid in India, it’s probably not as bad as it sounds.
It was an all expenses paid trip for work purposes, and they were going to be paid what was considered a decent wage by Indian standards. It was a job. They wanted to work.
It shocks us because of our wage levels, but from an Indian employee vantage point, it may not have been a big deal at all.
I also wonder if the business entity that contracted the employees in India, gave any bonuses out of it’s fees. Employees could have gotten some sort of a participation perk from that entity as well. We won’t hear that in this effort to trash the California business.
So nice to know that you’ll urinate all over the American worker when he or she is down, and are fully supportive of 120 hour workweeks. Traitor.
And in CA, I believe >8 hrs per day is paid at overtime. I am sure they have some law about >12 hours a day.
These were not American workers.
They knew what they were signing on for.
I’ve worked 120 hour weeks for short periods.
LOL
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3219441/posts?page=22#22
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3219441/posts?page=25#25
<08 hours wage
>08 hours wage x 1.5
>12 hours wage x 2.0
i just can’t see how $40k in backwages covers this “oversight”
And who processed those checks. Someone somewhere was punching numbers or seeing an audit. ridiculous.
There was an installation going on. Only eight guys from India were brought in on a temporary basis.
This wasn’t something that went on for years. I doubt it took more than a few weeks.
120 hour work weeks sounds terrible. For only two or three weeks, it’s not.
These guys probably made months worth of wages back home in three weeks. That was probably a good deal to them.
Since this was temporary, perhaps only a pay period or two at most, it could fall between the cracks. As long as the agreed wages by both parties were paid, I don’t particularly mind this. But when I say this, I am only referencing an agreement between two parties which both agreed to, and which met each parties desires.
I do not agree with replacing U. S. workers with foreign labor.
The ability for these workers to make what they did back home, and bring in bigger bucks than they would have back home during the same time period, was a perk for them, even if we think it wasn’t.
120 hours per week is three weeks worth of work. If this went on for three weeks, that 2.25 months worth of wages.
The time worked isn’t the problem. the fine and back pay don’t quite add up, but I would, given what numbers you gave, add it up.
they were being paid federal minimum wage with the 40,000 in back pay
There was company in California making buses and paying Chinese laborers less than minimum too.
Does anyone buy the excuse that they didn’t know that US law applied to foreign workers too??
Let me guess, well-connected guy at the top?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.