Posted on 12/31/2024 11:37:47 AM PST by conservative98
In the wake of Elon Musk’s fiery defense of H-1B visas, it has come to light that Tesla has replaced U.S. employees laid off earlier this year with foreign workers holding the very H-1B visas that Musk lashed out at conservatives for not supporting.
Electrek reports that according to reports from current and former Tesla employees, as well as data from the U.S. Department of Labor, the company has significantly increased its use of H-1B visas to fill positions left vacant by the layoffs of approximately 15,000 U.S. workers in April 2024. The layoffs affected every department but were particularly concentrated in Tesla’s operations in Texas and California, where the company has the largest number of employees.
H-1B visas are intended to allow US companies to hire foreign workers for “specialty occupations” when there is a shortage of qualified American workers. The visas are valid for three years and can be extended for an additional three years. However, the visa holder must maintain employment with the sponsoring company to retain their work status, otherwise they are required to leave the country. This arrangement has been criticized by some as giving employers excessive power over foreign workers and potentially leading to a form of modern indentured servitude.
Tesla alone requested over 2,000 H-1B visas during the period when it was laying off thousands of U.S. workers. This figure represents over three percent of the total H-1B visas available nationwide. According to the affected employees, many of those laid off were senior engineers with higher salaries, who have been replaced by more junior foreign engineers at lower pay rates. This practice has raised concerns about companies using the H-1B program to cut labor costs and displace American workers.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Elon Musk has recently been using his considerable influence to advocate for increasing the number of H-1B visas, arguing that there are not enough skilled workers in the US to meet the needs of companies like Tesla. However, this stance has drawn criticism from some of Musk’s conservative supporters, who view the H-1B program as a threat to American jobs.
When conservatives raised their voices against policies that harm U.S. workers, Musk lashed out at them via his X platform:
“Elon and Trump are so alike. They both seem to have adopted the Roy Cohn philosophy of the truth being just whatever you want it to be, and all you have to do is repeat it as much as possible and as loud as possible.”
Fred Lambert
Well how about that. Sigh. They’re all the same.
Issue discussed here yesterday.
Liberal hit piece put out to divide us.
Everywhere except places like North Korea and Haiti deals with a worldwide competition now for products and labor.
“Well how about that. Sigh. They’re all the same.”
You just got jerked.
Musk sycophant ping
It was 3 days ago and Elon and Vivek put it out. He wants a war. We’ll give him a war he won’t believe.
You got your facts wrong. Get your facts straight, Texasjerk.
We are getting played. The Deep State/MSM are out to drive a wedge between MAGA and Elon/Vivek. Every day there are 2 or 3 of these hit pieces coming from different sources.
Now that is the Anti-Trump TexasGator we have all come to detest!
The federal application for H1B states:
Ensure the position qualifies as a specialty occupation requiring at least a bachelor’s degree or equivalent in a specific field.
Is this the case here?
“We are getting played. The Deep State/MSM are out to drive a wedge between MAGA and Elon/Vivek. Every day there are 2 or 3 of these hit pieces coming from different sources.”
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Agreed. There are SOOOO many more important issues to be resolved.
This one is easy to resolve. Yes, we should allow some to get the best of the best. To have zero is absolutely ludicrous and unacceptable. They should be expensive to get, and LET THE MARKETPLACE DECIDE.
End of discussion on H1B’s.
In 2024, Musk’s Tesla filed WARN notices to lay off 18,000 people while Tesla filed papers for hiring 1,520 H1B foreigners.
How this media story is playing out and how the giddy, reactionary, conservative-”right” is responding.
1. Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.
2. Never go outside the expertise of your people.
3. Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy.
4. Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.
5. Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.
6. A good tactic is one your people enjoy.
7. A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag.
8. Keep the pressure on. Never let up.
9. The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.
10. The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.
11. If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside [positive].
12. The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.
13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.
Someone could write a book.
You can wish, you can demand but the H1B problem is not going away until Musk and Ramaswamy recant or Trump fires them.
Query: What is the history of layoffs at Tesla?
Tesla Layoff History
Tesla has experienced several rounds of layoffs in recent years, reflecting shifts in the company’s strategic direction and economic conditions. Here is a timeline of significant layoffs:
- 2017: Tesla laid off 700 workers due to production bottlenecks on the Model 3 car.
- 2018: Tesla laid off 9% of its employees, approximately 3,500 workers, as part of a restructuring to boost profitability. The layoffs were aimed at eliminating bureaucracy and improving communication within the company.
- 2019: Tesla conducted another round of layoffs, cutting 7% of its staff, primarily affecting sales, delivery, and production teams of the Model S and Model X.
- 2022: In June, Tesla laid off 10% of its employees and implemented a hiring freeze, as CEO Elon Musk felt the economy was starting to turn.
- April 2024: Tesla announced plans to lay off more than 10% of its global workforce, or around 14,000 workers, due to falling sales and an intensifying price war for electric vehicles. This round of layoffs affected employees across all departments and seniority levels, including high performers.
- May 2024: Elon Musk dismissed two senior executives, Rebecca Tinucci and Daniel Ho, and planned to lay off hundreds more employees, frustrated by falling sales and the pace of job cuts so far. The layoffs included the Supercharger team and other departments.
These layoffs reflect Tesla’s ongoing efforts to reduce costs, increase productivity, and prepare for its next phase of growth.
To me, the question regarding Tesla's use of H-1B visa workers is how long Musk continues to use them: will they be a ongoing growth practice or a stop-gap measure while the company refocuses its product offerings before hiring a new sustainable workforce aligned to the next generation of electric vehicle?
If the data presented in post #9 is an indication, Tesla laid of 14,500 workers in April 2024, but only sought 16.5% of that number in H-1B visa applications at the end of the year. That doesn't look like a replacement strategy to me. We will have to see what 2025 brings to Tesla to know for sure.
The bottom line is that no company can sustain a competitive advantage in a market segment if they maintain a revolving door workforce. A company needs a developed institutional knowledge and a core of subject-matter expertise if they want to remain leaders in their field. Turnover happens when base technologies become obsolete, and then new core competencies are built as the refocused strategic direction of the company becomes proven.
At that point, the company must keep a reliable workforce intact or cede the ground to competitors. I think we're seeing a Tesla that's in the midst of a transformation.
-PJ
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