Posted on 12/16/2002 7:06:21 AM PST by FlyingA
Honorable Representative Tom Davis,
I have just finished reading the article http://www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20021213S0035 and as an unemployed IT consultant and US CITIZEN, I find the idea stupid and unpatriotic. First, training foreigners on the internals of our IT infrastructure is a disaster in the making. Second, I find it difficult to believe that it will "save" that much, if any, money - the employment of CITIZENS to do the work keeps the money in the USA and adds to the growth of OUR economy, not that of India or China. Finally, at a time when the unemployment rate for IT and telecom people is at record levels, I find this action to be extremely unpatriotic.
If you really want to save money, why don't you outsource the war on terror and Iraq, to India and China. I'm sure that would save the taxpayers a lot of hardship and grief, not to mention money - funerals aren't cheap. Maybe you can save even more money by importing some people to replace those overpaid policeman and fireman - I'm sure the state and local governments would appreciate the help.
Let's be honest, all you're doing is lining the pockets of any contractor will to move government contracted work to offshore sweatshops. Short-term gain for you and your bosses, with long-term cost and hardship to the American people.
"A man who is good enough to shed his blood for his country is good enough to be given a square deal afterwards. More than that no man is entitled to, and less than that no man shall have." •Theodore Roosevelt Gonna forward something to my reps, but I'm waiting a few more days for a response from my last nasty-gram.
I was thinking the same thing..
Mark the heart of the compassionate conservatives huh?
Bump
(Snip)
That is the general proposition, but there are more specific concerns. First, the lack of real teeth against corporate abuse of these two programs requires a remedy. Instead of violations being a complaint-driven process, an active enforcement team needs to be established to respond to, investigate, track and coordinate legitimate complaints of abuses. While the Bar can take the initiative in many of these cases by prosecuting them on a contingency basis, particularly where they involve, as many appear to, instances of age discrimination, that is not enough. I believe that abuses of these two programs need to be armed with at least the same armory of regulatory and prosecutorial weapons that sex and disability discrimination cases have at their disposal, including remedies for recovery of both attorneys fees and punitive damages by successful plaintiffs. As a former plaintiff's personal injury lawyer, I can tell you that no lawyer worth his or her salt would willingly turn down a case coming to him on the silver platter of a government-established violation. (Compare, the willingness of many large corporate law firms to handle so-called "pro-bono" work on behalf of convicted felons, defaulting tenants, petty criminals and others undeserving of free legal representation, while ignoring the legitimate needs of people like laid-off workers suffering the abuses of H1B and L1. Next time you look for a lawyer, ask what kind of pro-bono work he or she does on your dime or dollar - and make your choice of counsel accordingly.)
Second, establishing the "need" for importing H1B and L1 workers should not be the responsibility of the corporations who stand to - and have! - benefit from their self-established need, but of an impartial factfinder, whether governmentally or privately and independently based. As is it now, the fox is not just guarding the henhouse, but building it - and what shoddy construction it is! Checks must replace the cracks in the construction to ensure that where H1B and L1 workers are legitimately employed they are being paid what their applications said they'd be paid, with penalties to both the employer and employee for any variances found from the prevailing or agreed-upon wage, whichever is higher. Corporations seeking to employ these workers must be required to demonstrate their actual need for them under a higher standard of proof than the relatively lax, self-defined one now in effect. And the "walk-on-water" rule of Sec. 412 of ACWIA must be permanently plugged.
Third, to help those who have been displaced NOW, training and workforce reintegration programs must be adequately funded and operated. That does NOT mean dumbing down intelligent tech workers to assume less skilled or challenging jobs than those they performed so well for so long in so many cases. Nor does it mean using money originally targeted for training to go to facilitating imported workers' access to Green Cards, thereby mindlessly exacerbating this problem. It means real training and what I'd call "internal reintegration," i.e., establishing a system for displaced workers to regain their prior jobs once the need for their replacements, if ever even legitimately established, has ended.
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.