Posted on 07/30/2003 2:23:45 PM PDT by sarcasm
BANGALORE: ‘Bill HR 2268’ in the US, which seeks to abolish H1B visas, is a topic of raging debate in Indian IT circles, both in this country and the US. The dominant view is that the US bureaucrats and politicians would not be so foolish as to support the move. And the message for the moment is: ignore the threat and move on.
The Bill seems flawed, because when you don’t have the right skills within your country, you look overseas,” says Anshul Gupta, an employee of i2 Technologies, US. Hemal Gandhi of Intel, US, adds, “If the US government’s attempt is to revive its economy and solve the unemployment problem, this is not the right way to do it — it will only result in adverse affects.’’Sulekha.com, an online community portal linking Indians from over 100 countries, has received more than one lakh letters on the issue on its site www.sulekha.com/h1b. Over 75 per cent of these letters are from within the US, 20 per cent from India and the rest from across the globe, according to Sulekha.com CEO Satya Prabhakar.
Many writers to the site have expressed the view that the abolition move will not improve matters in the US because it would still have to look beyond its boundaries for IT talent.
There’s also anger: “It was Indian professionals who helped the US enjoy the power of the Internet and IT. They should not be served with such threats,” reads one petition. Says Puneet Mahajan, who works with IBM in the US, “H1B visa abolition means laying off half of embassy staff and professors in engineering colleges. It is not practical.” One fear is that if the Bill achieves some momentum among Congressmen and the US public, it could become unstoppable. This could have serious consequences since one out of every three Indians in the US either holds an H1B visa or is a dependent. But for now, Indian firms are not worried. “Backlash-related pressures are bound to happen.
The US is a democracy — various voices will be heard, but till something concrete comes out, we should ignore it,” says Vivek Paul, vice-chairman and CEO, Wipro Technologies. Mindtree Consulting general manager (people function) TGC Prasad feels the US is going through a turmoil, which is the reason for such negative thoughts on the H1B visa.Companies like Cognizant and Cisco Systems are also not concerned. “In fact, the only concern is the uncertainties and delays this might cause for processing visas,” says Lakshmi Narayanan, president, COO, Cognizant.
Note that Indians and Chinese are not the only people on H1B visas. A Hungarian at my last job had one, as do other Europeans. A few of the H1B people I've worked with are actually the sort of immigrants I'd like to see and most have taken the trouble to get their green cards. I don't really want to toss the people who are here legally out of the country, but I do think that we don't need any more.
It's not that there is a shortage of IT workers. It is a shortage of IT workers that are willing to work for peanuts.
Yes, but I suspect that many IT workers would accept less these days, especially if their unemployment is running out. I know that I've taken about a substantial pay cut to take a new job and my previous salary was not at the high-end of things for this area. So have many others. Despite the fact that I was a beneficiary of high IT wages, they really were insane (recent college grads for $80K?) and needed correction, especially for the people who were never very good. The problem right now is that employers have so many resumes that all look the same on paper that it is difficult to filter out the good people from those who were hired because they could spell "computer".
With the economic downturn, green card approval is extremely difficult anymore. And I have mixed feelings about it in any case.
Like you, I have met wonderful visa holders who would make model citizens and truly want to immigrate to the U. S. for good. As far as I'm concerned, they're welcome to come and to stay.
I have also met good people who prefer to stay loyal to their country, but would rather work in the U. S. because the money is better. They have no intention of ever becoming U. S. citizens, but they still want green cards. It's this latter group I have reservations about.
That all depends on a great many variables. In practice, H1B visa holders make less so pay less in taxes. But if they were hiring out of work American IT people, there is no guarantee that they still wouldn't be paying less. A lot of IT people are taking lower paying jobs just to get work. My point is simply that the real gripe is that H1B visa holders are preventing unemployed American IT workers from finding jobs and that the drain caused by out of work IT workers collecting unemployment is a bigger concern that any disparity between taxes paid. I'm sure the thousands of dollars spent to pay unemployment for an out of work IT worker are a bigger problem than the lost tax revenue.
Agreed. Though it is also my experience that some of those who plan to go back eventually don't, once they've been in the US long enough.
Of course they would, but the way the hiring company sees it, they'll bolt at the first decent offer they get.
Not right now but eventually, yes. Good point. I forgot about the "slave labor" aspect to H1B visas. They've got 10 days to leave the country if they lose their job.
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