Posted on 10/01/2003 9:39:39 AM PDT by 11th_VA
MUMBAI: The annual cap for H-1B visas will now be 65,000. This is a sharp drop from the earlier limit of 195,000 visas.
The US plans to enforce this rule from October 1, 2003.
The Indian IT industry has been lobbying hard to freeze H-1B visa limits at current levels. However, these efforts which had the support of some US corporations to retain H-1B visa limits have failed. (Will Europe be the next big hunting ground for Indian IT pros?)
Indian IT professionals are among the largest users of H-1B visas, as US Big Tech shops big from this technical pool. The H1-B visa cap was raised to 195,000 in 02. This particular legislation had a 'sunset' clause. According to this clause, the limit would have (automatically) lapsed on October 1, 2003. Ergo, the H1-B visa annual cap will now fall back to 65,000 visas.
The H1-B visa issue has generated a lot of controversy in the US. Several trade unions representing (local) technology workers have been lobbying against these work permits. The slowdown in the high-tech industry combined with an overall drop in US economic growth has resulted in a number of job losses.
H1-B visa users have been at the receiving end of criticism from unemployed American professionals for taking away their jobs. These visa users are also seen as representative of the trend towards offshore outsourcing trade jargon for moving to cheaper locations like India which is also under flak for spiriting away US jobs.
The visa was created in the early 1950s to give skilled foreign workers a permit to reside in the United States. The H1-B category was added in 1990 to give foreign workers an opportunity to pick up a job with the intention of remaining permanently in the United States.
In 1999, under pressure from high-tech companies and other manufacturers, Congress expanded the limit from 65,000 to 115,000. It raised the cap again to 215,000 in 00 and to 195,000 in 01 and 02.
Top Indian companies have been curtailing the use of H1-B visas for sending employees to the US. Ergo, it unlikely that the offshore outsourcing trend will be affected. Most companies have shifted to the use of L-1 visas (used for intra-company transfers). However, companies whose basic revenue model is supplying manpower to US corporations, ( body-shoppers, are likely to be hit by this move.
CATIC's study ( a group comprised mostly of foreign steel companies, and their phalanx of importer handlers) was debunked big-time.
Their entire asserted 2002 jobs-losses from the tariff turned out to have occurred in January 2002. The tariff decision and its imposition was imposed at the end of March, 2002. Subsequently, the U.S. steel-consuming industries employment rose some 23,800. Correcting CATIC's numbers for the intentional falsehood they have successfully bally-hooed throughout cyberspace and the chattering classes in the media...we find that there have not been any 'steel consumer' industry job losses. Our prices are holding much more steady against a far higher global price hike. Get this: Steel market prices in every other competing nation are already higher than ours, and are also going up considerably faster. So you aren't 'paying' anything. Our consuming indutries don't lose their advantage. And no one of them is going out of business. Unless you are a DUMPED steel importer. The President and Customs have also determined that some importers were trying to cheat and evade the tax. [Such honest types]. They are now being required to post bonds to enforce the payments of the taxes. These are the CATIC people who are squealing like stuck pigs.
Natuarally I can't since I don't know you. But I could introduce you to many family friends of mine who are some of Bush's best friends and not a single one of them supports federal trade and business restrictions or the rabid hatred and suspicion of business that you have.
Not in a perfectly free market. The world's rarely seen one of those though.
And, if so, is that a good thing?
Nope because the person doing such a thing would not be a capitalist either.
Of course. And none of those governments are capitalist either. As China has been forced by the U.S. to become more capitalist though, it has drastically improved for many people there (which isn't saying a lot as it had was one of the worst places the world has ever seen under pure Communism). I always think it's funny when people like you use the poor Chinese (like you give a flip) to push your federal punishments on business... what you want would remove jobs from millions of Chinese people and strengthen the Communists that suppress them.
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Strange, then, that your heart once again extends out to China.
Well, not so strange. Not for a Chinese citizen such as yourself.
I read the study obviously he did not. Now, if one wishes to go to the Steel Producers side of the coin there are a couple of studies there that must be considered suspect because they are paid for by people who benefitted from the Steel tariff in question. I have not provided a link to them because I do not consider them meeting the test of being peer reviewed, accepted as academically sound and I question the funding behind the study.
The Steel Consumer's study is of course likewise funded by people who have an ax to grind regarding this particular tariff which alone should make it suspect. I am unaware of any per review of it as a a fair net study and it does not make that claim in the executove summary. In the executive summary it only claims to look at the costs and makes no claim about it being a net benefit study.
Now clearly everything has a cost and a tariff does have a cost but the question is "Is the cost worth the benefit?" If one just knows the costs but not the benefits then one can not answer the question. I actually would be very interested in a study showing just one tariff that has been harmful to the USA. It would I think go a long way towards adding rationality to the debate. Then the advocates of the current unfair trade envirornment might be willing to really analyze what is happening.
Texas_Dawg has repeatedly posted that Steel consumers study because that is all he has.
I agree with you on the current situation, but you're arguing the wrong point with Taxes_Dawg. He rails against government intervention, but the H1-B visa program IS GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. It creates an artificial pool of labor that does not have the same rights as you and me. That is, this labor pool does not have the RIGHT OF LIBERTY. Taxes_Dawg is violating his supposed most sacred principle, his staunch opposition to government intervention, by arguing for what? GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. H1-B IS GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. So, Dawg, are you in favor of changing the visa law to allow workers to move to whichever job they choose? Hmmm? Does the current law violate you free market principles?
So, someone chasing excessive profits is not a capitalist. To you a "capitalist" should not just chase after profits, he must make do with fewer profits or else he stops being a capitalist? This implies a politicized or value-driven definition not an economic one.
Your implied definition of capitalist based on your posts is a common one, someone who wants to maximize his profits and who finds an unregulated enviroment the best place to do so. You also think this definition implies that a capitalist is somehow "good".
But there's no good capitalist or bad capitalist. It's just someone maximizing his profits. Your problem is that the quest for maximizing profits can hurt the society as a whole and you are uncomfortable with that fact.
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