Posted on 05/04/2006 7:37:14 AM PDT by areafiftyone
U.S. Sen. George Allen, R-Va., has co-sponsored a bill offered by Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, that seeks to promote employer access to skilled employees. The Securing Knowledge, Innovation and Leadership Bill expands the number of visas allowed for high-tech workers educated in the United States who are employed as part of the H1-B visa program.
"I want the United States to be the world capital of innovation. And to achieve that goal, we must adapt, innovate and compete by allowing them to attract highly skilled individuals so that they can become fully productive citizens," said Allen.
Currently, the number of visas for high-tech workers allowed under the H1-B program is capped at 65,000. This bill increases that number to 115,000 and creates a market-based cap whereby unused visas can be carried forward to the next year. In addition, the bill exempts from the H1-B cap any professional who has earned a post-graduate degree from an accredited college or university in the United States.
"Many of these students are studying engineering, science and technology, which are vital for the future competitiveness of our country. I want America to be the magnet for the best minds in the world. But we must allow our companies to compete and succeed, and this reasonable approach reduces paperwork on employees in this vital sector of our economy who have demonstrated a solid record of complying with our immigration laws," said Allen. "This is an example of why more young American men and women should be studying science and engineering so that they can fill those good paying jobs of the future.
"With women composing about 15 percent of engineers, and Latinos and African Americans at 6 percent each, I will continue to advocate that there must be incentives and encouragement of Americans to acquire the technological skills to lead a fulfilling life and improve American competitiveness."
The H1-B visa program has specific relevance to Virginia. A recent report by Cyberstates details tremendous gains in the high-tech sector of the U.S. economy. In a survey released earlier this month, U.S. high-tech employment totaled 5.6 million in 2005, up by 61,100. Virginia is number one in high-tech job growth, adding 9,100 such jobs in 2004.
Virginia is also among the top five in high-tech employment.
In fact, as Allen pointed out, "computer chips are replacing tobacco as Virginia's largest export."
Allen views continued growth in this sector of the economy as vital to the nation's future competitiveness. In March, he launched the U.S. Senate Economic Competitiveness Caucus, putting forth nine goals that would boost the nation's ability to compete and succeed against foreign competitors, including India and China, which are graduating far more engineers and scientists than the United States.
"To continue this type of solid growth, certain attributes will be the keys: We need more energy security. We need the right tax and regulatory policies for investment and jobs. We need to strengthen education to make this country more competitive. And finally, we need to be able to make sure that highly skilled workers - and their jobs - remain here," said Allen.
Watch both the dems and the repugs line up behind him to support this. The average American no longer has representation in our federal government.
"Yeah, there are lots of older high-tech workers out there who haven't gotten jobs since the 2002 slump. How about hiring them back first and THEN we'll talk about bringing in more H1-B visa folks?"
Absolutely. Employers love green-card workers because they can treat them "anyhow they want" (in the words of one of them) - the green-cards need employer-certification in order to stay here.
When a slow-down occurs, guess who are the first workers to get laid off? (Not the green-cards.)
H1-B is basically to the skilled worker, what the open border is to the unskilled... just more of our representatives selling us down the pike.. COMPLETE AND TOTAL SCAM!!! Folks that support this should be tried and shot as the traitors they are.
Many of the students are loyal to their mother countries, and are here to exploit our military technology.
I dumped Allen long back.
EXACTLY! Why not encourage American students to take up these courses and train them? Its as if we Americans don't exist anymore. Politicians seem to be ignoring us!
And that raises the other issue - health care costs. That is the dirty little secret here - companies want younger H1-B workers partially so they don't have to pay the health care costs of older workers.
How about some attention to our own people, George? Our own people need jobs.
As I mentioned in post 20 they don't like paying high salaries to their employees.
Excellent point!
Yep, tell students entering college that they should study computer science for four years and then graduate into a field where the wages are agressively being kept down by importing foreign workers. And once you get into your forties, companies will want to lay you off.
That's a great way to get more CompSci majors in this country.
1) Senator Supports S. Korea's Visa Waiver (George Allen)
2) Sen. Allen's Journey Of Racial Conciliation (apologizing for slavery)
Oh, wonderful. Fifty thousand more H-1Bs that I'll be competing with the next time I change employers. I'm pretty confident about my ability to get a job should I have to--I've done it before--but I've had way too many friends, skilled programmers, who have been out of the field for YEARS after getting laid off while companies are bringing in Indians by the thousands. And my wife's worked for an immigration lawyer and has seen the tricks these companies use--believe me, they find ways around the rules about having to advertise the jobs for Americans first, and having to pay prevailing wages to the visaholder.
Free trade is one thing and I'm for it where it doesn't impact national security. But with a big labor glut out there in the IT industry, why the heck do we need 50,000 more H-1Bs a year? We don't.
}:-)4
Yep, I've seen those games firsthand. Of course companies are squawking that there is a shortage - the alternative would be to hire back the older workers they jettisoned in 2002.
All the more reason to support HSAs - it would help with the age discrimination issue if health care is not necessary as a benefit (ie not tied to the job).
And we should send our sons and daughters to top engineering schools and incur $ 120,000.00 debt doing it because??
Time for a cleaning out of D. C. WHORES!
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