Posted on 06/18/2002 2:41:55 PM PDT by M 91 u2 K
Here's the real deal, our guys do the job, then when the company is up and running on their program, they fire our guys and hire people from India, or Pakistan, at a much lower salary to maintain the programs.
Same thing messed up the nursing industry for so many years. About the time nurses would start making a salary worth talking about, hospitals would run in nurses from Guam, Ireland, etc., salaries would crash and burn.
What happens once all of our manufacturing and engineering capabilities are gone? What if those countries that are manufacturing our goods and writing software for us suddenly decide to shut us off?
How do you figure that? Are you saying foreigners are more technically skilled and better educated than American engineers?
In the 1980s, my employer had a world-class I/T training department but disbanded it in the late '80s due to cost-cutting. That, and downsizing, were reasons for cutting back on employee training costs (training philosophy used to be 2 weeks/year, then became can you justify it, then became just-in-time, then became "can't you read a book?").
Fast-forward to the 1990s and you find that client-server came, networks came, the internet came, web-based applications came, and companies are saying that their internal staff doesn't have the skillset and they have to go outside the country to get skilled workers. They can't wait for their internal staff to retrain because the market moves to fast, retraining costs are too high, yada yada yada.
Here we are in 2002 and we're now focusing on "organizational capability," in other words, can the organization sustain itself with the proper skills when all the contractors leave.
Go figure.
-PJ
Unless they are providing secret information on foreign military capabilities, I don't see what they could provide that we don't already have. If anything, they bring back OUR secrets to THEIR country at the end of their employment.
IF they do have a better academic background, it is usually because they went to universities here in the US for FREE on our dime. As many of us have to pay over a third of their income in taxes, many US citizens are unable to pursue their degrees. Financial aid is reserved for affirmative action and foreign aid. Student loans only cover one semester per school year, forcing the student to somehow come up with the other semester's tuition on their own.
Financial aid in the form of grants ARE given to FOREIGN nationals who then go to the school that the US citizen was unable to attend due to paying TOO MUCH of his/her income in TAXES.
As far as experience, I've worked with many H1-B visa types who needed their hands held in every little thing they had to do.
Unless you can provide specific examples of how foreigners provide skills that are lacking in US workers, I have to totally and absolutely disagree with you.
The sad reality is that most american kids do not live in the upper income communities and therefore they are going to get crap for education. There are lots of little boys who do have the ability to do high-tech work, but they languish in american public schools and become nothing, their talent is never identified and it is never developed. In India they systematically look for high-aptitude kids and put them into special programs, eventually to technical institutes so an american corporation can hire them as an indentured servant.
The end result is that if an american kid has a high aptitude for math and science he is ignored, but an Indian kid gets ushered into the american workplace. All the while the americans are the ones who are not qualified to do the job by design and yet the americans are the ones who produce in high tech jobs, the H1B indentured servants have a reputation for mediocrity. At least they are submissive and don't seek raises, they don't demand a change in stupid management that keeps them from performing the way an american would, that is why we have H1B. It is merely an oppression by the managerial class of some valuable employees whom they would like to own, so they have passed laws in order to achieve that.
The government could establish a similar program for hamburger flippers and systematically drive down wages for hamburger flippers, but it would not do anyone any real good.
People who are pro-h1b say that it creates more total jobs. That is debatable, but it may be a true statement. However, it is undeniable that h1b raises unemployment. It lowers wages by means of throwing americans out of work and putting foreigners in their jobs right here in america. Our unemployment rate today is 3 times what it was 40 years ago, is this really in our national interest? Republicans say it is.
Never forget that H1B is a republican program. The democrats have done a lot of awful things, but I don't ever remember them intervening into a labor market that americans rely upon in order to throw americans out of work and drive wages down in that labor market.
This is not true. I've had to train many a foreign worker in the computer field. I am an older worker and was laid off in October and haven't found anything even though I am willing to relocate. I have kept current with the latest technologies and can keep up with the best of them. A lot of the jobs were sent overseas. Companies have become short-sighted. I don't think the company I was working for will not be around in a few years.
I've got news for you. The people coming in on H1B visas aren't here because they're the best or the brightest. They're here because they're cheap.
Do you think we send all labor intensive work to factories in China because they produce the highest quality work? Ever hear of forced labor?
Do you advocate that any american business that wants a cheaper worker be able to hire a foreigner and promise them that if they only work for them in america for 6 years, then they can become a citizen. Under those rules any industry can be overwhelmed with foreign labor to work at much lower price. All american workers would become too expensive and unqualified under those rules. Do you advocate those rules in the industry you work in?
If we impose those rules everywhere, then wages will go down, unemployment will spiral and we as a society won't be able to afford to pay for social security and medicaire. That is not a good result, it certainly does not take the best and brightest to see that.
Where Did All The Jobs Go? - The H-1B Situation I am a software engineer currently looking for work. My job skills are current. In fact, I filed a patent at my last employer. I have submitted hundreds of resumes for various positions. I have only had a few job interviews. However, those interviews were quite informative. For example, on a recent interview, I immediately noticed that the software managers and engineers were from other countries. This appears to be the situation at all the companies I have recently interviewed with. I was aware that Congress had recently doubled the number of H-1B visas for skilled foreign workers. In fact, 1,000,000 H-1B workers will be employed in the U.S. by the end of 2002. That's right - one million people. That's a lot of jobs especially since unemployment is at record highs. What is the H-1B program? If you don't know about it, you better learn about it quickly because it may be the reason you don't have a job. "The H-1B non-immigrant program is a voluntary program that allows employers to temporarily import and employ non-immigrants admitted under H-1B visas to fill specialized jobs not filled by U.S. workers." http://www.dol.gov/dol/eta/public/regs/fedreg/final/2000 122001.htm Each company hiring an H-1B employee is required to file a Labor Condition Application (LCA). An LCA is an application filed by a company that wants to hire a foreign national to fill a position within the United States. With this in mind, I wanted to determine how many engineering positions were filled by H-1B engineers at a given company. Since this should be public information, I went to my trusty search engine looking for a LCA database. For some reason, it does not appear that the INS (http://www.ins.gov) or other government web sites provide a LCA database. However, I finally found a web site which has a LCA database at http://www.zazona.com The database link is at http://www.zazona.com/LCA-Data Their advanced database search is very helpful. For example in the advanced search, select the state as California, enter a city as Santa Clara, enter the employer name as Hewlett Packard and enter number of records as 50 then press the submit query button. You can see the positions and salaries of the H-1B employees. Looking at the data, we are not talking about a few dozen positions. We are talking about literally hundreds of positions. This is only for the HP offices in Santa Clara. Go back and do the above search but leave the enter a city blank. You will see that Hewlett Packard employs hundreds and hundreds of H-1B workers. Moreover, we are not only losing engineering jobs but H-1B visas are being granted for almost any conceivable position. Just look at the LCA database to see what types of jobs are being denied to U.S. citizens. This appears to be the only site with a LCA database so I wondered who created the site. There is an interesting article about its creator at www.sacbee.com/content/opinion/story/1094647p- 1159082c.html With the current economic conditions, many large firms have instigated massive layoffs. Many engineers have been unable to find work for months. As mentioned above, the H-1B program allows employers to temporarily import and employ non U.S. citizens to fill specialized jobs not filled by U.S. workers. Go back and look at the list of jobs filled at Hewlett Packard by H-1B employees. I personally know of many individuals who are qualified for those positions but are unable to find work. Something is seriously wrong. I've been told by many permanent and contract hiring agencies that companies now prefer to hire H-1B workers and work them long hours at lower wages - knowing they won't say anything fearing they would lose their H-1B status. At my last firm, the engineering manager had his engineers working many weekends. When one of the H- 1B engineers complained, he said that there were plenty of engineers in Taiwan that wanted his place. I have heard other engineers say that managers like to threaten H-1B engineers with losing their H-1B status unless they do exactly what they are told. I've also heard and personally noticed that many companies are hiring H-1B managers with the expressed purpose of having them fill engineering positions with H-1B engineers from their respective country. Many companies are finding this an inexpensive way to lower costs as discussed in a recent USA Today article titled "Tech Firms' Hiring Practices Ignore Idle Americans" http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20011205/3673849s .htm Dr. Norman Matloff, professor of computer science at the University of California at Davis, also supports these findings. http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/itaa.html Someone wrote me to ask "Why do US citizens deserve the jobs more than H-1B workers?" Well, think about it. If tomorrow, 1,000,000 technical jobs in say New Delhi were suddenly replaced by American workers, the Indian government would be very upset. The problem is the sheer number of people since one million H-1B workers will be employed in the U.S. by the end of 2002. There needs to be a more balanced system in which everyone comes out ahead. Countries need to provide the infrastructure for their own engineers to develop businesses and find employment at home. Globalization should mean that software projects are jointly developed between countries rather than having everyone move here. The myth is that the U.S. has unlimited space but just look at the traffic congestion in most U.S. cities. What was initially a reasonable idea has grown into a monster of unreasonable size. Another person wrote me to say "If economics is the corporate motivation, isn't it more effective to take the entire division offshore? You don't need any H1-B visas for that." You have to remember there is a good reason that everyone is coming here rather than starting companies in other countries. The infrastructure of roads, legal systems, communications and schools does not exist in most countries. This infrastructure exists because U.S. taxpayers have been paying for it over many years. If companies had to build a similar infrastructure offshore, the cost would be prohibitive for them. The H1-Bs use our schools, roads, etc. but have not had to pay taxes over many years for their construction. Hence, citizens paid for the schools and roads which companies use for H1-Bs to replace citizens. So companies and H1-Bs get a free lunch. I am not saying we should not have any H-1Bs, the problem is that we are talking about hundreds of thousands of H-1Bs. This is having a major impact on the technical labor market. The U.S. is one of the few countries which now offers unlimited access to its job market at the expense of its own citizens. While going to college, if I had any idea that most of the engineering positions would be taken by H-1B labor, I would never have become an engineer. I advise young people not to become involved in engineering since companies find it easier to hire less expensive H-1B labor. The H-1B managers prefer to hire more H-1B labor - it's only human nature - so you have a vicious cycle. The end result is that U.S. citizens need not apply. This is the situation for the majority of companies in my area. The other issue is that U.S. engineering firms are no longer hiring African and Hispanic Americans. I've noticed that many firms with H-1B managers have no African and Hispanic Americans on their staff. We need to hire minority Americans at home before we run off and hire everyone from elsewhere. I believe with the current economic conditions the H-1B issue will become a very important topic in the coming months. Frankly, the media and press have not discussed the seriousness of this subject. Why? I believe they did not have the tools and databases required to see the size of the problem. Fortunately, the LCA data is now available at (http://www.zazona.com). You can now determine how many and what type of jobs are being denied to unemployed U.S. citizens at a given company and location. The H-1B law says it is to "temporarily import and employ ... specialized jobs not filled by U.S. workers". Thus, the law was intended for "temporary" rather than permanent labor. The law was clearly not intended to deny U.S. citizens jobs but this is precisely what it is doing during this difficult economic time. What needs to be done to correct this grievous situation? Congress needs to enforce the law by requiring companies to provide immediate employment to qualified unemployed U.S. citizens if an H-1B employee is filling a position a citizen is qualified for. When a company has layoffs, Congress should force companies to obey the law by discharging H-1B employees before U.S. citizens. It's the law. Whether Congress enforces the law is another matter. It is ironic that the same corporations displaying football field size American flags are the worse offenders. They are making the technology sector as dependent upon foreign labor as we are dependent upon foreign oil. Because of their lust for profits, our government, banking, financial and technology systems are now heavily in the hands of non citizens. Companies are using the system to their own advantage while pitting U.S. employees against H-1B employees and cruelly hurting both. If the current H-1B situation is not immediately changed, U.S. citizens will abandon the engineering field. Think about it. You just lost your job and go to the LCA database to learn that 25 H-1B employees are still working in your position. You will not be a happy camper. What can you do to help? Email this article to all your friends. Encourage them to look at the LCA database. http://www.zazona.com/LCA-Data/ The job they are losing may be on the list. Sign the petition. You will find a petition to send to your congressional representatives at http://www.zazona.com/H1BPetition/P/petition.html Your most powerful action is to write your U.S. Congressperson and Senators. Remember, H-1B employees cannot vote but as a U.S. citizen, your vote counts. Even though powerful companies have heavily contributed to your congressional leaders to keep the H- 1B laws in place, companies cannot vote - only you can. Don't let your job be eliminated next. You can find your congressional representative at these links. Your Congressperson http://www.house.gov/writerep/ Your Senators http://www.senate.gov/contacting/index_by_state.cfm Don't forget to both email and make a phone call to your local Congressperson. Write the business and political editors of your local newspaper. The following academic articles should be of interest: Dr. Norman Matloff is a professor of computer science at the University of California at Davis http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/itaa.html August 5, 1999 Testimony of Gene A. Nelson, Ph.D. http://www.house.gov/judiciary/nels0805.htm Thank you for your support. Unemployed Engineer
They are being paid much less then the "going rate".
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