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We Americans pride ourselves for being better, more efficient, more innovative than any other nation on earth. But clearly in this case, there needs to be some seriously improvement in education, there must be more math/science in the curriculum and less liberal arts.

Amen. I was in the high tech industry for years. In the beginning, most co-workers had engineering credentials. Then, starting in the late 80's, I started seeing more workers with BA's in programming degrees- useless. Their knowledge was English, French and Fortran (or Cobol).
A few years later, the industry was awash in MBA degrees - how to tell the engineers what to do.

The H1B workers were really engineers. Not many Americans, except for the Asian-Americans, go for engineering degrees. If we can't educate more engineers, then we do need the H1B workers.

I would not be so quick to assume that math and science are more important than liberal arts. I hold a BSCS, magna cum laude, from the University of Maryland (ranked 12th in the nation). I was also the product architect and principal engineer for several very successful commercial products. You know what? I am currently enrolled in a legal program.

Many of the attorneys that teach at my school also actively practice law. They say that techies are easy prey because they lack the well-rounded education that most professional types possess; namely, the ability to effectively convey one’s ideas in written/verbal form as well the ability to negotiate and organize.

Additionally, techies are the only so called professionals that are not represented by a union. Lawyers have the American Bar Association (ABA) that actively lobbies congress on their behalf. One lawyer said that a bill to import guest worker lawyers would last about twenty-four hours before the ABA had it killed.

If one examines the text for the “American Competitiveness and Workforce Investment Act” (ACWIA—a.k.a the H-1B statute), ones sees provisions for special interests included everywhere in the language. Heck, even the worker protections written in the bill are hollow at best. This language was manipulated; so, that Indian-owned (i.e., foreign controlled companies) body shops, like Tata and Satyam, that were some of the largest users of H-1B visas, could basically game the law.

The ACWIA statute reads like Swiss cheese, and should have been called the “Indian Competitiveness and Workforce Investment Act” because that is exactly the effect it had on the economy. It basically allowed foreign-owned companies to establish a beachhead on are shores, and train their workforce on our dime.

In closing, please remember that many H-1Bs are brokered through multi-party arrangements. An Indian-owned, foreign company, with a U.S. presence, will often subcontract to another Indian-owned foreign company without a U.S. presence. The effect is that the payment is made corp-to-corp. The company in India deposits the H-1B’s check in an Indian bank and gives the Indian here a tax-free living allowance; thus, the Indian living and working here pays no U.S. income or social security tax. When these foreign nationals bring over their families, we pick up the freight for educating their children. We could all work for at least forty-percent less if we did not have to pay income or payroll taxes.