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Take A Stand: Vote against H1B, Boycott H1B Companies
Self | November 2, 2002 | FormerLurker

Posted on 11/01/2002 8:18:12 PM PST by FormerLurker

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To: sinkspur
OK. Eliminate H-1Bs entirely. You know what happens next? Your company will simply outsource development to India. It's easily done, and India resources can undercut American programmers by 50%. My company sells Indian outsourcing, and we're doing very well right now. It's all about productivity. Get out of programming and into project management.

Gee...where to start.
Okay, first if everyone got out of programming and went into project management, we would have lots of incompetent (and overpaid) project managers.
Second, it makes no sense to take a highly skilled programmer (of which sadly there are not enough of) and make them a project manager. Believe me, I have done both, and project management is really not that hard to do well when leading software developers (building an aircraft, or a nuclear power plant, yes; being a PM for a software project team, no.)
Finally - lots of software development can't be sent offshore. I've seen it done, and done well (rarely), but it generally only works well when doing either very simple piecework that is easy to spec, or when doing very large projects where a whole mass of work with very clear and well defined requirements enable the code to be designed and coded offshore. But - from my experience - quite often we need to be meeting with the end users face to face to determine those requirements.

Most software projects fail because:

(a) No one shakes the real requirements out, so the software is developed to what the developers think the users need, while the guys who sold the work take the money and run; or
(b) The end users want the new stuff to look and act just like the old stuff (no business process change needed no sirree) and the end result is a heavily customized piece of junk that can't integrate with future upgrade releases - meanwhile the guys that sold the work take the money and run and the executives that bought the work go to jobs at other companies while putting on their resumes how they led and managed this major initiative (leaving off how they bail before it goes bust.)
(c) Or lastly the guys that sold the work didn't bring in the senior architects who could have told them that the concept wouldn't fly (can't scale, too complex, not enough money) so they just staff some junior types (who are cheap) who produce a system (that is supposed to support 20,000 simultaneous users) and craps out when more than 200 people sign on simultaneously. Meanwhile the guys that sold the project have taken the money and ran (e.g., they put on their resumes how they have sold millions of dollars worth of work, so they got hired somewhere else to do the same.)
Hmm...see a pattern here?

In none of these cases will "moving it offshore" fix the problem. In fact they will aggravate it.

Oh well - guess I am giving away that I have been in this business for a while. :-)

21 posted on 11/01/2002 9:22:44 PM PST by dark_lord
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To: KingKongCobra
Your pitiful math and logic skills tell an interesting story.

Er, last time I checked (80 x 103) X (1 x 106) = 8 x 109

You picked an outlandish number for average salary and the assume 100% of it leaves the U.S. Ergo, the worker paid zero taxes and lives here for free and never needs a bite to eat.

They pay ZERO US taxes. They ARE taxed on Social Security, but that money goes to their NATIVE country..

New H1B Scandal - Tax Evasion

Sure they pay for lodging and food, but the majority of their wages go back to their native country, where when they return they'll live a life of luxury. If they even spend HALF of their money on food and lodging, then 40 BILLION dollars is still leaving our economy, as American workers would have spent and/or invested that money HERE in the US. If we take into consideration that many engineers working as consultants were making upwards of $60/hour (~120K/yr), and many permanent employees were earning upwards of $85,000 - $100,000 per year, the $80,000 average is quite conservative. That would include entry level workers in the $40,000 range, where there were fewer of them who lost their jobs than there were higher paid workers.

Where can I get one of these magic Visas?

Immigrate to India. Call sinkspur's overseas sweat shop service, maybe he could help you out. If you come here on a visa, be prepared to work 70-80 hours a week or more for about half to three quarters of the usual salary..

22 posted on 11/01/2002 9:31:23 PM PST by FormerLurker
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To: sinkspur
Wow, I'm speechless. I've never disagreed with any of your posts before.

My husband has worked in IT for over 15 years, and if I do say so myself he is brilliant. He is now working in a very undesirable company and has many qualified American friends out of work due to H1Bs.

These foreign workers force the salaries down and are beholden to their employers for lower than marketplace wages. If they don't work forced free overtime and weekends they are fired and deported. The employers literally abuse these workers and get away with it. Many American programmers are driving trucks and working in convenience stores. It's impossible to compete with people that have to obey because of what's at stake.

I have no idea what project managemnet is, but I'm sure if my husband could get into it he would. The compnay he works for expects weekends and 12 hour days. Their attitude is "go ahead and find another job." There aren't any. We had to leave Tampa, FL (a place we both loved) because there was no work for him due to so many H1B's working for low wages.

This is the ONLY issue I agree with my current senator Hollings on. Do away with H1Bs!!!

23 posted on 11/01/2002 9:33:11 PM PST by SoCar
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To: sinkspur
[My company sells Indian outsourcing, and we're doing very well right now. It's all about productivity. Get out of programming and into project management]

Yes, until you begin to 'outsource' project managers - then what?

24 posted on 11/01/2002 9:44:38 PM PST by nanny
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To: dark_lord
Dittos on your post. I've dealt with a lot of companies that thought they could save money by sending their programming work off shore. You should add in there that you can't manage a project when there's a 9 hour time difference. Stuff that could get handled in a single hour meeting now take a day with emails sent back and forth.
Not anything against non-native English speakers but programming requires that all parties know the same terms.
I'm not saying that American programming firms are perfect, but take all their flaws and multiply them by X and you'll have what its like dealing with offshore programming teams.
25 posted on 11/01/2002 9:46:05 PM PST by lelio
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To: KingKongCobra
Oops, I try to get fancy and then I go ahead and miss a zero in my answer. That should have been..

Er, last time I checked (80 x 103) X (1 x 106) = 80 x 109

You see, us old goats are getting rusty. The longer we're out of work, the rustier we get, and the harder it'd be to get back into the work force. Perhaps that's the whole idea....

26 posted on 11/01/2002 9:46:42 PM PST by FormerLurker
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To: SoCar
[These foreign workers force the salaries down and are beholden to their employers for lower than marketplace wages]z

Thanks for a real post. It is so easy to be flip about the hardship of other people - until it hits you. What a lot of people do not realize is, these foreign workers can do anything an American worker can do and unless something is stopped here - the greedy politicians will continue to force it upon the American workers in return for contributions.

I realize I am very simplistic, but I fail to see ever, how it is good to put an American worker out of work, put in a foreign worker who works for less, pays little or no taxes, sends most of the money home and has no interest or allegiance to this country. That is not the way to build or maintain a country. Just ridiculous

27 posted on 11/01/2002 9:51:46 PM PST by nanny
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To: All
A bit more info on the H1-B program..

H1B Issues

28 posted on 11/01/2002 9:55:05 PM PST by FormerLurker
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To: lelio
[I think America would go apple-less if all illegals were kicked out. Traveling over to eastern Washington that's all you see.]

Yes, you would think so - but I have been eating Washington apples all my life - somebody was picking them before the illegals.

I do know what you mean, but that actually seems so with any agribusiness, home construction, highway construction. It is amazing!! If all these people were paying taxes, the government wouldn't have a deficit.

29 posted on 11/01/2002 9:56:33 PM PST by nanny
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To: FormerLurker
Thanks for this informative post. I am interested in a certain company, but kept getting an error message. I have bookmarked the site and will go back later and see.
30 posted on 11/01/2002 9:58:25 PM PST by nanny
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To: FormerLurker
[? Do you enjoy being part of the cause of the decline of the United States economy and the poverty of hundreds of thousand American families?]

You know I have that thought quite often when I read posts on FR. Now I know sometimes people can get caught up in a situation where it is do this or not have a job and if that is the case, I understand to a point. But to deliberately work in this way to undermine the US just makes no sense to me. I see no diffence in that and hiring illegals.

31 posted on 11/01/2002 10:02:03 PM PST by nanny
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To: nanny
If all these people were paying taxes, the government wouldn't have a deficit.

Not only that, but it'd greatly reduce the number of families on "welfare". You see, once unemployment runs out, there aren't a whole lot of options if there isn't any work.

Unfortunetly, it becomes almost impossible for a family to subsist on any public assistance these days as major cutbacks have taken place over the past decade. Although politicians have created the illusion that SOCIAL welfare was the MAJOR cause of the deficit, it has in reality been CORPORATE welfare that's been the MAJOR cause of our debt.

32 posted on 11/01/2002 10:02:38 PM PST by FormerLurker
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To: FormerLurker
I hate to get involved in something that's a waste of time. You feel too strongly about this for me to have an impact. Nonetheless, In Houston for 2002 there are a grand total of 41 H1B1 hires. The average salaray is 51,000 per year. It's safe to assume that taxes and living expenses consume about all of this. You can complain about people taking your job but the idea that this money is drained from the economy is ludicrous. In every downturn, people need scapegoats. I see you've found yours.
33 posted on 11/01/2002 10:06:12 PM PST by KingKongCobra
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To: nanny
While it maybe easy to stop Indian workers from coming to US on H1B by tightening visa regulations, American jobs moving to India cannot be stopped. Even as American corporations announce massive layoffs, they are making tens of million $ investments in India and hiring 1000s in India. GE , AOL , Microsoft , Oracle, Adobe , IBM , yahoo etc are currently hiring 10s of engineers each month in Bangalore and New Delhi. Its not the Indian CEOs who are doing this. These jobs , like manufacturing jobs which went to China in 80s will never comeback to US.
34 posted on 11/01/2002 10:09:43 PM PST by anu_shr
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To: Camber-G
"... Don't the H1B visa personnel get laid off before citizens ? That's the law, isn't it ?"

Couldn't be.

If it is, my company is breaking the law.

35 posted on 11/01/2002 10:12:48 PM PST by The KG9 Kid
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To: KingKongCobra
Nonetheless, In Houston for 2002 there are a grand total of 41 H1B1 hires.

You obviously didn't look too hard. Just one search for Programmer/Analyists in Houston returned over 220 H1-B workers on one page, where the search was limited to 500 records so only 10 pages were returned. As I said, there were OVER 220 on the FIRST page!

Now if you look at the OTHER categories, you'd see that the number of H1-B workers in Houston is ASTRONOMICAL.

36 posted on 11/01/2002 10:17:23 PM PST by FormerLurker
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To: KingKongCobra
BTW KKC, the number of records is not the same as the number of hires, as there can be MANY workers on one application. Additionally, you need to look not only at how many were hired in 2002, but you need to look at how many are working here period. That is where you'll begin to see the scope of the problem..
37 posted on 11/01/2002 10:23:42 PM PST by FormerLurker
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Comment #38 Removed by Moderator

To: KingKongCobra
In fact KKC, try looking at how many were hired in 2001. There you'll see that they must have been ferrying them in by 747s at least once a day...
39 posted on 11/01/2002 10:29:03 PM PST by FormerLurker
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To: FormerLurker
You are correct. Some of these are multiple hires. That brings the grand total to almost 90 people in the Houston area this year. Big whoop.

40 posted on 11/01/2002 10:29:18 PM PST by KingKongCobra
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