H-1B Study (All you US Citizen IT Workers are TOAST!)

U.S. House Judiciary Committee Testimony ^ | September 10, 2002 | Dr. Norman Matloff

[dark_lord]

Debunking the Myth of a Desperate Software Labor Shortage

Due to an extensive public relations campaign orchestrated by an industry trade organization, the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA), a rash of newspaper articles have been appearing since early 1997, claiming desperate labor shortages in the information-technology field. Frantic employers complain that they cannot fill many open positions for computer programmers.

Yet readers of the articles proclaiming a shortage would be perplexed if they also knew that Microsoft only hires 2% of its applicants for software positions, and that this rate is typical in the industry. Software employers, large or small, across the nation, concede that they receive huge numbers of re'sume's but reject most of them without even an interview. One does not have to be a ``techie'' to see the contradiction here. A 2% hiring rate might be unremarkable in other fields, but not in one in which there is supposed to be a ``desperate'' labor shortage. If employers were that desperate, they would certainly not be hiring just a minuscule fraction of their job applicants.

Here is a table showing the actual number of job applicants hired for a variety of companies:

American Management Systems	2%
Broderbund Software	1%
Cisco	5%
Cohesive	2%
Datascan	5%
Deltanet	4%
ECbridges	2%
Flashpoint Technology	2 to 5%
R.D. Raab	1%
H.L. Yoh	4%
Inktomi	less than 5%
Microsoft	2%
Net Perceptions	2%
New England firm	1%
Qualcomm	4.5%
Radiant Systems	under 1%
Red Hat Linux	under 1%
Tangis	under 1%

Table 1: Percent of software applicants hired

In other words, there is no shortage of ``bodies,'' i.e. there is no shortage of experienced computer programmers. The problem is that employers are not willing to hire them. Employers are only willing to hire from three narrow categories of programmers:
* New or recent (within a few years of graduation) college graduates, who have cheaper salaries. Note, though, that even among new computer science graduates, fewer than half are hired as programmers.
* Foreign nationals on work visas, who have cheaper salaries.
* A relatively small number of experiencedprogrammers who have background in certain highly-specialized software technologies.

Dr. Matloff says: "Hiring managers have often complained to me that their firm's Human Resources Dept. screens out resume's of applicants who the managers feel qualified. HR apparently decides to screen out the applicants who are too expensive or too old - and then complains that there is a ``shortage'' of applicants...There does seem to be coordination among the HR departments of the various firms. The HR departments of the major firms in Silicon Valley hold monthly meetings, at which the firms exchange information with each other on policy, salaries and so on. (Personal communication from Paul Donnelly, IEEE-USA, June 30, 2000.)...All the firms hire an extremely low percentage of their programming applicants, due to the fact that all the firms overstate job requirements...Almost all firms aim for applicants having three to seven years (or two to eight) of experience."

He says: "It seems safe to say that experience may not be the most valued commodity, according to a survey of 200 IT managers nationwide conducted by InformationWeek Research in May. Though age wasn't specified in the question, only 2% of the managers said they would most likely hire a worker with 10 or more years' experience. Almost half-46%-preferred to hire a worker with four to 10 years' experience, while 26% said they would hire a worker with less than three years' experience, and another 26% wanted an entry-level worker or recent college graduate."

[FormerLurker]

I'd give the opposite advice. If you are suited to the work and don't expect that the world owes you a house on easy street to maintain your status, you can go a long way in IT.

Until you hit late thirties or early forties. Or unless of course your company simply cans all of their American workers to make room for H1-B's.

Yes, you bust your rump staying ahead of the curve, but it's a pretty cool way to keep your mind sharp and the job unboring.

Been there, done that..

If you have no initiative or are content to sit on the things you've done forever and expect to be rewarded for it, you might be in the wrong job.

You're also sitting in the wrong job if you expect to feed a family when they most need it. Many families are in a horrible way right now due to the fact that monied minnions of industry executives have fabricated lies insisting that there's a shortage of qualified engineers in this country, so they needed to raise the H1-B quota in order to fill those positions. Most people here know that's not just an absurd lie, it is an obscenely ridiculous statement.

[DoughtyOne]

I believe that racial strife, leftist ideology in our schools, the media programming aimed at our youth and other facets of our society are efforts to make sure US citizens do not excel to the optimal.  And I believe that much of this is carefully masterminded by different think tanks within our own government agencies.  This shouldn't be misconstrued to intimate that natural human nature doesn't play in at all.  I just happen to think that it plays in a lot less than we think.

Note that real wages and the goodies we must purchase to have a "normal lifestyle" today, are going in the opposite directions.  Today both adults need to work to support a home.  Why is that?  It's a question very few people ask.

We have flooded the labor market, shipped jobs overseas and undermined our workers every chance we had.  Like it or not, this is true.

Racial strife is instilled by the race baiters and the Democrats.  This serves the purpose of actually keeping the very people down, that the race baiters profess to want to help.  This keeps those folks less successful that they could be.  And less successful folks are easier to herd.

Many youth are able to counter the programming to become successful people.  They somehow cast off the best efforts of the left to brainwash them.  But the numbers that fail are sufficiently bumped up to create another class that can be easily manipulated.  Success has it's own problematic aspects.  If you become successful, you become accostomed to an elevated level of existance.  Too busy to interfere with the plans of the federal government, you will generally be content to participate in the 9 to 5 grind, never having enough time or energy to do much more than service your work, bill and recreation time needs.

It's all a neat little game that is much more complex and manipulated than most people will accept.  It sounds crazy.  I'm not convinced it is.

Look at the numbers of people who are too turned off by the system to become engaged and successful enough to combat it.  Look at the numbers of folks who are so successful that they are too busy to fight it.

The people on this forum have made the time.  Most of them are sufficiently well off to be able to not only access this site, but be able to spend the time here to become informed.  This is the single most terrifying factor of today's society to the manipulators.  A growing number of people are tuning in.

I realize this sounds Orwelian.  It think it needs to be tweaked to be sure.  But I do believe there is more truth in this synopsis than folks think.

I could polish this up and make it more plausible.  If you are willing, I think you can fill in those gaps.  If you're not willing, my filling them in wouldn't help.

LOL.  Thanks for the comments.

[Glenn]

Most people here know that's not just an absurd lie, it is an obscenely ridiculous statement.

Then most people are amazing deluded. I'll be 50 in February and I am thriving and advancing in this industry, still have time for my family, and enjoy the hell out of what I do. I work with an amazing number of 40 hour wonders who bitch if they have to work a minute of overtime or take a call in the middle of the night over a problem. The older employees resent the younger employees because they are on the high profile projects while the oldsters are relegated to the back bench because they haven't kept up their skills and don't will themselves to tackle something they might just fail at. They simply haven't recognized that no one gives you knowledge, you have to take it. Most are waiting for the company to "retrain" them. Too bad. So sad. Bye, Bye. You do not understand modern corporate realities.

I work for a very large company and there are many others who understand and many others who do not. It all comes down to work ethic, skill and self-initiative in the end. If you have what the market is buying, you'll be selling. If you want to be a "victim", then it's a choice you made -- not a role someone made you take.

[Yeti]

The HR departments of the major firms in Silicon Valley hold monthly meetings, at which the firms exchange information with each other on policy, salaries and so on. (Personal communication from Paul Donnelly, IEEE-USA, June 30, 2000.)...

I haven't read all of the replies in this thread, so forgive me if I am saying something that has already been said, but --

If this is true is smacks of anti-trust, and possibly RICO-type conspiracy to defraud.

[Red Jones]

you've worked in a more professional niche than me.

[RWG]

With all of that IT talent available why can't anyone find a technician to fix computers locally for less than $55/hr? And why do these folks work by the hour and not by the result? How come my geek friends do for me in less time and for a soda what shops predict will be a week and want hundreds of dollars to do? If these IT workers do for companies what they are doing to me, I can see why there are no jobs for them.

[Taxman]

Thought this might interest y'all.

[Perceptive]

This add was running in the Washintonpost this past sunday. It appears that they are exclusively fishing for H-1B visa employees who they can exploit instead of Ameican citizens.

Curiously, most of the advertisements I see specifically state NO H1-B's or sponserships.

[RKV]

I don't know who you are, but it's clear you don't know squat. FYI, coders is a term of respect. Not everyone can write code. It's hard. It takes years of dedication to get good at it. Your ignorance is showing.

[Perceptive]

1. Everyone knows that engineers and programmers by and large have lower social skills. Thus we are more easily manipulated and it is harder for us to get together to oppose exploitation. Thus, we are among the first to be exploited by H1Bs.

Not necessarily true. I have outstanding 'soft skills' with people. Folks tell me I should be in sales. However, I do admit I am the exception.

2. About every five years a new computer language is thrust upon our industry. People who were considered experts in the field are instantly obsoleted or must start again from scratch. Camps are formed. Lines are drawn. So instead of uniting together in common interest for our careers, we backbite and stab each other in the back for a declining number of jobs.

Two observations: 1) I would like to see programmers unionize. 2) You are correct about new languages obsoleting old ones every 5 years. It is incumbant upon us all to get up to speed. However, there are also jobs out there to maintain and improve legacy code. The single largest language still out in the business world is COBOL.

3. Even if there are still lots of jobs left over for local talent, the fact that we can be replaced by an H1B or offshored talent means that we will be less likely to ask for a raise or a promotion. Fear is a great motivator.

Most of my raises and promotions come from either moving to new jobs, or threatening to (in a nice way). Throw the fear of God into your employer, if you are a key player. Fear works two ways.

4. What you learn after years of programming is how to go about solving problems efficiently. Maybe you need to spend time learning a new syntax or a new interface, but you will most often come up with a better solution than the newby "expert" in the latest software flavor ... whether the newby is from here or elsewhere. The dot.com revolution favored newness over experience. With the demise of the dot.coms there is hope that those who hire us will respect our experience and reward us accordingly. But I'm not going to hold my breath.

You are right about the REAL skill we bring. Also, remember, the Y2K (non)crisis got a lot of people into coding that simply should not have been there. I've been programming for almost 2 decades. This tech recession is clearing out a lot of people who should not have entered the field to begin with.

Also, consider that the Y2K (non)crisis blew the credibility of a lot of IT departments. Scads of money were sent to IT, and now upper management is leery of giving them money. Projects are being delayed endlessly until the systems creak and break. That cannot help but change. Will we have a boom like 1997-2000 ever again? No. But we will all find niches.

[wotan]

The low percentage of applicants hired is not a surprise.

The software industry is highly specialized. Programmers are not as interchangeable as garbagemen. Many resumes are ignored because the applicants have the wrong skill set.

Most programmers can pick up needed skills in time, but in a fast growing company the opportunity costs of having someone not producing for a few months can be quite high.

Also, there are few jobs that require such close cooperation as software development. It is vital that members of an effective group get along well. Different organizations have different personalities, often reflective of the leader's. Many will be rejected just because they fail to fit into the prevailing ethos.

Incidentally, where I work, programmers are paid without regard to their H1B status.

[banjo joe]

Is that what you got from my post? How old are you and how long have you been in IT? Companies don't care much for experience and judgement, it's the salary level they're concerned with. You can get a fresh grad or H-1B for less than half the cost.

Frankly, you sound like a low or mid-level management drone.

[banjo joe]

Is that what you got from my post? How old are you and how long have you been in IT? Companies don't care much for experience and judgement, it's the salary level they're concerned with. You can get a fresh grad or H-1B for less than half the cost.

Frankly, you sound like a low or mid-level management drone.

You're also ignoring the evidence presented in the article (also indicative of drone-ness).

[Non-Sequitur]

bump

[A. Pole]

Here is published paper titled How and Why Government, Universities, and Industry Create Domestic Labor Shortages of Scientists and High-Tech Workers.

Refering to this paper, Dr. Markoff says "Amazingly, policy makers in another federal agency, the National Science Foundation (NSF), actually planned to bring in foreign nationals to hold down wages in science and engineering, at least at the postgraduate degree level. In early 1998, Dr. Eric Weinstein, then a mathematician at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, uncovered internal NSF documents which expressed concern that science and engineering salaries were getting too high, and proposed as a solution to this ``problem'' bringing in a glut of foreign labor. It is amazing that a federal agency would actually plot to keep U.S. citizens' salaries down. Subsequent to the writing of these documents, the NSF pushed Congress to establish the current H-1B program, in much expanded form compared to the old H-1 program. "

Bump

[1john2 3and4]

Top 15 Companies Requesting H-1B Visas Employer Name H-1B Visa Requests Group One Therapy 169,666

so joe, i guess you noticed that TOO, huh? (they're #1 on the list)

this is my first time on this subject. it is something which i had NO knowledge of before, though i support tancredo's efforts, (michelle malkin ROCKS!) and pray we may have more like him to actually GET SOMETHING DONE about this problem. i lurk at free republic, therefore i become INFORMED. (my new "axiom")

who IS "group one therapy"? anyone with a link? i am assuming theyre like "health south" etc.(?) any info appreciated!

the LEAST i can do is make sure they never get any of my business, etc. thank you,

john

[FlyingA]

BIG BUMP

[Glenn]

Frankly, you sound like a low or mid-level management drone.

Let me repeat what said in my mail reply: You couldn't touch my game.

I've got more than 25 years in. I work on stuff you couldn't understand with a flowchart stapled to your eyebrows.

This idea that "companies" ignore experience and judgement is a red herring. Maybe your experience just expired. Maybe because it did, your judgement is questionable.

[bvw]

Engineers and programmers have fine social skills. But when the pedal meets the metal, for us social skills don't make even a single line of code work, don't calculate the stress loads in a plant layout or hotel design, and wouldn't have any idea which hydraulic SOV to use to operate the milk box sealer. So engineering and practising engineers learn early to tolerate those with very lousy social skills, because they can calculate, code or design.

By that inclusive bent we have -- which is good, and the few among us that succeed despite poor social skills, we *all* get mis-labeled. Why? Because others lines of work don't tolerate as much lousy or undeveloped social skills as we do.

What brought the H1B deluge on was not some inate ability to be expoloited -- but rather that the software job market literally burst onto the scence in the late 70's, and did so with massive numbers of jobs. Medicine has never had anything comparable -- comparable would have been for disease not to have existed until 1973 or so. Had that happened, India and China would now be throwing hundreds of thousands of MD's at us a year.

Each job needs a person to fill it, of persons, well, India and China have massive inventories, and the smarts to get into our market by hook or crook.

To me, the great problem with H1B is that it rewards crooks, and every decent Indian or Chinese programmer who arrives here is let through in the door of crime. A bad, bad example. The first, the proimary lesson they learn s that in America, lies and fraud are expected and rewarding.

H1B is a bastard, bastard program!

[A. Pole]

Each job needs a person to fill it, of persons, well, India and China have massive inventories, and the smarts to get into our market by hook or crook.

How do you explain the "fact" that India and China are so ahead with a large number of experienced engineers? I thought that the computer revolution started in America and that those two countries are behind technologically? Where did they accumulated this overwheling huge amount of experience?

On the other hand, if you say that they are especially talented, tell me which and how much of important software was invented over there? Give me examples, I am curious.