H1-Bs -- some damning data

[Loren Pechtel]

http://spectrum.ieee.org/view-from-...commentary-the-h1b-problem-as-ieeeusa-sees-it

Most of them are making far below market rate. Strangely enough, a lot are making a little over the threshold that greatly reduces the scrutiny.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Well, ya. Isn't the entire point of them to reduce salaries so that the upper echelons of the company can keep more of the money, so that the upper 1% get even richer?

That's the rationale for about 90% of American laws. It would be kind of racist if the laws affecting foreigners had a different standard than the laws affecting Americans.

 

[TSwizzle]

The H1-B is a bit of a farce now. It had good intentions to begin with but a lot of companies use it inappropriately and exploit the people on it.

 

[dismal]

So in this thread immigrants are bad because they lower wages and stuff?

 

[TSwizzle]

So in this thread immigrants are bad because they lower wages and stuff?

H1-B holders are not immigrants, they are temporary workers.

 

[dismal]

So in this thread immigrants are bad because they lower wages and stuff?

H1-B holders are not immigrants, they are temporary workers.

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

 

[TSwizzle]

H1-B holders are not immigrants, they are temporary workers.

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

there's no "magick" involved.

 

[coloradoatheist]

H1-B holders are not immigrants, they are temporary workers.

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

Good question. Are they people against the H1B Visas also the ones for Trumps immigration policies?

 

[Tom Sawyer]

H1-B holders are not immigrants, they are temporary workers.

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

They don't. If someone's paid cash under the counter, it means that the business is getting the labour for less than they'd need to pay to get a legal worker. That means that the demand for legal workers at a proper wage is reduced, so those going for those jobs are going to need to accept less money as a result of the competition for fewer positions.

That's why minimum wage laws are important and why there should be severe consequences for businesses which hire illegally. I am against Trump's policies, but that's because he's going after the wrong people. It's the businesses which should be targeted and which should be the focus of ICE activities, rather than the immigrants. Clamping down on businesses will have the effect of reducing the attractiveness of the country to illegals and reduce their numbers as a result, but won't be quite so dickish about doing so.

 

[dismal]

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

They don't. If someone's paid cash under the counter, it means that the business is getting the labour for less than they'd need to pay to get a legal worker. That means that the demand for legal workers at a proper wage is reduced, so those going for those jobs are going to need to accept less money as a result of the competition for fewer positions.

That's why minimum wage laws are important and why there should be severe consequences for businesses which hire illegally. I am against Trump's policies, but that's because he's going after the wrong people. It's the businesses which should be targeted and which should be the focus of ICE activities, rather than the immigrants. Clamping down on businesses will have the effect of reducing the attractiveness of the country to illegals and reduce their numbers as a result, but won't be quite so dickish about doing so.

Doesn't clamping down on businesses that hire immigrants harm immigrants? You some kinda racist trumpsucker?

 

[prideandfall]

H1-B holders are not immigrants, they are temporary workers.

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

one of them is outsourcing high demand skill-intensive jobs to what is essentially the geographical equivalent of a labor farm that requires less wages for substandard but acceptable work, while the other is giving menial but fundamentally essential jobs that nobody wants to do for wages that nobody wants to the only people who will take them.

 

[TSwizzle]

Doesn't clamping down on businesses that hire immigrants harm immigrants? You some kinda racist trumpsucker?

H1-B Visas are not immigrants.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Doesn't clamping down on businesses that hire immigrants harm immigrants? You some kinda racist trumpsucker?

Just because I'm a racist doesn't mean that I suck off Trump - I'm anti-gay, too, thank you very much.

Yes, it harms illegal immigrants, but in the sense that it makes them lack opportunities and go home as a result, not in the sense that they get rounded up and thrown out.

It's like if you have a drug problem in your community - you want to have law enforcement activities focus on the pushers, not on the users, because they are the source of the problem and the drug users are a symptom of the problem. Similarly, the businesses which pay below minimum wage are the source of the problem and the large number of illegal immigrants who come because of the opportunities to undercut the wages of legal workers are a symptom of the problem.

 

[coloradoatheist]

By what magick do temporary workers depress wages but immigrants not?

one of them is outsourcing high demand skill-intensive jobs to what is essentially the geographical equivalent of a labor farm that requires less wages for substandard but acceptable work, while the other is giving menial but fundamentally essential jobs that nobody wants to do for wages that nobody wants to the only people who will take them.

so if a low skilled worker loses his job or has his wages cut it's okay, but we can't let that happen to someone making more money?

 

[barbos]

Maybe american engineers are overpaid to begin with?

 

[barbos]

So, Loren, you don't trust when Bill Gates, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, etc people say H1-B is good and US need it?

 

[Canard DuJour]

http://spectrum.ieee.org/view-from-...commentary-the-h1b-problem-as-ieeeusa-sees-it

Most of them are making far below market rate. Strangely enough, a lot are making a little over the threshold that greatly reduces the scrutiny.

If that's what employers are paying them, surely that's what their labour is worth? Or is that only true for those people? After all, employers don't have an infinite pool of profits to draw from, do they? Restricting work visas because the workers are paid too little (whatever that could mean) would amount to a price floor. Surely that has to cause a load of inflation and unemployment? Ah but I forget - only for those people.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

So, Loren, you don't trust when Bill Gates, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, etc people say H1-B is good and US need it?

You mean the people who directly profit when salaries in their companies are kept down? What possible motivation could these recipients of the money that's saved by depressing wages have for saying that one of the processes which allows them to depress wages is important? I can't think of one.

Also, the H1-B program is not a bad thing in and of itself. I worked for several years in the US under a similar visa program that they have under NAFTA. What I didn't do was work for a salary which was less than my American co-workers were getting. There's nothing wrong with hiring from overseas if the company cannot find a sufficient number of trained and qualified personnel domestically. It becomes a problem when they use this type of program in order to cut salary costs.

 

[prideandfall]

one of them is outsourcing high demand skill-intensive jobs to what is essentially the geographical equivalent of a labor farm that requires less wages for substandard but acceptable work, while the other is giving menial but fundamentally essential jobs that nobody wants to do for wages that nobody wants to the only people who will take them.

so if a low skilled worker loses his job or has his wages cut it's okay, but we can't let that happen to someone making more money?

first you'd have to show that low skilled worker's are losing jobs or having their wages cut.
when you can show me the droves of american fruit pickers who are out of their 12 hour a day job because mexican immigrants will do it for cheaper, then you might have a point.

you can keep trying to make a comparison directly in order to use that straw man as the basis for your argument, but the fact remains that on the one hand you have in-demand jobs that people want, and on the other hand you have what is essentially slave labor that nobody wants and only the desperate take on.

 

[dismal]

so if a low skilled worker loses his job or has his wages cut it's okay, but we can't let that happen to someone making more money?

first you'd have to show that low skilled worker's are losing jobs or having their wages cut.
when you can show me the droves of american fruit pickers who are out of their 12 hour a day job because mexican immigrants will do it for cheaper, then you might have a point.

you can keep trying to make a comparison directly in order to use that straw man as the basis for your argument, but the fact remains that on the one hand you have in-demand jobs that people want, and on the other hand you have what is essentially slave labor that nobody wants and only the desperate take on.

How did the fruit used to get picked before? Who would pick it if the immigrants didn't?

Someone did, someone would.

That someone is out there doing some other work and increasing the overall supply of labor. You don't increase the supply of something without dropping the price of it.