Comment by r2dnb | Hacker News Reader

Comment by r2dnb | Hacker News Reader

I think that their claim that the country is losing more and more talent is realistic. I am one those who weighted going to this country to establish my company, but after a failure to find an acceptable immigration option, I went to the UK instead.

I think that what's lacking in the american system is the recognition of "normal" entrepreneurs, those making $200 dollars at a time, and growing their high-potential tech-product business from $0 to $1M in 5 years. In the UK, and in most places in Europe, an immigrant can take a job, change job, build a business on the side, and then manage the business full-time. In the american system, this is not possible :

- If you come as a worker you are stuck in the H1B system where changing employer is a pain, starting a company requires sophisticated immigration layers, and the path to the green card often takes one decade or more - which entrepreneur with a burning idea in his mind would accept that ?

- Otherwise, coming as an entrepreneur directly, requires $$$ which young people with creativity and energy simply do not have yet.

The american system works fine as soon as you are backed by venture capital but is at present time not very welcoming for creative and talented people without deep pockets. This lack of exhaustivity is the issue. As far as I am concerned, I've been successful in the UK and am setting up an operation in the US now that I have the dollars. However I have decided to keep my headquarters and the bulk of my operations in the UK. Therefore I totally understand the feelings of the people quoted in the article who applied for a US visa a few years ago and are today saying "Why would I even go there ?"

The US should really not underestimate the long-term destructive potential of this phenomenon.

This situation is a dramatic departure from the original immigration spirit of the US which used to welcome creative immigrants with $0 in their pockets dreaming of success. These people were largely influential in building the wealthy nation we know today but the country seems to be kind of losing what made them great in the first place. Perhaps this is the time to Make America Great Again.

(Sorry, too tempting)

> This situation is a dramatic departure from the original immigration spirit of the US which used to welcome creative immigrants with $0 in their pockets dreaming of success.

I'm not sure this was ever true. A blunt review of historical American attitudes towards immigrants shows they were typically despised and discouraged, and only allowed here at all for the purpose of being exploited as cheap labor for industrial projects.

Despised and discouraged is one thing, actually kept out is another.

And if there is any take-away point to distill from your post, it seems to be that even the cheap-labour kind of immigration works out well.

Pretty sure a hundred or so years ago laws were passed that literally stopped immigration from different countries (China, Italy, Eastern European countries). So that's happened before.

> it seems to be that even the cheap-labour kind of immigration works out well.

At least when you have unlimited undeveloped land, and thus a nearly unlimited need for workers to develop it.

Developed countries? I'm not convinced.

It's been a while since I studied the topic, so there may be some holes, but my recollection is that this is not quite true.

In the 1800s, laws were passed that produced immigration quotas, where each country was assigned a number of immigrants permitted as a percentage of national origins of current Americans as indicated by the census. This law permitted plenty of immigrants from "favorable" countries like England and France, but few from countries like Italy, Ireland, or China. At the same time, the US saw very few people attempting to immigrate from England and France but large amounts coming from Italy, Ireland, and China.

For those immigrants who got in, the attitude towards them is well documented...

Except that we don't need cheap labor immigrants anymore. We just vilify illegal immigrants while allowing the US businesses that exploit their situations to stuff their pockets with money. If anyone was really concerned about illegal immigration you wouldn't build walls or complicated visa structures -- you just eliminate the demand for their labor by enacting harsh penalties on the businesses that exploit them. But it's much easier to vilify the immigrants themselves, so that's what we do.

I don't disagree with many of your points, but I think perhaps what is missing is perspective. Playing a bit of devil's advocate:

> I think that what's lacking in the american system is the recognition of "normal" entrepreneurs, those making $200 dollars at a time, and growing their high-potential tech-product business from $0 to $1M in 5 years

This doesn't move the needle in the biggest economy in the world. That's not even a viable business in most cities with high cost of living. At that rate you probably wouldn't even be able to pay yourself a decent wage, let alone hire anyone, within the first 2-3 years. Why would the United States want to let you in where there are more promising businesses/entrepreneurs on the path to $100m/year companies within 5 years?

To give some idea of how small a 1M company is, a non-chain Mexican restaurant in the suburbs of Virginia was making 3M / year.

On the other hand, it matters how many people are involved in the operation. A small two or three-person tech startup making a million dollars is different from a restaurant with thirty (? estimate) employees making a million dollars.

It's usually not easy to compare across industries, though. A software company with $1M revenue could easily end up with higher net profit than a restaurant with $3M revenue.

There were niche startup doing niche programming language (BASIC) with less revenue that ended up being Microsoft.

Is that an accurate comparison? Gates was born into weatlh and a pre-existing social network. His company's success has a foundation of winning the genetic lottery.

It's reasonably accurate. IMO, MS grew because of DOS.

They were hoping Gary Kildall's C/PM would be the OS for the IBM PC, and only leveraged DOS "to save the language business."

It's not clear how much of a factor Gates' parents' wealth and social network was in this process. Yeah, his Mom was on the board of IBM but Microsoft was an established brand already.

His company didn't spring into being without a history. He had access to educational and tutoring resources, specifically technology related resources, his entire life. I'd say it's very clear his parents' circumstances were a huge factor in his early successes, and arguably much more important than those successes were to later ones.

There are millions of people who are equally as lucky as Bill Gates in terms of family economic and social status. Luck plays a role but it is not the defining factor.

"Millions?" How do you figure? Gates was born well into the top 1%. Tens or hundreds of thousands is more accurate. Luck isn't the deciding factor, especially in what endeavors to pursue, but it is a prominent factor in the success of those endeavors.

Let's say you are right that he was born into the top 1% in the US. I am not confident that is true without data but let's say that is it for the sake of argument.

.01 * 330,000,000 = 3,300,000

So yes, millions. And yet there are only a handful of Americans like Bill Gates.

> This doesn't move the needle in the biggest economy in the world. That's not even a viable business in most cities with high cost of living.

This sort of penny-wise, pound-foolish thinking is the root of the problem. Many large, important businesses start very small and stay small for a while. ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft#1972.E2.80.9384:_Fou... , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Inc.#1976.E2.80.9384:_Fo... ) By admitting only founders of companies that are already large, you ensure that many of these companies are established and grow elsewhere.

> Why would the United States want to let you in where there are more promising businesses/entrepreneurs on the path to $100m/year companies within 5 years?

Blatant false dichotomy. Nothing prevents the US from admitting both.

I didn't say only admit people that are already running large companies, though those are welcome as well.

I said "on the path to 100m in 5 years"

That could be $0 through year 1-3, but it would be wholly different if that company was a technology startup creating value vs a services business like a non-chain Mexican restaurant mentioned below that is not necessarily creating an outsized impact on the US economy with low wage service jobs.

Apple was incorporated and immediately had $250,000 in capital invested. Me thinks you did not read the wiki page.

> During the first five years of operations revenues grew exponentially, doubling about every four months. Between September 1977 and September 1980 yearly sales grew from $775,000 to $118m, an average annual growth rate of 533%.

In reality number of people trying to game the system is to a point preventing relaxation of rules.

How terrible. Others want access to the same opportunities we have.

I am not saying it's a good idea but it is a valid concern.

They should have worked harder to be born to the right parents, I guess.

The US doesn't have infinite resources.

Did Facebook know that they will be worth 100s of billions when they started. Neither did Google.

Anyone who is net positive on the welfare system should be welcome to US. Even a company which makes a million dollar profit per year in 5 Years should be welcome.

Exactly. Jessica Livingston mentioned in a video, many founders don't know for sure where things are headed in the beginning. It's hard to picture you are going to be a billion dollar company when you are starting.

How would immigration officials recognize Facebook or Google among the millions of web sites that won't be successful?

Anyone who can create a startup should be allowed as long as they can pay themselves and their employees. If they employ more than 5 citizens/green card holders who are more than 50% of employees and have more than 0 profit for 3 years give them a green card. These company should build products and not provide services.

Were Facebook or Google able to pay themselves and their employees a living wage before they got venture capital?

You gotta start somewhere. Right now the situation is an utter clusterf*! And if an Entrepreneur who is moving to US can't pay for food and lodging to himself and his employees - how are they gonna survive.

1. How do you know if an entrepreneur is on the path to a 100m business prior to reaching product/market fit?

2. Why do only >100m businesses move the needle? Do 10,000 1m businesses not move the needle?

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