I think the linked CNN Money article provides a better explanation of the motives behind this change http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/23/technology/h1b-visa-abuse/in...
>That's when firms bring on H-1B visa holders but don't give them work and don't pay them the required wages while they wait for jobs.
I can 100% guarantee that the top Indian companies do not engage in this practice. Every single one of them have a policy that if the H1B employee doesn't have a project for 2 weeks to 1 month, they must go back to India. And they get paid the full amount mentioned in their offer letter for the duration they are in US. And they are also paid for expenses that arise from having to go back to India. This includes lease breakage, air fare for the H1B holder and their family and a few other expenses. For "benching", the only exception I have seen is the Indians they hire from US. Those people get to stay on bench until the company can find a new project for them. But they are still paid in full.
>if an employer can't prove the H-1B holder is "more likely than not" needed for the full three years, the government might issue the visa for fewer than three years.
This has already been the case. I have seen many H1Bs getting visa approved only for 1 year.
EB1-C is a Green Card category for multinational managers. It is supposed to be used to move job creating foreign nationals to US.
Till 2010, the body shop and consulting companies didn't use it much. However as rule tightened since 2010, these companies started using EB1-C to most low cost labor to US and delaying Green Card for everyone else.
With EB1-C you can get Green Card within an year, cutting in line in front of everyone else from India.
With this ruling, these companies are going to double down on EB1-C.
Even if these companies wants to double down on EB-1C, it’d still be much harder to bring in low skill tech workers as “multi-national managers”
There are financial and legal reasons why a company might not hire you if you were in this situation. There is more hassle for the company, and additional expense. They may or may not think any particular candidate is worth the additional hassle and expense. So it is a perfectly legitimate question to ask ( again, assuming it is asked in an appropritate manner ).
This is complicated a little for transferable sponsored visas like the H1B. Someone already on an H1B might reply ‘yes’ to the work authorization question, but with the caveat that you would need to take on their sponsorship. Technically, their answer should be ‘no’. They aren’t authorized to work for anyone other than their sponsoring employer, in a specific location, with a specific job title. As I say, the point is that if the answer is ‘yes’, not ‘yes but’, or ‘no’, then you’re not permitted to discriminate. Asking someone with work authorization questions about their visa type should be as much of an interview no-no as asking a candidate if she’s pregnant.
Only exception is certain jobs can place citizenship requirements because of security clearance requirements.
I am not sure but in the UK employing some one without the legal right to work has no defence even if they had perfectly forged passports/documents.
I had to (as some one with all 4 grandparents being natural born uk citizens) have had to take my birth certificate to register at a local high street agency.
It's most likely (almost certainly) a legal obligation. Each time I had to furnish a SS card as well. A non-citizen SS card has a disclaimer on it saying it's not valid for work authorization alone.
You probably have been asked for documentation that gives you permission to work. The Department of Labor has a list somewhere (can't find it right now) of what constitutes a work permit, and the employer has to accept anything that conforms.
My wife ran into a particularly obstinate HR drone once who wouldn't accept what she had. She asked company counsel if her documentation was in order and received a phonecall from HR to please come in and sign paperwork before the day was over. Yes, federal law has teeth.
https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/acceptable-documents/list-...
If the way Infosys and Tata use the H-1B visa is abuse then so is how Microsoft, Google and Facebook use it.
> If the way Infosys and Tata use the H-1B visa is abuse then so is how Microsoft, Google and Facebook use it.
Infosys and Tata enable companies to abuse H-1B laws. Disney use them.
Your statement also imply that Microsoft, Google, and Facebook is abusing too and no difference between Infosys and Tata. There is a small difference that I've stated but all of them are abusing it.
The point of contention is not that the Indians are stealing our job. The point is the people who are using H-1B visa are unable to negotiate wages which depresses their American counterpart wages.
That's just a rephrasing of "they're taking our jobs": rejecting foreign competition of similar qualification because it's cheaper.
I don't think there is nothing wrong per se with this position; it would be impossible to maintain any decent standard of living for the middle class citizenry with an open border policy where everyone from Afghanistan or Centrafrican Republic can freely enter the country and claim any low level job available. Many of such jobs, the result of government spending specifically aimed at economic development and creation of opportunity, so in limited supply in the short run.
Where this policy backfires and turns to rent seeking is protecting very well paid professionals from foreign competition simply because they have the adequate lobbying power. The economic progress is retarded and consumers pay much more for the services of those professionals - doctors are a good example.
Ideally, the visas should be granted simply to anyone making a high enough paycheck (with criminal liability for anyone artificially inflating it). If you are making more than $100.000 net per year, you are in absolutely no need of protection from unfair foreign competition, as such a measure pushes the increased price of your work onto the rest of citizens who earn less, possibly much less.
Note that I am making a distinction between Google eng roles and those tech roles which Infosys and TCS hire for. For the latter the play is cost arbitrage such as replacing Disney engineers with Indian eng who can do the same work for lower cost.
However, I want you to be aware of the real talent shortage which is present there on the high end tech side.
Did you really think this response was going to convince anyone of anything? If you are so smart maybe try applying that intellect to your reading comprehension and communication skills.
Your response about false positives and false negatives is a strawman argument. Why does a low false positive single out non Indians and not Indians? Also, this is not only a phenomenon with Google - the same is true for Facebook, Amazon, Netflix etc. All have 100s (if not thousands) of eng roles open right now and is up for grabs whoever is qualified.
How is helping all people of the world compete fairly abusing the law? Aren't we all free people of the world? Why should anybody be privileged just because he was born in a certain country?
This is largely true. These days Microsoft and Google do not outsource to Infosys and Tata. They set up their own centers in Bangalore, that way they can even quality control at many levels and the net result is the same.
The fact that Infosys and Tata aren't involved is just a minor detail here. Practices as a net do not change.