Comment by pascalxus | Hacker News Reader

Comment by pascalxus | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

I can understand how this might seem unfair to immigrants.

this part is completely wrong: "If they have more workforce they can do more".

The demand for labor is not determined by the supply of labor, it's determined by the demand for those products. When companies higher engineers for example, they don't just go, "hey, we just had two brilliant engineers interview, so instead of highering 1, we'll higher 2." It never works that way. Companies need the amount of labor they need, and not one person more.

The reality is there's a vast oversupply of labor right now in most fields. Wages have been stagnant for a long time. And even in the bay area, average engineering salaries lag behind the local COL.

Furthermore, the US simply won't allow for enough housing to be built. Even with the population we currently have, there's no where near enough housing. this problem is only getting worse. Sure, it's just politics, it's a choice voters have made, but we're stuck with that choice. And, having more immigrants/increasing population makes it worse.

Let's talk about immigrants that are being paid well, for a moment -- since Trump is seeking ban those people as well. (Also since I myself am one such immigrant, and I know several immigrants who were being paid extremely well, whose H-1B cases were denied by the US government under the guise of software engineering not being a "specialty occupation"[1]).

A friend of mine last year got a job as a L5 at Google, for around $380k a year in total ($190k base + $28.5k bonus + approx $160k stock). Plus a sign-on of $50k. First year pay is $430k. He's not doing rocket science, or managing. He's an individual contributor writing back end code.

Meanwhile, there are folks doing a similar jobs in Canada, who are making 100k CAD (on the high end), which is $73k USD. And the cost of living in big cities in Canada is shockingly high.

Now, you were saying something about bay area salaries being low? The salaries are, if anything, over the top insanely high.

Also, I'm trying to understand why companies go through all the processing delays, legal costs, frequent unjust denials since 2017, to hire someone who is not a citizen, while paying them well above the median for the job, if there is a supposed oversupply of talented top-tier skilled people who are looking for a job. The truth i that oversupply myth is just a lie, spun by people with anti-immigrant animus, plain and simple.

I can't fathom the head space you would have to be in to think that salaries are low. Incredible arrogance and entitlement, combined with a generous dose of xenophobia probably. Instead of being thankful, there are people who want to cut off / deport / exclude people from working in the US (and I mean people making these high salaries).

Also, I know a lot of H-1B holders with high salaries. I myself am one of them. (In fact I don't know any low-paid H-1B holders, but my social circles are all folks working at top companies or friends from other social groups.) The intense amount of hatred for immigrants on HN always continues to appall and amaze me.

I usually tend to refrain from commenting on these threads, because the toxic amount of contempt and hatred for immigrants that I come across in these threads is extremely upsetting, but sometimes it's better to speak up, than be silent.

[1] See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20671424

Hatred comes from lack of understanding and knowledge. Most American citizens I interacted with on this issue have little or no idea of how the immigration system is designed or works. It’s hard for them to fathom why it is so hard for third world passport to travel or work in other parts of the world because they haven’t had to jump through odd Red tape hoops to do it themselves.

A google job is like the top 1-3%. The vast majority of people don't make anywhere near that much.

second, it's not about hatred for immigrants. It's just about jobs and housing. And, there's simply not enough of those to go around.

I mean, sure we could have more immigrants. But, make no mistake, it will reduce the amount high end jobs available and reduce the housing supply even more.

And, actually, most blue states are very welcoming to new immigrants which is especially ironic since they're the ones that don't want to support the housing growth needed to house an increase in population.

This doesn't address GPs question about why, if local talent is plentiful, companies are willing to spend a lot of money and jump through several hoops to pay top dollar to immigrants when they could pay the same to a local and not have to spend extra money and effort.

The locals are not captive workers and will do anti-business things like starting a family.

This is an extremely rude, blatantly false, offensive, degrading, and insulting comment to make about the 1 million+ high-skilled workers in the US. Plenty of people own homes, start families, etc. But, I'm not too disturbed/bothered anymore -- as I've come to expect these sort of low-effort low-quality dishonest, hateful/insulting comments due to xenophobia.

Here are comments from just one user on HN (who was sadly banned), but who is/was on the H-1B, who owns a $1.15 home, has an American kid, has lived in the US for 17 years, and makes $650K a year:

1) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20473537

2) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19993373

3) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19944062

4) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19525820

5) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19222618

The laws of U.S. that were written by Congress, make it practically impossible for India-born to ever become citizens or even permanent residents through the EB2 or EB routes. This is large topic, I've covered in some of my previous comments like: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19857687 (short comment) or https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19857878 (long comment).

Because, in essence, they get servitude from far more of those foreign hires than they do from the locals who can confidently exercise their rights.

No one here has contempt and hatred for immigrants, you're just being melodramatic. People have contempt for companies abusing the H1-B system.

Your entire post seems fairly out of touch. You're talking about Google L5, basically the top 1% of H1-B jobs in the US.

> Also, I'm trying to understand why companies go through all the processing delays, legal costs, frequent unjust denials since 2017, to hire someone who is not a citizen, while paying them well above the median for the job, if there is a supposed oversupply of talented top-tier skilled people who are looking for a job. The truth i that oversupply myth is just a lie, spun by people with anti-immigrant animus, plain and simple.

Just because you can't understand it, doesn't mean it's not happening. I have personally witnessed the oddly-specific job requirement postings, and have had friends who worked at some of these consulting companies as H1-B. Things are very different outside of the top tech companies. There is absolutely abuse happening. This is not some "anti-immigrant animus". This is happening. It's frankly ridiculous that you blame this on xenophobia on HN of all places.

I can't fathom the head space you would have to be to believe there isn't widespread H1-B abuse after reading countless articles and comments about it. Incredible arrogance and entitlement, combined with a generous dose of disdain for citizens wanting to protect their country from abuse probably.

Criticism of a widely abused immigration system and the companies that abuse it is not anti-immigrant sentiment.

I am an immigrant.

In order for the HB1 program to pass muster, and validate its value for US citizens, people taking advantage of HB1 must put into the US least as much as they are taking out.

I dont see US citizens emmigrating / benefitting from similar benefits at foreign countries, like those given by HB1s within the US. In fact, as far as i know, there are no USA emigres going to india to work, drawing india SS retirement benefits, for example.

In other words, the HB1 program is asymetrical. Americans put in a lot more than they get out of it.

As such, the only logical thing for the HB1 to be discontinued.

> And even in the bay area, average engineering salaries lag behind the local COL.

> the US simply won't allow for enough housing to be built

You don't see the connection here? Why do you think there will be enough housing even with less immigration? The "housing must increase value at all costs" mantra is responsible for this.

There are 17 million vacant homes in the US[0]. With the exception of the half a million of us that are homeless at any given time[1] we all live in one of the other 121,520,180 homes that currently exist in the country. How much housing is enough? What if instead of focusing on how much of the population we can cram into the fewest (constantly under construction) places we figured out ways to incentivize commercial development and rehabilitation of derelict communities?

[0] https://247wallst.com/housing/2019/09/30/there-are-over-17-m...

[1] https://endhomelessness.org/homelessness-in-america/homeless...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com