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Comment by linuxftw | Hacker News Reader

You shouldn't build your life here on a temporary visa. 4 years should be the maximum allowed stay, and the employer should be obligated to have you train your replacement the entire time. Otherwise, it's just a wage-suppressing system of indentured service.

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Whoa whoa, 4 years is not remotely short term.

Why would anyone want to uproot their life and move here for the mere opportunity to live in the US for 4 years and have to uproot your life again? Are you supposed to be celibate for 4 years? The limits you are suggesting only discourages assimilation or giving a fuck about your life in the US since it’s only temporary.

Also wage-supressing? You are supposed to pay market rate to H1B workers and since they work in the US and not off-shore this isn’t the money saving scheme you think it is.

Besides all the H1B salaries for your company are published in a national database and have to be prominently displayed (aka printed and posted to some board somewhere in your office), so one could argue it does actually help wage transparency.

Lastly, as to your genius point about training your replacement. If you can only be employed by a company for a certain period, you would technically not be an FTE, but a contractor. Most companies have policies barring any contractors from training FTEs (because it creates perverse incentives and opens companies up to discrimination lawsuits).

We're talking about H1B visas, which are non-immigrant visas which should be short-term. The only reason a company can obtain an H1B visa for an employee is to certify they can't fill the role with domestic workers. Yeah, they're never going to fill the role with domestic workers if they don't have to train domestic workers.

The wage equation is simple. More available labor means less wages. Nobody debates this.

Let's not act like people here on H1B are some kind of humanitarian cause. They're the brightest and most educated in the country (according to H1B proponents anyway).

My goal is to lift up impoverished people domestically. The best way to do this is to have more white collar jobs that lower-level workers can move into. If those roles are always filled, there's no need for scholarships or apprenticeships from companies to train the next generation of workers. They get to push the problem on the university system, and then ignore the vast majority of those graduates because they're only hiring 'senior level' positions.

So you want to lift up impoverished people in the US by exploiting immigrant labor?

There are many reasons why companies hire H1B people and if you do as you suggest you remove any incentive for anyone to want to pursue H1B. The effect will only be detrimental to the US economy.

As a highly skilled immigrant I have personally generated 10s if not 100s of millions of dollars in profits for the US corporations. There are already very strong incentives for companies to hire domestically, that already work to filter our the best and brightest and most capable people in the industry. Plus the US has spent $0 training those people.

By the way I am not saying the US is obligated to hire H1B workers as some humanitarian cause, but if the US wants to continue hiring immigrant workers it has to be mutually beneficial.

The 4 year limit is meant to be a process for training a domestic replacement, or otherwise a very short period of time (relatively) for the company to invest in whatever it needs to invest in to be competitive.

The only lawful reason to bring in an H1B is that you cannot find that skill domestically. That's how the program works. Obviously, the program is being exploited by corporations to bring in low-wage workers that are beholden to them.

I encourage you to look at H1B salary stats, you will see that majority are not even remotely low wage. Your argument about “the more skilled workers there are the cheaper the labor” is also backwards, this means we should all be trying really hard to ensure there are no new CS graduates to enter the workforce that will inevitably reduce our earnings.

I’m all here for uplifting people in the US, but what you are advocating for is blatant exploitation. D As an older individual I have trained many younger professionals. I have and continue to be involved in university recruiting and many programs that support minorities in tech. How is that not contributing positively?

If I was only allowed to be in the US for 4 or however few years, why would I give a single fuck about “girls who code”, or anything else that doesn’t maximize my financial gain the short term I am allowed to remain here?

Also I would like to point out to you the difference between “non-immigrant visa” (which most visas fall into this category) that does not guarantee you a path to immigration if you choose to not pursue it, and imposing arbitrary limits on how long an individual can live and work in the country of their choice proven they are able find employment and sustain their life.

If you can't see how hundreds of thousands of extra employees in the labor pool depresses wages, I don't know what to tell you.

> How is that not contributing positively?

You understand that universities are the #1 gate keeper for the impoverished, right? Your company can afford to be highly selective with hiring candidates from universities because immigrants have created a surplus of labor. If there were not immigrants in these high paying jobs, the university pipeline would be inadequate to fulfill hiring goals, and they'd have to invest in either putting more people into universities or providing them with apprenticeships.

Are you claiming that an employee with decades of experience can be replaced with a new grad willy-nilly? That's a false equivalency.

A lot of things you seem to believe are incredibly backwards. Please educate yourself, because you do come off as xenophobic.

Good place to start: https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/h1b-visa...

Looks like there's already a 6 year max that is obviously being abused.

> Please educate yourself, because you do come off as xenophobic.

I do not care about foreign workers, only domestic workers. I don't think immigration should be tied to employment for any reason. It has nothing to do with cultures, or races, or nationalities, it has to do with wages. There are too many poor people in the US that are not able to move up economically for a variety of reasons, one of which is a large influx of white collar labor.

> Looks like there's already a 6 year max that is obviously being abused.

How is it being abused? E.g. it is perfectly legal to apply for a green card after your H1B and there are quotas for immigrants from each country. Alternatively, after living in a country for 5+ years someone may marry a US citizen. Should it be banned? Are we to impose a ban on dating anyone who is not a US national?

> I don't think immigration should be tied to employment for any reason.

So what should immigration be tied to then? What are other reasons for someone to be in the US for extended period of time.

> I do not care about foreign workers, only domestic workers.

Replace "workers" with "people" and here you have the reason why you are a bit xenophobic.

> There are too many poor people in the US that are not able to move up economically for a variety of reasons, one of which is a large influx of white collar labor.

There is literally no evidence to support the claim that white collar skilled immigrant workers do anything but create MORE job opportunities in the United States.

>I encourage you to look at H1B salary stats, you will see that majority are not even remotely low wage.

Are they not atleast lower wage when compared to domestic workers with similar qualifications?

I’m sure someone somewhere compiled the stats per region or per company.

Average h1b SWE salary is $109K, average SWE salary in the US is $108K

Of course average does not particularly prove one thing or the other. You can however look up your employer and compare the compensation to your own https://h1bdata.info/topjobs.php

That's not how immigration works, at all, much less for high-skilled immigration. It's such a bad take that falls into the bucket of "not even wrong"...

Or perhaps you are in the xenophobic camp, which is just sad.

Why not actually treat them with dignity instead, and give them a legit chance to settle?

Because clearly people who weren’t born here are unworthy of being treated equally. And because “they took our jerbws”

I am in favor of treating H1B holders with dignity, but I think it's at least fair (and likely proper) for any country's government to give priority and preference to its own citizens/permanent residents over the citizens/permanent residents of other countries.

I think that's what the debate ends up being about in a time like this. If there comes a broad tech recession, should the US government prioritize the needs of US citizen/permanent resident tech workers or the needs of H1B tech workers? As much as I believe we must treat everyone with dignity, it seems eminently reasonable for the US government to prioritize the first group over the second group (and even unreasonable to not do that).

What you say holds true. Of course the US nationals have to be prioritized.

But the reality is they already are. Hiring someone on H1B results in lawyer fees and visa fees. Every company is already incentivized to hire domestically.

Which I do agree is 100% fair. However how is extending the grace period beyond 60 days harming anyone?

Per upthread, I am in favor of extending the grace period beyond 60 days.

I'm not disagreeing on the principle. As the sovereign of the land, of course you're going to prioritize yourself. The prioritization you're talking about does not come in as giving an advantage to the domestic worker, it comes in the form of hostile treatment of people who are here on work visas, and has been living here quite a while.

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