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Comment by paxys | Hacker News Reader

Whoever wrote this doesn't understand how the H-1B system works. Most of these applications are for existing employees of the company who are on some other kind of work authorization (like EAD or OPT). Because of the lottery they have to reapply every year for 3-4 years until their authorization expires. The layoffs have nothing to do with anything.

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>The layoffs have nothing to do with anything.

They probably should though, at least I think so.

With mass layoffs of this scale, it seems like H1B roles should be the on the top of chopping block if we're keeping in the spirit of the actual purpose of the program. That means those H1B roles should have been so unique and world class talented that they were considered irreplaceable by the other thousands laid off. It seems they should be required to show justification this holds. It seems this should be pretty easy to provide evidence for if your holders are say Google Fellows (picking Google as an example) or the Peter Norvigs of the world.

I have nothing against H1B holders, I do however have a lot against businesses who often abuse these programs to suppress labor costs and dangle green cards as a piece of leverage. To be fair, big tech companies tend to be better about this and pay competitively for these roles though not always.

> this should be pretty easy to provide evidence for if your holders are say Google Fellows (picking Google as an example) or the Peter Norvigs of the world.

Google Fellows wouldn't be on H-1B but on O-1.

The H-1B visa is a good fit for foreign nationals in the early to mid-stages of their careers hoping to expand their experience by working in the U.S. The O-1 visa is generally suited for established professionals and researchers.

Very true, I forgot about the O-1 visa distinction.

From the DOL (https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/immigration/h1b), emphasis mine:

The H-1B program applies to employers seeking to hire nonimmigrant aliens as workers in specialty occupations or as fashion models of distinguished merit and ability. A specialty occupation is one that requires the application of a body of highly specialized knowledge and the attainment of at least a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent. The intent of the H-1B provisions is to help employers who cannot otherwise obtain needed business skills and abilities from the U.S. workforce by authorizing the temporary employment of qualified individuals who are not otherwise authorized to work in the United States.

> authorizing the temporary employment

People born in India will be under this "temporary employment" for decades before they get a green card due to the country cap. With recent backlogs it looks like the process will take up to 50 years for someone with a currently approved green card petition.

>I have nothing against H1B holders, I do however have a lot against businesses who often abuse these programs to suppress labor costs and dangle green cards as a piece of leverage.

One would be called a Right Wing nutcase for saying this : "I have nothing against immigration. But I am against businesses employing illegal immigrants to lower labor costs while taking away jobs from poor Americans."

But on HN it's fine for Tech workers to protest for 'fairness' when it comes to H1B and Tech jobs. Most people entering Legally on H1B will not get a Green Card for next 15-20 years. That's not exactly 'dangling' green cards.

A lot of them will return to their home countries after paying a ton of Taxes in the USA. As they can't be sure if and when they will get a Green Card.

But the same American Tech workers are all for 'Immigration'.

I guess, immigration is good when it suits them. Cheap Janitors, Plumbers, Mechanics and more Blue Collar workers. Lowers living costs. Good Immigration.

That doesn't make a difference to the H-1B requirements. No other domestic worker could do the same job? It's a scam.

That's not the requirement. It's frustrating to see otherwise smart people on every single tech board ever since decades to not understand work visa and employment green card requirements and the difference between them.

You’re right about the law, however the rhetoric from tech executives testifying before Congress in favor of increased visa issuances has always been about a shortage of workers. So this misconception people have didn’t come from nowhere.

That is the requirement. The law applies standards to ensure that domestic workers aren't adversely impacted by the hiring of foreign workers. This includes putting essentially bogus ads in newspaper classifieds, and requires that they're paying the same to H1-B workers in the same role as a domestic worker, among other comical things.

The program has defacto evolved to one in which the US can tap into a skilled global labor market to increase competition for roles, without paying too much attention to the actual legal requirements.

Sources:

(Like many here, I've written a few H1-B role requisition documents - which are often designed to be so ludicrously specific that it would be almost impossible to find anyone to fill that role, save for the one person applying for the visa)

[0] https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/immigration/h1b

[1] https://www.boundless.com/immigration-resources/the-h-1b-vis...

> This includes putting essentially bogus ads in newspaper classifieds

> Like many here, I've written a few H1-B role requisition documents - which are often designed to be so ludicrously specific that it would be almost impossible to find anyone to fill that role, save for the one person applying for the visa

Both of these things have absolutely nothing to do with H1B visa requirements. You're just proving my point in the comment you're replying to. Please read it again.

Also read your own references to see where they require ads in newspapers or needing to tailor H1B "requisition documents". Spoiler, there's none.

It would be better to spend less of your comments expressing frustration with people who don't understand, and more explaining what the difference actually is. I read both of your comments and while I have no reason to disagree with you, I can't tell what you're actually saying.

If you respond to incorrect information with correct information and show us how it is correct, your comments will be more persuasive as well as more in the intended spirit of the site (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html).

It can be easy to take this for granted when you already have the correct information mapped out in your head many times over—but the rest of us don't have access to that!

Fair, I will do that. I had just become jaded over the years(almost 15 years now) spending time explaining the same point in tech forums and then later it's just even more and more comments from others confidently stating the same wrong things again on every tech immigration related story(a bunch on this story including the couple of parent comments in this thread I was replying to). This creates a feedback loop with others assuming the same.

For a while I did not engage with such stories because it feels like a losing battle swimming against the current even though tech forums are generally filled with smart folks.

As another sibling comment said, the requirements for placing ads etc. are for the first step of the green card process, aka PERM, and are not required for a H1B visa.

Maybe I should write a blog post or something explaining it and link it every time :)

Having posted over 60k comments largely repeating the same explanations over and over, I definitely sympathize with the frustrations of internet statelessness!

Writing one definitive explanation and then linking to it sounds like a good solution in this case. Even if just you wrote it up as an HN comment and then linked to that in the future.

Are you sure you are not conflating this with PERM? H-1B only requires a prevailing wage determination. There is no “ludicrously specific” job description, nor a requirement to post ads (just a notice at the workplace).

I understand perfectly. And I still firmly believe that companies should immediately and completely lose ANY access to the visa pipelines if they do a layoff.

If visa holders are that important to the company, then the company will figure out how to not do a layoff, no?

Of course, I'm also someone who believes that visa holders should be granted green card status within 24 months tops--none of this 7 years of indentured servitude bullshit. Green cards like this would shut down 90+% of the companies abusing the visa process in the US.

> No other domestic worker could do the same job?

That is not an H-1B requirement.

No other domestic worker could do that job for the same price. You see, we just went through layoffs for cost saving purposes, and have nearly no money in the bank (just $100B), so we can only hire these H-1B visa holders or our business will go under.

H-1Bs are required to be paid prevailing wage for the job in the geographical area as determined by the DOL. There's a whole labor conditions application filing that you have to make with the Department of Labor.

[1] https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fact-sheets/62g-h1b-require...

[2] https://flag.dol.gov/programs/LCA

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