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Comment by efitz | Hacker News Reader

I have a crazy idea.

If a corporation lays off any people in a particular job category/title, that corporation should not be allocated ANY H1B visas for that job category/title for the next year.

If a corporation institutes any policy that requires decimation (or any other statistic-based termination program) of employees with a particular job category or title, or if IN EFFECT they perform this (because they will just hide it otherwise), then they will not be allocated any H1B visas for that job category or title, for the next year following any such act.

In essence, the point here is that if a corporation decides it can live without X% of their workforce, then they don't get to go bring in foreign workers. The H1B program is to help find workers for positions that can't be filled; if you're laying off or mass firing people then obviously you CAN find people to fill those jobs.

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> In essence, the point here is that if a corporation decides it can live without X% of their workforce

The open secret is that layoffs are also used as a gentle way to fire low performers.

By including people in layoffs, you can give them a potentially very generous severance package and you allow them the courtesy of saying they were laid off as opposed to being fired. They get mixed in with all of the good performers who were laid off due to budget cuts.

Putting a lot of restrictions on a company that does layoffs creates a perverse incentive to fire these people explicitly instead of giving them a gentle landing with a layoff. You would see far more people fired instead of "laid off".

At the extreme, you incentivize companies to start firing people to make budget cuts.

So, this is actually a very bad idea. You do not want to start putting handcuffs on companies who do layoffs instead of constant firings.

I think it's exceptionally unlikely that companies are doing layoffs instead of firing for the benefit of employees. You're holding up reasons like severance and saving face.

From everything I've seen, the much more common reason is that firing someone typically entails a much longer paper trail for CYA reasons. Batching them up and including them in the next round of layoffs is easier and safer.

Severance packages always requires signing a “I give up my right to sue you” document. It is 100% about lawsuit reduction and 0% about being gentle with employees.

>Putting a lot of restrictions on a company that does layoffs creates a perverse incentive to fire these people explicitly instead of giving them a gentle landing with a layoff. You would see far more people fired instead of "laid off".

Given that we long since decoupled terminations for being based on performance, I'd rather employers just be honest.

But they won't do that because they don't want any risk of lawsuits. Even if they are truly low performing, firing a pregnant woman or someone who happens to be an outlier race in the company is just too easy a setup for scrutiny. I've seen plenty of those kinds of people mixed up in these layoffs as well.

In France, if you lay off people collectively for economical reasons, those people have the right to be re-hired first should the company open jobs that are compatible with their qualifications within 1 year after the layoff (it's called "re-hire priority").

Interesting. Is that a law or a typical contract term?

It's labour law. If you want to read some french law ^^ https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/codes/id/LEGISCTA000006198540

It’s common with unionized workforces.

Usually there’s a layoff list with a timer.

It's entirely possible to need to lay off people for one type of work while being unable to staff up for a different skillset. I would expect software developers, of all people, to understand that we're not commodities.

I'd also expect that Software Engineers can ramp up surprisingly fast in different skillsets as needed. But that requires time to train (independently or otherwise), and no one wants to do that anymore.

This is indeed a crazy idea (your words, not mine). Why should a foreign worker who can do a job in the US that pays 2,3,4x what they make at home be forced to languish underpaid because of where they were born? And why should the US economy be denied their talent to protect inherited privilege of an American worker who can't compete?

The play devil's advocate, presumably they're fired because they didn't meet standards (in whatever vague way they can justify) and they want foreign workers because local workers didn't meet those standards.

Parent's point was about lay-offs, not firings. I'm very comfortable with their suggestion. Make the company be explicit. If it's a firing ("they are underperforming") then sure, that doesn't affect H1B eligibility, but you have to actually fire them. If it is a layoff ("we don't need those jobs") then why are you turning around and hiring for them immediately afterwards?

Oh yes I agree!

If some % of workers were hired that didn't meet standards, then it seems like those doing the hiring are the ones that need to be replaced first.

I think this is true already. Companies who lay off do not get to sponsor for green card. I am not sure about h1b

There’s a 6 month window between layoffs and PERM filings (green card). Employers can still submit PERM filings, but AIUI, doing so risks audits.

But this is not punishing the company. If anything it is helping the company to avoid having all those H1B workers looking for another job. "Oh, surely, we'd love to sponsor your green card, but you see? we can't! This senator that we incidentaly gave millions for his campaign got this idea out of his mind, alone, that we now can't sponsor your green card, and yes, it is horrible to work here after the layoffs, but looks like you're stuck with us."

Why can't people just suck, why does it have to turn into some anti-immigrant narrative.

>Why can't people just suck

Because most people after a few years of experience do not simply "suck" in a vacuum. If you need to get rid of 2-3 people it might be a "suck problem". if you need to get rid of 200-300 people it's a more systematic issue or incentive being driving such mass actions.

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