Not startups. 100k is like 75% of base comp in most bay area startups
Among BigTech, maybe like ~20 companies will be willing to pay this per employee.
I suspect that flying someone from Buenos Aires to SF or NYC for onboarding and then and back would cost significantly less than $100k.
Remote work from Europe is harder in this regard, and from India... would be night shifts only.
I do not mind working all day until I pass out, and I do not mind adjusting my life to a different timezone as long as I get paid enough, and considering that USD > HUF, it is probably a no-brainer.
So yeah, hire me for full remote! Unfortunately traveling is out of the question due to disability.
What if they are a contractor? Well usually the law treats these things like ducks and asks if they quack. If it quacks like employment it is subject to that law.
I work for an American startup, remotely from S. America. I'm hired according to the (extensive, and expensive) local labor laws, while my startup likely knows absolutely nothing about the intricacies of how my countries' labor laws work, the EoR just handles everything and sends the employer a bill every month.
Certainly the $100k fee is going to make the application much more expensive (though you can amortize it across 3 or 6 years, right?), but it was already not exactly cheap to deal with the legal costs around H-1B employees.
> Among BigTech, maybe like ~20 companies will be willing to pay this per employee.
I think that's a vast, vast underestimation. Most companies, even not-so-big ones, will continue to pay it. Maybe they'll think twice a bit more for future hires, and try harder to find someone local, which I don't think is a bad thing. Or, of course, this could just represent another factor in downward wage pressure across the board, which is bad.
I dont know of a single person here on a visa making less than 150k salary. They get the same stock, bonus and benefits that every one else gets.... it's well over 300k to have that staff member when all is said and done.
You're not adding on 100k a year, you're adding on 100k for a 3-6 year employee.
Even if that works out to 20k a year, it's pocket change in the grand scheme of things.
I'm glad to hear this has been the environment you've worked in, but I don't believe it reflects the majority of skilled workers in the US on H1-B.
H1b also only takes into account the actual salary, it completely ignores stock bonuses.
The USCIS uses the BLS data for the prevailing wage. You can also check it on the BLS website if you want.
Do you think that the median "Software" developer being brought over on a H1-B is Level 4? Even if you think a large number of them are L4, do you see the issue with trying to exceed a median salary at 150k if the L1 is 117k and the L4 (management or supervisory) is only 212k ... and we're using data from one of the most expensive corners of the US?
Anyway, I looked at studies of H1B wage gap and they either find none or at most 10-20%.
I'm relieved to hear this and appreciate you giving me a better understanding of the pay situation in Software.
$150,000 median yearly salary would mean H1-B positions are taking home 10k a month. I've worked with too many people in these positions to believe they're being paid reasonable wages - unless you have an extremely in-demand skillset, H1-B holders are often treated like indentured servants by huge companies/teams.
Don't have data on this but anecdotally the base salary range for most YC startup jobs advertised here is around 150k-200k based on what I see.
You are right that it does amortize if the employee stays long enough.
And I expect workers on H-1B change jobs much less frequently than citizens & green card holders (and holders of "safer" visas), since changing jobs on an H-1B involves more risk that can end up with you being required to leave the US.
All the H1B's I have worked with are whip smart, hard working, and in general amazing people. I cant say the same for all my localy sourced colleges. The tragedy of the economics in most of these cases was that they were making the same amount of money as their peers and not more...
In a lot of cases companies are getting a Steff Curry or a Lionel Messi and paying them the average of the rest of the team...
Anecdotally myself, I've worked with great ones yes, but the majority aren't incredible.
In the tech arms of banks you can see a lot of what I would describe as at best regular software engineers, nothing special.
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2025-h1b-visa-middlemen-c...
That's surprising; for me, H-1Bs have run the gamut, with a range of talent and ambition that's pretty similar to the range of talent and ambition I see with US-born workers. And I think this is perhaps the problem: your experience should be the norm, if the H-1 visa program is functioning properly, but I don't think that's the case.
Among my friends who have been on H-1Bs, they tend to be high performers, but that's just selection bias at work.
Mathematically if we collected all the brightest people from both these nations, say the top 5 percent of their population thats 100 million people in that pool to pick from.
The entire population of the US is 350million.
Comp sci went from something people did cause they enjoyed to something they did cause they thought it was a pay day: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/ocpf0g/oc_...
We ran out of talented, passionate people a long time ago.
There is also a cultural problem in America, one that buisness and staff are afflicted with.
https://www.construction-physics.com/p/no-inventions-no-inno...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=At3256ASxlA (pay attention to Noyce in Japan and the article he wrote... think about intel today, compare it to the above article).
I don't think Noyce's take as a business owner is far removed from the above take from the prospective of staff.
The top 5 percent of India and China is a pool of 200 millon people.
The top 5 percent of the US is a pool of 17 millon people.
If your looking for talent and not looking to other nations your going to come up short.
That exactly is Trump’s intention, no?
He has been pretty good at sticking to his campaign promises.
Whitehouse already clarified the new fees apply to new applicants, not current H1B. It's an opening gambit, designed to shock people and get them to the negotiating table. If not, they will continue to ratchet up the pressure.
I wouldn't be too surprised if you genuinely believe that Ukraine war has been over since Jan 20 and that grocery prices are at all time low.