If I created 1 nepotistic software job for my kid and 3 jobs for software professionals not related to me, I think very few people would look at that and say "Oh, well three times as many non-nepotistic jobs were created, so we can ignore the one..."
Consider two scenarios:
1. H-1Bs get massively reduced over the next five years. Tech sector crisis ensues due to market shocks. Foreign workers decrease. American workers go up by 25% (~2.5M).
2. H-1B numbers stay as is. Tech sector relatively unperturbed. Foreign workers increase by 50% (~1.3M). American workers increase by 30% (~3M).
Wouldn't you argue that 2 is preferable to 1?
(I'm not saying that a crisis will happen if H-1Bs end, I'm just presenting two scenarios with different relative increases that I believe prove my point)
I think the $100K fee is a good idea. If these H-1Bs are exceptional talent, paying $100k to employ one is truly a bargain.
Its not like it isn't already a work market for talent. $100k is a significant amount of friction to overcome.
Companies are going to be offshoring as much as they can anyway. Bits fly across borders untaxed.
If there is some foreign talent that, for example, Meta thinks will benefit their bottom line by $1M/year, an extra $100K on top of a $250K benefits package is small change!
It's a human-tariff, but it is paid by wealthy corporations.
Regarding the overall problem: For the jobs that people care about keeping away from the alphabet soup provisions, the only problem is finding pliant and desperate people that take any port in a storm - not competence.
On business resistance: As for firms like Alphabet/Microsoft/Meta, they are not immune to noneconomic forces that might favor US presence and penalize non US expansion, broadly construed.