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Comment by dudul | Hacker News Reader

> I think one of the fundamental problem with h1b is that it is labeled as "non-immigrant" whereas for all practical purposes it is really an immigrant visa.

The fundamental problem is people spreading this lie. It has a path to permanent immigration, but it is a non immigrant visa, it is very clearly define and describe as such.

It is idiotic to build a life in a country where you only have a temporary visa. I've lived in 4 countries and I never assumed I would forever be allowed to stay in any of them.

The US do not owe a path to permanent residency to anyone.

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Curious how long have you lived in 4 countries beyond college? No kids, marriage, social life?

Grew up in one for ~25 years, lived in 2 for roughly 1.5 years each, then moved to the fourth for the past ~15 years. Married with 2 children. What's your point?

I never even thought of buying a house or "build a permanent life" in a country before I was given permanent residency with no condition. And even then, I worked as fast as possible to get citizenship. When you are a guest in a country you don't assume they'll keep you around forever.

So you're claim of 4 countries isn't applicable to most people buying homes while on visa. Nobody on visa is buying a house in 1.5 years. People buy homes when they've been here for several years and have a permanent residency application in progress. So that's more like the last country where you've been.

Whole point of this thread is that it isn't unreasonable to have kids and family and a house and social life when you've lived somewhere for 10+ years. So any action on part of the government should at least give the space to get things in order or find alternatives. This is a fair and humane expectation.

Duration has nothing to do with it. One should not buy a house while on a temporary visa, period. You should not feel entitled to stay in a country just because you've been there X years on a temporary visa.

If someone gets permanent residency in a country I see no problem if they want to buy a house after 6 months, more power to them.

The abnormality is this idiotic 10+ years time that people are allowed to stay on a temporary visa. This is what needs to end. This is what makes people entitled - understandably I would even say. People are foolish, but I still blame the game, not the players.

The question isn't about entitlement at all. It's about decency. I agree, better to not allow people to stay too long on temporary status. But it was and is allowed today. So there are people who have been on temporary status for 15, even 20 years. Fully legally. If your policies require them to just leave one fine day without any recourse, it is not decent.

An example might be someone who is renting your house. If you allowed them to live in your house for 10 years, would you ask them to leave without notice or with just the minimum 1 month notice? Yes they are not entitled to anything more than what was in the contract but would you do that? I wouldn't. Most people I know would work with the tenant and give them more time to figure things out. And if all of this was done with that decency, I am fine with it.

"Decency" is subjective so I don't really see the point of debating it. The rules were 1) clear from the beginning when it comes to a status being temporary and 2) always potentially subject to change since countries change their policies all the time. To be honest, that's the only objective thing to look at.

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