H-1B Models Strut Into U.S. as Programmers Pray for Help | Hacker News Reader

H-1B Models Strut Into U.S. as Programmers Pray for Help

bloomberg.com

46 pointshkmurakami35 comments

What has been baffling me for some time is that the US doesn't seem to have a visa for professionals doing short-term work for their clients in the US. For example, as a freelance programmer I have clients in the US and sometimes they may want me to pay a visit. I have to turn such requests down since I won't be able to bill them for my time while in the US.

There only seem to be 2 kinds of visas: B1 (business) which does not allow you to bill anybody in the US, and H1B which is an overkill for 1-2 days on-site visits (not to mention that this visa usually implies moving to the US to take a full-time position with a company there).

But there must be some kind of provision for consultants doing short-term work in the US; it's such a common practice all over the world. Am I missing something?

Yes, this is a very valid point. somehow this is missing.

Everybody else is using Bwaivers. You're not doing short-term work for your clients, you're working for your company in your home country, and visiting clients.

You would think, but I have been researching the variety of visas available to folk in the tech industry.

Theoretically, the L1 [1] is supposed to fill the role for business trips based on partnerships and relationships between companies. But for whatever weird reason the client-consultant relationship is not valid for an L1, but only parent-child companies, headquarter-branch or affiliates. In fact, in light of me not getting a H1B, yet have a company registered in the US, I am pretty sure I'll just go register a company in my home-country as an affiliate of my company here and come back on an L1 visa. This is all very obsolete and convoluted, and is just making people skip ropes and jump hoops for no good reason.

[1] http://www.immihelp.com/l1-visa/l1-visa-h1b-visa-comparison....

Why not just bill them from your home country?

Numerically, these are not comparable.

> There were 478 initial applications made for fashion models in 2010 ... U.S. ... approved 250 ...

> 325,000 H-1B petitions were filed for computer-related occupations ... about 90,800 visas were distributed to foreign information-technology workers

It is equally true that 90,000 more people were renewed or accepted for the first time for computer work vs for fashion modeling.

This article is extremely poorly written. While the conversations around visas (specifically H1Bs) are especially relevant to the HN community, the conversation this article is trying to spark is rote and shortsighted: "Percentage-wise, fashion models get more H1B visas than elite programmer grads." Why should a programmer feel any more entitled to a work visa than a fashion model? There's so many important aspects of the way this country handles immigration worth inspiring conversation about.

A visa lottery? That gets triggered on April Fools' no less. A person who has spent 6 years in America studying, working, starting a company, and contributing to the economy has the same chances as a phantom non-existent consulting seat in a large outsourcing firm.

A mildly miffed H1B lottery non-winner who has to leave the country in 6 months

That is frustrating. Don't you have an option for other types of visa, as a workaround until next H1B lottery?

Every time I see an article like this, I try harder to appreciate this country more, despite all my disappointments.

So many people want to come here, even those that could most easily work virtually from elsewhere. And what do you get for your efforts except to get sub-standard wages and treated very badly as "foreigners" in our ever growing xenophobia.

Best wishes and good luck, sorry it has to been under such strange pretenses and politics.

According to the law, they are to be paid the prevailing wage. That is a slippery definition, because I think it means the median wage, but in some situations it means the highest wage.

Either way, the point is not to depress local wages.

The fact is, H1B is being abused by body shops that are paying lower wages. That must be stopped, not only because it depresses US wages, but also because it's illegal.

US wages for software engineers, even sub-standard ones (wages, not engineers!), are still more, and in many cases much more, than most countries in the world.

I was making more as an intern in the US, that now as an experienced engineeer in southern Europe, and that not considering income taxes (much lower in the US).

But doesn't everything cost more here too, which offsets it?

Is income the primary/only motivation?

No, it does not cost more. Things you use every day like cars, fuel, clothing, etc usually cost considerably less in the US than in other countries.

And you might be surprised, but in the US "foreigners" are usually treated much better compared to other countries where immigration is not as common, like Germany or UK.

I want to start a job shop that hires only fashion-model beautiful programmers. They should breeze through the H1-B process...

Russia, Brazil, Colombia? Anyone? Anyone?

Don't forget the Scandanavian countries!

Or Romania!

The company I used to work at bought a German company that had an office in Romania. When they came and did a QA with the company in the US, they listed a good M:F ratio as one of the upsides of working in the Romanian office.

I fail to understand why the US even has quota on desirable migrant workers with a solid job offer.

One the one hand the US still does this "we're an immigrant nation" dog and pony show with shit like the green card lottery, on the other hand, if you're educated, qualified and have the guarantee of a full-time well paid job, it's harder to get into the US than most European countries.

Of course, Bloomberg is interested in this as it effects his importation of H1B wage slaves.

As an ex-Bloomberg software developer who was on a H1B, I couldn't agree more. What option do you have but be a wage slave when they pay much, much more than what the tech giants such as Microsoft, Google and Amazon pay?

Did you mean you couldn't "disagree" more with the parent comment? Sorry it is a little unclear to me, but are you saying that Bloomberg pays "much much more" or much less compared to Google/Amazon? Thanks.

I believe it's sarcasm bro.

Yes, I meant as in a 'they pay so well that you're going to be a slave to your wages' sense. :)

And so? What makes you think you are inherently better than a Fashion model?

I don't think it has anything to do with better/worse. It's just silly to group fashion models into the same category as tech workers. They are more similar to performers/athletes.

Agreed.

My looks. I have been told that red bull induced beer bellies are all the rage nowadays.

You should ask it to American wifes: which one they would prefer as their neighbour - Supermodel from Brazil vs "slightly overweight" Software Engineer (which can be asked to reinstall Windows from time to time)?

I think this article is horribly written. I get that the main point is to point out the absurdity of grouping fashion models with tech workers under a single visa class, but the whole prayer thing is really stretching it.

There's also this quote that comes from nowhere: '“As a single man, would you prefer to look at a beautiful woman or a high-tech worker?” he asked.' I still don't understand the context.

Even as the submitter of this article, I completely agree that this article is pretty poorly written (much like most Bloomberg news articles) but I thought the info was interesting and noteworthy (it was news to me!).

The "whole prayer thing" was the most amusing to me; maybe because I'm a stereotypical atheist hacker, but I fail to understand that people in high-tech fields such as computer science can be sufficiently credulous (of any religion) to... pray to some deity for a visa. This isn't just a mostly-cultural religiosity or spiritual veneer; it's full "long-beard guy in the sky listening and answering to personal wishes" kind of belief...

Is there any political movement trying to convert H1Bs into green cards? Expanding temporary guest workers harms local workers, by creating a two-class workforce. Giving them green cards, while still causing a decline in wages, at least keeps their status equal, so there's less of a decline.

I guess the models should stay too.

Due to a combination of long processing times for green cards, and the legal notion of "immigrant intent", H1-B is commonly used as a bridge to a green card.

Any US visa which isn't a green card (e.g. tourist visas, student visas) is considered a non-immigrant visa. You can only apply for, and enter on a non-immigrant visa if you don't have immigrant intent. If an international student, for example, applies for a green card, this shows immigrant intent and they could find it difficult to renew their student visa or even to re-enter the US after traveling.

Obviously this wouldn't be a problem if the green card itself were quickly approved, but the process is bureaucratic and can take years even for people with advanced degrees.

H1-B visas, on the other hand are one of the few visa classes that allow "dual intent", meaning that while they're non-immigrant visas, H1-B holders are also allowed immigrant intent. Which makes it a good visa to have before starting the green card process, if you want to be able to travel (e.g. to visit family) while your application is pending.

This is a weird old article. Yes, fashion models are getting through on a higher percentage rate than programmers, but there's significantly fewer. Even then, that's weirdly sloppy statistical faff to sell a point.

They're suggesting that fashion models get twice as many as devs. I'm not 100% sure, but I believe this is a misunderstanding in how the applications work.

The process is that you apply, and then you get it or you don't. If they run out the same week you applied in, then you get put in a lottery. There's no person or process saying the fashion models are more important or get 2x as many visas as devs.

wow. this is interesting.

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