Microsoft Releases Statement Regarding Visas

[Terry Olaes]

A couple of weeks ago, we told you about Bill Gates’ visit to DC to stump for reform in the H-1B visa process. Microsoft released an official statement from their Director of Federal Government Affairs on this same topic.

Immigration reform for high-skilled workers is a must for the strength of the U.S. economy, the competitiveness of American companies and the vitality of the American workforce. We need leadership on all sides – in the current administration and from the next President and Congress – to come together to solve this critical and urgent issue before America loses its leading position as an innovator in the global economy.

 

[mustang_steve]

My opinion: we should be working towards incentives for corporations to hire domestically.

The incentive: If more than 75% of your workforce is domestic, you can get tax write-offs...otherwise, you get nothing, and pay full taxes, regardless or conditions.

That should do it. As for them crying foul about it...cry me a freakin river....there's good people out there doing totally unrelated jobs because they can't find work...go hire them and STFU.

 

[Croak]

The H1-B problem is real. Not all talent CAN be home-grown, and some talent that can be, is better suited if it's not (say, a native Mandarin speaker who grew up in China and understands the culture and market, to work on a product aimed at that market).

MS built a new campus near Vancouver BC because of the H1-B issue. British Columbia has a much more liberal IT work visa program (I'm an American working in Vancouver under that same program).

So, MS can get good international talent and park them just across the border, just a two hour drive from the Headquarters of Evil. Hundreds of new, high paying jobs are created in the area, Vancouver gets even more "tech-rep" (and tax revenues and disposable income), it's a win-win for all parties involved...

Even if you're a nativist and protectionist, wouldn't you rather see that economic windfall happen in Redmond (or Cupertino or Austin, etc) instead of Vancouver, Toronto, or Montreal? All are experiencing strong tech sector growth fueled by "furreners".

The other thing to keep in mind is that most H1-B workers end up citizens or permanent residents, and make for a more productive, competitive America.

If Americans feel threatened by foreign workers taking high-skill jobs, they might also be incentivized to improve the abysmal U.S. education system.

But the real deal is, most of that high-skill foreign talent developed a strong desire to succeed as a way out of wherever it is they come from, and make excellent hires because they work, they work hard, and they are good at what they do...their home-grown American counterparts sometimes don't have that drive because they didn't grow up surrounded by hunger, war, bad haircuts, etc.

Not to say being born in America makes you a failure, but the bar IS set lower from day one for Americans, and it's the exceptional one that usually rises. Just as it's the exceptional Asian, Indian, African, South American or European that rises...the difference is, most of the H1-B applicants are pre-selected as exceptional.

 

[nilepez]

I've got mixed opinions on this matter. On the one hand, there are plenty of qualified people in the U.S. that don't get these types jobs, simply because they're not fresh out of school.

OTOH, I went to grad school with a lot of guys from India, and with very few exceptions, they were all incredibly smart and talented. The amazing thing is these weren't India's best of the best. The best of the best get their masters in India --I don't recall the name, but it might be the Indian College of Engineering.

With that said, I disagree with part of Croak's post. Most of these men and women are not from a poor background. India's still a caste based society and with very few exceptions, those that come here are all from one of the upper castes (possibly just one).

They may make more money here. They may be more driven than many American's, but they weren't struggling in India.

 

[the_dealer]

If Americans feel threatened by foreign workers taking high-skill jobs, they might also be incentivized to improve the abysmal U.S. education system.

Not to say being born in America makes you a failure, but the bar IS set lower from day one for Americans, and it's the exceptional one that usually rises. Just as it's the exceptional Asian, Indian, African, South American or European that rises...the difference is, most of the H1-B applicants are pre-selected as exceptional.

The problem is, that the folks that would be in favor of relaxing the H1-B system are completely against reform of the US education system. Crippling the education system to the tune of instruction to the lowest common denominator allows those in ed to cry 'Workers from foreign countrys are superior to US workers!!1 We need more money!!11' it'll never end. Stop foreign intrusion and force America to pull itself up by the bootstraps, or be absorbed, as it seems hell-bent on achieving.

Mike

 

[mustang_steve]

The other thing to keep in mind is that most H1-B workers end up citizens or permanent residents, and make for a more productive, competitive America.

If Americans feel threatened by foreign workers taking high-skill jobs, they might also be incentivized to improve the abysmal U.S. education system.

Not to say being born in America makes you a failure, but the bar IS set lower from day one for Americans, and it's the exceptional one that usually rises. Just as it's the exceptional Asian, Indian, African, South American or European that rises...the difference is, most of the H1-B applicants are pre-selected as exceptional.

The problem is this: it costs more to fix education than it does to bring in more H1-Bs...so in essence, the visas are band-aid fixing the issue, which is our diminishing quality of education. Thus, the visas are bad for our nation as a whole, and benefitting just one aspect, thus unjust and should be illegal.

Given, these guys are good...but there's a side to it you usually odn't see, and that's that many of hte overseas H1-B guys are usually underpaid compared to their american-citizen counterparts. That's unfair to them, and to the one that lost their job to them, since it was obviously just another ploy to bring in low-cost labor in a non-competive manner.

Really, anyone that has any degree of trust in a publicly traded corporation needs a lobotomy. Whatever they say, we should be doing the opposite, considering their track records.

 

[BGK]

The reason there is economic incentive for companies to want more H1-Bs has nothing to do with a shortage of talent in america (that's a myth) it has to do with the fact that they get away with paying H1-Bs less than equivalently skilled permanent residents. This suppresses wages and discourages the best and brightest of americans from entering these fields.

 

[Manny Calavera]

The problem is this: it costs more to fix education than it does to bring in more H1-Bs...so in essence, the visas are band-aid fixing the issue, which is our diminishing quality of education. Thus, the visas are bad for our nation as a whole, and benefitting just one aspect, thus unjust and should be illegal.

Given, these guys are good...but there's a side to it you usually odn't see, and that's that many of hte overseas H1-B guys are usually underpaid compared to their american-citizen counterparts. That's unfair to them, and to the one that lost their job to them, since it was obviously just another ploy to bring in low-cost labor in a non-competive manner.

Really, anyone that has any degree of trust in a publicly traded corporation needs a lobotomy. Whatever they say, we should be doing the opposite, considering their track records.

The reason there is economic incentive for companies to want more H1-Bs has nothing to do with a shortage of talent in america (that's a myth) it has to do with the fact that they get away with paying H1-Bs less than equivalently skilled permanent residents. This suppresses wages and discourages the best and brightest of americans from entering these fields.

Agreed ! Same thing is happening here in Canada.

 

[AreEss]

The problem isn't H1B's, is the way it's administered.

What they have to do is prove they can't fill the position domestically. There are quite literally, HR managers and staffers who are paid to write job descriptions that cannot possibly be filled ever. Those "10 years MSSQL DBA, 10 years Oracle DBA, 10 years VB.NET programming" listings? They wrote those. Then when people interview, they conveniently lack for example, the 10 years of VB.NET and get the 'reject' stamp. Over and over again. After so many interviews and/or so many months, they can now fill that job with an H1B. So they go to India, and suddenly the 2 years of VB.NET is enough to hire someone at half the salary or less.

What we need is the same number of H1B's, and actual enforcement of the H1B policies. There is zero enforcement - you can post ANY requirements you want for a job, no matter how ridiculous, refuse to fill it because of those, and then get yourself a shiny new H1B allocation. That's all there is to it. If there was enforcement of positions being realistic? They'd have probably a 10-15k H1B surplus annually.

 

[nilepez]

The problem is this: it costs more to fix education than it does to bring in more H1-Bs...so in essence, the visas are band-aid fixing the issue, which is our diminishing quality of education. Thus, the visas are bad for our nation as a whole, and benefitting just one aspect, thus unjust and should be illegal.

Given, these guys are good...but there's a side to it you usually odn't see, and that's that many of hte overseas H1-B guys are usually underpaid compared to their american-citizen counterparts. That's unfair to them, and to the one that lost their job to them, since it was obviously just another ploy to bring in low-cost labor in a non-competive manner.

Really? Strange, because all the indians I know are pretty far up the pay scale. They're Architects at MS, VPs at Motorola and so on. They were never making below average wages. those that are, are generally contracting with a 3rd party. MS isn't paying these guys less.

Our education system is broken, because kids don't like math or science. Those subjects aren't cool. They were cool 30 or 40 years ago either.

 

[Croak]

Agreed ! Same thing is happening here in Canada.

I'm an American working in Canada filling a job that might have been available to a Canadian. But I'm not underpaid, by any stretch..

Over-taxed, well, that's a different story. And perhaps one more reason there's so many European (and Canadian) workers willing to come to the U.S. to work for a "lower wage", because they still net more income once you factor in income taxes, VAT/GST, etc, and have a higher standard of living (in square footage, anyway) per dollar than they left behind.

In my case, the Canadian company needed somebody with a certain skill set, experience and track record, and needed that person sooner rather than later. Expanding the search outside the borders of Canada meant more qualified candidates to choose from, and more chances to find one in a reasonable time frame.

Had they hired a Canadian in the same time frame, they would have hired a much less qualified person, or they would have had to wait an unknown period of time before one with my qualifications turned up. Patriotism is fine and dandy, but being patriotic at the expense of the quality of product and deadlines is not a good place to be.

The reason I was willing to work outside the U.S. is that I had a chance to expand my skills, work for a company that also has a proven track record, and the opportunity to see a little bit more of the world in the process.

So here I am. I should add that my standard of living dropped a good deal, not because of the wages, but because of the high taxes on income and goods. None of that helped by the high cost of housing in Vancouver, but that too, is another story. But I'm still here, and still enjoying my work, and mostly glad I decided to work outside the U.S. for awhile.

 

[BGK]

It a documented fact that H1-Bs earn less. This information is easy to find.

http://www.computerworld.com/managementtopics/outsourcing/story/0,10801,107442,00.html