
H-1B in 2020: Immigration Visa Faces Further Restrictions - SunTzu9087
https://insights.dice.com/2019/12/03/h-1b-2020-immigration-visa-restrictions/
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vsskanth
Honestly this was long overdue. The amount of abuse in the H1B program is
staggering especially in IT consulting and staffing agencies. They find all
kinds of loopholes to legally pay the minimum prevailing wage to maximize
profit.

Unfortunately, legitimate employers also have to use the same H1B visa due to
the lack of a points based immigration system.

This has led to quite a bit of collateral damage and has turned many
legitimately high skilled professionals and grad students away from the US
towards EU and Canada.

At the end of the day, these steps still don't address the root cause of work
visa abuse - your legal presence in the US on H1B tied to the employer. You
probably need legislation to address this and it's nowhere in sight.

~~~
Jako33
As far as I know, H1B are transferable, so you are not actually 'tied' to the
employer. Some employers are actually reluctant to hire H1B as some people
accept jobs they don't really want and then find a better job thanks to H1B
transfer being much easier and cheaper than requesting a new H1B.

~~~
vsskanth
I should clarify - legal status in the US is tied to your employment status,
not necessarily to a particular employer. If they lose their job, they have 60
days to get an H1B with another employer before they start accruing illegal
presence.

Also, there isn't really something called an H1B transfer. its a new H1B
application every time you change your job, just that you dont go through the
annual lottery if you already went through it once or have an I-140 approved.

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omarhaneef
This topic is a perennial favorite on HN.

Invariably someone will offer the opinion that they should auction the visas
so the highest paid get it.

Someone else will respond what about junior people joining it and salaries in
Michigan vs San Francisco and so on.

I'll tell you what struck me about this article: the data is staggering. The
drop in acceptances is much greater than what I would have guessed. The
distribution among the firms is about what I might have guessed. But 30-60%
rejections is definitely news.

~~~
sdinsn
> This topic is a perennial favorite on HN.

Because it's an important issue.

> Invariably someone will offer the opinion that they should auction the visas
> so the highest paid get it

Haven't seen it yet.

~~~
omarhaneef
> Haven't seen it yet.

Heisenberg!!!

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engclazz
Finally someone is cracking down on the H1B1 mafia. Stop bringing in 7 Indian
contractors instead of just hiring 2 americans to do IT work... I'm looking at
you Verizon, Tata, Infosys, Cognizant, and every other "staffing company"
a.k.a import cheap foreign labor to flood the IT market.

~~~
StreamBright
It is not about Indians vs Americans. You could continue your argument with:
or bring in 1 hard working Chinese or European, but this is missing the point.
American economy needs more qualified workers than the US education system can
produce. Now you either starve the economy or force US companies to hire
abroad. Non of these options are great for the economy overall. More over, the
H1B holders are rarely cheap or flood the market. It it was true the IT
staffing wages would go down instead of going up.

~~~
dominotw
> IT staffing wages would go down instead of going up.

They have hit rock bottom here in DFW area. If you are generic 'java/.net
programmer' or a `QA tester`, I've seen rates as low as 25$/hr.

~~~
iakh
Unless Dallas is significantly different than the rest of the world, I find
this wholly implausible. That would match entry level offshore rates. So next
$25/hr resume you see, please pass it along and I'd be glad to hire that them

~~~
dominotw
[https://www.indeed.com/viewjob?jk=a47c478572895fae&tk=1dr64o...](https://www.indeed.com/viewjob?jk=a47c478572895fae&tk=1dr64o6me34rl001&from=serp&vjs=3)

found this on page one of indeed search. enjoy.

~~~
rwmurrayVT
>Federal security clearances

If you've got an active security clearance you should definitely run far, far
away from this sort of job.

>Flexibility for those needing time off for jury duty, voting, military leave,
etc

Two out of three of those aren't even a "perk". That's a legal requirement.

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breitling
You know where they are headed instead? Canada.

There has been an huge influx of Indians from US coming to Canada. I've seen
it first hand in the Toronto market.

We had shit salaries to begin with, and this isn't helping.

~~~
jdjdjjsjs
We had 5 developers move to Canada.

They are being paid far above market value because they wouldn't agree to drop
down to Canadian salaries.

Further, new hiring has shifted to Canada (we didn't hire devs in Canada at
all) and there is a new office now because 5 devs is quite a few, as opposed
to the single remote Canadian we used to have.

I suspect salaries are only gonna rise. At least the devs who moved from
within our company are being paid well above local market value.

~~~
md8
I have come across companies that stopped hiring in the US and moving jobs to
Canada.

Even a Silicon Valley company with good funding recently that I applied to,
with a job posting in San Francisco, eventually hired in Canada.

~~~
ireadfaces
That's true for FAANG companies as well. They have slowed down hiring in US
since it has become really hard to bring that talent in the country. Instead
they are slowly moving their work to other countries and doubling down on
hiring there. Source - I and many people I know have been approached for jobs
in Countries other than my country of residence.

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draklor40
Interesting to note that they are cracking down heavily on service and
consulting companies as they are the reasons why most people find it hard to
get a H1-B. FANG salaries are quite good and the increase in rejection % for
FANG-ish companies is a little discouraging though.

~~~
sgift
Over 90% acceptance in all cases (IBM excluded, as the article states it's
probably due to their service business), 95% for the majority. Why is that
discouraging? Looks to me as if even with very stringent checks they didn't
find many reasons to block.

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strategyanalyst
So, one of the three things will happen

1- Companies will start hiring citizens and pay them higher salaries leading
to shortage of skills and re-skilling of people with other skills into IT.

2- Companies decide to forgo lower NPV IT projects and invest money elsewhere.
Accept products without customization. Demand for labour and wages remain
close to where they are.

3- Remote work for even project management takes off. It is successful enough
that wages actually fall further.

Which one is most likely or will it be a combination of three?

~~~
vsskanth
There is evidence for all three happening

1 - Bootcamps and coding schools are a thing now.

2 - companies moving from on-prem to SaaS reduces the level of customization
and the need to hire talent in-house.

3 - Many companies are setting up massive offshore offices (Canada,EU, India,
even Brazil). With cloud services this is even more easier.

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phenkdo
As someone, who argues for H1b, I support these changes. The H1b visa should
be restricted to the well-qualified, i.e. people who hold Master's degrees or
higher and actually qualified for the jobs (not the body shopping TCS & Wipro
types).

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atonse
I have a BS in CompSci. I hired a person with a masters in CompSci from
Syracuse.

She didn’t know what null was. Nor did she know how to write a single line of
code.

Which leads me to believe that Either she lied about that degree (unlikely
because her visa was tied to it), or that a masters isn’t a sign of anything.

~~~
phenkdo
Exceptions & anecdata can be found anywhere... I am not saying a graduate
degree is the only necessary qualification, but one among other such as their
OSS contributions, relevant work experience etc.

But strict enforcement is needed to prevent H1b fraud by body-shoppers. I do
believe there is a significant need for H1b developers, just a higher quality
filter.

~~~
ireadfaces
Not just exceptions. I have hoards of friends who have bachelors degree and
they moved in through H1 route, but now working in FAANG or similar
competitive start-ups because they are skilful and are making 130k+. But I got
your point, there has to be a quantifiable way to judge talent.

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virmundi
It looks like the Trump administration is looking to make the H1-B system
follow its original intent: bring rare labor to these shores. I look forward
to seeing the labor market change where there are five to seven Indian
contractors doing basic web programming all living in a rental ghetto in a 2
bedroom apartment. We’ve been treating all labor unfairly. We’ve exploited
poor from foreign shores and squashed the ability to develop native talent.

~~~
ireadfaces
I agree to that, not just it kills local job market, it is exploiting foreign
workers. I read Theranos' account, and I imagined many Indian workers kept
working because they had no choice to say No. The moment they say no, they
will lose their job, and getting a H1B sponsoring job in 60 days? Ain't nobody
got (enough) time for that!

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njx
Go ahead and put all sorts of restrictions but atleast consider giving
permanent residency to those who have been waiting for several years(10+
years)

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brookhaven_dude
So much misinformation in this thread. H1B's don't get paid lower. Law
requires that they be paid market wage and no native workers are being
undercut.

If you see this happening, then you can actually report it to DoL (I have had
a call from a DoL investigator about H1B abuse at a past employer based on a
complaint filed by an employee).

~~~
rubbingalcohol
The law also says there can be no gender wage gap.

I've worked at several big tech companies and they all abused H1B's. The
immigrant workers were paid a lot less than citizens. It pissed me off because
the immigrant workers were treated like crap and also I would imagine it puts
downward pressure on my own salary.

I worked at a company that gave referral bonuses to employees for new hires.
It went like this: $2,000 for a white. $3,000 for a black or Asian. $5,000 for
an Indian. HMMM.

There's little incentive for an individual to report anything. You've seen how
"whistleblowers" get treated. Up against a big company with a legal
department, chances are good that they know how to put up chaff, redirect,
deny and obfuscate their abusive practices. Why stick your neck out when it's
a systemic problem?

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klaudius
Could this speed up the shift to remote work? Why even bring people to the US
when you can employ them where they live?

~~~
antielectronite
Another aspect of immigration law that is shaken up by the growth of remote
jobs is that it makes work restrictions unenforceable. Pretty much all expat
digital nomads who travel around to work are doing so on tourist visas. It'll
be interesting to see how governments react as this becomes more and more
common

~~~
chrischen
Most governments don’t care about restricting work unless you are there to
take a local’s job.

~~~
antielectronite
If that were true then foreigners on F1 and H-1B visas would be allowed to
start their own companies. That not only doesn't take away jobs for locals, it
creates new ones. But that's illegal.

~~~
chrischen
Can’t they start the company and then sponsor themselves?

Also H1-Bs are specific to The US so does not negate my comment about _most_
countries and their attitudes to remote workers. Even if technically not
allowed somewhere, no one’s going to start a campaign trying to deport remote
tourist workers.

Remote workers pay local consumption tax while not draining value from the
local economy.

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downerending
Wild idea: Remove all caps completely. Instead, require a US$1M annual fee.

That way, companies can get all of the workers that they are in dire need of,
but demonstrably without the possibility of undercutting local labor.

~~~
belltaco
A move like that will actually undercut labor much more, and not just tech
labor. It will cause huge outsourcing to Canada(which is already happening to
some extent) and to places on the other side of the world. Given that 100 IT
jobs create about 30 non-IT jobs supporting them, it's going to hurt the local
economy. Once entire teams are built in other countries, companies would
prefer hiring new workers there just to keep communication overhead low,
forget about the lower cost.

~~~
downerending
Perhaps so. It does seem like a fast track "all you can eat and right away"
feature would be a draw, even for the steep fee, but maybe on balance it
wouldn't be enough. Maybe toss in permanent residence after five years, or
something like that.

FWIW, the H-1Bs I've worked with have been good people and as competent as
locals. I worry some about them being abused by their employers, but that's
their trade-off to manage. I have noticed, though, over the years that demand
for my skills has lessened noticeably.

Thanks for your answer.

~~~
pandaman
If you are willing to spend 1M a year and think permanent residence is a draw
then you can just go with the EB1 GC and it will cost much less.

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drpgq
Anyone know if they are cracking down on TN visas too?

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datashow
The "H-1B Approval Rate" chart has two problems with the y-axis: 1) the 75 and
100 grid lines should display and marked, 2) it is misleading by setting the
y-axis range at 75 to 100. Because it gives reader an impression that approval
rate drops to almost zero.

If you want to emphasize the disapproval rate, just make a disapproval rate
chart, which can have the y-axis range at 0 to 25.

~~~
md8
Classic example of "How to Lie with Statistics?"

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buttholesurfer
Good.

