
America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away - petethomas
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-10-24/america-s-need-for-skilled-immigrants-isn-t-going-away?srnd=premium
======
firedrakerage
I do not typically post, but these suggestions seem like genuine improvements
to the existing system:

"Kerr suggests allocating H-1Bs not by lottery as they are now, but by salary
— the more that a company is willing to pay for a foreign worker, the quicker
they can get a visa."

"A second change would be to allow H-1B workers to apply for permanent
residency green cards on their own, without having to be sponsored by their
employers."

Both of these would ensure that we can get smart and talented individuals from
outside the US and would drastically improve the ability for the US to compete
while continuing to provide broad-based wage increases.

~~~
bduerst
The problem is that pay isn't uniform across skilled labor demand, and the
purpose of the H1B program is to fulfill demand in the economy.

If you set a quota and give to the highest bidder, you're going to see private
sector executives and financial roles being filled in cities with high costs
of living and competitive wages. Salary is a function not only of demand but
also location and industry.

This will discriminate against rural and middle America by depriving them of
the skilled labor that they need to survive.

~~~
ivl
> This will deprive rural and middle America on the skilled labor that they
> need to survive.

That's kind of already happened. Since the recession almost all new jobs
created were in cities and metro areas, and mostly to educated workers.

Rural and middle America have this problem all on their own: skilled labor
does not want to live in rural and middle America. Especially young skilled
workers. There's even the concept of rural brain drain, as the top 5 % are
sure to leave right after they're done high school.

~~~
zjaffee
> skilled labor does not want to live in rural and middle America.

I'm unsure about this, and think it's kind of a chicken and the egg problem. I
know tons of people who are from the midwest that would prefer to be there,
but tend to flock to the coast simply because it's hard to find as rigorous of
a professional environment back home.

~~~
ivl
It's not a chicken and egg problem. Cities are much more efficient for labor
and companies. You have a larger pool of talent, a larger pool of freshly
educated replacements for those who retire or leave, and often more services
available for said talent.

Edit: Now that I'm thinking about it a little more I can maybe sympathize a
_little_ bit. I prefer to live in rural areas in some ways due to my hobbies,
but I'm never going to as the economics of a tech company, or even a company
that needs skilled, educated workers makes no sense in rural areas. So there's
something to the want vs. choice angle, but what one fantasizes about has
little to do with economic realities. Plenty of people want high paying low
skilled manufacturing jobs to be a thing again, that doesn't mean it's
realistically going to happen.

~~~
iguy
Another factor is the 2-body problem. If most of the workers are looking for a
city with enough jobs for two different careers, then that's where employers
will need to be to hire them.

------
tabtab
The H-1B topic strikes a personal tone with me. After the dot-com crash in the
early 2000's, IT jobs in California were hard to come by. I almost got one
job, but the company decided to go with an H-1B worker instead. I had a new
young family, but had to go out of state to find work, leaving my family
behind.

I'm NOT summarily against H-1B's but wish to insist they be used ONLY to fill
in true skill shortages instead of those manufactured via job ad word-
smithing.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
> I almost got one job, but the company decided to go with an H-1B worker
> instead.

This scenario is explicitly forbidden by the provisions of the visa program
and it is illegal to select a guest worker in preference to a domestic
candidate. That is why there is a public notification requirement for all jobs
open to guest workers. Obviously all it takes is one minor reason to deem you
unqualified. The Disney IT incident shows that there are no consequences for
abusing American employees.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
They can go get hired elsewhere I suppose. Does it rise to 'abuse'? Who is
entitled to a particular job anyway?

~~~
leereeves
Who is "entitled" to work in America is defined by the law, which disallows
replacing American workers with H1B recipients.

Are you suggesting that everyone in the world should have the right to live
and work in America?

------
nimbius
Theres a ton of talk about skilled immigrants and the american education
system, and as a blue-collar automotive mechanic, I have no problem with
immigrant doctors and engineers. Where I see the real problem is _unskilled_
immigrants.

Take for example a job posting I had up for more than 3 months. I needed a
solid mid-level mechanic. oil/air/tires/suspension and electrical a plus. I
dont want my apprentices doing this work because theyre learning to do
manifold rebuilds and such. And i dont want my old timers doing it because it
will cost a fortune and i need them on harder problems.

So for weeks on end, I get at least 3 interviews a day from grossly
unqualified immigrants. Why immigrants? nobody wants a kid who grows up to be
a successful mechanic i guess. Everyone "goes to college" now. just ask my
alignment tech with a masters in english.

\- Ive had a slew of random tourists from europe backpacking around in the US
who want a job, and cant seem to understand the gravity of a visa violation.
They all want three times what I'm paying and health insurance.

\- Ive got college drop-outs from china, russia, you name it, who either blew
through all their money or were never qualified for college in the first
place, and need something to keep afloat while they fake college.

\- and finally, perhaps most controversially, I have central and south
americans. Theyre either trapped here because of american immigration policy,
or theyre fresh off the boat with a slip of paper written by a friend
dictating what they will work for in cash. Most of them speak about 8 words of
english. They are radioactive as far as im concerned; you would be insane to
hire them.

We're always going to need doctors and engineers. not everyone grows up to be
a rocket scientist, and thats okay. But im frustrated at how Americans have
turned trade jobs (plumbing, auto work, electricians, linemen, pipefitters,
etc...) into some kind of field that no kid can ever enter lest they be
disowned.

 __update __: I should clarify. These applicants are upset they must wait 90
days for benefits. we do provide health /dental/401k, just not on day one.

~~~
toomanybeersies
So you're complaining about unskilled immigrants applying for your job
opening, and apart from being unqualified for the job, they apparently can't
even legally work in the USA anyway.

What about if you had skilled immigrants applying for the job? Say, some
qualified mechanics, whether from Germany or China or Mexico?

The problem with America's immigration system (from an outsiders perspective)
is that skilled immigration visas (i.e. H1B) are only worthwhile for high
skill white collar jobs, and in particular for larger companies who can be
bothered with the visa lottery.

I see no reason why skilled immigration for lower paying, but still skilled
jobs, like auto mechanics shouldn't be possible. In most developed countries,
they run a points system. If you want to move here to Australia and become an
electrician or any other high demand job, it's relatively easy as long as you
have a qualification, good health, and can speak English, and I think that's
the way it should be. Obviously long term you should be trying to train more
mechanics, but that's a 5-10 year process, and doesn't fix the problem that
you're facing right now with a lack of mechanics.

It sounds like you have a bigger problem than simply a lack of qualified
candidates. Do you have any unqualified Americans applying for your job? How
little are you offering that European backpackers (who in my experience will
work for a pittance) are asking three times what you're offering?

~~~
ryandrake
> Do you have any unqualified Americans applying for your job? How little are
> you offering that European backpackers (who in my experience will work for a
> pittance) are asking three times what you're offering?

Bingo. I think you nailed OP’s problem right there. If you’re offering to pay
in bananas, don’t be surprised when you get a line of monkeys out your door.

------
calvinbhai
I agree with what Kerr is suggesting. It makes a lot of sense.

I also agree with a many Americans who are anti-H1b that it suppresses wages,
hence makes it attractive to higher foreign workers, quite often for jobs that
are not truly state of the art, but do require the technical know how.

This is why it makes sense for the H1-B to be a highest paid gets first kind
of a visa. That way there's a strong incentive to not hire lowest paid
employees.

In fact, I think a better way would be to give two 3-year temporary green
cards. if at the end of 6th year if the person still has job, it becomes a
permanent job. This removes any control that an employer has to depress the
wages, and be fair to the American as well as immigrant labour. Such a system
can be made available to at least the undergrad/grad/doctoral degree holders
from the US universities.

By limiting the immigrant talent, US has already ensure China is taking a huge
leap in terms of tech advances. India will figure out how to make the leap
soon.

All the while, Canada is making the most of USA's anti high skilled immigrant
situation, but inviting them in droves. We'll see a different Canada in the
next 5-10 years, mainly due to the huge number of tech immigrants (of Chinese
or Indian origin) moving to Canada.

~~~
httpz
Though it should be divided by industry. Otherwise, highly paid software
engineers will take all the visas and other industries will struggle to match
the salary required get a visa. How to divide industry is a very messy
business though. Some of our immigration laws divide by industry and those
were written 30 years ago. A lot of jobs we hire now didn't exist 30 years
ago.

~~~
drankula3
So what? Wouldn't that just make wages rise in those other industries, pushing
more Americans into those apparently underserved fields?

------
petermcneeley
I think Eric Weinstein covers this question in a relatively academic way in
his article:

[https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/blog/how-why-
gove...](https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/blog/how-why-government-
universities-industry-create-domestic-labor-shortages-of-scientists-high-tech-
workers)

"During the late 1990s I became convinced that in order to orchestrate lower
wages for scientists, there would have to have been a competent economic study
done to guide the curious policy choices that had resulted in the flooded
market for STEM PhDs."

------
Kephael
The supply of technical workers is artificially limited by Leetcode style
interviews. There doesn't seem to be an actual supply side limitation,
especially not at the entry level.

~~~
mohaine
Maybe on the west coast but here in the Midwest we often have issues finding
candidates that can write fizzbuz.

We recently had a candidate who's main language was python but failed to even
run his code on the command line. Saddly this isnt overly rare.

~~~
max76
I use to work in the midwest before moving to the west coast.

We had a guy come in for a programming interview. He claimed to have 3 years
experience with a programming language we commonly use. We gave him a simple
challenge (connect to a database using a database connector, read some fields
and update another field based on data from the read fields). We told him it's
fine to use google, and left him alone for four hours with a computer.

He asked to expand his interview time at the end of the four hours, we grant
him an additional two hours. At the end he didn't have code that compiled,
much less connected to the database.

This story is not atypical from my experience.

~~~
amrx431
First I thought thats not straightforward to make a DB update because you
know, not everything is loaded into our brains working memory like which
package to use, exact syntax etc etc. But then I read that you guys gave 4
hours + Google and I am shocked. BTW are you hiring :)

------
ALittleLight
My intuition is that H1B and similar programs hurt my personal compensation as
a domestic provider of skilled labor. My reasoning is that less supply of
skilled labor should result in increased cost - which gets paid to me.

I understand it's better for the companies and perhaps the economy as a whole
to import labor, but it seems worse for me. Is there research on this subject
or something I'm missing?

~~~
landryraccoon
This intuition only holds as long as you believe there is zero chance of new
large competitors arising in other countries.

If protectionism causes a rival to Google to be viable in other countries,
that could hurt your salary prospects back home quite a bit.

~~~
ALittleLight
It seems like the current model, which is import large numbers of software
related folks to the US, hurts competition. What I mean by this is that
Amazon, Google, etc have a few core businesses that are monopolies (search,
online retail, etc) and many ancillary endeavors. Most software people don't
work in the core business. If so many software people weren't imported to
extend US software giants then some of those people would stay home and
develop regional competitors. This would be bad for the company I work for,
but for customers it would be good, for foreign software developers who could
stay home AND work in a successful domestic company it would be good, and for
me it would be good - I'd be paid more.

------
slothtrop
Hire graduates and train them, problem solved. Cheap immigrant labor is a case
of employers having their cake and eating it too.

The vast majority of these jobs aren't that challenging, hence the immigrants.
They're mostly looking for monkeys, not 10x devs.

~~~
jws
This doesn't work for widely usable skills with a mobile workforce. Consider…

Company A hires a worker and invests in training them, then before they can
get their value back out of the education the worker changes to a higher
paying job at Company B which doesn't have the training expenses to recoup.
Our example worker and Company B are both making their best possible rational
decisions.

There are solutions to making this work:

• It could be unlawful for the worker to use their skills, paid for by Company
A, with another company until they had 'paid off' their training. Effective
non-competes based on skills. Not a PR win for Company A. Also, you never want
a judge to cite the Emancipation Proclamation to you in court.

• Company A could train a worker and have the worker incur unavoidable debt so
that should they switch companies Company A will still be reimbursed for their
training costs. This combines student loans with for profit workplace
training. The conflicts of interest are huge and the optics are horrible for
Company A. Again, you don't want a judge to say "indentured servant" to you in
court.

• The worker could independently train themselves in something they feel might
be advantageous in the work place, incurring any costs themselves in the hope
of recouping that investment. This is the usual method in the US, there are
some problems with workers making bad investments and incurring lifelong
financial burdens.

• Both Company A and Company B could shoulder the cost of training/educating
workers and have access to the resulting workers. This is known as taxation
and state sponsored education. Workers still may make bad decisions in their
training selections.

This is the paragraph where I espouse the best way to move forward. I've got
nothing. I like the fourth one, but when you add in educational institutions
with their own interests and some desire to steer the educational funding to
studies which are in demand it gets very complicated.

~~~
ryandrake
Company A could simply pay the (now more qualified) worker a higher wage to
remove the motivation to move to company B.

------
NTDF9
My god! The amount of discussion here is nuts. Skilled immigration is already
a settled case. Just look at how Canada and Australia does it.

America has the whole idea of skilled temporary immigration completely
backwards. You want the equivalent of Ivy leaguers from other countries but
want to treat them like slaves with a ton of documentation and constant fear
of deportation?

That is not a life Ivy-League level folks of any country want to live. Just
look at other developed countries. America has really not kept pace.

~~~
gnulinux
Even worse, you study in a true Ivy League in the US, be successful, work for
years, but still be treated like a slave with tons of bureaucracy. I'm not
trying to be an asshole, and I understand I'm somewhat of an "outsider"
because I'm not a citizen, so I don't have the same rights, but having lived
in the US for years and learned everything technical I know here, it's really
harsh that my existence here is debated every other week. Understandable but
depressing.

------
malandrew
One thing that is incorrect here is how the Republican position on immigration
is portrayed. They want comprehensive immigration reform that specifically
allows skilled immigrants to come to the US, do away with the lottery system
and eliminate exemptions for those that broke immigration laws. Basically,
most Republicans would prefer a system that is more like Canada's or
Switzerland's, where you need to earn your way in.

Here's one site that better explains the Republican position:
[https://www.republicanviews.org/republican-views-on-
immigrat...](https://www.republicanviews.org/republican-views-on-immigration/)

"Republicans believe that family and skill should be prioritized when granting
citizenship to those who go through the proper legal channels to enter the
country. Priority should be given to children and spouses of immigrants that
are already legally in the country. They believe the government should
emphasize the skills that our economy needs most when determining eligibility,
and that the Labor Certification Program should be overhauled. These two
measures together would help match qualified workers with work that is in
urgent need of filling positions in the country. Despite accusations of being
anti-immigration, Republicans do understand the value that immigrants bring to
this country, when entering via legal methods. In the Republican Platform
adopted at the 2000 GOP convention, the Republican Party declared that it
supports increasing the number of H-1B visas, to ensure that high-tech workers
are provided to specialized positions, as well as expanding the H-2A program
for temporary agricultural workers."

~~~
ojbyrne
That page references John Boehner and Mitt Romney, who don’t have any
influence in Republican policy anymore.

The current administration has repeatedly demonstrated their antipathy to
legal immigration.

~~~
jki275
Cite please.

The current administration has never done anything to show antipathy to legal
immigration, the first lady is a legal immigrant as are her parents.

~~~
georgeburdell
"Muslim ban" affected the ability for Iranians to immigrate. All of the top
engineering/science schools in the U.S. lost an entire cohort of Iranian
students this past year.

~~~
jki275
First, there was no "muslim ban", and second the list of countries affected
had been defined already by Congress years previous, not the President or the
current administration.

Also school visas are not immigrant visas if one wants to be pedantic about
it.

~~~
spiznnx
There is an Iran ban, call it whatever you like.

The existence of a list at a certain point in time doesn't mean anything if
the current administration is the one that uses it in a policy it created
itself.

School visas are the foot in the door for young scientists and engineers to
employment in the US.

~~~
jki275
They restricted immigration from countries who posed a threat. That threat was
defined previously.

You're being disingenuous in claiming it was motivated by religion. You're
incorrect in stating it restricted legal immigration. It stopped immigration
by countries deemed a threat to the security of the US by Congress and the
previous administration.

~~~
freeone3000
Oh, come on, there was a given number of legal immigrants and now there are
fewer because of a change in government policies, that's a restriction on
legal immigration. You're arguing it's justified, but stating it didn't reduce
legal immigration is simply incorrect. Because it did.

I also don't think it's disingenuous in stating it was motivated by religion
when the circuit court for Hawaii declared it was and 4 members of the supreme
court agreed.

~~~
shaklee3
Can you provide a source for that? I tried finding information showing a
decrease in legal immigration, but couldn't find any statistics that were
current.

------
colechristensen
Immigration is a complex topic.

Putting all other issues aside positive and negative, if you turned off the
foreign immigration tap, the people in power (corporations) would be screaming
at Washington to fix American education system so they could actually find
qualified candidates. In that would be a lot of value.

------
jorblumesea
The biggest problem with the H1B visa system is that it's mainly an
outsourcing tool. Cognizant, Infosys etc are just offshoring companies and
spam the system. The really talented engineers go to the FANGs but these
represent a small proportion of visas used.

------
let_var
I support a point-based H1B and Green Card system allowing individuals to
apply for their own green card. Salary should take precedence over lottery any
day. Someone mentioned about making it industry specific, but that's just
opening a loophole. Something like this might improve domestic salaries across
sectors.

------
thedaemon
We could recover from needing skilled immigrants if we would educate our
population for free like most of the world. We still only allow rich or lucky
people to receive high level educations. How can we complain about skilled
labor when we make no effort to create said skilled laborers?

~~~
merpnderp
Why would you think only rich or lucky people can go to college in the US?
With grants and student loans pretty much anyone can go to college that wants
to. And at my local state university, where tuition is a mere $5k/year, lower
income kids make up over 90% of the student body.

Yet my area has a gross shortage of skilled trade labor. Want an electrician,
prepare to wait 6 months. Need concrete poured at your house? Zero chance of
getting a legitimate contractor, you'll be hiring someone doing it illegally.
And you'd better treat your plumber like your best friend and not grouch when
they pad the bill by a couple of hours.

~~~
thedaemon
Because it has been my experience. I personally was able to do 2 years of
college but the student loans killed me after I wasn't able to get a high
paying job. I love when they take money out of my paycheck. Most people have
to work for a living, especially poor people. They cannot afford to not have
an income, to just go to school... You are talking about lower middle class
kids, not poor people. If you've never been poor don't assume you know
anything about it.

Also a student loan is how you claim the poor can go to college. But I stated
that most countries have free schooling. Being poor then immediately adding
debt doesn't help yourself at all. Perhaps you should go hang out with some
poor people and hear it straight from the source. Not trying to be rude or
anything, as you make good points about skilled labor.

------
_iyig
What is the difference between this headline and one that might read,
“Americans’ Access to Affordable, High-quality STEM Education Needs to
Improve?”

I’ve know too many friends and relatives, all American-born, who got into tech
despite of rather than because of their state-funded primary and secondary
education.

------
throwingay5556
The option that isn't being discussed is the one that would align the
interests of the working class in America and the immigrant population.
Namely, a federal job guarantee for everyone in the country with a minimum
standard of living and the requirement that everyone be treated the same. If
the buisness community can't stomach that, then maybe they shouldn't get any
desperate immigrants that essentially function like scabs because of the way
they engineered the system. Our true enemy is the elites and the business
community. Immigrants are just ordinary and often desperate people who deserve
our kindness. Rise up!

------
giardini
Emphasis on "skilled" and add "legal", please. We don't need more chicken
pluckers - there's a machine that does that faster and cheaper.

~~~
gotocake
But not a machine to affordably and accurately pick strawberries or citrus, or
clean your house and office park. Let’s not pretend that the demand for
relatively unskilled work isn’t very high, because the work is perceived to be
beneath the dignity or price range or natives. It would be nice if we could
benefit from the immigrants willing and able to do this hard and unpleasant
work, without also castigating them for doing it.

~~~
giardini
gotocake says: "But not a machine to affordably and accurately pick
strawberries or citrus":

[https://www.bing.com/search?q=strawberry+picking+machine&for...](https://www.bing.com/search?q=strawberry+picking+machine&form=OPRTSD&pc=OPER)

gotocake says: "this hard and unpleasant work":

[http://whvaustralia.net/fruit-picking-hard/](http://whvaustralia.net/fruit-
picking-hard/)

Certainly we don't need to castigate anyone. But we don't need more (illegal
or legal) unskilled immigrants taking jobs that will soon be supplanted
entirely by automation. We need skilled professions: doctors, engineers,
nurses and (God forbid) lawyers.

We'd be fine (indeed, we'd be better off) w/o _any_ of the 7,000-14,000
migrants headed toward the USA's southern border right now.

~~~
iguy
Right, it's a mistake to think that there are a fixed number of low-skill jobs
which need filling. A mistake encouraged by propaganda from those heavily
invested in industries set up to employ them.

Swiss people clean their own damn homes at a wage which, in India, would
justify several servants. This in turn drives a market for Roomba early
adopters... but also just for less obvious technology, like houses well-enough
sealed against dust.

------
sbr464
A side benefit that I hadn’t really considered but seems obvious; By taking in
skilled workers from other countries, it’s like poaching talent from another
company. Then they aren’t contributing to or building companies in their
former country. Not sure the scale you would need to make a dent, but is there
a name for this?

~~~
dudul
The choice of word is interesting: encouraging immigration of skilled workers
to the US has the _benefit_ of preventing them from participating in the
development of their home country.

Short term, sure it's beneficial for the US, but I don't think it's a good
idea to reflect in a vacuum or only thinking short term. Emergent countries
being able to develop is beneficial for everybody.

~~~
damnyou
What about the _immigrants_? It's a huge benefit to them!

~~~
dudul
Of course, but that's not what the original message was pointing out.
Comparing countries stealing other countries skilled workers and companies
poaching employees is not a good idea IMO, that's all.

~~~
damnyou
It's the same thing, it's just the barriers are different.

Silicon Valley is successful partly because noncompetes don't get enforced in
California. It makes things slightly worse in the short term for each company
but better for both the individuals and the world overall.

The US has been successful partly because it's attracted so many skilled
immigrants. It makes things slightly worse for other countries in the short
term (though remittances!) but is better for both the individuals and the
world overall.

~~~
rhexs
Citation? Brain drain, so that Silicon Valley can produce various ride-sharing
and world-changing pizza delivery apps, is better for the world?

I certainly think it's better for the rich as it drives the stock market up,
but a blanket "better for the world overall" is certainly an interesting take.

------
kvhdude
While H1B debate is ongoing, vmware invests $2b in india

------
cwperkins
As when any immigration topic comes up on here, I am in full support of
getting the best talent from anywhere in the world to help create the next
innovation or invention that makes people lives easier, better and richer. I
just ask, because I know there are many immigrants on this forum, that if the
American people are given a referendum on what they think is proper on how to
handle immigration (whether it be legal or illegal) that you respect the vote
of the electorate. With that being said I wish anyone that wants to immigrate
to America has a good experience with the people here, works hard and achieves
the American dream for themselves and their offspring.

------
coldtea
> _America’s Need for Skilled Immigrants Isn’t Going Away_

Really? Why? It can't find enough people to educate among 350 existing
million?

------
sid-
I think we should have a world without borders and countries, only states.
People should be able to live and work wherever they want to irrespective of
where they are born. Most of the problems arise because we have divided the
world into countries. This is really something the world needs rather than
immigration reform

------
seshagiric
Wouldn't this favor large companies? e.g. someone like Google, Amazon may pay
the top $ to get talent from abroad but startups or small companies are not
able to?

While the pay gap between companies exist even today, the difference is today
small & medium companies can afford the foreign labor.

------
dkhenry
I have a modest proposal to help with the need for skilled labor. Reject all
skilled applicants for visa's. Only accept the unskilled and uneducated. If
you have an advanced degree and specialty skills you are not allowed in and
have to remain in your country of origin. If you get a visa to study in the US
you have to return to be employed in your home country. I think this will have
two primary effects.

1\. It will create a huge shortage of skilled professionals in America and
will significantly drive up their costs and salary. This will result in more
people choosing to enter those fields.

2\. It will increase the global support of skilled persons as those who remain
in their country of origin will be able to train and support more
professionals.

My basis for this is looking at number of engineers per capita, the developed
world produces an order of magnitude more engineers and doctors and scientists
then the developing world, but then we take the few they do produce which
inhibits future growth.

~~~
basilgohar
This is fine for the purpose you are outlining, but it completely neglects the
fact that the primary reason people are emigrating from their home countries
is seeking a better quality of life for themselves and/or their families.
Closing the door to them shuts them out from this path.

Moreover, a lot of immigrants that arrive to the US end up having a greater
impact on the world as a whole than they would or could have had in their home
countries. This is the ideal scenarios of the sometimes true concept, "Land of
Opportunity". I don't presume you are ignorant of this, but conditions in many
other countries are worse for a lot of reasons.

My own anecdotal evidence: One of the main factors the lead to my own father's
emigration from his home country was because the "old guard" at his university
effectively blocked him from progressing any further lest it be a threat to
their own established position. Arriving at in the US, he had no problem
rising up to the top in the more merit-based system here and effecting major,
positive change in his field.

So, as is the case with so many other issues, this one is not as cut-and-dry
as your comment makes it out to be, and prevents a lot of other good from
flourishing as well. There are not equal opportunities for world-benefiting
success everywhere.

~~~
onemoresoop
Also nobody here mentions that immigrants to the US pay taxes and spend most
of their money inside the US propping up the economy.

------
gumby
Interesting: according to Kerr, recent restrictions on immigration
shouldmindeed _help_ they US be encouraging bright workers to go elsewhere and
send remittances back to the US. Hmm.

------
geff82
You want good healthcare, good salary, the real Autobahns, good houses and you
are talented, have at least a bachelor in IT and are willing to try something
out? Come over to Germany. Honestly, no I other country I know of has such a
fast and well thought out way to permanent residence for foreign talent than
Germany. If you are interested in working here, drop me a message to
eriklistserve at gmail dot com.

~~~
dunpeal
Correct me if I'm wrong, a friend of mine who looked into it, all he could get
in Berlin was less than half his American salary, while his taxes were very
substantially higher.

His take-home would have been slashed by about 70%, so he gave up the idea.
Have things changed since then?

~~~
geff82
Berlin is the worst place if you want to have a good paying job. If you only
want to work for startups, then Berlin is the place to go. But if you are open
to work in Big Enterprise IT, then there are many places where you can work
and earn very good salaries (especially Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg where
Enterprise IT usually pays between 80k$-140k$ depending on your role). While
taxes and contributions for singles are quite high, it also includes health
insurance, retirement money and unemployment insurance. For food, Germany is
one of the cheapest places in the world. Property taxes are REALLY low
compared to the US (I mean, in the US or in Germany, you as a renter pay them,
so rent is also cheaper here, even in the hubs). In big cities, many people do
not need a car as public transportation is very affordable and available
everywhere (so that money gets saved for some).

The biggest challenge: to stay here for longer, try to learn German well. It
is not that difficult if you take your time.

~~~
shados
> 80k$-140k$

Thats the problem. You used the dollar symbol, but even if its euros, the
upper range you gave is 160k. That's way, way too low for an upper range if
someone's thinking of salaries on one of the US' coasts (especially west, but
also east). Insurance is mostly for if you lose your job...as long as you have
one, its a pretty tiny part of the paychecks, retirement matching is pretty
common, food isn't that expense (I dunno about Germany, but compared to other
countries Ive lived in, its cheap). After the difference in taxes, the delta
in the upper range is a significant factor.

Im curious about the property taxes part though. Do you have some examples?
Real numbers are hard to google.

~~~
pastor_elm
If you want to make 600k as a software developer, stay in San Francisco, live
in your 2.5 million dollar .2 acre ranch house, and enjoy walking over
homeless people on your way to work.

~~~
shados
The last part is definitely the right point to make. To me there's no argument
that taken in a vacuum, there is no country in the world where you'll be
better off as a software developer than in one of the big tech centers in the
US (not just SF, but NY, Boston, whatever. There's a bunch).

But it comes at the cost of...well, everyone else.

------
AngryData
That is what happens when you put meaningful education behind a wall of
private business.

------
collyw
Couldn't they skill up non immigrants? That would improve inequality ad seems
clear from Trump being elected that not everyone is happy with immigrants.

------
crusso
deleted

~~~
learc83
No mainstream politician is pushing for completely open borders. That's a
complete straw man.

The closest quote I can find from a national politician calling for open
borders is Donald Trump in 2013.

"We will have to leave borders behind and go for global unity when it comes to
financial stability."

~~~
lenkite
AFAIK this is not a "complete straw man". Democratic National Committee deputy
chair Keith Ellison (Minnesota) is strongly in favor of open borders, goes
around wearing T-shirts saying the same. He has even been quoted saying that
"America’s national borders create an injustice by keeping Mexican workers
from traveling to the United States to look for higher-paying jobs". Maybe he
has a point, however he does not share that opinion alone.

~~~
learc83
>"America’s national borders create an injustice by keeping Mexican workers
from traveling to the United States to look for higher-paying jobs"

That's an inaccurate summary of what he said that's been going around right
wing news sites. Here's what he actually said:

> “And so corporations, certain people who get certain rights, can go back and
> forth across the border seeking out the lowest wages, but people, regular
> people, cannot go back and forth across the border seeking out the highest
> wages. So what it creates is an imbalance. It creates an injustice.”

He isn't calling for open borders. In the context he was pointing out problems
created by allowing corporations to move back and forth between borders to
seek out the lowest wage employees, but not allowing employees to move back in
forth to seek the highest wage employer. In the context of the interview, he
was talking mostly about market protectionism to correct the employer side of
that imbalance.

With respect to the shirt he was wearing. It was band merch for an rap group.
It's an inspirational quote empathizing with people crossing the border to
improve their lives, not a literal call to remove border checkpoints. He may
even prefer a world with open borders, but he's not saying we can or should
actually implement that unilaterally.

Again no one thinks Donald Trump wants open borders because he thinks one day
we will have to "leave borders behind".

His his actual immigration platform:

"I believe immigration rules need to be straightforward, fair, and
predictable. They currently are not. I am committed to passing comprehensive
immigration reform and have co-sponsored such legislation in my two terms in
Congress. I believe that our reformed immigration system should include a
clear path to citizenship for those who are already in the U.S. working and
paying taxes. We need to put families first and have an expedited process for
family reunification and believe that the federal government has an obligation
to clear up the lengthy backlog of family visa requests. I also believe we
need to pass The Dream Act, which is legislation designed to increase access
to higher education for the children of immigrants and give them an
opportunity to succeed and give back to their communities."

Notice nothing about open borders.

~~~
lenkite
I haven't observed this from right wing media, but from his own twitter
channel.

I don't understand this. Corporations are not allowed to move back and forth
between borders at the drop of a hat- you have to satisfy legal obligations to
be recognized as a corporation and hire people in any nation. Legal immigrants
have also have to wait in a queue and satisfy formalities. The analogy just
breaks down for illegal immigrants who are neither interested in following
laws or awaiting their turn. So national borders are not creating any
injustice.

Please note that he wore that T-shirt at a "May-day" parade in a video
published on his own twitter channel. It is rather "nice" of you to re-frame
his stance that it was in support of a "Rap Group", but you and I both know
that certainly wasn't the case.

~~~
learc83
You got text you quoted from right wing media. He never said the words you
wrote, and if you google them, you'll find they only appear in right wing
media.

I'm not arguing for or against open borders. But I'm telling you Keith Ellison
isn't arguing for what you think he is.

>Legal immigrants have also have to wait in a queue and satisfy formalities.

For 99% of the population there is no queue to wait in.

>who are neither interested in following laws or awaiting their turn

Again this is a right wing talking point. For the average person in Mexico,
there is no turn. There isn't even a line to get in.

>So national borders are not creating any injustice.

You're arguing with a straw man. He never said that. He said that it's too
easy for corporations to move between borders because of NAFTA (not
frictionless, but too easy), and too hard for employees. That imbalance is
what he's saying creates the injustice, not border security.

>but you and I both know that certainly wasn't the case.

I do know that it wasnt to support a rap group (also no need for scare quotes
here--rap group is an accurate description.).

I never said it was only or even partially to support the group itself. It was
to show solidarity with a group of desperate poor people with an aspirational
quote.

You can believe and even advocate for a future world without borders as an
aspirational goal, without believing that it's possible today or likely
possible ever.

Do you think Donald Trump's quote that we need to leave borders behind meant
that he wants to just stop gaurding the border?

~~~
lenkite
My last comment as I really don't like to talk about politics on HN.

Speaking from an immigrant family - there are _lot_ of procedures to formally
migrate into the US. You need an immigrant visa for starters and this is not
easy to get - you can be rejected for several reasons and need to reapply.
Then you need to work towards getting a green card for at-least 5 years. There
is a waiting list. You may not get your card for more than a decade -
sometimes even 20 years!. So I do not understand what you mean by "99% of the
population, there is NO queue to wait in". That doesn't make any sense to me
at all. The only way there would be no queue if you hop the border and claim
false refugee status. For folks who have had a long, long road to legal
immigration into the states, this is very bitter pill.

About Donald Trump - it obvious that he is a closed border/anti-immigrant
politician. Thats the plank he ran on for office. His one misleading quote is
offset by thousands/ten-thousands of his other statements in favour of reduced
immigration.

About a future world without borders - only possible when world-wide legal
frameworks are in place, common law enforcement, similar systems of government
and world-wide elections.

~~~
learc83
You seem to be very misinformed because you are overgeneralizing your family's
experience. I don't blame you, but you are very wrong and you need to research
this yourself, because right now you are angry over an imaginary situation.

>there are lot of procedures to formally migrate into the US.

There are specialized visa for celebrities, athletes, people with
extraordinary abilities, investors, refugees from certain countries, and
qualified asylum seekers. Almost none of the of people in Mexico will qualify
for these visas, and there is nothing they can do to change that.

For everyone else in Mexico, there are 3* ways to immigrate to the US.

1\. You have close family who are US citizens, who are willing to sponsor you.

2\. You marry a US citizen.

3\. You have an occupation that is in high demand, _and_ you can find an
employer to sponsor you. (For most professions the employer must also win one
of a few slots in a visa lottery)

For all of those categories except refuge and asylum, your family must make
1.5x above the federal poverty level for your family size including yourself
(this disqualifies most of the Mexicans who do have family in the US), you
must pass a Civil Surgeon exam, and a background check.

If you don't fit into one of those categories there is no way for you to
legally immigrate to the US. There is nothing you can do about it. There is no
line to wait in. There is no immigration visa to apply for.

When you see poor Mexican families crossing the border, it’s because they had
absolutely no way to legally immigrate. Even if they waited 20 or even 50
years, they wouldn’t get in because there is no line, no process.

>You need an immigrant visa for starters and this is not easy to get - you can
be rejected for several reasons and need to reapply.

Again unless you fit one of the above categories, and the vast majority of
Mexicans do not, this does not exist. There is nothing to apply for.

*There are also a small amount of diversity visas awarded each year in a lottery. People born in Mexico and most other large countries don't qualify for the diversity lottery.

------
jmpman
This still seems like a waste of resources. If the H1Bs are willing to come
over for $40k, why should a bidding war result in them being paid $100k? Have
the companies bid on slots. That money is a tax that should be used to train
US workers for that same job. Pay the H1B $40k, pay a tax of $60k, and in 4
years you have a newly minted US College graduate qualified to do that job,
with no college debt, and they’ll be willing to take the job for $80k.

