Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said she will introduce a bill to end H-1B visas, which allow companies to bring skilled foreign workers, days after Donald Trump backed the program.
I have to say that while it’s a stupid idea and motivated by spite , it’s more logically consistent than the usual MAGA shitshow
YES!
YEESSS!
SPLIT YOURSELVES! DIVIDE COMPLETELY BEFORE MIDTERMS!
Mutually assured destruction of Republican factions?
Pass the popcorn.
Playing “Who is the more extreme patriot?” Trump went in like an aimless wrecking ball, she’s going to do precision extreme moves. Bet she runs for prez. All or nothing.
She might want to heed Michelle Obama’s warning…
The first female president will be a Republican, and she’ll be horrifying. MTG might fit that bill.
Have you been paying attention?
Republicans will NEVER vote for a female president, women are supposed to be in the kitchen and getting children and be quiet, not become the president.
Let’s first see if voting and democracy will still be a thing by then
We’ll see if the monster she helped create crushes her, or, if for some bizarre reason trump doesn’t run again, Republicans hate Democrats enough to vote for a woman.
What kind of special insight does a former first lady have to the American electorate?
She says they’re not ready for a female president.
Honestly., I really think workers should be able to move through borders like water. All it should take is applying for a job, getting the job, and moving (and filling out so the proper tax documents, etc before you start working.)
Are you a globalist? What you say makes perfect sense. I’m a globalist too. Being a globalist is the end result of societal progression, not some evil cabal. Everyone on earth should shoot for globalism and then the planet would be running on all cylinders.
Pretty much I guess. I just think it’s a human right to be able to move freely and that nations and borders are just arbitrary things.
Yeah, I don’t agree.
Here in Canada we pay a buncha tax to get things like universal healthcare and to fund various social programs, we also handle taxes differently than other jurisdictions.
Like even with the existing setup, one of the issues we have is that there’s been a fairly standard style of immigration where chinese citizens will buy property in Canada and have the kid and “stay at home mom” living in Canada, while their Dad/breadwinner stays in China. One reason its done this way is that Canada was considered to have better education opportunities and social supports for the non-income earning side of the family – and property taxes are fairly low in places like Vancouver, with income taxes being very high. However in China, it’s the opposite – high property taxes, low income taxes. So as a country/region, you end up with basically no tax income, but high social program costs, with ‘needy welfare’ people living in multimillion dollar properties.
And once the kid is through school, and entering the workforce… they often go back home to china to take over the family business from a retiring parent. That parent then comes to Canada, and enjoys the old age social security network.
If you remove all impediments to inter-country immigration, I reckon that sort of abuse would become so rampant that social programs would become essentially unsustainable.
Yeah thats some kind of asinine loophole Canada has that has nothing to do with what I proposed. Like how is that even possible.
Those sound like the sorts of issues that could easily be addressed by well thought out legislation. I have a nephew that recently got a digital nomad visa so that he could work for his US employer while traveling around Europe. Some of those countries require you to prove you have health insurance or buy insurance from their national health network. Those countries also regulations regarding taxes, etc. that the visa holder is responsible for.
So Canada should pass laws to close the loopholes you describe. They would need regulations similar to digital nomads that apply to foreign exchange students etc.
Yeah, but a bunch of legislation and conditions isn’t what the op guys comment was hinting at. He was basically saying, get a job? Congrats, you’ve immigrated and get all the citizenship perks of wherever you work.
So you don’t want foreign workers being able to work in Canada because immigrants are not taking Canadian jobs?
Sounds like you actually have a property tax problem.
Or china has a property tax/income tax problem.
The variance is why the approach the op commenter hints at doesn’t make sense.
Sure maybe they do, but you can’t vote in China. You can vote in Canada though. And Canada’s real estate issues are at least somewhat known down here. Which, given how apathetic American media is about Canadian problems should tell you how horrifically fucked up your real estate situation is. It’s almost as if your country is courting exactly that type of relationship with foreign investors.
Oh, yeah, our housing situation is an absolute gong show. I’m “hopeful” that our current govs push for a kind of modular/prefab evolution will help, but it’s really not clear how that’ll pan out, or when – and most of their “major projects” that they’re pushing for, are still about building infrastructure for corporations to extract resources to foreign partners, not so much about building up Canada itself, so there’s good reason to be skeptical of it all. Like even the Small Nuclear reactors they’re promoting, are made by US companies and are reliant on US fuel sources, which is absurd.
But this is basically a thread responding to a commenter’s take on how immigration should be entirely dependant on job acquisition – get a job in Canada? Boom, you’re Canadian. Get a job in the US? Boom, you’re American. The point of my previous comment isn’t so much to highlight/critique “Canadian” or “Chinese” policies on housing and income tax, but rather to point out that there are differences that make the commenter’s take unfeasible in my view. I’m just familiar with the Canadian/Chinese variance as it’s been an issue that Canada’s failed to address adequately for years.
Sure maybe they do, but you can’t vote in China.
Typical of the ignorance of the internet. Look it up.
Are you saying you’re a Chinese citizen?
I’m saying I’m educated. Try it.
My current employer is headquartered in Austin, TX. We have software engineers, QA engineers, and other technical people working remotely all over the world, including Germany, Ukraine, India, Australia, and elsewhere.
Ahahahahahaha
It’s counterproductive and racist all around but holy hell is it funny when these goobers fight each other.
Do not discount her, she’s keenly sensing a disruption and looking to create a schism. Pay attention to her statements now basically “I just want everyone to be kind to each other, I am sorry I participated in the divisive politics of yesterday.” This will ring a bell with a lot of folks in the rural areas. Then she leaps on his anti-populist mistake. I think we might be looking at the next leader of the party.
Honestly… It would be so fitting.
America deserves its first cro-magnon president now that they make up such a huge portion of the USA
The program doesn’t need to end, it needs to have severe restrictions on use.
It 100% needs to end…
Like, how it was intended was fine, but now it’s used to get employees who can’t quit. Sign them to a contract that doesn’t get OT and make em work 100 hr weeks when here till they burn out then replace them.
So Americans need to put up with it, or they won’t get hired.
Yep, it’s basically slavery via holding the visa for foreign workers who have to put up with the corps holding their status over their heads, all while driving down pay for citizens. It was a good thought, but it’s being heavily abused now.
It was a good thought
It was never a good thing. It was only ever intended to put downward pressure on domestic workers wages and increase the labor pool.
I would support an h1b program if the base wage had to be 10x the normal wage for the position they were hired. If you are truly an exemplary unicorn worker that can’t possibly be found in the rest of the US, then why not mandate a healthy and definitely non-exploitive wage for them?
That’s a fair point. When I say good thought, I was more referring to it being used as a stepping stone to help someone get into the USA to gain citizenship, not the way it’s used now. Which is slave labor that’s used to suppress wages of US citizens.
It was a good thought, but it’s being heavily abused now.
I’m not sure when it was a good idea and I also don’t know a time when it was not being abused, if I’m being honest. At least in IT (and in general, engineering, or so I’ve heard) going back to the 90s…
Now, the other threat they hold over our heads is that companies will just outsource if we don’t allow this, but that’s not a law of nature or anything, either. There is no reason we should not tax such services like that, too.
America kept telling their youth (and probably keep telling them) to “learn to code” because those were the jobs they were told Americans should aspire to, etc. Since I’ve been in IT since the 90s, I have more than my share of doubts about this promise, since I’ve seen how we are treated and the strong desire in the corporate world to suppress wages, benefits, any sense of autonomy, etc…if America is serious about this message, maybe they ought to look out for the workers.
America will never look out for the workers. The workers have to unionize. Probably even the H1B employees. I think until that happens, we’re going to see wages stagnate and fail to keep up with inflation.
Unfortunately people are so cowed by their employees and the system that they won’t unionize.
Personally this is why I think we don’t have universal healthcare and basic social support systems. They would enable us to negotiate.
It’s not really slavery…
Because you can quit, you just go back to your home country.
And your home country might suck, but if you got a H1B, you’re upper class. No one goes from starving to getting a 100k salary in tech on a H1B.
It’s more like how Americans work on an oil platform. They come here to earn a shit ton of money on a short timeline, then go back home where the money is worth a shit ton more instead of spending here or even “investing” it.
Because you can quit, you just go back to your home country.
When someone hangs a carrot over your head and says “if you want to stay, do what I say” that’s a form of slavery.
And your home country might suck, but if you got a H1B, you’re upper class. No one goes from starving to getting a 100k salary in tech on a H1B.
You’re right and it kills the need for the local citizens to get paid properly when a company has the option to pay way under market for someone who’s home country might suck.
It’s more like how Americans work on an oil platform. They come here to earn a shit ton of money on a short timeline, then go back home where the money is worth a shit ton more instead of spending here or even “investing” it.
And this isn’t an issue because???
Not ever bad thing is slavery…
But you don’t seem to understand any of this
Nobody said every bad thing was slavery.
Right, but they said h1b’s are modern slavery…
Which means they don’t know how bad either are/were…
But fuck man, if you didn’t understand before this comment, I doubt this will help. It’s not exactly complicated and from your response you didn’t just miss a little thing, you fundamentally dont know how the English language works.
“Not every” means that not only are they wrong here, they’re so fundamentally wrong that they’re most likely long about other modern things they think are “modern slavery”.
It’s like a 9 year old saying homework is modern slavery. At least that makes sense because they’re 9.
n adult that thinks H1bs are modern slavery is a fucking idiot that doesn’t understand either
I think it needs to be replaced immediately with something less exploitative a skilled persons visa that’s closer to a green card and requires multiple companies or a union to request skills then a government agency checks if those skills are actually in higher demand then capacity and issues reasonable length visas that merely require regular employment in a certain industry and become a reasonable speed onramp to green card status. Or something similar.
The reality is getting rid of skilled labor visas entirely is shooting ourselves in the foot in a way that reminds me of how much of the Manhattan project’s scientists came from axis nations. What we have now is hurting the visa holders and the labor they compete with, but we really do benefit from being able to bring in the exceptional.
Could go either way.
It 1000000% needs to end as it is currently. I think we could make it a lot better but the ownership class wouldn’t like that.
I was laid off from my first job soon after I trained an H-1B loaner engineer.
It was getting abused since at least the 90s, at least as far as I could see. Sure, it was anecdotal as far as what I saw, but you’d hear others saying similar things.
The sad thing is that even after the dot-com bubble, we still had H-1Bs, when something like that should have been an obvious trigger point to shut them down to zero, at least within IT jobs, and only raise them above zero once some other trigger point is reached, and even then, only very cautiously.
If companies really need to find such rare talent, maybe they find some kind of way to have Congress build them a path to bring someone in as a full citizen and work. We’ll see how many “shortages” of local talent they have once all that rare talent are also free agents entirely capable of finding another job, LOL. I think the real “shortage” they are talking about is a lack of workers beholden to them, and willing to work for less than the prevailing wages…
Just because the Nazis are tearing their throats out, doesn’t mean any of them are on your side. In fact, they have already proven they will never be on your side.
Therefore, it is perfectly acceptable for you to enjoy watching them tear each other’s throats out
Lepards ate each others faces!
I can’t speak for the tech industry only the system as a whole.
I think people calling it slavery or likening it to some kind of bonded labor are obviously exaggerating to a degree.
The only situation where its clearly problematic are for countries like China and India that have massive populations but still have the same green card cap as a nation a tenth of their size.
Everyone else on an H1b would generally be working towards a green card on a timeline of 3-5 years. Yes mobility is limited during that time (though not absolutely so) but I can’t think of a country on earth where new immigrants don’t have to work with their hands tied to a degree.
Right now employers only have to pay the prevailing wage to an H1b employee. This can be significantly less than the median.
I think the median should be the absolute floor. One can make an argument to have 75th percentile be the floor also.
I think if a company is allowed to pay below median wage for a large number of employees they should be forced to invest in local education / apprenticeship. Even if they are allowed to, there should be strict caps on this.
There are many H1bs that get paid above the median wage in the US but I think conversations around the tech sector tend to dominate so the perception is that these are mostly lower wage entry level workers. It’s really the tech sector that has exploited the system the most so I think it’s worthwhile distinguishing tech H1bs and therefore considering more significant restrictions on a sectoral level.
It is very close to slavery. Your employer gets absolute power over you and your immigration status. “You’re fired” means “you need to leave everything you built and everyone you love behind”.
Are you gonna risk leaving your family behind and being banned from the country to join a union? To protest bad work conditions.
It is a scourge of a system that legitimizes the exploitation of immigrants.
Are you gonna risk leaving your family behind and being banned from the country to join a union? To protest bad work conditions.
Since this is the tech industry, I’d add, to protest unethical practices towards end users?
I am curious since it appears you are Canadian, what reform would you propose? The LMIA system in Canada faces similar issues but for a shorter period since immigrants with a high enough score on their application can secure PR within around 2 years. During those two years Canadian employers have similar leverage over immigrant employees. However under the American H1b system if you’re terminated, you have up 60 days to leave which is often not enough time to secure a new sponsor. Under the Canadian LMIA system you have 90 days and can potentially apply for a temporary visitors extension which allows immigrants and their families a better shot at staying. This delverages the employer to a degree.
There are several different aspects of policy that can be tweaked but the employer leverage is really a tough one to eliminate. Though it can certainly be cushioned by removing barriers to PR and offering a longer grace period in the event of termination as Canada has.
I think the systems employed in the middle east where passports are confiscated and more overt coercion is involved are closer to slavery.
The conditions you describe certainly exist but are the nature of employment based immigration everywhere. It’s hard to imagine any country forgoing that initial period of leverage in their corporation’s favor. What’s uniquely exploitative in the US is keeping people in visa limbo for a period of 10 to 15 years because each nation has a cap of 7% of total green cards regardless of size or level of immigration. That mean the number of greencards available to a nation of 1 billion is the same as the number available to a nation of 20 million.
In the end it’s not the population of an immigrants origin country that matters, it’s how many are coming to the US. If there are a larger number of immigrants admitted from one country via H1b then there should be a greater number of green cards alotted. This way that exploitative relationship doesn’t stretch for 10 to 15 years which allows employers to engage in questionable labor practices.
Immigrants have always had to come in, put their heads down, and work. That’s the nature of moving to a new country. To a degree, anyone (even locals) that joins a new employer has a probationary period and has to avoid making waves initially, at least in the many parts of the country with at will employment. Those circumstances are not likely to change.
Instead we should be focussed on immigrants getting at minimum fair (median) pay and having a clear pathway to permanent residency to curtail an employer’s ability leverage visa status.
If there is another “nation of immigrants” that does it better I’d be interested to hear about it. As far as I know Canada’s LMIA system faces similar issues.
Damn that crazy bro.
17ish years in tech here…
H1-B’s at one of my previous companies (2015-2017) were regularly working 70+ hours a week and getting paid less than new hires coming out of college.
They often were either isolated, or stuck within their one self made cliques of other H1-Bs from their country of origin. They did not try to socialize or make friends. More often than not, they’d leave and go home within 2 years. You could feel the despair and unhappiness.
Aside from how it impacted the H1-Bs (which from what I saw was almost all negative and fucked up), I wasn’t thrilled about seeing a multi-billion dollar org making so much extra money, and then not really distributing it correctly.
The H1-B thing helped one group of people to the detriment of everyone else at that org. I’m pretty sure you can figure out the only group that it benefited.
This sounds more like H1b fraud (failure to meet prevailing wage for hours worked) on the part of the company rather than an issue with the H1b visa itself. More oversight is certainly necessary to ensure American companies don’t break the law.
Ya, it really may have been.
I have long thought - since the 90s - that the H-1B program needs a lot of oversight and a revamping on exactly how it is governed, but I don’t for a minute think that MTG understands the nuance here. Trying to talk about this in certain company is always fun, because it’s like trying to talk about Israel in the early 90s - you’d get accused of being a nativist or whatever immediately w/ almost no thought, just like talking about Israel in frank terms would get people called “antisemitic”. It seems that, like the Israel thing, it’s kind of broken through into the national conversation at least vs. just people within IT only. Unfortunately, it seems to be nativists like Bannon and MTG trying to make the counter H-1B arguments, and I hate that.
If we really cannot find local talent for an endeavor, and it is truly something that is rather time-bound, sure, bring in people for 3-6 years, I guess.
But I think the terms that the person is under should not be something where they have much reliance on the good graces of a company. And I think finding easy paths for them to transition to full citizenship if they so wish should be there. And I think the requirement should be that they are paid 2x what the going rate here might be.
But using these visas for cheap labor for companies to exploit in things like programming jobs - most especially in a crappy job market exacerbated by things like AI - well, hell to the no. We have PLENTY of that talent in this country, FFS. Companies just want to suppress the cost of doing business here.
And for people saying that this is the alternative as opposed to shipping jobs overseas - bullshit, we can tax the shit out of overseas services, too. Apparently, Pedonald is even able to do such things as tariffs on goods without an act of Congress; it would be something that could be done on services as well.
Is there no middle ground, like keep the program but invest in education and tax incentives for hiring from US universities?
I think there are lots of options that could be explored. One is if these are for truly research types of things, maybe keep a smaller amount of the visas, but only for that. And make it easy for them to become full citizens if they wish. Make it easy for them to float between entities (corps, universities) so that they are truly free agents in the marketplace, etc., even if they don’t opt for citizenship.
Another would be to find ways to fast-track truly rare talent right to a path to citizenship that is not tied to an entity at all. Or maybe it is, but for maybe three months as a trial run, then they are full citizens free to work for anyone (or not at all, or go to school again), and vote, etc…
But as for stacking the deck for corporations with lots of compliant cheap labor to be used in IT and engineering, keep American workers in line, and drive down wages…nah.
The supposed aims and the rationales given for the H-1B are easily punctured the minute you ask - wait a minute, if these are such precious commodities that cannot be found here, why the fuck would we send them packing in 3 to 6 years? Why wouldn’t we do everything possible to entice them to stay and become full citizens? Surely they’ll end up starting up businesses of their own, etc…it’s truly the American dream. Why are we subbing a 3 - 6 year gig for the American dream, FFS?
I live in a part of the country where I frequently compete for work (or did before I started a business) against candidates from all over the world. These are not roles that can be done by a unique, small set of people - it’s like marketing manager type roles. So something needs to be adjusted - even just a little.
Ending H-1B will only further accelerate domestic layoffs for outsourced talent. 🙄
Why do you think that?
mostly pessimism as I watch colleagues slowly get laid off for AI or off-shore dev work (i’m a software engineer). I suppose If they have to offshore anyways, might as well go all in. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
To be clear I, personally, don’t have any problem with H-1Bs i’m just pessimistic on what companies will take as an action item from this. Man, i’m just pessimistic about software engineering as a career in general lately.
So you have no idea how it affects you, despite it being something that affects your career…
And instead of doing any type of basic research, you’re just making random guesses nd hoping for the best?
I’m shocked you have a job to worry about losing
Guy, it’s a Lemmy post, I am not running for office. People are allowed to have opinions without them being fully fledged thesis papers.
You said it’s something that concerns you…
In the time you’ve spent making random guesses and defending your own ignorance, you could have learned about it…
There is no law of nature that could not be taxed accordingly, too, but the country needs to have this option presented as part of the conversation.
That threat is always thrown out there to keep people from questioning H-1B as if we need to answer to wayward corporations, instead of the other way around…
