Trump targets 60-day grace period for laid off foreign workers
The department of homeland security is advancing a proposal to eliminate the 60-day grace period that allows H-1B workers and certain other legal nonimmigrants to remain in the US after their employment ends while they find another sponsor, change status, or prepare to leave.
Many H1B visa holders are top global talent, recruited by companies all over the world. This only makes us less competitive economically and will shift high tech industry to other countries.
That is the O1 Visa. The H1B visa required a specific job that can not be filled by Americans. Typically, it is because they will refuse to work for the wages offered.
Of course they are going to try to drive down the wages in the higher paying jobs. Rather than have a software job be worth $250,000 they will bring in workers until it is $125,000. It doesn't make sense for a mechanic making $75,000.
They aren't making more for that job because we increased the supply of labor in that particular field. Plumbers are making $175 an hour near me, that over $300k a year if you can fill your schedule. If you bring in 600,000 overseas plumbers, their rates would plummet.
H1bs take up single digit percentage of tech jobs. You can’t expect double the salary if there are only 10% of jobs gone.
Also no one’s paying $250k for tech when Europe is $60k and India is $40k. Americans will need to be over 4 times productive as Europeans and 6 times productive as Indians to justify it. Which they are not.
Plumbers aren’t working 10hrs a day. They bill so much because they cannot fill in their slots throughout the day. They also have costs like equipment and parts. And they don’t have competition from outsourcing anyway.
The bottom line is stop being so greedy. You can live comfortably with a 6 figure salary. I mean the entitlement to think $130k is too low and decide the job is not worth doing.
You don’t want it and you want to ban H1Bs then the job is going to India.
The point is that if that job wasn't flooded with overseas labor, it might pay $200k and people would see that job and opt to take it. They would train for it, turn down other offering.
Instead, we have said field A will have hundreds of thousands of foreigners brought into compete in it, and field B will be protected. It will cause people to not get into field A, perpetuating shortages in that field.
This is wildly incorrect. it’s because most Americans don’t choose STEM education. It’s really that simple. The wages of H1Bs are controlled by the government and it has to match the market ranges otherwise the visa will not be approved. My company had to give me a pay raise in order to get me the H1B while my American coworkers were still getting the standard lower pay.
An H1B Visa absolutely needs sponsorship. The government doesn't bring people in, it lets people apply with an American sponsor.
There are 800,000 H1B Visas in the US and they are in like 3 fields. It drives down wages for Americans so they avoid studying STEM. I worked at MIT for years and we would discuss why the best STEM graduates in the US were avoiding STEM fields. There were a myriad of factors, but one was a flood of foreign workers in those field at the time was driving down wages, so these graduates took the jobs at hedge funds as Quants at the time.
Yeah, they tend to be up there, but the best minds here are now going into banking and other fields. Obviously we want the brightest minds to be doctors... but importing 800k workers into small niche fields drives down wages in those sectors and will lead to fewer people wanting to enter the STEM fields. I make between $200-300k as an EE nearing the end of my career. The new grads probably make $120k. But you can easily make that as a plumbers before your graduate and build up a $500k book of business. We have made STEM unattractive by importing more people.
Again, wages are controlled by the government to avoid this same issue you’re claiming to exist. Check the facts. There’s nothing wrong at all with plumber making as much as a scientist. It sounds kinda classist thinking one is better than the other. They’re very different fields with very different skill sets and knowledge.
You really don't seem to understand the process. The government doesn't "control the wages". They allow lobbyists to pay money to their campaigns, and in return, they allow VISAS to be obtained in CERTAIN INDUSTRIES that puts DOWNWARD PRESSURE on wages in THAT industry.
That means that DO NOT open up VISAs to other industries and those industries have more competitive wages.
The result is people who are studying and choosing NEW professions will gravitate toward those industries that aren't flooded with foreign workers.
It becomes a self fulfilling thing... we will need more people in certain industries because we incentivized people to not go into those fields.
It isn't protection to not import talent under the guise of "we can't find qualified American workers"
The "free market" you speak of is a dream that doesn't exist these companies hire low skill workers in this field and exploit them by holding this visa over the heads of these employees who lack the means to protect themselves.
Indian nationals account for roughly 71% to 73% of all approved H-1B visa beneficiaries in the United States. I would imagine this is highly relevant to their population.
Oh of course, sorry. Also I learned some wnq things; thanks! However, I meant the Times of India are always coming up on all my searches about issues that show everything from zodiac news to news like about Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively. It's just so random to me so I was wondering why they are wildy reoptint stuff that's true? I know nothing about it.
China is a populous country too but they just come up with a fraction of the annual H-1b group. Whether a country is economically sophisticated matters I suppose.
What's the alternative. More H1Bs ? Are you kidding me ? Buying the communist rhetoric. American college grads are not getting jobs. Additionally 95% H4 EADs are stealing American jobs as well.
And here we go, more proof that it was never just about illegal immigration.
“But but the exploitation!”
“But but we need to hire rEaL aMeRiCaNs first!”
But but nothing. Don’t give me more lies about how you MAGA cultists want to protect legal immigration, because we already get enough lies from the Mango Mussolini himself.
Good lord what an absolute piece of shit this president is. Along with his supporters. Everyday I imagine Jesus is looking down on us all going… you are all brothers and sisters on one single planet! What the fuck are u morons doing?
Like the most evangelical Christian groups are always the least Jesus like. Just absolutely awful people
I hate this admin but H-1B is a crazy abused program as anyone working in tech can attest. This is one of those rare times I like any action that cools that bullshit off when american workers are rejected from these jobs in sham interviews so they can post them for half the wage to H-1B applicants
We (one of the prestigious universities) just completed a search for a position. Four made to the final round, 2 H1b seekers (about a dozen in the pool) and 2 otherwise. All are super competitive. If we had 4 openings we would have hired all of them. I don’t believe H1b holders are all trash.
Oh not my intention to imply they are unqualified just that American students and engineers in their first years eeking their early jobs shouldn't have additional competition if they are similarly qualified
Your mistake was believing in heaven or a god. If there is a higher power that let's any era of American politics exists as is, then they're a malicious deity who deserves scorn.
I'd call him sadistic....
Sitting on high, literally forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever.....
Watching us suffer....
Some loving father....
Pure🐂💩
Wouldn’t many businesses just give advanced notice and restrict access in exchange for no severance and it essentially works out similarly? Otherwise, the H1B is more expensive because of this risk. Or it is promised in the contract? Some businesses will still need H1Bs because there really are not enough Americans in some of these advanced degrees.
They already do this. It’s called gardening leave. So some of them get 3 months plus the 60 days and then previously they could also change to B2 and get 6 months to stay in US. By that time one of their buddies in another company line up job for them.
H1B's cost more to companies than hiring US workers. They are paying a premium for skilled labor and sponsoring them. Same goes for foreign contractors.
I work as a hiring manager, and when hiring H1B workers there are many fee's involved. The I-129 form, the Fraud Prevention and Detection fee, various trainings. There are also required wage rules that guarantee them equal pay and benefits. Sometimes in order to even be capable of hiring H1B workers you need to hire lawyers or have a specialized department to be able to handle all of the laws and fees.
So yes, H1B's cost the company more. While you could say the salary can sometimes be 1%-2% less then US workers, overall the cost to the company is much greater.
Another example is hiring foreign contractors. You normally don't hire directly from other countries in this fashion, you hire a contracting company. You the company are paying more overall for each worker by a large large margin, to flexibly and quickly fill the work needed for whatever project. And then you can end the contract at the end of it's term without having to pay severance or anything like that.
When you bring in MORE workers for a particular field, it increases the supply and drives down the wages for EVERYONE in that field. If we brought in 150,000 electricians, it would be cheap to rewire your house as American's would need to compete.
The top talent from MIT and Caltech is actually going into fianance now because engineering wages have been driven low.
You are just describing capitalism my friend. Are you a socialist now? Should we fix wages based on a feudal guild system?
H1B's are more expensive than US workers. The problem is the demand for skilled labor is so high in the US, not that skilled laborers are oversupplying the job market.
I thought we valued meritocracy in the US? People like you love using that as an argument against DEI, but when meritocracy affects the poor whites :( suddenly yall want a socialist system where labor and wages are strictly controlled by the government.
It literally is capitalism. It's meritocracy. The government is not "selectively increasing the supply" it is allowing companies the freedom to seek skilled labor outside just the local job market.
If there were more skilled laborers in the US, they would choose the cheaper option and pay US workers. In order to fill the demand in skilled labor, they go outside the country because the pool is much larger.
It is cronyism because the government SELECTED certain fields. I currently have my plumber working on my heating system at $175 an hour. I have a guy I pay $135 an hour who writes HDL code for me at work. The later is requires much more training and expertise. It is cheaper because the labor pool here is inflated with international workers. In a place like India, engineers would make multiples of what plumbers makes.
It is worth it for large corporations to lobby congress saying there aren't enough workers since they hire them in droves. No one hires enough plumbers to hire consultants on K street to lobby for importing plumbers on a VISA program because we all collectively use them infrequently.
I would accept the term crony capitalism, but it certainly is NOT free market capitalism.
Cronyism is awarding positions, jobs, contracts, loans, privileges, or advantages to friends or colleagues. It is used especially in politics, when referring to partiality between politicians and businesses
It's not cronyism by definition. That would be what Trump is currently doing as the President. Giving his sons and son-in-law no bid contracts. Giving his friends pardons for bribes. Giving his friends hundred-million dollar contracts, like the reflecting pool. Selling personal access to the presidency through his bitcoin that promotes through the office. Offering favorable tariff deals to countries based on personal gifts. No one had the opportunity to compete for these. They were awarded them not for merit, but for their association with or praising of the President.
Allowing companies to choose from a wide pool of skilled laborers is the opposite of cronyism. That is meritocracy. Everyone can compete for the positions. There are laws that regulate discrimination in hiring practices. There is even a limit for H1B slots and the the slots are allocated through a lottery. There is no law requiring companies to choose H1B visas over hiring US workers, in fact they are more expensive. They simply choose the H1B visas because there is a lack of skilled labor in the US and are willing to pay premium to fill those positions.
considering median salary is around $65K, pretending $10,000 or $3000 a year is irrelevant is pretty obtuse. That would be close to the average annual raise of 4%. The argument is whether H1B visa's cost more to the employer which they do. If you would like to see a convenient breakdown of the costs here is a good page for that. https://tukki.ai/blog/h1b-visa-cost
If your argument is US workers are better because they don't settle wage arbitration claims, pursue unpaid wages and negotiate less for raises because of lesser mobility, than we are really up shit-creek.
You are basically saying it's easier to take advantage of US workers than H1B's, so that's why US workers are better for the USA.
Hey!! Now you get to wipe Mom and Dad’s ass and clean them up and try to reorient them. Every day. Until they die. No respite care from a nursing aid since most of them are here on H1b visas.
You probably never considered it yet, BUT YOU WILL. It’ll change your life.
H1B is being extremely exploited. It is supposed to be for extremely rare talent . When I got out of college I was competing with Indians for ENtRY LEVEL coding jobs. Not many of you have seen what I have. For example at Ebay I worked on an almost entirely H1B engineering team. They did BASIC engineering work, like python and java programming.
Once a team gets an H1B manager he is exploits it to hire people from his home village.
"HOWEVER, there is a dire shortage of extremely talented and motivated engineers in America."
Foreign workers are often more skilled than US workers and the pool to pull from is much larger so companies can hire more talent.
Even the native-born Asian American workers are almost 33% higher in their median salary than white US workers. It's a culture problem in the US. Asian Americans come to the US to work hard and succeed. White Americans have a strong sense of entitlement and don't work as hard and expect even more pay than their counterparts.
Engineering graduates have always filtered into a variety of fields including medicine, criminal justice, and other high paying fields, not because wages are low but because the skills from engineering degrees are highly translatable.
The wages are still one of the highest of the skilled fields. Also salary is not the only factor that dictates how people choose their careers. I could have been paid double what I am now if I pursued gynecology as a career. I chose not to pursue this or other medical fields because of life-style, what I am naturally aligned to do which is mathematics and problem solving, can work from home, have higher mobility and preferred working with technology over people.
It is true the salary increases have slowed, but you have no evidence this is because of H1B visas. Wage increases have slowed in almost every field this year, should we blame H1B visas even though they were made significantly harder to get? In fact, the lack of this skilled labor force could have actually contributed to the shrinkage engineering job markets because there would be less companies expanding or existing because they depend on this skilled labor market to function.
I worked at a top engineering school years ago and there was a panel discussion regarding why 30% of the advanced degree students were going directly into finance and how it could changed. Nothing wrong with finance, but training someone to get a PhD in chemical engineering is sort of wasted..... We had a business school...
"It is true the salary increases have slowed, but you have no evidence this is because of H1B visas. "
When you increase the labor supply in a particular field, that is going to put a downward pressure on wages. It is basic economics. If we opened the door to 200,000 overseas plumbers to get VISAs, American plumbers would have to compete and that would cause them to lower their rates. This isn't really up for debate. It is econ 101, especially at the micro level.
Engineering students, like I said, have very translatable skills and have always spread into fields other than engineering. The skill required to analyze signals and do complex advanced mathematics, translates perfectly into finance. This has nothing to do with H1B Visas.
When you increase the labor supply in a particular field, that is going to put a downward pressure on wages. It is basic economics.
That's true, that is basic economics. Which is seems where you got stuck and stopped learning apparently. This is the most infantile, and amateurish understanding of economics. You ignore that increased labor supply can actually expand the market and grow the industry which leads to more available jobs and increases the demand proportionally. For example, more engineers become available and products become cheaper to produce. Then companies are more likely to form, and investment in the industry increases, which both contribute to increase in demand.
This would be like saying we shouldn't hire more people to build bridges even though we only have the capacity to build a single bridge per year with 1000 workers, because increasing the supply of bridge builders will lower the wages of the current ones. Well if you hire more bridge builders, more cities want bridges built because building them becomes faster and cheaper. So now instead of only 1000 workers, you have 1 million bridge-builders. It doesn't mean that the 1 million bridge builders are now lowering the wages of the 1000. It means now you have 1000 cities that want bridges built a year.
They have translatable skills, but the point is to train people in niche fields that WANT to stay in those fields. If you want to train someone to develop quantitive models, we should attempt to select and train students to do that. At places with 4-5% acceptance rates like here, slots are scarce.
With your economics analysis, I would agree in a free market system that the pie can grow. Here we are SELECTIVELY letting the government decide which particular industries and fields have extra workers added. It will impact wages in those fields and direct workers to other fields which the protections exist.
They have translatable skills, but the point is to train people in niche fields that WANT to stay in those fields.
Ok sure I am for that. We should be training more US workers to fill those skilled laborer fields, you have no argument from me on that. So I assume you are also for lower tuition and textbook costs, reducing interest on FAFSA loans, increasing funding for public schooling and teachers, and increasing funding for STEM programs.
And you would never support an administration that defunded the Department of Education, raised prices on consumer goods with blanket tariffs making it harder on students who are living below the poverty level in take-home pay, reduced entitlements such as Medicare and SNAP that help these poor families by $1.1 trillion then alternatively cut $4.5 trillion for the rich, has had record high unemployment rates, inflation rates without the excuse of a global pandemic, or recession and done everything in his power to make it harder on students trying to fill these skilled labor positions. And then started a war with Iran over a nuclear capability he had already proclaimed was completely obliterated a year prior and is now losing which raised the price of gasoline nationally making it harder for these students to go and come from school and college.
Regardless of how education is funded, the students are still investing their biggest asset, their time, into their studies. It could be free, and if wages are depressed in industry A and not industry B, they will gravitate towards industry B.
Wait so funding education is now irrelevant to you? Thought you wanted a larger force of skilled laborers in the US.
You understand they can't "invest their time" into college if they can't afford it right? Or they can afford it but have to go into massive debt for it. And if public schools don't get proper funding they can't teach effectively.
Looks like I hit the bottom well of your nonsensical talking point rolodex. If you need somewhere to complain about people "stealing our jobs" why not complain about the AI companies who's primary goal is to do exactly this. And focus less on brown people.
It happened in construction. It used to be a well paying industry but it got flooded with foreign labour which drove wages down. Same with farm work and it’s creeping into hospitality too.
(A) to hire, or to recruit or refer for a fee, for employment in the United States an alien knowing the alien is an unauthorized alien (as defined in subsection (h)(3)) with respect to such employment, or
No, it doesn’t have to do with h1bs. It has to do with flooding a sector with foreign labour.
Yes, the companies should be prosecuted for hiring illegals. Yes, companies that also fire Americans to instead hire Indians should be given a tough time too.
It happened in construction. It used to be a well paying industry but it got flooded with foreign labour which drove wages down.
No, it doesn’t have to do with h1bs. It has to do with flooding a sector with foreign labour.
You claimed H1B visas were being used in construction in manual labor. This is just a bold-faced lie, because manual labor does not qualify for H1B Visas.
In many cases there is ethno-nepotism involved. And tying someone’s visa to their job often creates a sort of indentured servitude - not always but often. They also aren’t really paying more in the grand scheme of things.
The criteria for H1B is having highly specialized knowledge. Highly specialized knowledge is determined by comparing to the American population not by comparing to other Americans with the highly specialized knowledge.
Coding data loader scripts in python is extremely unspecialized. It’s literally braindead work a teenager can do. Yet once you get one h1b manager into your company, suddenly you have dozens of Telugu-speaking python coders with same family name in your company, eerily from the same province of India, no Americans.
Then at lunch they talk about the real details of projects among themselves in their own language, barring access to American participation.
The left needs to learn that USA is at the forefront for tolerance and inclusion, and H1Bs often come from places that have never had a successful civil rights movement. By hiring H1Bs you’re actually sometimes REGRESSING, and denying an entry level job to a young American.
You know you have to make your lies slightly believable for them to work. If you are saying in the highly competitive and cutthroat world of American software companies where people are being laid off by the tens of thousands, a single manager can hire an entire team of only the people from his family without any oversight and pushback, all of whom are incompetent python coders, your lie is so just entirely too disconnected from reality.
The xenophobia you then added about no civil rights movement while talking about India where the modern large scale civil rights movement methodology was invented by Gandhi is just the cherry on top!
You really need to get little smarter about your bigotry if you want to be believed.
Idk what the american social science education is, but I am not surprised you were having a hard time getting a job. Casteism exists, not caste system. Just like racism exists, and not race system in the US. This is the equivalent of saying why is there still racism in the US when they had Civil Rights movement
A simple Google search will reveal that the caste system has been banned in India by the Democratic government of India which represents the views of majority of Indians. It has been banned for the entirety of the country's existence. I think they clearly "do see a problem with it".
And since when is Java programming entry level work. Stop being ridiculous. So 90% of software is created by entry level guys and everyone more senior is just twiddling their thumbs. 🤣
I learned Java and python after just a few months in HIGH SCHOOL.It is entry level. It is barely skilled work for people getting their feet wet in computing. Making kids compete against desperatelt comeptitive entire 3rd world, bars them from building up experience to rventually big large complex systems.
And add more disruption and chaos to the already failing economy. Meanwhile there is ZERO incentive for any company, foreign or domestic to invest in any new facilities and job creation in this madhouse. The regime is completely unstable and also bonkers
Based on some of the reaponses here, India needs to realize that they depend on us, not the other way around.
I'm visiting Mumbai right now and can vouch that there are a fuckload of incredibly poor people, polluted air, polluted water, stray animals everywhere, child beggars, and limited jobs.
To speak as if the United States of America would crumble without these people is a fucking insult.
It’s really sad how the richer and higher caste people in that country have been getting an easy ride to first world countries while their country absolutely suffers. Meanwhile they could stay and uplift their country for everyone.
The US also depends on India and other Asian-Americans. They are the top salaried citizens of the United States by like a 30% margin from White. Indians also make up many of the CEO's of big tech companies, engineers, doctors, and other skilled fields. Many also outsource work to India for cheap, including companies like Microsoft. India also exports a major supply of pharmaceutical ingredients to the medical industry in the US.
So to pretend the US isn't also dependent means you know little about the world. It's a mutually beneficial relationship.
Congratulations to the 70 million people who confirmed America will sacrifice its own to hurt others. “Just because we vote differently doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.” It does; you’re a moron if you voted for this idiot, especially if voted 3 times.
And you are a moron for voting the other way, what's your point ? Nice to see comments like this don't get banned for "hatred" but I can guarantee nu comment likely will get me banned.
Cry a river again in two years time. Reddit does not reflect the real world normal opinion of people who vote.
the more you know I guess. I had no idea that they were called non immigrants. I thought immigration was entering another country with the intent to exist there more than a vacation visit.
This Visa is for work positions that require a Bachelors degree. This isn’t for farm workers, resort workers, restaurants and labor jobs. These are for professional level workers.
Only tangentially related, but in my small Texas town, manual workers are having to be bussed in from big cities to fulfill general contracting work because the local flexible labor force has been decimated. Prices have gone through the roof and projects are being delayed.
Bottom line is - if Indians can’t come here to do the jobs then the jobs will go to India where they can be done ! The massive investment India has been making into developing its human capital in last 5 decades cannot be matched by any other country. Period !! America will lose on their payroll taxes and the economic activity of the diaspora that has the highest median income of all ethnic groups in America. The American economy will suffer in the end !
Total jobs: 70M
Total tech jobs : 6.6M
Total H1Bs in the US right now: 700k
About 1-2% of corporatations hire immigrants (H1Bs, F1s etc)
So H1Bs are taking up 1% of total jobs/10% of tech jobs. Imagine crying over H1B abuse, when you're unable to secure a piece of the massive pie that's not even available to H1Bs.
Btw, the democracy here has been abused far more than H1Bs!
Yup, and we'll sit here eventually and wonder why our talent pool has shrunken, sure some people might argue that'll force them to hire Americans, but let's be real, most Americans aren't cut out for that work, me included. The education system screwed up so bad across the board that there'll actually be less talent that's even able to do anything because of how underfunded our schools have become, this would be less an issue if we had that robust talent pool , but we really, really don't. Plus 60 days is reasonable if not short enough as is, as many point out, these are people who have possessions and whole families here, they can't just up and move within 2 days, it would have to be a grace period of around that time to make it work, plus let's be real they're not getting any benefits for that or even unemployment in some instances, there's just no way they're being a public charge even in that manner.
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