Good day all. President Trump, regardless of what the Washington (Com)Post says, is moving right along on keeping his promises. Now he’s starting to look into the H1B Visa program and how it’s being used to screw over American STEM workers.
Now, for a little background. The H1B visa program has been around since the 90’s. It was meant to allow companies to hire certain foreign individuals with a skill set not currently available in the United States. In the last 10 years or so, we have seen companies use the H1B Visa’s to basically fire all American workers and bring in cheap foreign slaves. This was never what the program was meant for, and during the Campaign, President Trump said he would do something about this. Now he’s begun. Here are the details from Fox News:
President Trump traveled to Wisconsin Tuesday, (April 18, 2017), where he signed an order aimed at changing a visa program that brings in highly skilled workers from overseas. (Note. This story came out last week. I have altered the previous to allow for the time that has past)
The order, dubbed “Buy American, Hire American,” would direct the departments of Homeland Security, Justice, Labor and State to propose new rules to prevent immigration fraud and abuse. Those departments would also be asked to offer changes so that H-1B visas are awarded to the “most-skilled or highest-paid applicants.”
The White House said the H-1B program is currently undercutting American workers by bringing in cheaper labor and said some tech companies are using it to hire large numbers of workers and drive down wages.
Currently, H1B visa slaves make upwards of 50% less then their American counterparts. They are also bound to the companies that they are working for. By that, I mean they can’t just quit and look for a better paying job.
The order specifically asks the secretary to review waivers of these rules that exist in free-trade agreements. The administration said that if the waivers are not benefiting the United States they will be “renegotiated or revoked.”
And that noise you just heard was thousands of Chamber of Commerce members screaming out in horror that they will be forced to hire Americans and actually pay them what they’re worth.
About 85,000 H-1B visas are distributed annually by lottery. Many go to technology companies, which argue that the United States has a shortage of skilled technology workers.
Which is an outright blatant lie.
But critics say the program has been hijacked by staffing companies that use the visas to import foreigners — often from India — who will work for less than Americans. The staffing companies then sell their services to corporate clients who use them to outsource tech work.
And if you are an American trying to get a job, and you are contacted by one of these Indian staffing companies, you may as well hang up the phone. The last one I dealt with tried to scam me. They contact American’s to show that they are trying to find local workers. It’s all a scam of course. Now when I hear that Indian accent, I just hang up on them.
Employers from Walt Disney World to the University of California in San Francisco have laid off their tech employees and replaced them with H-1B visa holders. Adding to the indignity: The U.S. workers are sometimes asked to train their replacements to qualify for severance packages.
It’s worse than that. In order to keep their packages, not only did they have to train their replacements, they also were forbidden to talk about what happened to the media. There have been several lawsuits over what happened, but I’m not up on the status.
On the planned order by Trump, Ronil Hira, a professor in public policy at Howard University and a critic of the H-1B program, told the Associated Press, “It’s better than nothing.” But he added, “It’s not as aggressive as it needs to be.”
I agree with Professor Hira. I think the whole damn program should be shut down and and every single H1B holder given 90 days to leave the country. On the other hand, I have no problem with them coming back as permanent legal residents, and their H1B time counting towards their green card. They obeyed the laws and rules as they currently stand.
The tech industry has argued that the H-1B program is needed because it encourages students to stay in the U.S. after getting degrees in high-tech specialties — and they can’t always find enough American workers with the skills they need.
I would love to have a congressional committee haul these liars up and ask them a few pointed questions regarding their complaints. I would also have a box of resumes from previous applicants who met the criteria laid down by the hiring managers, but weren’t hired. Can we say perjury trap? Sure we can!
Canceling the H1B Visa program will open up as many as 800,000 jobs to American and permanent resident aliens who can’t find jobs in their field. As for those companies that say they will elave the United States?
Thatisall
~The Angry Webmaster~
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