Quote:
Originally Posted by candycanechick
Reading my previous threads, you will notice that I am not a fan of the H-1B guest worker program.
But, I have done more probing into this topic. And have some specific questions about it.
1.) Is it right that an H-1B worker is sponsored by a company? That all the control is in the companies hands? These workers cannot easily quit and work somewhere better, or somewhere with better pay? This is SUPPOSED to be a capitalist nation, but it seems many (not all) H-1B are treated like second class resident.
2.) Is it right that their dependents cannot work? Reinforcing the second class resident idea?
3.) Is it right that they have to wait for their green card to be sponsored by their company?
Considering that all of the above is true of the current program, it seems as though these people are almost treated as slaves or indentured servants to these companies. How can a free US resident or worker be expected to compete against an indentured servant?
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1) That is correct.
Bear in mind, there is a set of requirement from ICE for the company to hire foreigners.
A. The company should post an advertisement of the job opportunity in 3 renowned media. If there is an American citizen who has more credentials apply for the job, by law the company has to hire the American citizen. This is one requirement ICE creates in order to prevent the companies to hire non-US citizens and give priority to US citizens.
Now HOW these companies override this rule and go straight in hiring the foreigner is up to them.
B. There is a fee that the companies have to pay the government for issuing H1-B visas.
C. ICE also requires the company to pay these non-US citizen workers certain amount of salary commensurate to their education and experience. All the paperwork has to be submitted and notarized.
FYI lots of companies hesitant to hire non-US citizens because of these requirements.
2) Dependents cannot work - that is correct.
3) Yes they have to wait, but it is not as easy as filling up a piece of paper. Please refer to answer #1. Again the company has to follow arduous requirements and hefty fee to sponsor the individual. Most company won't even do so. (Also consider that companies are not stupid. They know that once these peeps get their greencard, they can freely leave the job and apply for another jobs anywhere in the US. Hence, the company usually make a contract with them that bind the worker to the company for x amount of years; Hence sealing the deal of that job position to this H1B-soon-to-be-greencard-holder worker)
Yes in some ways, these H1B workers will have some fear instilled within them that if they don't do what their boss told them, they could be kicked out from the job and the country.
So why do these companies consider US-graduate foreigners as job candidates?
Most companies which choose to take this route in hiring non-US citizens probably either cannot find suitable US-citizens candidates or they decide somewhat hiring foreigners is still more beneficial fr the companies than hiring locals.
A good example is the company I work for.
There is just simply not enough US citizens who are up to pars.
Why?
There are alot of people wants to work in the company I work for. Competition is fierce!
Hence the company creates requirements, which unfortunately can mostly be filled up by US-graduate foreigners.
1. The company of course only hiring candidates with engineering / science background. Alot of US citizens are not willing to go through the hard path of science / engineering.
2. In addition, due to the economic recession and competitiveness of the market, the company only hires those with engineering undergraduate degree equipped with equivalent graduate degrees (M.S.. PhD or MBA) from ivy leagues and/or top ten schools based on renowned publications. If you graduate from Keiser college or Univ. of Phoenix - forget it. You get your MBA from where? If it is not from Wharton of UPenn, maybe I will consider you later. State University? Depending on what state university that is on the U.S. NEWS top universities in the fields. I work in PA, and they fly candidates from Stanford and CalTech, and neglect local candidates from Penn State. If you have connections in the company, that is another story of course.
(Off Topic: For all jobless people out there, please do not consider taking MBA "just because" unless it is from an ivy league school or top 10 schools. Not only will it hurt you financially, it will not help you to advance in your career since MBA graduates are dime a dozen nowadays)
Most of my co workers who has H1B status come to this country as international students. Since their sole purpose going to America were to study, they were more studious back then in school. While the American students partied in the weekends, they studied. While the American students went to Cancun for the Summer, they did unpaid internship / co-op. This of course gave them a better chance to land a job.
So after blabbering for half an hour, I agree and disagree with you.
Yes, US citizens will have more competitions since companies consider US-graduated foreigners (they RARELY hire somebody from say;India with a degree from Indian's univ. and fly them to the US).
HOWEVER US citizens have an advantage over these foreigners since ICE gives some restrictions / guidelines for the companies to follow in hiring foreigners. The only thing that US citizens; that is your children and mine, have to do in order to get better than these foreigners is to WORK HARD.
Source:
I know all these too well because I witnessed them with my own eyes.
I was fortunate enough to grow up in a strict 2nd generation asian family who knows how it feels to be foreigners. They told me that either I go to engineering / law / medical schools and EXCEL in it, or they wont pay for my tuition. I painfully picked engineering. My real calling? Dancing and singing in Broadway musicals - but that's another story.
I went to top-five engineering schools both for my B.S and my M.S. (different schools). As I went to my junior and then senior years, there were less and less (caucasians and african americans) US citizens in the class. I hope I am not being racist; just stating the fact. Most of them dropped out and decided to go to management or humanity. (Note: most companies mostly sponsor H1-B for occupation related to engineer / science. They rarely sponsor H1B in the bussiness / management fields - let alone history, humanity, etc etc)
My junior and senior level classes mostly (85% to 90%) consisted of Asian Americans, Indian Americans, Jewish and foreigners.
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