Slashdot Mirror
Gates Calls for Increase in Tech Labor Supply
Randeep Igochyorjob writes "Reuters is reporting that
Bill Gates is asking for the removal of quotas for guest workers by removing the caps on non-immigrant alien workers. In a mild attempt at balance, buried near the end of the story, the article also says "Undersecretary of Commerce Phil Bond, a top Bush administration technology official, pointed out that the unemployment rate for engineers is above the national average." I'm wondering if raising wages might attract the "needed" workers from domestic sources or is Gate's request "necessary to remain competitive and innovative"."
It's all about raising the value of their stock. Which is the same way Jobs makes his $$$ but it kills jobs but some investors wealthy.
http://www.h1b.info/
Microsoft in November 2002 announced plans to build a half-billion dollar complex in Hyderabad, India. With this new development center, Microsoft can use L-1 visas to displace further US citizen employees and will not be subject to H-1B caps. Other major companies in the US are doing the same. This is why reform is needed across all US visa types and not just for H-1B visas alone. It was through the use of these "special" visas that all of the September 11th terrorists secured admittance to the United States. There is virtually no security or monitoring of these special visa holders.
The average for Washington state is actually more, $94,600.
How I wish I how had your job. I finished college last May and could not find work as a programmer at all. Now I'm working in a call center for $10/hr Canadian. Somebody shoot me. There are no jobs here.
According to payscale.com, the California average is $70,000, and the Washington state average is $65,000. I think the American Electronics Association's survey is seriously wrong. They also claim that the California average is almost $20k higher than everybody else's estimates.
I don't buy it.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
I live in Seattle. I don't code, I'm a PM - but I know plenty of out-of-work coders who aren't even offered an interview because they don't have the right bullshit "keywords" on their resumes. Some of the people I know can write assembly, build synthesizers from scratch, and handle kernel mode Windows coding. Guess what? They aren't finding jobs. It's not because they "aren't looking hard enough", it's because they're being offered $40-50k for $70-80k worth of work, and they won't take that shit.
Two key differences between IT workers and steel workers, ship builders, etc. IT work is generally high skill while auto work and coal mining is not. The IT industry is generally not burdend by shortsighted unions. Absent the unions, no assembly line worker would be making $25/hour with full benefits. And so, the jobs go somewhere else where there are no unions. IT jobs have wages that fluctuates wildly. Entry level is cheap. But there's also tremendous value in experiance; someone who knows the product or codebase is worth a lot more. It's amusing how outsorucing is playing out. Some stuff is being brought back to the US where they pay more, but they get the value of stability. On the other hand, India is starting to be undercut by China and other places where workers are willing to work for less.
And to put this in the context of the article and Mr. Gates' comments, we can either bring the workers here (and have the benifits of taxing them and having an educated population) or we can send the work there. Either way, it's a global marketplace for labor and we can compete, or become obsolete.
bance.net
I didn't enter the country illegally. My SSN is legit, has my name and issued to me when I was 6 (I came to this country at the age of 5, almost 6). I don't see how the fuck I'm a drain on the American System since I've paid way through college at international fees. I have been raised in this country and educated here. I'm not a brain drain on Nepal because if raised there, I would never have been this educated. What the country lost was a number because of the civil war and other strife, I wouldn't have been able to do shit there anyway.
I am not legally allowed to work, but that doesn't mean I'm not legally allowed to be here. My legal situation is more complex than can be summerized easily in a slashdot post.
In times like these, it is helpful to remember that there have always been times like these. - Paul Harvey