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Tech Czar Unimpressed With US IT Workforce

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the faint-praise dept.

theodp writes, "'The IT work force is not skilled enough and almost never can be skilled enough,' said Robert Cresanti, Under Secretary of Commerce for Technology. So what does the Poli Sci grad and ex-General Counsel for the ITAA think is the answer? Open the gates to more foreign workers, urged Cresanti, including H-1B holders."

10 of 568 comments (clear)

  1. at first glance... by bechthros · · Score: 2, Funny

    ...i read this as "czech tsar"... and who asked him, anyway?

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    They will never stop until somebody makes the
  2. Lobbyists Lobbyists Lobbyists by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

    They were saying this during the bottom-of-the-barrel tech bust in the early 2000's. I personally met a representative from Microsoft who claimed this at a San Diego university, and he was saying this to unemployed techies in the same goddam room. He quickly left when the question-and-answer session came.

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
  3. What we really need by OeLeWaPpErKe · · Score: 4, Funny

    Is for technically skilled people to have more children. Companies must embrace women and pregnancy, with daycare and . Only Darwin can help us here. They are the only way to increase the force of people capable and willing to be the next generation.

    1. Re:What we really need by Shajenko42 · · Score: 5, Funny

      And, since technical people tend to have fewer social skills and have a harder time finding mates, there needs to be a lottery amongst the non-technical people. Draw the "lucky" number, and you are required to marry a tech person.

      The government will also be monitoring the bedrooms of these couples to ensure that the mandated sexual encounter per week is not avoided.

    2. Re:What we really need by ScrewMaster · · Score: 2, Funny

      More specifically, there needs to be a lottery among incredibly beautiful women with exceptional breasts. Basically, if you win the lottery you don't have to get pregnant by a highly-intelligent but socially inept nerd. If you lose (and let's face it, very very few people ever win a lottery) well ... better check out these pictures of all the nerds in your area. Pick one.

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      The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
  4. Re:No no no ... by kfg · · Score: 3, Funny

    . . .our government is too closely involved with business's desire to get the maximum benefit with the minimum investment.

    You just don't understand. The Huns are a burden on society, but if we put them to good use guarding the gates of The City our native legions will be free to roam afield expanding the Empire.

    KFG

  5. Re:Or alternatively by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny
    Meet new people, and kill them.


    You are my new hero.
  6. Re:Green Card by jcr · · Score: 2, Funny

    A Chinese friend of mine offered me $10k to "marry" her so that she could get her green card instead of working on an H1-B visa.
    Is she cute? ;-)

    -jcr

    --
    The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
  7. Re:Best Alternative: Economic Law of Supply & by Iron+Condor · · Score: 1, Funny
    There is no need for the government to "fix" shortages by importing desperate labor in the form of H-1B workers or illegal aliens. When the government "fixes" a shortage, the government is damaging the normal operation of the free market. The free market works fine without government intervention.

    This is incoherent gibberish: if there is a shortage of a good (in this case IT labor) in one place and a surplus in another place (i.e. India) then a government that allows free movement of the good from the surplus location to the demand location is facilitating a free market. It is the artificial imposition of borders and boundaries that you would like to have that impede such travel that hamper any kind of free market.

    Reality is: tech-monkey skills are cheap and easy to acquire, as witnessed by a hundred million perfectly-qualified folks in China, Korea, India etc. IT skills in the US are vastly overpriced, if anything or otherwise the free market wouldn't be moving the demand for these skills away from the US.

    Does "Libertarian" really mean "mentally retarded moron" or does it only look that way?

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    We're all born with nothing.
    If you die in debt, you're ahead.
  8. Re:Big Picture is Missing - No Studies by Casualposter · · Score: 2, Funny

    While am certain that there is an MBA thesis on the irrelevance of management to actually running a business, especially a large one, mabhatter564 nails one thing precisely: Most business owners don't know what they need from IT or even what they need their computers to do. I work for a company whose entire IT department was a guy who also ran a forklift as his primary job. He did "that computer stuff" on the side because he got a whole dollar and hour more for it.

    So what happens when the network fails because it was put in 25 years ago and has finally just worn out?

    Yep. . . Panic

    Furthermore I agree with the lack of good understanding of what a business wants its employee to do. Many companies have NO job descriptions that mean anything, and the ones with detailed descriptions often have the phrase: "other duties as assigned." That is really informative.

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    Creative Spelling Copyright (2002). May use without Persimmons