Slashdot Mirror
Smart Immigrants Going Home
olddotter writes "A 24-page paper on a reverse brain drain from the US back to home countries (PDF) is getting news coverage. Quoting: 'Our new paper, "America's Loss Is the World's Gain," finds that the vast majority of these returnees were relatively young. The average age was 30 for Indian returnees, and 33 for Chinese. They were highly educated, with degrees in management, technology, or science. Fifty-one percent of the Chinese held master's degrees and 41% had PhDs. Sixty-six percent of the Indians held a master's and 12.1% had PhDs. They were at very top of the educational distribution for these highly educated immigrant groups — precisely the kind of people who make the greatest contribution to the US economy and to business and job growth." Adding to the brain drain is a problem with slow US visa processing, since last November or so, that has been driving desirable students and scientists out of the country.
The American dream used to be a house in the country. Now it's a house in another country.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
I'll close the door! = )
Do you think this will mean jobs in India and China will get outsourced to a broke white boy like me now?
Test me and I will chronicle your pain - The Archivist (Diablo 3)
The fact of the matter is that intelligent foreigners exist. They can work here, or they can work there. The question, then, is it better if they work here or there?
The answer is obvious - we want them here.
As for 'room' for American citizens, if you can't compete with a guy who was born in India, with all your American-born advantages, he's either just plain smarter than you, or just plain works harder than you. Either way, he deserves your job, and the American company hiring him shouldn't be saddled with your either less-intelligent or less-driven self just because the more qualified candidate was born in the wrong spot.
paintball
There's also the fact that many of them get scholarships/fellowships/teaching assistantships from US universities. Essentially, American taxpayer money has gone into funding their education, and because of idiotic political reasons they are going back. Of course the layman just sees them as taking up a job, and won't see the fact that
a) They could create more jobs
b) A US-educated immigrant going back is a net loss (in terms of taxpayer money) for the country.
I just have to wonder how much more of this erosion of the U.S. the U.S. is willing to accept and permit? H1-Bs and lowering of wages, offshoring and outsourcing services are all great ways for companies to increase their bottom lines. But when EVERYONE is doing it, these companies ultimately create poor and unemployed customers! This is not sustainable.
People constantly ask "so protectionism is the answer?" Right now, yes it is!
It seems that everyone and every entity is seeming short, fast turn-around and ever-increasing bottom lines using "growth percentage" as a metric for success and viability. (Reality check! In no part of the universe is growth a sustainable metric!!)
It's about time we make some room for real US citizens.
Presumably, most of those people originally wanted to become "real" (is there any other kind?) US citizens as well, but realized they have to jump through too many hoops for it to be worth it.
(or do you mean that "real US citizen" is a White Protestant guy with Anglo-Saxon lineage?)
Of course, you can have those guys working in engineering, physics or biotech fields in US - preferably as citizens - or you can have them working on thermonuclear warheads, delivery systems, and biological weapons in China or Russia. Your pick.
This is the end ....
my feeling, in 30 years this moment will be viewed as the tipping point, the moment in which america stopped being the siphon of the worlds best minds.
For the first time in history the melting pot hasn't managed to retain the best.
Those people will bring a BIG BOOST in their respoective countries ruling intellighentia.
lots of sour grapes here, but have no one else to blame ....
There's nothing special about the foreigners. We can make more.
You can't make more Foreigner, AND THEY ARE TOTALLY SPECIAL!
You're as cold as ice if you don't think so! Man, these head games you are playing really make me hot blooded...
Fortunately, they are still alive, well, touring, and rocking, so we don't need to make more.
I'm tired of the smell of curry.
Then you, sir, are tired of life.
Our educational system has become so damned expensive that only people who don't live here can seemingly afford it. So it makes sense... As to why the visa system is clogged... Maybe the economic hard times have hit government offices partially responsible for it as well? Oh, what sweet revenge. -_- More seriously though, what difference does it make how well we educate people (either people who stay or leave?) if the environmental conditions necessary for real progress are absent? Our intellectual property system has gutted any hopes of "desirable individuals" doing much of anything besides occupying a desk. The medical field is screwed because people are too afraid of litigation to actually practice medicine at less than a 6000% markup on procedures, which is literally killing people who can't afford it anymore. The lawyers are the only ones in this country that are well-off anymore.
It's no wonder people are jumping ship... Some people looked down the length of the bow and see a giant iceberg in front of the USS Our Future. An iceberg made almost totally of greed, because we couldn't look farther than the end of our damn noses as the social problems we're facing. And leaving is the smart thing -- how long until Canada starts patrolling its borders to keep illegal immigrants from the United States out? Probably not long.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
I guess they ran out of secret documents and technology to steal
Yep, they've just found out that they can themselves engineer better stuff than they can steal from the U.S. today.
And what scholarships would that be? When I was a foreign undergrad I got to pay full price for the privilege of attending a U.S. university. No American taxpayer-funded scholarships whatsoever for me.
Our new paper, "America's Loss Is the World's Gain"...
Shouldn't that be "America's Loss Is the Rest of the World's Gain"? I know you insist on calling us aliens and think we use strange units like metres and kilograms but we are all part of the same world.
simply tells smart immigrants to wait for a real change before coming back or planning to stay.
I work with 1 H1B and a few naturalized immigrants who all are very well educated (masters for two of them) and their drive is well beyond what the average "American" I see today. They still want it all. The difference is that they are willing to sacrifice and work for it.
When schools allow dummies to pass because it isn't fair to hold them back, when schools don't celebrate their brightest because it offends, when doing grunt work on your path through the job market is for losers, what can you expect? Fortunately there are still more of us than them. The problem is that very little is being done to encourage more of those yearning for success who will work for it instead we are now seeing more who expect everything to be done or handed to them.
Reverse brain drain? It will get worse as some of OUR brightest go overseas to excel.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I think a lot of Americans don't realize why America became the superpower it is.
For thousands and thousands of years, the way to increase your nation's power was to go and invade the other nation, subjugate them, and take their stuff.
The problem is that's a pretty expensive way of going about things. The answer?
Immigration!
Why fight through the world subjugating people when you can just open up the gates of immigration and the best, brightest and hardest working of the other nation's populace will voluntarily and at their own expense subjugate themselves?
Much cheaper and more effective than invasion!
paintball
I dont understand why we get so many potential immigrants into this country through the higher education system when we do not want to give them job opportunities. The number of visa's and offers for higher education should be correlated.
While a U.S. student visa is a "potential immigration" visa (in that you're allowed to apply for permanent residence while on it), not everyone it is supposed to immigrate, and not everyone does. A lot of people come to U.S. (and other First World countries) to get quality education, and then return to their home country where its relative value is much higher.
A colleague of mine decided to return to Africa. The money he collected over seven years in the USA would enable him live a better life in his homeland.
A mansion, with a swimming pool and three maids only costs him about 900 dollars to maintain. The respect he would get from the community would be greater and he'll have a chance to eat fresh "organic" fruit.
All in all...good for them...I wish them all the best.
When the economy picks up, I will welcome them to the mighty USA.
I like my protectionism like I like my women: passive aggressive!
'a';DROP TABLE users; SELECT * FROM DATA WHERE name LIKE '%'... if you're reading this, it didn't work.
American jobs should be going to AMERICANS, not foreigners.
You miss the point. Those people wanted to become Americans. Now they do not want to, anymore. Wonder why is that?
I said "Many of them" and not "all of them". Perhaps I should have said "some of them". I also think that there are more scholarships available for masters/PhD programmes than for undergraduate studies.
It just seems illogical to me that this country would not want to keep the professionals whose education they paid for.
It's also true that any US Educated person, immigrant or not, going to some other country is a net loss. The US person leaving is a bigger net loss, since most likely their tuition didn't contain the astronomical international student fees.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
The temporary H1-B visa was supposed to be good for seven years. The average age at which H1-Bs come to this country is fresh out of college, so 22-23 years old plus seven years is about thirty.
All this says is that the H1-B visa program is working as advertised.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
I fail to understand why this matters. As long as they're working somewhere, that's good, right? They might even help the people they're working with in countries other than America.
Why does it have to be a competition?
Well, there are two major factors.
1) Given the current recession, the number of jobs have fallen off. That and there is pressure to hire an American over someone on a visa. Plus, maybe the foreigners don't want to pay our debt due to all of the bailouts and "Economic stimulus".
2) Xenophobia is alive and well. Even if there were no 9/11, there was a fear of foreigners in the US. Be it left over hostiles from the Cold War, hatred towards Mexicans and South Americans for taking "good jobs" from Americans, Native Americans wanting their land back, or African-Americans wanting a piece of the American Dream and compensation from slavery, there are build up resentments which have been under the surface.
Whenever you evaluate a strategic game or a problem, you can see it by seeing it from the opponents point of view.
Training foreign students served two purposes. First, so we have an opportunity to hire the best and brightest. Secondly, so we can expose them to our culture. What better way is there to bring about change in a country than to train some of their top academic leaders? This is how you bring human rights to China and reduce corruption in Mexico.
The next time you complain about immigration into the USA, consider how much worse things will be when people no longer even want to come here. Worse, that American citizens start leaving for greener pastures. That day may be coming.
If we have an "immigration problem", it's generally a sign of a healthy economy. It's when we have an "emigration problem", that you know things will be really rough.
I work with lots of Indians and Chinese. And most are very good workers and smart.
But times are tough right now. Everyone is hurting. It's going to be tough to justify more work visas and green cards when companies are laying off.
The economy will turn around some day and hopefully things will be different for these workers then.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Are you saying my immigrant coworkers who aren't planning on leaving are stupid? That seems both rash and mean. You take it back!
The enemies of Democracy are
then things might be different.
As it is, the H1B program has merely managed to feed the "fat cats" without improving the lot of US citizens.
By all means, encourage immigration of hard-working, talented, intelligent people.
But allow them to control their own destinies and compete without handicapping them or US citizens by institutionalizing a system that unfairly depresses wages for all.
Maybe we've just reached a sort of equilibrium here, where US wages have stagnated while the rest of world's has grown.
...have made them want to leave..
I've worked in the US twice, the first time in the early '90's in southern California, the second more recently in New England. Both times I felt like kissing the soil of my native country upon return.
Individual Americans are some of the most decent people I've met. Collectively, though, you people scare me.
The change between the early '90's and post-9/11 was striking, from the crazy stuff on TV (Glenn Beck pronouncing that 'security' is the most important thing to any American, when once upon a time it would have been something called 'liberty'), fast-food places with signs announcing that they only hired legal American citizens, and of course the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which temporarily stripped people like me from having access to Habeas Corpus protections.
On the surface, everything was the same. Underneath, the picture was not pretty.
The team I worked with was mostly non-Americans, from both the Far East and Europe, and most of them were highly educated and wanted to stay, but I could never figure out why.
On the good side, like Churchill said, Americans will always find the solution to the problem... after they've tried everything else.
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
You know, one thing that no one ever bothered to mention is that they might be leaving BECAUSE they can't find good jobs here. A lot of the kids at the university I went to had to go back to their own countries after graduation, not because they wanted to, they love America. They can't find an employer willing to put up with all the BS that uncle sam requires so they can become citizens.
Barriers to entry never help anybody. Uncle Sam, tear down this wall.
This game will waste your life. Don't clicky!
Oh no! The summary said PhDs and business managers were leaving, so I wasn't worried. But if the restaurant proprietors are going we have to act now. This is America, you can have your doctors and scientists, but for the love of God, don't take our food.
Sometimes its a loss, sometimes it isn't. Sometimes it is only a short term loss.
A US citizen who will probably return to the US will probably be a short-term loss with a long-term gain. A foreign citizen may bring American ideals to their home country which, barring obesity, is probably a good thing. They may also spread a view of Americans that isn't from Jerry Springer.
'Ey took our jerbs!
Anybody want my mod points?
No, for the billionth time, we don't mind competing on quality. No, for the billionth time, we're not racist. No, for the billionth time, we don't mind the competition. On the contrary, my heart goes out to the H1-Bs I work with because I know they don't have any good choices.
In the most brutal stark terms, H1-Bs are hired specifically because they don't enjoy the same political and legal protection that native workers do. They get paid less, worked like indentured servants, and disposed of like kleenex. I've actually heard one manager scream at the H1-B team he employed "If you're awake, you're working for me!"
This is why you don't see the IT market flooded with French, Canadian or Australian workers, but rather see the market flooded with people from countries struggling with poverty and political horrors.
These poor people are exploited here precisely because the conditions in their home country are so horrific. My heart goes out to the women H1-Bs I've worked with, because I've seen the haunted look in their eye when they speak of home. I once cornered another H1-B over a hideously unethical stunt he pulled to shift the blame away from his own screwup to another, more junior engineer. He robbed my righteous thunder when he got a desperate look in his eyes and pleaded with me, "Look, if he gets fired he can just get another job. If I get fired, they'd make me go back..."
For the billionth time, if we need this talent, then let's do the right thing by these people and offer them citizenship. If we're not prepared to do the right thing, then we shouldn't be using them as scabs to break the back of American labor.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
The article is extremely misleading and makes you think that these companies may have been started by people that came to the US on H1-B visas
They never break out the number of immigrants who come to the US on H1-B visas that start technology companies (H1-B is of course a temporary non-immigration visa).
Google was started by Sergey Brin who was a Jewish immigrant from the Soviet Union whose family immigrated to the US when he 6 and Larry Page of Lansing Michigan.
Andy Grove of Intel fame was a Jewish refugee who fled post WWII Europe to the US (Gordon Moore was born in San Fran and Robert Noyce born in Iowa however, where the actual founders of Intel).
Pierre Omidyar of eBay of course is a Frenchman who moved to this country with his family when he was 6 years old.
Yahoo! founded by David Filo ( cheese head from Wisconsin) and Jerry Yang who came to this country with his family when he 10 from Taiwan.
None of these people came to the US on work visas.
This article is reprinted by Business Week & Wall Street Journal every year close to the May deadline for H1-B visas.
In May, there will be an article about how the 85,000 visas were snapped up in one day due to "shortages" amongst technology and science workers and how we need to have unlimited H1-B visas to fix this problem.
Skip ------ See the latest from http://www.anArchyFortWorth.com
Funding opportunities for foreign students come from university resources only. They are not eligible for FAFSA, state or local government scholarships.
Fellowships are rare, most foreign graduate students end up getting a teaching assistantship or research assistantship. Undergrads don't even have that. Further, they cannot take up jobs off-campus which generally pay as much or better than on-campus jobs.
Obama Declares War on Investors, Entrepreneurs, Businesses, And More
Friday, 27 Feb 2009 | 4:39 PM ET
Posted By: Larry Kudlow
Let me be very clear on the economics of President Obama's State of the Union speech and his budget.
He is declaring war on investors, entrepreneurs, small businesses, large corporations, and private-equity and venture-capital funds.
That is the meaning of his anti-growth tax-hike proposals, which make absolutely no sense at all -- either for this recession or from the standpoint of expanding our economy's long-run potential to grow.
Raising the marginal tax rate on successful earners, capital, dividends, and all the private funds is a function of Obama's left-wing social vision, and a repudiation of his economic-recovery statements. Ditto for his sweeping government-planning-and-spending program, which will wind up raising federal outlays as a share of GDP to at least 30 percent, if not more, over the next 10 years.
RELATED LINKS
Current DateTime: 03:39:08 03 Mar 2009
LinksList Documentid: 29434273
* Obama Walking Tightrope On Banks Bailout
* Obama Vs Reagan
* Americans Mixed On Obama's Budget
* What's In Obama's Budget
This is nearly double the government-spending low-point reached during the late 1990s by the Gingrich Congress and the Clinton administration. While not quite as high as spending levels in Western Europe, we regrettably will be gaining on this statist-planning approach.
Study after study over the past several decades has shown how countries that spend more produce less, while nations that tax less produce more. Obama is doing it wrong on both counts.
And as far as middle-class tax cuts are concerned, Obama's cap-and-trade program will be a huge across-the-board tax increase on blue-collar workers, including unionized workers. Industrial production is plunging, but new carbon taxes will prevent production from ever recovering. While the country wants more fuel and power, cap-and-trade will deliver less.
The tax hikes will generate lower growth and fewer revenues. Yes, the economy will recover. But Obama's rosy scenario of 4 percent recovery growth in the out years of his budget is not likely to occur. The combination of easy money from the Fed and below-potential economic growth is a prescription for stagflation. That's one of the messages of the falling stock market.
Essentially, the Obama economic policies represent a major Democratic party relapse into Great Society social spending and taxing. It is a return to the LBJ/Nixon era, and a move away from the Reagan/Clinton period. House Republicans, fortunately, are 90 days sober, as they are putting up a valiant fight to stop the big-government onslaught and move the GOP back to first principles.
Noteworthy up here on Wall Street, a great many Obama supporters -- especially hedge-fund types who voted for "change" -- are becoming disillusioned with the performances of Obama and Treasury man Geithner.
There is a growing sense of buyer's remorse.
Well then, do conservatives dare say: We told you so?
They were highly educated, with degrees in management...
So that's our plan for destroying the world!
It is also important to note that for many colleges and universities, foreign nationals make up a large portion of the student body _and_ the faculty in several departments. As these highly talented folks go back, they leave big holes in the departments they leave behind. I think that if all the FNs left our petroleum engineering, for example, department the place would be a ghost town.
No, at least while I was a grad student, an (F1) student visa was only able to get you a 1 year apprenticeship after graduation. No way to apply for residency.
If the company you apprentice with for a year decides to keep you on, they sponsor an H1B visa that allows you to apply for residency.
The process of actually getting residency is horribly convoluted and takes between 5 and 8 years to complete. Not to mention all the shyster lawyers out there (yechh).
As a basic matter of fairness, if Indian and Chinese citizens are going to be free to work in the United States, then US citizens should be free to work in India and China.
The problem is they're not. Some out-of-work disgruntled geek published an article looking into this a while back. The Indian consulate just laughed at him when he inquired about being allowed to work in India, while the Chinese representatives haughtily told him that Chinese jobs were for Chinese citizens.
They can't have it both ways. The Indians and the Chinese cannot argue that their citizens should be allowed to compete world-wide, but that jobs inside their own borders are only open to native citizens.
It's not just faulty logic. It's raging hypocrisy.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
I would assume that "Real US Citizen" means born in the US since what you become when you get a citizenship is a naturalized citizen.
....
I'm sure most of those H1-B's would apply for regular green cards, without the disadvantages you cite, if it were possible to get one without winning a long-odds lottery.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
PhD students in the sciences and engineering do not pay for their education. Nearly 100% of them are funded in one way or another, whether it's fellowships, research assistantships, or teaching assistantships.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Suggesting that slow visa processing began last November is just silly. That has been old news for years. Getting to the US to give a class, lecture, concert, or to go to school is much much more difficult than it was before Bush, and before 9/11. It's really bad for the US, for innovation, and for everyone, really, but it is old news.
Yeah I saw that commercial too. The Germans always make good stuff.
wooooosh!
I say don't drink and drive, you might spill your drink. Before you get behind the wheel just stop and think.
I am removing your Foreigner Belt privileges
Presumably, most of those people originally wanted to become "real" (is there any other kind?) US citizens as well, but realized they have to jump through too many hoops for it to be worth it.
I don't know about that. I live in a city with a high number of educated workers on a visa, and I know a lot of graduate students that will be looking for work on a visa. With a couple of exceptions, they are all pretty adamant about maintaining their citizenship and staying here on a visa only. The reasons vary, but most of them don't want to give up that part of their identity.
Of course this is all anecdotal, but in my experience the majority of the educated immigrants are here for the education and job opportunities, not to stay here permanently.
I understood the troll's intent. I was just countering his insult by saying most Americans love the food and culture new immigrants bring to our country, more so than work skills.
What are the smart Americans doing? Are Americans leaving the US at the same rate as before or in increasing numbers?
Learn to love Alaska
Hate to break it to you but this is not a new trend.
"Back in the good olde days" it was an honor to have your children born in america, only to return to your home country (Especially a european country).
Ever since before the USA was formed, people got an education over here or came here for foreign study, only to return home.
Did you think it only worked the other way around?
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
I think this is bad, however they are also stopping them getting in. I've a degree in programming and a masters in business. I've always wanted to go to the US to work, however I've been having trouble finding a viable way to get in.
To enter using a job, I first need to find someone willing to employ a candidate from over here (Australia), or I need to take substantial risk and quit my job, take a holiday over there, apply for positions, and when I get one, then come back, get the visa for it, and then go back to the US.
It becomes increasingly difficult for skilled people to enter. I hang out with a group of people who have good degrees in electronics, petroleum engineering, programming, economics, management and similar, all of which would love to go to the US, however most of which would find it hard.
It's not the lack of jobs, it's the difficulty navigating the system. Also, I've had trouble finding out exactly how to do it. I believe the only way is for me to apply for a job, then get them to sponsor me, then fly to Sydney to get the visa (I'm in Adelaide), then fly to the US to work.
Has anyone had any experience doing this? I'd love to find out the best way to get in, and similar. Any information is much appreciated.
This is my footer. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
Everyone knows that the Germans invented everything important
Like those ShamWow towels! :D They're made in Germany, and you know the Germans make good stuff. Just ask Vince! He won't steer you wrong. :)
Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.
precisely the kind of people who make the greatest contribution to the US economy
Considering the current state of the ecomony, and now knowing those who made it what it is; I fail to see the problem.
I conclude that you pulled that figure out of your ass.
Most people start college at 17 or 18. Eighteen plus four equals twenty-two, at least it does in my corner of the universe. I know I graduated college at twenty-two. Twenty-two or twenty-three plus seven years lands you in the neighborhood of thirty, again, for most values of thirty.
Does the math work differently when it comes out of your ass? Perhaps you don't realize it's not customary to take seven years to finish an undergrad degree?
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
There's nothing special about the foreigners. We can make more.
Well, not exactly. THEY can make more. If we make them, they're not foreigners.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
As far as I'm concerned, if you can look to the sky and speak with your heart that "All men should be free," then you're an American and we should make you a citizen.
What we have now is institutionalized exploitation, and it's a stain on our national character.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
... give them their PhD and their citizenship at the same time? If someone came here from another country long enough to earn their PhD, they've already worked here for somewhere around 5-7 years. Why do we make it more difficult for them to stay longer?
Add to that the fact that most grant funding agencies only give grants to citizens, and it isn't hard to figure out why so many people who come here for their PhD from other countries end up leaving afterwards - they finished their PhD and then ran straight into a career roadblock of no fault their own.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
That's a fiction that's been repeated endlessly, like an urban myth. There are indeed managers from Western countries who live and work in India. Look at IBM, Cisco, Accenture -- they have plenty of Western managers there onsite in India. I had a friend at IBM whose division was being downsized, and IBM offered him a chance to resettle in India. He didn't take it, but obviously you can indeed work there, if you choose.
Sometimes its a loss, sometimes it isn't.
Sometimes it isn't a loss because sometimes the person leaving is a moron.
Examples of a non-lossy emigration:
Darl McBride emigrates from the U.S. to anywhere that is not the U.S.
Jack Thompson emigrates from the U.S. to anywhere that is not the U.S.
There are countless other examples of non-lossy emigration, but I feel these two suffice to make the point.
On the good side, like Churchill said, Americans will always find the solution to the problem... after they've tried everything else.
Well, you know, your keys are always in the last place you look...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
A couple of token managers don't count. India and China do not open their employment markets, nor any of their markets, in the manner in which they argue we should.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Get back on my lawn!
Then stop paying to educate them and start paying to educate US! Stupid justification man.
Why bother
My cousin from El Salvador wanted to come to the US to attend school to get an education degree. She would have been a great teacher, especially for dealing with kids who needed bilingual help. She applied to school a year after 9/11, and her student visa was delayed, delayed, delayed, so she ended up staying in El Salvador and working in HR at a recruiting firm in El Salvador.
True, at least our Supreme Court hasn't decided the government can randomly censor publications, the Interwebs, or even the *possession* of fairly pedestrian knowledge. (As in, having your own copy of a how-to guide for suicide.) And unlike Canada, the UK, and almost every other country, our courts don't allow "prior restraint" on publication.
Australia was an awesome country back in the 70s, before seemingly everyone in Australia became afraid of seemingly everything.
A friend of mine from AU found work in Canada and then a couple of years later in San Francisco, not far from where I live. But the employment climate is grimmer now.
as they are laid off, so what's your point? I have several colleagues with a master's and years of experience getting laid off. It's not as if U.S. citizens are getting preferential treatment when it comes to who gets laid off and who doesn't. There's an oversupply of highly qualified people and less demand for these professionals. If we're losing bright people, it's because right now we don't have jobs for them.
The fact that these highly qualified immigrants are going home is exactly why U.S. citizens SHOULD get preferential treatment when it comes to laying off or hiring people; because while an immigrant can just up and leave to their previous country, we as Americans are STUCK with this country. How many Americans have support networks outside of the U.S. that they can turn to when times get worse? It is in our best interest that this country succeed, but this country can't succeed when it invests time and money in foreign students and employees who will just up and leave when the going gets rough.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Markets work because pressure eventually comes to bear. Wages, and therefore standards of living, rise because labor becomes scarce. For markets to be work as intended, the rules must be applied fairly. To allow India and China access to American markets, but not America to Indian and Chinese markets, distorts the outcome of the game. It not only keeps Indian workers comparatively poor, but it sucks the blood right out of the American labor market in the proverbial "race to the bottom."
If it's sauce for the goose...
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Cool, more jobs for Real Americans, like plumbing and stuff. That's like software, right? Putting stuff together and running stuff through it.
On average, teenagers in America get their drivers license at sixteen. The minimum legal age to get your license in America is sixteen. Therefore, since sixteen is the average, half of them must have received their license before it was legal to do so.
How's that Moliere paper coming?
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Yes, this.
Give them back all of the management grads.
See if we can export some of ours too.
Alaren, you are absolutely correct. I'm a former academic who still has many connections and the biggest group that seems to be leaving are recently minted MBAs and B-school grads. Those are fields that just aren't doing well in an economic downturn.
My wife of 21 years was a PhD student in Math and an immigrant from Eastern Europe when we met. Her experience opened my eyes to a population and situation that I barely knew existed. So many Americans believe that immigrants "just take a test" and they're instant citizens. Many more believe all the racial and ethnic stereotypes about intelligence and science and math skills (or lack thereof). Too many believe they take more than they give.
I can barely imagine what it's like for a young person with talent who comes to America to try to better herself. I've walked with such a person for a couple of decades now. My grandparents were also such people, coming from war-torn (WWI) Italy to be shepherds and steelworkers and shirt-makers and railroad workers. Their sons fought in WWII. All their sons and daughters became proud and successful Americans and thanks to the Labor Unions that are now under attack from American "conservatives", became productive members of the US middle class.
I was one of those "liberal arts students who scored higher on verbal and lower on math" that Alaren mentioned. My wife is a mathematician in a field I can hardly understand, and my daughter, now an undergrad who gets her looks from her Mom (thank god) is pretty well-rounded. She wants to be either a mathematician or a novelist. It would not suprise me if she became both.
I get a sick feeling when I hear Americans talk down immigrants, legal and otherwise. They are as important to the formation and future of our country as the Founding Fathers.
We have to remember, the Pilgrims (you know, the guys with the funny hats and buckled shoes from Thanksgiving) were immigrants, every one.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The value of so-called IP is nothing beside the value of the skills, human relationships etc. for creating and developing ideas. Those who think innovation means resting on the creativity of 10, 20, life plus 70 years ago are doomed from the start. Creativity and innovation are activities, not artifacts. A focus on the frozen ideas of "IP" diverts attention from the real issues. The problem is not that the smart immigrants are taking American ideas away: it is that they are taking themselves.
To quote southpark goobacks: They took our jobs! http://www.southparkstudios.com/clips/104259 Ironic that people are now concerned about foreigners leaving the country.
Do anything, anywhere, anytime.
Remember, Shakespeare preceded Moliere, and no paper is complete without noting the similarities, but crediting Shakespeare with Moliere's work is a tired old trope...
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Scandinavia?
Full healthcare, full dental care, retirement, just for working at a McD's.
Welcome to Socialism.
The problem is, for the same grade and academic quality, it is far easier for an international student to get financial aid then U.S. Citizens / Permanent resident. FOr us, we can only get loans, while international students get loads of assistantships.
Here is why... it is easier for the professors to abuse international students.
New Economic Perspectives
I like to listen to The World, from BBC/NPR... In today's audio...
http://www.theworld.org/node/24849
"Delhi-based economic journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurtha tells anchor Lisa Mullins why India's economy is managing some growth while many neighboring economies are slipping."
But, what did *I* learn today? (this is from memory, and some of it my own adding...)
India's economy is set or on track to grow some 3-5% this and next year, even though the rest of the (industrialized) world is stagnating. Why? India's economy is not nearly as integrated with the rest of the world as is the US', Japan's, Korea's, UK's, etc.
Some 1/3 of Indians go to bed starving, but some 2/3 of "Americans" are classed as "overweight". Indian make of some 1/3 of the world's IT force, yet India's own domestic infrastructure is ~ or http://www.theworld.org/node/24850
I learned:
"General Motors and Chrysler produce nearly a quarter of their North American vehicles in Ontario. So they're asking Canadian taxpayers to pitch in almost a quarter of the money that the companies say they need to stay afloat. The World's Jason Margolis has more."
So,
Canadians produce around 25% of GM's cars, and GM wants Canadians to ante up (help out) with some 20% of the money GM needs. Including benefits, Canadian GM workers earn about $49/per hour! But, effective take-home pay is about $25/hour. Canadians, understandably, are concerned that GM or other US-carmakers will get them to sign on to a Canadian-citizen-funded auto industry bailout program, then take the money to less-expensive Asian areas, or back to the US.
Interesting report...
---
And, here:
GM Europe 'could run out of cash'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7922186.stm
----
GM Europe 'could run out of cash'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7879372.stm
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
We (meaning America) needs to start churning out more home-grown techies.
Not necessarily. Maybe we can just make do with nothing more than a comparative advantage is in management, insurance, banking, and finance! ;)
Seriously, I'm not sure that the problem is that we can't produce technically proficient and brilliant folks who can advance science. The problem very well may be that as our society doesn't reward these people very well, particularly in comparison to how well it rewards lawyers, medical specialists, and MBAs. Phil Greenspun's classic Women in Science explores this (and is actually far more about the problem of rewards for a scientific career than it is specifically about gender distribution in said careers).
I really don't hold out a lot of hope for this. Academia would be hard to change, but it's changeable, and it's probably easier to steer on a public policy level than the private sector. As for the private sector... our culture there is quite simply primed to value marketers and legal talent and management more than production workers. In fact, it's pretty much a solid tenet in the business world since the advent of industrialism that you want to make production labor as fungible as possible. We've liked to believe that creative/knowledge/information workers are immune from the reach of this, but they're not. The culture will drive management and owners to see science and engineering talent as a production resource and cost center. The other thing -- worse still -- is that it might well be true that legal, finance, and management talent can bring capital holders and business owners better returns than technical talent. At least over the last 30 years or so.
Combine that with the fact that technical fields of study involve some hard intellectual work. And then add to that the problem that even with recent geek chic, there are still plenty of other professions with higher social status (on top of monetary rewards). I really doubt we're going to see any change in whether the US produces more science and engineering talent. Maybe the following could happen, though, in rough order from most to least likely:
1) The economies of foreign countries become better places for their own talent to stay. They don't emigrate here, and local demand grows enough outsourcing isn't cheap either. Scientific / engineering talent becomes more expensive, and people who might have done something else decide it's worthwhile.
2) Education, cultural, and policy changes encourage scientists and engineers to become more entrepreneurial and reap more rewards from their disciplinary sweat equity, so the potential financial rewards rise.
3) Our downturn and narratives about our downturn become so severe towards bankers, finance folks, C-execs, and other suitlike entitites that capital holders and business are reluctant to shower them with rich financial rewards.
We still want to encourage immigration though.
It's true, immigration itself is a somewhat selective process, and being somewhat selective beyond that brings high-quality labor and potential social capital into the system.
However... I don't know about the H1-B model. Seems to me it mostly allows us to place our finger on the scales of balance between talent and compensation.
Tweet, tweet.
And what scholarships would that be? When I was a foreign undergrad I got to pay full price for the privilege of attending a U.S. university. No American taxpayer-funded scholarships whatsoever for me.
Shoulda' been Chinese. Most of the Chinese students at the univerity I attended were there on the Chinese government's dime.The university loved them, because they paid full out-of-state tuition rates. Then they graduate and go home.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
When you have Neo-Cons calling for expulsion of non-white immigrants from America, this is pretty much what is expected.
New Economic Perspectives
it says most of those who're leaving have Master or PhD. Master takes 2-3 years, PhD takes 4-7 years. So those people most likely started their H1 when they are around 25-30 years old.
Granted, it hurts to lose educated people from an economy that is in desperate need of new industry (as opposed to new services and new debts) ... but ... America isn't the whole of the world, and the world as a whole has real problems. Educating these people and then dispersing them to the wind like this... it may hurt right now, but what if they take seed in places of the world in greater need of educated people... places with runaway population growth, terrible environmental records, and similarly unsustainable practices?
Heck... beyond that, after a taste of democracy, who is to say all these people going back to their less tolerant homes won't also foment cultural reforms (not that our model is picture perfect right now, but...)
It's a notion, anyways
If I have to pay employees enough to buy a house?
Look, I've got about 10 H1-B's working for me, and I'm saving a good half a million over hiring American workers. How am I supposed to afford a second house in the Bahamas? Honestly, you whiners are killing me here.
And my daughter wants a Lexus when she turns 16. Hmm, I've got an open position, and I can hire an American or H1-B... Tell me, honestly, that you'd tell your daughter she'll have to drive a 2 year old Camry because Daddy hired an American!
You people, such whiners. I tell you, these guys could teach you a lesson or two. Work less than 60 hours a week? Sure, FOR SOMEONE ELSE! Go ahead and try to leave - I can replace you in a week.
It's sad, but some of you reading this probably don't realize its satire. Hopefully I'm not bringing up bad memories of past employers for any of you.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
Foreclosures aren't the root of the falling home prices. They started falling before the lenders ramped up their processes. They are falling because they rose too quickly, because buyers were speculating and using homes as income generating devices and because people got mortgages they couldn't afford. Who thought I/O loans were a good way to get folks into homes they couldn't afford? Who thought no-paperwork loans weren't going to result in fraud?
Banks and lenders did what they did because the market and congress beat them up if they didn't lend to everyone and if they didn't go after every possible borrower and property. Conservative outfits got hammered in the press and their stock price. Borrowers did what they did because they thought housing was the path to wealth and not just a place to live. Lending guidelines that were in place 20 years ago will come back again because they existed for a reason. All the "new ways of looking at money" crap was greed at all levels.
Even if H-1B workers are good for the U.S., which is debatable, it doesn't matter in the long run, because American companies will continue to offshore work because of the cost of living in the U.S.
In the country I live in (Australia) I own a 4bedroom house in an inner-city suburb. (That's considered desirable here.) The house is worth a shade under 2M and it's nothing special. That's pretty typical for your average professional here.
I run a small sw company that is developing software for android. Labor costs in Australia are very expensive. It's tough to find good engineers for less than 100K/yr. The best graduates usually want to work for the big blue chip companies. Despite the alleged global economic downturn, unemployment here is still very low.
I would love to move to the U.S. and take advantage of the insanely cheap housing and labor costs. However the process looks hard, scary and filled with uncertainty. I would be required to retain ownership of my Australian house as proof that I plan on coming back. There is no guarantee I could stay there if I went, though I could renew my visa indefinitely.
I bet there are thousands of small business people like myself worldwide. Given the chance these people would move to the U.S. and open small-medium sized businesses that would provide a ton of jobs. But it's just too risky for many of us at the moment.
Canada is similar and I could move there tomorrow but let's face it, it's just too damn cold. I have one of the most beautiful beaches in the world about 30 minute drive from my door now. If I moved to the U.S. it would be to the South West.
It's a bit of a shame. I would love to buy a house in the U.S. real estate market right now.
Last week I worked for a company that has their roots here. Now the whole company is moving to India (back to where the owners are from). They have laid off all the American workers and are taking the indian workers home with them. They say that they aren't selling enough of their product here and they can sell their product in those countries back home. So, here we are: where we cannot afford to buy the products that the Indians can afford. The emerging markets are growing and our markets are not. The problem here isn't that we are loosing brain power. The problem here is that we are loosing our whole market. Of course in 10 years this might settle itself out somewhat but what will be left? Lots less than if we had controlled the money system in the first place. The problem is that corporations want something for nothing and then we are all left with lots less. The problem was that the derivative market was printing so much money no government could hope to keep up. Ultimately we rise and fall together (owners and workers), (foreign and american) and we really can't pretend that any other system will work. We have to control thieves, double check the integrity of the products that are sold. We have to keep a careful eye on how those products are produced so we don't kill our planet trying to sustain this crazy consumption lifestyle that we have created. There is no easy answer here.
Do you live in a cave? The real US unemployment rate is probably as high as it's been since the great depression. You can't read the headlines without coming across news of another huge layoff.
There absolutely is not plenty of room.
Canada started a policy to fast-track Immigration (not Visa) processing for H1B holders - http://www.immigration.ca/permres-pnp-h1b.asp or http://www.canadavisa.com/strategic-recruitment-stream-h1b-visa.html
I guess the US loss is Canada's gain!
OK, now I feel bad for you. Look, you're confusing the concepts of mean and range.
Consider the set {10,10,10,10,10,10,10}
The mean (average) is 10. That doesn't mean half the set members are less than ten. It simply means that the range (largest member minus smallest member) is small, or in this case zero.
Here's a great middle school tutorial on mean, median, mode and range: http://www.purplemath.com/modules/meanmode.htm
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Predictably, physics and engineering students scored high on math and lower on verbal; liberal arts students scored higher on verbal and lower on math. Management students tended to score lower than almost everyone on both sections (with education students averaging lowest of all, though there may be some interesting "continuing education" reasons for this).
And where's the part where you show that GRE scores correlate with contribution to society and the economy later in life?
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
Probably doesn't matter but I'd guess they wouldn't be all that excited about a bunch of Americans coming into their country. Just saw an article about how the rest of the world outside of the US was fairing during the current economic downturn. The Irish economy is in the dumper nowadays. Heck, even having relatives over in Ireland (which I do) may not be enough to let you stay there for an extended time and take a job. Other than the scenery there's not as much going for it as there was a few years ago.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
The temporary H1-B visa was supposed to be good for seven years. The average age at which H1-Bs come to this country is fresh out of college, so 22-23 years old plus seven years is about thirty.
Though many science PhD programs take around 7 years. Which means you finish your degree and then your H1-B is expired; at which point you have to go back to your "home" country, even though you just spent 7 years working in the US. I know PhD students from eastern European countries who are expected (by the US State Dept) to return to their 2nd-world countries for two years after graduation before they can come back to the US to further their careers in this country.
So if we are discussing the brain drain and immigration, we should really reconsider the way our immigration system works.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
I'm sorry but if you think "highly educated" means "undergrad"...
TFA is talking about people with Masters, PhDs. Undergrads rarely get TA jobs, they're usually reserved for graduates pursuing a Masters.
You sound like some company taking advantage of H1B visa applicants. The whole theory of H1B is that they do go back home.
The goal is to raise the quality of life for the world. To create jobs and worldwide economic success. Our chief export should be success.
Just watch ten or twenty years from now when the tech companies using H1B applicants and the ones shipping jobs offshore find out that they created their own competition. Competition that is very hungry and aggressive. Competition that will one day be hiring the top 10% of American talent. Not because it's cheap but because of greater demand of genuine skills and talent.
>>It is also important to note that for many colleges and universities, foreign nationals make up a large portion of the student body
It doesn't have to be that way. Americans would be glad to study STEM, if Americans felt there would be career opportunities when they graduated.
But, with the hyper-aggressive offshoring, and replacing Americans with guest workers, Americans are wisely avoiding STEM.
We can't seem to keep the LEGAL immigrants we want...the educated ones, that followed the laws, and contribute to the system. Instead, we are stuck with the ILLEGAL ones, that...well......generally are the opposite of the aforementioned legal ones.
*sigh*
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Kinda funny, I think. We are so constantly lectured that the US should not have any "protectionist" policies against India, because protectionism never works.
March 1, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/02/business/worldbusiness/02rupee.html?_r=1&ref=world
Those stats are meaningless without a baseline comparison to how many foreigners used to come here to get educated, work and save some money, build a resume, then go to another country where their money and resume is worth even more in buying power than here.
This research looks like just another fake study designed to convince Congress and Americans to keep replacing American workers with foreigners who are subsidized to compete with Americans by living abroad at least part of the time where things are cheaper. They don't care about the worse labor conditions there because they don't work there (they work here), and they don't care about the environment because they haven't grown up expecting better.
--
make install -not war
Why is everybody is such a wad about Indian temp workers? What about all the US workers who can find jobs because the market is so glutted? Doesn't the US have a right, and a responsibility, to take of it's own interests first?
Please take a quick look at this, if you don't believe me:
http://techtoil.org/wiki/doku.php?id=articles:news_and_commentary
The US could compete if the cost of getting an education here was much cheaper. The problem is--it isn't.
I have no problems with the foreign workers themselves. They, like us, are trying to make a good living. And they do a good job at that.
But they have a much lower cost of education. Doing a quick google search brings up the following URL on the education cost in India.
http://prayatna.typepad.com/education/2005/07/what_does_a_uni.html
While the above cost may be amazingly expensive in India, you could quickly pay all of that cost back by scoring a job in the United States. The average cost of a similar education in the US is sometimes as much as 10 times that, even higher if you attend a private university.
It's not that American workers are underskilled or underqualified, it's that the cost of entry into the same field of work is significantly higher than these foreign workers. The cost of something like a PhD is even much higher than a simple bachelor's degree.
And people wonder why you can't find "quality American workers".
There you go, you've got your damn jobs back!
(In reference to the prevalent attitude that companies ought not to hire 'foreign labour', they should only hire Americans. Well, ha!)
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=334764
India has four times the population of the USA. It only stands to reason that the US can not provide jobs for the Indians who want to work here. In fact, the US can not even provide jobs for US citizens.
The US tech industry was in much better shape before all the offshoring and guest workers. Enough is enough.
I'm an Indian student at one of the top most universities. I'm pursuing my Masters. I have a few things to say about this situation especially about the fees that are imposed on non-Americans. We pay 3 times and more as our american counter parts ( and mind you the conversion rate from USD to INR is 1USD = ~50INR ). We take up part time jobs to take care of our living expenses and we still manage to be on top. I heard America was all about equality and such **** but its just a lip service to the world now. Companies have refused several of my brilliant peers just because they were on an F1 visa. Shocking? I thought companies weren't supposed to discriminate amongst people applying for internships or even full time positions as long as we have *work authorization*. Every single person I met at my university told me that America was all about treating people equally and yet every single company I have dealt with have blatantly made me feel discriminated simply because I dont have *permanent work authorization* in the country. Whats the point of having an F1 visa if companies are simply going to *discriminate* against us? ( Despite their stupid form which says we're an equal opportunity employer. What does equal opportunity mean?! ) As for our American counter parts, there are about 5 Americans in a class of about 80, they're really nice people, warm, helpful. They're not lazy and some of them work much harder than us. As the report pointed out very correctly, that Americans have become a bunch of paper pushers and the government needs to stimulate more American children towards Math and Science. Last but not least, the H1B visa program has put immigrant workers at such a BIG disadvantage that if the employer fires us we have no choice but to pick up our belongings and get the hell out of the country. What the hell do we pay the social security tax for then? I fully understand that the program was supposed to fill the need for skilled laborers in short supply but frankly an H1B worker has lesser rights than a child laborer working in an obscure factory in Calcutta. Dont forget that most people here in the US have immigrants as their ancestors. America was built on an immigrant population damn it! Why do people keep forgetting that?!
The US tech industry was built, and grew explosively, before the flood of h1bs. Now we are supposed to believe that only Indians are capable of understanding technology.
Is there any real evidence to prove that h1bs have been all that helpful to US technology? When did msft start all hiring so many h1bs? Right after XP and before Vista wasn't it? Banks have been hiring tons of h1bs, and they are all just doing great aren't they?
There are plenty of highly qualified US tech workers, many of whom are unemployed, why is so critical to keep flooding the market with h1bs?
If the cost of living is so much lower in india, why not make a deal to let americans work for American companies in india, alongside the indians.
Let the indians do the tier 1 stuff, and let the americans do tier 2 and 3, get a lot lower wages than in the US but live a lot better(maid, child care, gardener, hot indian girlfriend), im betting for 15k a year in india you could live pretty well.
God, tell me you aren't our hope for "more" or we, as a nation and a society, are going to be sooo screwed. Besides, most of our young, bright minds are too damn busy becoming lawyers to go through the rigors of education to become scientists and engineers. Well, lawyers and reality-TV stars.
Oh, for the days when sig's didn't have to be cute...hey, wait a sec.
Of course this is all anecdotal, but in my experience the majority of the educated immigrants are here for the education and job opportunities, not to stay here permanently.
My experience has mirrored this. If they want to stay they will find a way, and I for one welcome them openly. As a result, it's generally more intelligent for a business to hire someone local who they know it'll be easier to keep and who'll generally be happier working there.
Labor unions are under attack because they've gone from organizations that were concerned about worker health and safety to parasites that exist only to suck as many concessions for the industries they deal with. So, not only are the companies hobbled with an over priced work force, they are crippled to how flexible they can be with respect to adopting new technology or simple things as job duties. You have to look no further than the UAW and its contracts with the US auto makers. To their credit, GM and Ford do operate some efficient world class factories. The problem is that NONE of them are in North America because of the UAW. On top of it all, they take dues that are meant for collective benefits for the workers and use that to support political parties that the workers may or may not support.
I have relatives that are or were UAW auto workers and it is unbelievable how slack their jobs are or what nonsense the hard core slackers can get away with.
Way to editorialize. I for one, am happy to see fewer certification-hoarding, Samir Not-gonna-work-heres in the industry.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Gee, you'd think those slimy foreigners could love us for something besides our money, eh? Damn those socialists, and give my regards to your wife. Maybe she loved you for something besides your money, eh? We can always hope.
Yes, that's an insult, but I can't yet decide how stupid you are. Would you be worth having as a /. foe?
Just in case you aren't an idiot, I'm curious why you are so desperate for money? I currently earn about three times my expenses, and I've become rather spendthrift these years. I really can't imagine what I'd do with more money, and I don't think I would work any harder or better if I was making somewhat more or less money. Now when you get up to the level around $1 million/year, it just seems ridiculous to me. I actually think most people would find that downright demotivating and just quit working.
Or maybe the key factor ("problem" from your perspective?) is that I enjoy my work and I'm in no hurry to retire, even though I can see that age coming up pretty quickly...
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
The team I worked with was mostly non-Americans, from both the Far East and Europe, and most of them were highly educated and wanted to stay, but I could never figure out why.
What's here is better than what they have at home.
For the moment anyway.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
It seems like for every reasonably good immigrant there are 8 other lazy and incompetent ones.
And for every reasonably good american there are at least 8 other lazy and incompetent ones.
The same is true for H1-Bs. Don't want to work all kinds of overtime? Fine, don't get wet on the way back to your country.
Software Inventor
neo-cons are not the problem. In fact, neo-cons are the ones that ramped up H1B and illegals. W pushed ICE to ignore Illegals for 7 years. Dems are also not the problem. They LOVE illegals in hopes of increasing their votes.
The problem is the average person. Most ppl see the problems with illegals taking jobs and not paying taxes (lot more than most realize). That needs to stop.
Sadly, most ppl hear about the abuses of H1B and never think about the positives. Rather than worry about bringing ppl here, I would like to see us offer H1Bs and perhaps citizenship to those that have had Secondary education in US. If they have been here for 4 years, they know a lot already about being here.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
No, it would increase the supply of skilled labor, thus reducing cost of labor across he board for those skilled positions. The immigrants would get paid less, and non-immigrant (native/already naturalized labor) would also get paid less.
Thus decreasing the economic advantage of pursuing science or engineering as a career, especially relative to law, management, or finance.
Thus leading to fewer US natives pursuing an education in these fields...
Which is fine, more or less, I suppose. Deciding to import your technical talent is one way to do things, as long as you have more money than everybody else.
The problem is what happens when these other places can afford to keep their talent at home... while, in the meanwhile, we've let the cultivation of domestic talent languish.
Tweet, tweet.
It's also not a loss when that person returns to live and work in the US and has a wider world view than someone whose idea of a world view is that the can see Russia from their house.
They will have a broader world view and they can impart some of this on the folks back home as well. This can only be a good thing and every country everywhere could use more of it.
It's about time we make some room for real US citizens. There's nothing special about the foreigners. We can make more.
I'm a foreigner ( or rather, I'm not an American... I'm not a foreigner here because I'm in my home country ), and I have a job working for a US corporation. The plan was to bring me to the US to work, which would mean spending my money in US businesses, paying US taxes, and just generally propping up the US economy.
What actually happened was the hoops were such a pain in the ass, that I work for the same company, the same pay, the same job, except all the ( previously inside America ) money that I make goes to propping up foreign business, paying foreign taxes, etc.
My entire salary is now removed from the USA, and you guys ( Americans ) don't get to see a cent of it back except for the odd purchase I make of a US built or designed product.
This can be addressed by changing how we use water, how we approach development, etc. This is not a problem without solutions (pardon the pun) -- restrict development in water-limited areas. Reduce water consumption (I did mention reducing standard of living, and egregious consumption is part of that -- I also mentioned the unsustainable natural resource use, which water is part of).
The economy needs to be retooled. Increasing the labor pool also increases demand for consumer goods -- and reduced wages will enable us to competitively manufacture consumer goods (especially as fuel and energy costs continue to rise globally).
The affordable housing issue will sort itself out, if we have the contraction that is needed. It'll be painful... but note that the intense inflationary period we'll be going through in the next decade will wipe out a lot of the housing pain. We need to pay the piper.
Ah, here is where your true nature shines through. Let me give you hint -- first, the global economy is very different than it was in the 1800s. Just advances in transportation have changed the very nature of how economies work. Never mind the fact that the economy went to shit plenty of times before the institution of the Fed, of income tax, etc -- the Fed was created BECAUSE the economy went to shit so often.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
I've been saying for years when people around me bitched about immigrants, that the time to worry about the USA is when people don't want to stay here anymore.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Comment removed based on user account deletion
RTFA, that's precisely what's happening.
With my condolences to the Monty Python:
Damn right. Besides weekends, what has organized labor done for us?
OK, OK...
Besides weekends AND vacations, what has organized labor done for us?
Hum, what... OK
Besides weekends, vacations AND paid leave, what has organized labor done for us?
Really? No kidding... OK
Besides weekend, vacation, paid leave AND fair salaries, what has organized labor done for us?
For real?
Besides weekends, vacation, paid leave, fair salaries AND safe working conditions, what has organized labor done for us?
What? Really... OK OK
Besides weekends, vacations, paid leave, fair salaries, safe working conditions AND retirements, what has organized labor done for us?
Huh? come on... OK OK
Besides weekends, vacations, paid leave, fair salaries, safe working conditions, retirement, AND medical coverage, what has organized labor done for us?
Yeah... what a bunch of dicks!
My post was not a troll, just a brief summary of 90% of the posts beneath the story (at the time), I was interested enough to click upon.
I was expecting a few trolls, but not that many.
As some of the other posters have pointed out, the large number leaving is probably due to the increase difficulty in recent graduates getting US jobs, combined with better opportunities available in their home/other country.
Having known many forgeign students, this 'go home' attitude really grates. These are not stupid people. These are people who've scrimped, saved, had parents and family take out massive loans to pay for their education. They emerge as extremely high tax net-contributors and then suddenly find themselves.... oh I give up.
Mark this up as a troll as well for all I care.
No. It's actually extremely hard both for employer and for the H-1b to successfully apply and get GreenCard now. The process is much more harder than to get H-1b. Easier to leave the country, especially if you are almost sure that to find another good job will be tough.
There's nothing special about the foreigners. We can make more.
Actually, you can't.
As an American all you can do is make more Americans.
And recent American policy abroad seems to be aimed more at reducing the numbers of foreigners.
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
Nearly 10 years ago I was in California for a while, on an H-1B visa.
While the people are very nice, it was rather nasty comparing that place to Europe (Germany, to be more exact - I'm currently living in Munich).
Medical aid was a mess: when you show up, you have to pay first. No pay, no service. Forgot your wallet at home? Tough luck.
And that was one of the better clinics - I brought somebody to one of the poorer hospitals. First in one queue, then the next. Both take about 2h, and it's not nice watching that bleeding guy after the motorbike accident being held upright by his friends for these four hours...
Work is a mess. Very few vacation days (two weeks? I get about 30 work days over here!). Sickness days? If I'm sick for more than, what, 12 days, I don't get paid?
Can be fired at any moment, getting lousy support (if any) from the state?
No thanks. No wonder smart people leave after a while. ...however: for two years, Germany has the highest migration rate since the second world war. Apparently our problems are similar to yours, after all. Wonder where they're all going?
Free PC version of ChipWits at http://www.breueronline.de/klaus/chipwits/
I worked for 6 years at a US research institute on an academic H1B. I got a new job offer and would have loved to stay but couldn't get a commercial H1B (lost in the H1B visa lottery: my chances were 1 in 3).
So I moved to Switzerland last year. I'm still working for an American company, but I won't pay any taxes, buy products or use services in the US any more. And a US citizen still won't have my job, it went overseas.
If the US decreases the H1B cap even more, you'll see more stories like this. You can't keep jobs in America this way.
No culture is perfect, and unless you import new ideas it will inevitably stagnate. Surprisingly what made your nation great was immigrants and the fact you ended up with such a blend of cultures that innovation was inevitable. Your uneducated Saharan refugee may only seem to contribute cheap labor, but you can be sure as hell his culture and pride will mean he won't be a drain on your welfare system. As for his entire family, the next generation they'll grow up with a blend of US culture and their own and you'll end up with cultural renewal.
There's nothing special about the foreigners. We can make more.
Well, not exactly. THEY can make more. If we make them, they're not foreigners.
While that is true; making more requires actually knowing, very intimately, a member of the opposite sex. This being slashdot; well, you get the idea...
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
I am an Indian, and I have some news that I thought /. folks would already know, but somehow don't really pick up on. The salaries in India for folks at the top end of the market are equal or higher (after taxes) to the salaries you get paid as an Indian on a green card, and way higher than you get on an H1-B. In the last 6 or seven years, nearly all my friends who I consider top of the game in their respective fields; software, hardware R&D, banking, management consulting and senior corporate management; have all moved back to India.
For the salary that gets them a tiny flat in a crime ridden suburb of Jersey or LA, they can get a house, two cars with drivers, 3 servants; and get to stay near the kids grandparents so they can actually go out if they want to. Many of these people are US citizens already, or green card holders. Many folks actually let their green cards lapse because they are so sure they are not coming back.
The main reason Indians move out are today are 1) they can't beat the system in India and move up high enough or 2) they are so fed up of politics and bad infrastructure that they want to get away. The US is NOT the most common destination for these folks. People who want to emigrate for good have been moving to Canada, New Zeland and the Far East. Many moved to Dubai and other Middle East countries now that you can stay there for life. It's only a percentage of techies and senior management types who did move here to do their post grad work or earn MBA's. With the cost of college tuition going up, and chance of scholarships going down, that percentage is going to drop.
There are still 65,000 people apply for H1-B VISA's every year, I do agree. Out of a population of 1 billion, that's not a high percentage. Also, if you've spent the last 3 years slogging it out to finish college, you are out of the loop back in India, and the thought of competing with the huge numbers back home can be scary. So they put in an H1-B petition so they can avoid the competition. A backdoor start if you will. A very large percentage of these really don't want to live here for the rest of their lives (nor will be allowed to by their parents)
On a related note - I do agree with most posters here that a vast majority of Indian programmers who you get to work with suck. On behalf of my fellow Indians, I apologize for foisting these bozos on you. But you were suckers enough to pay for them and - Caveat Emptor and all that. You should really have been paying more attention during the interviews. There are some great programmers out there - and I consider myself one of them. When you buy in bulk, you are going to get some rotten fruit with the good stuff. Spend a little more time and shop around - and you can cherry pick the best. If you did not do that, or get your organization to do that - you will, unfortunately get ripped off. I, for one, always tip over the strawberry boxes to look at the bottom row that's hidden under the juicy ones. If you find a shop that never has ones with fungus and frost damage in the bottom row, let me know.
The INS Dehumanization of Foreigners Act is to blame. OK, so I joke, but having worked on a project in the US for a few years (before returning home). Here's my experience of the visa process.
First I was on an L1 as an intracompany transferee. I wasn't cheap to my company either - they did indeed pay the prevailing wage, and on top of that, a substantial international service allowance that paid all of my living expenses and then some (the ISA was something like double my actual basic living expenses). Since they are a big firm and have many people working in many different countries, they have a whole department that looks after people on international service. This department does things like visa paperwork. They are very experienced with it.
However, my visa application was refused (section 224g IIRC, "insufficient information") and the US Embassy demanded that I go and have a visa interview at the embassy. The ream of paperwork, incidentally, was filled out just like they had been doing successfully for some months - but they explained to me that every so often the embassy staff changes, and some new footling jobsworth rule changes, and they just start bouncing applications. I was just unlucky enough to hit a staff change. So I go up to London, where you have to line up outside the embassy at the crack of dawn for a good hour or so. Then you have to line up to get a delicatessen style ticket. Then you sit down and wait, while they call numbers.
You can't read a book while they are doing this - the numbers are called in seemingly random sequence, and you just know after your initial experience already with the embassy if you are reading, and miss your number, they won't call it again and you'll get sent home to repeat the experience some weeks later. So you sit and get bored. If you do decide to read, they have these "newspapers" around called something like "Going USA". The first half of which bizarrely seems to be dedicated to how terrible your own country is, how great the USA is, and what a good time your country folk are having running gas stations in Florida. The second half of the "newspaper" is dedicated to how they aren't going to give you a visa anyway.
Anyhow, after 4 hours, my number came up. The guy asked me a single question - what are the dates of service with your company? I told him. He said, "That's great, you'll get your passport back in about a week". They could have asked me that over the phone and saved me a completely unproductive day (and a great deal of expense). Now I have no quarrel with the guy who did the "interview" at the embassy, he was perfectly courteous and polite. But the whole bureaucratic machine is a red-taped mess.
I had a second run-in with the Embassy's bureaucratic machine again when my visa got extended. It was actually approved by the INS in the United States, all I needed to do was if I went back home on a trip, was to get the new visa stuck in my passport. The Embassy literally had nothing to do other than print the thing as it was already approved. There was another form to fill in for the Embassy (which merely duplicated all the information the INS already had when they approved the new visa), so I filled this in, sent it and the paperwork from the INS in the USA to the Embassy. They refused my new visa! My new pre-approved visa! Why? Because the form was out of date. So I downloaded the new form off the Embassy website and it was...exactly..the..same....as...the...one I sent, apart from the date at the bottom. Exactly the same. This bureaucratic stupidity cost me another couple of days as the new paperwork had to make yet another round trip.
Now I'm not singling out the USA here. My current next door neighbour is Albanian - she's very smart, has an engineering degree, and fluently speaks English, German and French (and of course Albanian). But the British embassy treated her like a liar and criminal - they were deliberately extremely unpleasant, rude and aggressive to her face (and indeed, she wouldn't have come here if it wasn't
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
smart move
You don't compete.
The only way you can reasonably compete with someone in a third world country who lives in a plywood shack and eats a bowl of rice a day is if you are willing to live the same lifestyle.
In an International economy, money is a bit like water. It's always going to roll down to the low points. While it's true that this has the advantage of raising the standard of living at the low end, it also decreases it at the high end. This is why there are borders and tariffs - to build a dam between economies that regulates the flow.
I've seen more than a few sentimental references to that poem on the statue in NY harbor. That poem was put there during the immigration boom of the early 20th century. Recall that during those years, we had low wages and abuse of workers on a massive scale. We tried to patch it then (and ever since) by running in circles passing more and more regulations on business. By nature, regulations limit freedoms and cost money to enforce. It could have (and still can) be done another way.
The real problem was that jobs and applicants are a supply and demand market. The demand for workers was finite, but the supply was unlimited. So a worker's value (to the company) was near zero. In a more balanced economy where the labor supply was closer to demand, employers would have had to make some reasonable concessions. But they were under no such pressure.
What's needed is a sensible trade and immigration policy - one that balances immigration with the job market, and prevents us from competing openly with countries who do not share our standard of living. Yes, it's true that prices would go up without cheap imports. But wages would hold too and we would have a balance.
The united states became the worlds dominant technological power house through the exercise of liberal education benefits. Unlike Europe and a lot of countries you could become educated with fairly modest means if you are willing to work.
Many nations have very strict rules about how people should learn and ultimately those who may be intelligent, do not get to participate.
This I believe is what attracts and large number of people here.
The executive management of many companies avoid paying taxes, take our University research and then export the manufacturing and knowledge to other countries like clock work.
In affect, the US Tax payer is paying to fund the industrial and research bases of foreign countries for one reason only: Greed.
These sorts of practices destroy our industrial base and the ability of people to become employed and buy things and pay taxes to fund more University research and access to education.
I don't mind if people come here, but I do mind how our policies of Globalization are destroying the technological and industrial bases this country once had by moving everything out of the country.
I mean is it any wonder now that the middle class has collapsed in the USA, that nobody can buy anything? Nobody can find a job because all of the manufacturing base has left the country.
Even with this downturn, China's economy will continue to grow at around 3-5% per year because they have all of the industrial base including research and manufacturing.
First thing we need to do is to restore our industrial base and actually make things here. That is what creates jobs.
But, I do not see anyone discussing that course of action.
Instead, all I see is our government destroying our currency by printing huge sums of money so people here can keep Chinese industrial base alive by buying Chinese stuff.
That is NOT going to help our long term employment problem, or restore the middle class in this country which now, sadly doesn't even exist.
We need to stop this insane practice for example, of building all of these high tech chip fabrication plants over seas and build them here and make CHINA buy our stuff, not the other way around.
Our exports relative to imports is WAY way WAY out of whack.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
But-but-but-but!!! Where will they get their underpaid graduate students, unwilling to report nuclear material handling violations and willing to ignore exposure guidelines, just so that they can take home that knowledge of nuclear weapons to Pakistans, where they can spread it to our partners like Iran and North Korea?
Ordinarily, I'd think that was a racist comment, but I actually saw this occurring in the nuclear engineering department of my city's best engineering school 20 years ago, and it was pretty frightening. It stopped when the Army visited the nuclear facility on an inspection tour and a US general expressed his deep concerns. And yes, the department had to shift a lot of its handling of students to get US students after that, improving their safety, doing less obviously military work, and being much more aware of where these nuclear experts might go with their educations and their access to classified research materials.
"Individual Americans are some of the most decent people I've met. Collectively, though, you people scare me."
A person is decent, people are scary. Please do not limit this to Americans only. It's like that everywhere.
"the kind of people who make the greatest contribution to the US economy and to business and job growth"
What we need in this world is fewer overpaid managers. Who do you think is authorizing massive bonuses despite profit loss in these large corporations? That's right, management. Who does the least amount of the down and dirty work, managers. Who typically has the highest payroll? Management. Who typically wants to find the cheapest workforce and lacks general understanding of their projects? Management!
Workers I will take, educated people willing to earn a good pay (stressing the earn), but I have no use for managers or people that did nothing to learn a trade fully first before seeing the end of the rainbow by trying to START in management.
Once they spend a few years in their native land they will realize what they gave up when they left.
They will be back, trust me. I have seen it dozens of times.
I totally believe you. On the same subject, my relatives are among the ten richest kings of Europe, and you'd be surprised at what slackers they are!
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
Is that to say now we are f*cked because we don't have any "american" doctors, or engineers available...who cares if they go back to their country, it is not like we have only idiots here, we have Bush for Christ's sake, we will be alright! Yeeeeha!
The person who wrote the article is hardly unbiased. He's merely trumpeting his own country. Not convincing.
At least people can get US citizenship, they only need to live and work in the states 3 years.
Compare that with say Germany where you have to live 8 years and you may never get citizenship.
Or Switzerland, where people in your community vote on you and if you should be allowed to get citizenship. So don't piss your neighbors off ever.
As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
Maybe this will mean that there will be more college professors able to speak comprehensible English, and thus bring up the overall intelligence of our own collegiate population.
You know, I don't like to be treated as a criminal by default when visiting a foreign country
According to whois, you live in Japan. Which has probably been the most xenophobic country in the last 500-1000 years. It's still culturally acceptable, if not expected, to refer to foreigners as gaijin- and god help you if you're Asian but not Japanese. Please tell me how many non-Japanese people you se on your way to work today? Uh huh- your country is one of the least racially-integrated on the planet.
Wikipedia says Japan in the 80's tortured prisoners (held for 72 hours, then another 10 days without any charges, all in line with your constitution) to extract confessions- and in the 70's, suspects were tortured until they signed blank confessions. We've had trial-by-jury for 200 years; you had it for 20 years around 1920, and now you're just finally getting it back.
Shall we go into freedom of the press? http://www.google.com/search?q=japan+media+blackout
...so pardon me if I say a giant "what the fuck?" to you complaining about the US being a "police state" or US xenophobia.
I was looking forward to go back to the US and see NYC (I liked Massachusetts).
You might want to try getting your geography straight- NYC is in NY, not Massachusetts.
Then again, I watched with amazement as an ABC reporter said he was in NY and then said "Here in New England..."
New York state never has, and never will be, part of New England. It's MA, RI, VT, NH, ME.
Please help metamoderate.
I went through an immigration nightmare. My Green Card had been temporary for 5 years (legally it should be all done in 2 years). My service center was in Nebraska and the correspondence with them showed me that the people writing do not have a clue of basic English grammar. Moreover, once I called the "hotline" and someone with a thick Indian accent answered (did they outsource immigration too?). My file kept getting lost, I had to travel 6 to 10 hours several times to go to an immigration office and submit address and phone number in person. Last summer my case was declined again (for the 3rd time) because they claimed they did not have a way to contact me (after 5 TIMES I submitted my address). Fortunately for me I kept all correspondence showing that they were sending me letters therefore they HAD my address. When I asked for specific questions they never replied with a specific answer just an envelope with no date and no return address saying "your file is here" (more or less). Then my name was screwed up, I had to submit documents to have my name corrected. Finally after last rejection I got tired and went to my senator's office and complained, bringing all evidence. Within 2 days my permanent green card was issued, valid for 10 years. And guess what? It came with my name screwed up in the same way that it was the first time.
I'm not in management, but a good manager can make the difference between a bunch of brilliant people producing fantastic work and a bunch of brilliant people producing nothing. Whether they managers themselves are "more intelligent" or not isn't relevant.
And guess what? If your brilliant people are diverse, it sometimes helps to have diverse managers.
Personally, I think we should restrict immigration from other states. I'm sick of those Texans coming here and taking Californian jobs.
"dding to the brain drain is a problem with slow US visa processing, since last November or so, that has been driving desirable students and scientists out of the country. "
well if this holds true, then there should be plenty of room in the masters and phd programs for good ol' americans, wait, the average american public school student isn't prepared for college nevermind a masters or phd progam? the only higher level education that is still dominated by american students is law? oh.
-my point is that there needs to be a very concentrated effort to improve lower levels of education in this country so that they can even qualify as a "desireable" student!
I really don't think that that's gonna happen because this economy revolves around the ignorance and inaction of others.
like a man without arms, you can't hang......
I've been party to both positive and negative foreign worker experiences.
I've had the privilege of working with a lot of extremely qualified, foreign-born engineers. Some from Europe, some from Asia. They're no different than American workers - you have to interview effectively to make sure you hire the best people. If you don't hire the best people, you're going to get bad people. Of all the foreign workers I've worked with, only one has not been worth his salary.
So if the foreign workers your company hires are a waste of money, shame on your company for having a poor interview and review process. But that has nothing to do with immigration - a nice talking kid from US engineering college could do just as much exaggeration and get hired at the same company.
On the strongly negative front, we outsourced part of a project once. Needed it done ASAP. Contracted a company in India to do it. Waste of money. Got zero value out of it. Just couldn't do effective management/quality control over half the globe and 12 time zones.
Anyway, if your company is hiring unqualified employees, that's a hiring problem, not an immigration problem.
paintball
While that is technically true (at least according to Wikipedia), for a large portion of the rest of the world, it's pretty much Close Enough. Similarly, Arizona and Nevada are technically not the "west coast", but from the perspective of someone on the eastern side of our nation, it's pretty close.
Yes, we can compete, so long as force and fraud are discouraged. When someone starts talking about "best and brightest" while hiring the cheapest and most easily brow-beaten, something's amiss. If it were really about "the best and brightest" there would be an IQ test. I'm thinking something along the lines of a score of at least 180 on multiple tests, or ACT aggregate of 32, or SAT of 1400 or better, or the equivalent for GREs. As to the inherited title, the USA is already over-crowded. You can see the cracks (some of them literal) in the infrastructure systems: water, toxic waste clean-up, electricity systems, roads, bridges, locks and dams, schools... not to mention the vast pool of unemployed and under-employed US citizens who are bright, knowledgeable, creative, industrious STEM workers. Every couple weeks I get an e-mail response from another "recruiter" saying that none of their clients are willing to relocate candidates within the USA. The job ads are mostly for body shopping (temp and "services") and few for real, full-time permanent (or long-term) employment making software and hardware products. Few ads include e-mail addresses. Nearly all are so inundated with applicants that they run inquiries through resume parsers to grab random buzz-words and dump them into data-bases, instead of conscientiously and actively reading resumes, talking with applicants and matching able and willing people with the work to be done. There's not a "Jerry Maguire" or even a "Dave" out there, and I don't think there have been since before those movies were made. (Then again, a lot of the projects I hear enthusiastically touted, even in radio ads recently, involve massive rights violations, most notably privacy violations, tracking individuals, etc. Why would they expect any self-respecting US citizen to aid and abet such abuse?)
Inscription for the statue of bondage.
And frankly, US citizenship is not so valuable that it should be dramatically harder to obtain than an EU, UK, or Australian citizenship. But it is.
If it isn't, then why are the majority of them still coming here?
What shocks me every time I stand on the US customs line is how come it's so fucking easy for complete losers to simply immigrate to the US (where they'll do any menial job that's available), while if you're a scientist, engineer or a doctor (that is, you have a lot to loose with immigration - but also a lot to gain), it's a complete PITA to simply become a US resident/worker?
Same thing in Europe. Boat people simply immigrate. Engineers, scientists and other highly qualified workers etc. must face a veritable via crucis.
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
> precisely the kind of people who make the greatest contribution to the US economy and to business and job growth.
Am I the only one who doesn't understand the PhD obsession?
I sort of feel like it's the people with ingenuity, insight, and an ability get things done who make the greatest contribution to the US economy. Those qualities may or may not be found in a single person, and that person may or may not have a PhD.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
According to whois, you live in Japan.
You took the time to check the whois info of my domain. You REALLY should have taken a look at my site too. Then you would have seen that I'm not Japanese. I'm Spanish, and quite happy living here.
Not counting myself, there are 10-12 other non-Japanese sitting close to me right now (we're around 70 people on this floor). But perhaps this is a bad example, since after all I'm working for an American company.
Most of my friends here are foreigners, many of them American. And so far I haven't heard anything about any of them having any issues here, just the opposite.
You might want to try getting your geography straight- NYC is in NY, not Massachusetts.
My geography is fine, thank you. I stayed in Boston / Massachusetts when I was visiting the MIT.
My site
While that is technically true (at least according to Wikipedia), for a large portion of the rest of the world, it's pretty much Close Enough.
Try that argument on someone from Ireland and see how well they react to being described as "British."
Please help metamoderate.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
In the future you might find yourself serving curry to Indians or sushi to Japanese, or whatever, depending on who has the money and is prepared to offer a pathetic Westerner such as yourself a menial service job.
Times change and those that don't realize that are going to struggle.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
H1-B wages are not the problem. By law, an employer is required to pay H1-B at least as much or more than the US market average for the given position.
But this is America - the only people required to obey the law are American citizens who fall into the category of "employee" or "unemployed".
Obeying that particular law is...ummm...unpopular. See http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=189401976/, as just one of many similar sources.
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
Yes that is pretty weird. We use Meters over here.
Everyone uses meters like voltmeters, ammeters etc. A meter is simply a device that measure something. Perhaps that's why you found metres the unit too confusing and stuck to using yards, inches, furlongs etc.?
Many people would be very happy to keep their citizenship, but that would mean an eternal threat of deportation, specially during xenophobic fests (like during recessions).
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
All this has been tried and tested: welcome to the European Union.
People in rich countries used to say pretty much the same as you uninformed rant, what happened is that after an initial influx from people from richer countries (both skilled and unskilled, because people don't move because they are "losers", they move because the incentives elsewhere are better, hardly a losers' attitude), the flux died out, immigrants became wealthier and were able to support the economy back home.
Free movement of people paired with free trade made poorer countries richer, up to the point that there is no immigration to former richer countries anymore.
The UK, Germany and France were not overrun by Spanish, Portuguese and Greek immigrants, nowadays these countries are prosperous and have now an "immigration problem" of their own.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Any developer, from lets say Mexico, has gone through 5 years of very rigorous University education (I know, I fare quite well against people educated in good UK universities).
If I have stayed in Mexico, my salary would be peanuts compared to what somebody in a rich country earns.
I would be a lo cost developer.
But my the quality of my work is demonstrably on par with anybody else's from anywhere else in the world (I can say this with confidence after working in several countries in different continents).
I was not even the smartest guy in my University for Pete's sakes.
Projects that fail do so not because the people doing the work are not talented, they do so because management does not know what they are doing.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Wait until the administration and congress raise taxes on 95% of the job-providers and producers of goods. Then the capital itself will begin moving overseas to countries with sufficient stability and more favorable tax policies.
You, sir, are a rare visionary. Such a simple and elegant solution! It seems obvious in retrospect.
Genius! Pure genius!
Yeah, this is something that's really confused the heck out of me. I agree that the US needs more immigration (our birthrate is really low), so why not make our immigration laws more favorable to more productive, college-educated foreigners? You know, the ones that some other country paid to educate while we reap the benefits?
Instead, we want to open up our borders to Mexican peasants. This does not make a great deal of sense to me.
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
Comment removed based on user account deletion
New York was part of the Dominion of New England. York was in England. New York is considered to be part of "Greater New England"
There are a lot of mitigating factors in mistakenly placing New York in New England.
Man, you really need that seminar!
So, unemployment is at 8,1% (highest since '83) and everyone is surprised H1-B's are going home?
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.