US Colleges Say Hiring US Students a Bad Deal

theodp writes "Many US colleges and universities have notices posted on their websites informing US companies that they're tax chumps if they hire students who are US citizens. 'In fact, a company may save money by hiring international students because the majority of them are exempt from Social Security (FICA) and Medicare tax requirements,' advises the taxpayer-supported University of Pittsburgh (pdf) as it makes the case against hiring its own US students. You'll find identical pitches made by the University of Delaware, the University of Cincinnati, Kansas State University, the University of Southern California, the University of Wisconsin, Iowa State University, and other public colleges and universities. The same message is also echoed by private schools, such as John Hopkins University, Brown University, Rollins College and Loyola University Chicago."

Comments

Don't blame the universities

[spikenerd]

Who is the problem here? The universities who tell it like it is? Or the morons in congress who make it the way it is?

Lou Dobbs Dot

[Deag]

I seem to have wandered into LouDobbsDot by accident.

These students I am sure are paying well to be attending those universities and part of that fee is towards support services for their interests.

It doesn't seem unreasonable to me for those services to highlight whatever advantages these students have, because they probably have a lot of disadvantages in language and local knowledge.

Mod Summary Troll.

[bmo]

Since Brown is literally up the road from me, I decided to click on Brown's PDF first, and then the others. I thought maybe there was a breaking story I could submit to the Providence Journal so they could get the whole state of Rhode Island up in arms.

The summary doesn't match the language of the PDFs in the least.

I don't have enough middle fingers for this summary. It's massive troll.

Unless exempted by a tax treaty, F-1 and J-1 students earning income under practical training are subject to
applicable federal, state, and local income taxes. Information on tax treaties may be found in Internal Revenue
Services Publication 519, U.S. Tax Guide for Aliens, and 901, U.S. Tax Treaties. Generally, F-1 and J-1
students are exempted from Social Security and Medicare tax requirements. However, if F-1 and J-1 students
are considered resident aliens for income tax purposes, Social Security and Medicare taxes should be
withheld. Chapter 1 of Internal Revenue Services Publication 519, U.S. Tax Guide for Aliens explains how to
determine the residency status of international students. More information on Social Security and Medicare
taxes can be found in Chapter 8 of Internal Revenue Services Publication 519, U.S. Tax Guide for Aliens and in
Section 940 of Social Security Administration Publication No. 65-008, Social Security Handbook.

Does that sound like employers can avoid taxes by hiring foreign students? I don't think so, Bob.

--
BMO

Kneejerk reaction.

[ikarous]

Read the PDF that is linked in the article. At no point does it advocate hiring international students over United States citizens. The document does mention that a company can conceivably save money since the majority of these students are exempt from Medicare and FICA tax requirements. Furthermore, the document is published by the university's international services department. It is their purpose to try to get the best deal for international students.

This article is trolling. Move on.

Re:All the proof I needed

[UnknowingFool]

If you RTFA instead of the summary you'd see it was a very poor and biased summary. The actual article did not advocate any such position.

Re:All the proof I needed

[dov_0]

The real reason could be this: International students pay well for their studies. If they hav work, they stay on studying to the end of their courses and can pay their fees. More importantly, they also encourage other students to come and study in the USA.

Re:Solution?

[thrillseeker]

Or you could move to a sales tax instead

a sales tax does not make the congressman a middleman with sufficient power

Re:Tax Exempt?

[Moryath]

Who said the government ever makes sense?

Seriously. Look at Microsoft - they've been pushing outsourced (e.g. "revolving temp agency hiring") and overseas-sourced (how many times did Bill Gates lie his ass off claiming he "couldn't find" people trained to do things here while pushing for H1-B increases?) for years now. I have a friend who just spent three years "working for Microsoft", but he was actually hired by a temp agency (along with 80% of the people in his building) and forced to work "Shifts" with 90-day breaks in between "hirings" to avoid MS or the temp agency having to pay out certain benefits.

Of course we should be making it better on taxes to hire American workers than foreign workers, and that doesn't just go for visa holders; we should be taxing companies that use outsourced labor overseas, too. If they don't want to pay the tax, they can move their factories and resources back to the States.

Michael Dell is too cheap to pay for labor in the country that made him rich. I think the government owes him a reality check on behalf of US.

Re:Tax Exempt?

[LKM]

With the way the recession is currently in the US, it makes no sense for the US govt. to not only allow, but, in some cases expedite bringing foreigners in (or letting them in willy nilly across the border illegally) to fill jobs that our own citizens are in desperate need of...

That makes little sense, but I approve. In fact, as somebody who lives in Europe, I encourage every smart, qualified worker who doesn't feel welcome in the US to come over here. We'll get out of these economic problems by having smart people do innovative things. It doesn't really matter where they were born, but it does matter where they work.

I don't see that a state funded school should be allowed by the taxpayers of that state to promote the hiring of foreign people over US citizens either...that's not what my tax dollars should be going for...

So you're saying that universities should promote political opinions instead of the truth?

Re:Tax Exempt?

[c6gunner]

Of course we should be making it better on taxes to hire American workers than foreign workers, and that doesn't just go for visa holders; we should be taxing companies that use outsourced labor overseas, too. If they don't want to pay the tax, they can move their factories and resources back to the States.

Or you could ... I dunno .... maybe SIMPLIFY THE TAX CODE and get rid of these dumb laws which create these idiotic problems in the first place? How much longer do you expect to be able to keep adding bandaids on top of one another?

Re:Tax Exempt?

[Ironica]

"Do not take things out of context! What the document says is companies might save some money if they hire foreigners on F-1 or J-1 visas. It is just so foreigners _who_study_in_the_United_States_ can find a job since employers seem to be under the impression that hiring a foreigner is a hassle."

With the way the recession is currently in the US, it makes no sense for the US govt. to not only allow, but, in some cases expedite bringing foreigners in (or letting them in willy nilly across the border illegally) to fill jobs that our own citizens are in desperate need of...

These particular foreigners have come to study at universities here. The universities bring foreign students over for a number of reasons:
* It makes it easier for our students to study in foreign countries when they want to.
* Different academic emphases in different cultures lead to students who bring a fresh perspective and a different set of background knowledge to research and inquiry.
* Foreign students are usually required to pay not just non-resident tuition, but an even higher additional fee to public universities.
* Positive experiences studying in the US send foreign students home with a new take on American culture and values. It's a fairly cheap and easy method of exporting democracy to certain parts of the world.

Our own university system would suffer if we ended international student recruitment. Unfortunately, because studying at US institutions is so expensive, many foreign students need to be able to find jobs to work while they're in school. Therefore, those programs are threatened by bigoted or ignorant employers who have something against hiring foreign students. (They're also threatened by DHS procedures that get students placed on the wrong list and have their visas held up for weeks, while their research languishes and in some cases completely expires, losing them a year or more of work.)

Re:Tax Exempt?

[cayenne8]

"And what exactly do you propose the government cuts? It's easy to hide behind generalities saying "we need to cut spending" without taking the loss of quality of life into consideration. Yes we could cut millions of dollars from the highway system, but our roads would deteriorate into an even more unacceptable state, yes we could cut education even more, but that would overwork an already overburdened, under appreciated set of teachers and put American children out of competition with those educated elsewhere. tl;dr it's a lot more complicated than lopping off a percentage off of everything"

Well, if they would start a very honest effort, I'm sure they could find TONS of stuff they could do without. Let's start with some really outdated things they fund? I mean, the just recently got rid of the federal excise tax that used to be on your phone bill that was used to pay for the Spanish-American war. That tax lasted from 1898 till 2006 I believe. Well, there are federal spending dollars going to things like that too. We could start there and drop all spending for programs that are outdated.

No we don't need to cut education dollars first..BUT, why not dismantle the bureaucracy layers above the teachers and schools? I mean, we pay a LOT per student, but, by the time that $$ actually reaches the student, there is very little left for him and the teacher and the school itself. If you could cut out the upteen layers of middle men, I'll be you'd find we could cut spending, and STILL have the student/teacher level realizing more dollars than they do today.

While I do support a safety net for the elderly and the truly infirmed, I don't see a need to subsidize any abled bodied person that can work. If you screwed around and didn't get an education, well the world needs fruit picked and ditches dug. If we put off all the able bodied workers on welfare and entitlement programs, we wouldn't have a need for so many ILLEGAL (there is a difference) alien workers. Taking care of that situation, would also ease the burden that feds and state have to pay for schools and social services that non-citizens use, as well as a large chunk of medical expenditures that we all pay treating illegals here in the US at the emergency rooms that they use for emergency and less than emergency tx.

Have you seen the highway system lately? It isn't looking good. Let's stop subsidizing everyone, the corn farmers, the corporations, all the special interests. We should NOT be giving money out to anyone from the tax coffers. It should only be used for basic government needs and functions. Hell, why do we give money to other countries? I mean, sure, in a time of need emergencies, I don't have a problem with it..like when the tsunami hit, sure you help out. But this constant stream of $$ out of the US is just bribe money for trying to get someone to vote or act our way. Screw that.

There is a fuck-ton load of waste in the bureaucracy of the United States govt.

Unfortunately, I think the only way to get the Fed. to stop spending like a drunken sailor on leave, is for the states to grow some balls, and STOP SENDING MONEY to the federal govt. I think we have to dry up the funds before they will cut the spending.

Re:Tax Exempt?

[cayenne8]

"the second biggest item in the US budget (16.9%) is the Department of Defense,"

Hey, at least it is ONE govt. program that DOES stimulate the economy and put money back in the hands of the citizens. There is a lot of money to be made in working these military govt. contracts. At least they aren't wasted dollars as bad as some govt. projects are. Good high tech jobs for these dollars, better than subsidies to corn farmers and high fructose corn syrup interests.

Re:Tax Exempt?

[Manchot]

Broken window fallacy. It's only "stimulating" the economy by taking money from the citizens and giving it to the defense contractors. If we cut our defense budget by 15%, we could pay for health care.

Re:Welfare bums now SS disability bums.

[LordKazan]

so why the hell are you bitching and not reporting them and their "doctors" for fraud like a responsible citizen.

fuck dude, take some responsibility.