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Mark Zuckerberg Throws Pal Joe Green Under the Tech Immigration Bus
theodp (442580) writes "A month after he argued that Executive Action by President Obama on tech immigration was needed lest his billionaire bosses at Mark Zuckerberg's FWD.us PAC have to hire 'just sort of OK' U.S. workers, Re/code reports that Joe Green — Zuckerberg's close friend and college roommate — has been pushed out of his role as President of FWD.us for failing to Git-R-Done on an issue critical to the tech community. "Today, we wanted to share an important change with you," begins 'Leadership Change', the announcement from the FWD.us Board that Todd Schulte is the new Green. So what sold FWD.us on Schulte? "His [Schulte's] prior experience as Chief-of-Staff at Priorities USA, the Super PAC supporting President Obama's re-election," assured Zuckerberg in a letter to FWD.us contributors, "will ensure FWD.us continues its momentum for reform." Facebook, reported the Washington Post in 2013, became legally "dependent" on H-1B visas and subject to stricter regulations shortly before Zuckerberg launched FWD.us with Green at the helm."
But, how is this possible? I thought Obama banned his team from becoming lobbyists after they left him???
I guess that rule doesn't apply to everyone. Good thing we have the most transparent administration ever and these lobbying efforts won't influence anyone...
Super PACs are run independent from individual campaigns and are not allowed to coordinate with candidates. So he wasn't part of Obama's staff, in theory...
Drive down wages
In the specific case of Facebook, it is not about driving wages down. Facebook pays decent wages, even for Silicon Valley standards. It is about not increasing wages.
What Facebook et al need is a way to ensure that they'll be able to fill their positions without creating too much of a jobseekers market so they won't be forced to lure employees away from the competition. All those sign-on bonuses, recruiter fees and salary increases (usually roughly 10% if you jump ship) will add up quickly.
Truth of the matter is, in the SF Bay Area, it is hard to be unemployed if you're a properly skilled tech worker, citizen, green-card holder or otherwise. That doesn't mean I condone the way that the H1-B program often is being abused today. I've seen abuse, and we'll always see that. But this is only made possible due to the ridiculous limits on permanent resident visas vs the amount of H1-B visas, as I pointed out in this comment.:
There is disconnect between the amount of H1-B visas (which are not limited per country) and amount of greencards (which are limited per country). We all know which country I'm talking about: the folks from India, however you may feel about their presence, are hitting this the most: For each EB category (EB1, EB2, EB3 in general), there are 265 greencards available per month. That's a little over 9500 per year. On the other side is the number of H1-B (and L-1) visa that get allocated to workers chargeable to India. Just for H1-B, that number comes close to 170,000 just for FY2012 (source [uscis.gov]). Then there are the L1 visa holders, which are uncapped.
So, you end up having ~10k greencards, vs ~200k influx, just for India alone. This means that there is a huge waiting list for people with approved I-140s, but not eligible to file for AOS. What are you going to do with them? Sent them back? Politics chose to let them stay by renewing their H1-B every 1 to 3 years, even after the 6th year.
I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are missing.
the disappointing thing about FWD.us is it focuses too much on increasing the quota of temporary (H-1B) visas, and almost no effort on streamlining the path from temporary to permanent. The reason isn't so difficult to see, temporary visas (6-years) are great for employers, not only do they bring in invaluable skills, but they also ensure those skills are tied to the company. They're not so great for either the temporary workers or other potential competitors in the labor market, because they are tied until the sponsoring employer *may at its discretion* apply for permanent residence status. Note in this case success is by no means assured, and may take up to two years. Personally I think the current H-1B quota is more than adequate if it were not used so heavily by a small number of companies, who account for the vast majority of applications. The most urgently needed reform is to not only streamline the permanent residence process, but to also give more agency to H-1B workers, to for instance self-petition for permanent residence status based on a number of factors. This will reduce the natural 'pull' to employers for temporary workers, and even the playing field between temporary and permanent residents.
First of all, on the "poor underpayed H1-B" myth. I live and work in Seattle metro area. My base pay is $150k, and then another $40k on top of that in bonuses.
First off, individual salaries of very highly skilled H-1B visa holders does nothing to undermine the "poor underpaid H-1B" myth. Does the fact there is a black president mean there is absolutely no discrimination left in the US?
According to the Center for Immigration Studies, H-1B Visa holders in the computer industry make on average $13k less per year than a citizen. In addition to that, 85% of H-1B workers work for less than the median wage for their occupation. Looks like you are not the norm.
Just because you are one of the few H-1B workers that almost all US citizens would agree we want to immigrate here does nothing to disprove the fact that H-1B workers depress wages by flooding the market with underpaid workers.
Every time I see these stories, I know what comments there will be, but I'm getting tired of all the whining and bullshit.
The sad thing is when anyone complains about H-1B workers they are almost immediately accused of xenophobia and/or labeled as whining. I hate our H-1B system, but only because of how unfairly it treats H-1B workers. I am a consultant and I work with many of these immigrants. I am appalled at how horrible the system is that they describe. If we had a properly functioning H-1B program, instead of the indentured servitude it usually consists of, I would bet that H-1B workers would make above median wages.
If they weren't just an exploited group (in the vast majority of cases), companies would only bring over the best and the brightest. And this would be wonderful.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
If you in truth think Bush was the brains behind everything, I'd say there's quite a few missing links. Cheney, however, has been documented leading quite a few initiatives, such as the invasion of Iraq. His commentary after leaving office has also been revealing, as has the total lack of statements from W.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.