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."

Comments

Stop using Facebook

[koan]

There couldn't be a wrose personality to be in power than Zuckerberg.

Re:Stop using Facebook

[Anonymous Coward]

Only idiots would trust Mark "People trust me. Dumb Fucks" Fuckerberg.

Re:Stop using Facebook

[Gr8Apes]

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.

Dafuq wrote this snippet?

[Anonymous Coward]

I hereby award you Most Unreadable News Snippet Award. Bravo.

This debate is about money.

[Anonymous Coward]

What this boils down to is we've got a company propped up on nothing more than hot air and advertising that has to lowball the market in order to keep their ill-gotten goods. Keep in mind Zuckerbergs billions came from people investing in his company, it didn't come from actual sales of a product. Of course the man is a scam artist.

1: To have Americans work on critical projects and not spill the beans to your competition, you need a NDA and non-compete agreement, both if which you pay American workers a premium for. With H1B's, you don't.

2: When you hire a college grad with a school loan, you're paying their them to be educated irregardless if you like it or not.

3: This is about wage arbitrage; whenever you sell products made in a slave wage state to a free state, you are in effect consuming the margin the labor pool in that free state would otherwise make to, and here's the key guys, put the cash in your pocket, you aren't doing a god damn thing for the world. There aren't more engineers, or better educated engineers, or better products, or better designed products, or better manufacturing and construction methodology. Do that enough and you destabilize the government like in Russia, and that one led to millions of deaths from the Russian Mob selling of arms, including nukes, to foreign countries.

4: What are you doing, Zuckerberg, to motivate Americans to work hard? Because at the end of the day, if you aren't sharing the profits and are just exploiting you, Americans will destroy your business. Mexicans do the same thing nowadays, and the Indians, well, they aren't much better.

Re:This debate is about money.

[bhcompy]

1: To have Americans work on critical projects and not spill the beans to your competition, you need a NDA and non-compete agreement, both if which you pay American workers a premium for. With H1B's, you don't.

Well, Facebook is located in California where non-competes are not legally enforceable, so there's that

Re:This debate is about money.

[pepty]

How to fix the H1-B problem:

1. Keep the process of sponsoring H1-Bs roughly the same, but slightly more expensive.

2. Once the recruit has the visa, he can work wherever he wants. The paperwork is the same whether he stays with his sponsor, goes to their biggest competitor, or goes to work at a coffee cart.

3. Ban the other legal shenanigans that would quickly ensue in attempts to lock the visa to the sponsoring company.

If the sponsor wants the worker to stay, they will have to pay them a high enough rate to keep them there.

Re:This debate is about money.

[Anonymous Coward]

2. Once the recruit has the visa, he can work wherever he wants. The paperwork is the same whether he stays with his sponsor, goes to their biggest competitor, or goes to work at a coffee cart.

The billionaires and multinational corps would never allow that. H1-B is purposeful wage slavery.

Re:Most transparent ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

"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."

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...

Mark Zuckerberg is a liar.

[Anonymous Coward]

Zuckerberg is also a traitor to the American tech worker.

Hey, Mark, MSFT just laid off 18,000 people; Cisco just laid off a bunch; MSFT just the other day closed its research center right down the street from you - filled with gifted coders and brilliance. Mark, there is a MOUND of studies showing NO shortage of STEM works in the US.

Some facts: The H-1B fiasco has cost Americans **$10TRILLION** dollars, since 1975. For anyone who wants to know the truth, read on.

One of the most respected technology pundits in Silicon Valley has this to say about the H1-B worker problem http://www.cringely.com/2012/1... Here's an attorney and his consultants teaching corporations how to manipulate foreign-worker immigration law to replace qualified American workers: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

H1-B abuse if accompanied by other worker-visa abuse L-1 Visa (H1-B's are only the tip of the iceberg). There are more than 20 categories of foreign worker visas. http://economyincrisis.org/con...

Professor Norman Matloff's extremely well documented studies on this problem. http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/...

Federal offshoring of healthcare.gov website http://www.economicpopulist.or...

How H1-B visa abuse is hurting American tech workers http://www.motherjones.com/pol...

There is no stem worker crisis in America http://spectrum.ieee.org/at-wo...

Marc Zuckerberg and wealthy tech scions continue to perpetuate this trend http://programmersguild.org/do...

Yahoo http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs...

Also, little known is the tactic of creating many different kinds of sub-visa categories to "fool the system". There are almost TWENTY different kinds of work visas. The whole thing is a sham and a lie, designed to drag down wages and keep from having to re-train Americans. Never thought I would see this day!

Some of the information presented in the following links will shock most Americans, because American corporate leaders don't want us to know the truth, and they are paying off policy makers with contributions to keep the truth from us. Bill Gates, John Chambers, Mark Zuckerberg, Eric Schmidt, and many, many others - including the principals of the most prominent immigration law firms, who profit from this outrage, are lying through their teeth. There is NO shortage of STEM workers in the US!!

Last, Zuckerberg has all out lied since day 1 about guaranteeing privacy on Facebook - just outright lied. Facebook has become something that teens shun and will soon go the way of MSFT, run by another deceiver, Bill Gates, on the H1-B issue.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg is a liar.

[Anonymous Coward]

I am an immigrant working in US on H1-B. Every time I see these stories, I know what comments there will be, but I'm getting tired of all the whining and bullshit.

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. This is after being with the company I'm at for slightly over 3 years. And I work 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, none of those crazy 60-hour work weeks. I have a fancy house, drive an expensive car, and even after mortage, property tax etc have enough left to support my family by myself, allowing my wife (an American citizen, by the way) to be a stay at home mom - and even then still have some left for my 401k and other savings. To sum it up, as an H1-B I live better than 9 out of 10 Americans do even here in Seattle, much less across the country.

Now you guys say two things. First, that I'm "stealing your job". I'll be blunt: in the current IT job market, if you can't find a job, then either you are living in the wrong place, or (if you're in one of the tech hubs), you plain suck. I know some people hit by Microsoft layoffs: they were immediately snagged by Google and Amazon. It's a seller's market: a good developer today in US can walk out of the door and literally find a job elsewhere tomorrow. If you can't find a job, that's not because some H1-B "stole" it. It's because you're not good enough, and your expectations are too high.

Speaking of expectations. One other thing that's often brought up is that H1-Bs "depress the wage" - as in, if we weren't here, you'd be paid more. Is that so? Well yes, of course it is, artificial scarcity (of labor, in this case) raises prices. But why do you believe you're entitled to even higher wages? You can certainly get the same wage as I do (if you're as good as I am) - and that gives you an extremely comfortable life, compared to vast majority of your fellow countrymen. With some prudent fiscal planning and the right investments, you can retire at 65 with over a million in the bank, and a house that you fully own - a luxury that most cannot even dream of.

Yet you still have an audacity to complain that it's too little? You think you deserve more? But you don't have a determination to actually go and make yourself better to achieve that, no. You want someone else to stop competing with you so that you can just have it.

You are sour whiners and losers, and that's why I can "steal" your job, and will keep on "stealing" it, while you will inhabiting your mom's basement, while posting inane ramblings on Slashdot about how you're being repressed by all those filthy smelly foreigners.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg is a liar.

[Tablizer]

There are some problems you ignored. First is that the industry claims there is a "shortage" to justify high quantities of H1B's. There is no evidence of a general shortage, only spot shortages, which are necessary for those with glut skills to be accepted into new-trend skills.

Second, is that during IT recessions they don't shut off the H1B spigot: visa workers keep coming. IT has been booming and busting since at least the 80's and I see no reason this pattern will change.

And I have seen H1B workers being abused. Your example is only a spot sample.

In general, the industry wants "instant employees" rather than spend time and money on training. This means that if a US techie loses their job in a glut area, they cannot get retraining for the new area because the company will hire an H1B worker that already has experience. The citizen can read books etc., but companies prefer existing paid experience.

Companies just want what they want when they want it and don't want to pay anything inconvenient for these goals.

Regardless of whether there are some H1B abuse myths floating around, the whole premise is based on a lie.

Re:Mark Zuckerberg is a liar.

[david.emery]

Mod parent up, please. In particular, the comment about industry being unwilling to invest in training is spot-on. I'm old enough to remember when it wasn't that way. (Example, how many remember getting training in Ada if you worked in the defense industry? Regardless of what you think of the language, 25-30 years ago that industry was willing to invest in its "human capital." )

dave

Re:Mark Zuckerberg is a liar.

[ranton]

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.

Pay These Geniuses What They're Worth!

[Baldrson]

Its tragic that Mark et al are being forced to put up with just sort of OK US workers.

You know one step that Mark et al could take that would grease the skids on their immigration reforms?

Pay the geniuses they want to import what they're worth. See The Bottom of the Pay Scale: Wages for H-1B Computer Programmers.

In fact, Mark et al should either pay back salaries to all of the H-1b workers they've ever employed or Mark et al should be thrown in prison for fraudulent abuse of the H-1B guest worker provision.

Re:Dissolution of the middle class!

[sabri]

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.

temporary vs permanent visas

[vitriol83]

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.

Re:Dissolution of the middle class!

[sabri]

If you're even remotely presentable and capable of basic human interaction, you cannot not have a job in the Bay area, even if you're completely freaking clueless.

Actually, I kind of have to agree with you here. Yesterday I had a friend over who worked in the same team as I did for a large vendor of telecommunications equipment. For years (at least 5), there was one guy who was completely and utterly useless, did not perform and could not even complete the most basic tasks by himself. I always thought he had some compromising images of his boss or something similar that prevented him from being fired.

Turns out the guy was hired by a startup recently. I thought that would be unimaginable, but then I realized that I was mistaken. He is very well-spoken, has a nice personality and if you don't have to work with him, he is generally a good guy to have a beer with. It's just that he is useless as a tech worker IMHO. Oh, and if you read this: no offense :)

Re:Fuck Zuckerberg

[Lunix Nutcase]

They posses a special talent: Taking lower pay.

Nope, you're wrong.

[sethstorm]

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.

If it's not (in any way) about wages, then there would be no problem for Congress to repeal the 1965 Immigration Act in its entirety, cancel all the programs enabled by it, and (via the market) actively/aggressively solicit long-term unemployed US citizens in their place - as regular workers. There are more than enough of them to go around to be not only qualified, but very well qualified. Unfortunately, citizenship in the US makes people expensive, even for hard-working, by-the-book immigrants that want to come to the US.

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.

Truth of the matter is that "properly skilled" can be redefined to exclude otherwise-suitable US citizens too easily. In the eyes of an H1-b/L1/etc. supporter, "properly skilled" is equivalent to saying "has proper fear of an employer". If you were to go to the extreme end of business-friendliness (which spawned the H1-b preference), the ultimately qualified worker is a slave. They cost nothing and are the easiest to dispose.

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.

Then get rid of what enables the abuse - every single guest worker program. After that, strict enforcement of immigration laws already on the books - SB1070 and similar laws show that it works.

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

The only proper limit for all guest worker programs is 0. If you want someone enough, they'll take up naturalization where they can't be corralled between sponsor employers. It might make them incur business-unfriendly "costs of freedom" (by being able to choose their employer), but the market also functions to raise prices.

Re:Dissolution of the middle class!

[eclectro]

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.

This is real humorous. One company offered a degreed Electrical Engineer $15 an hour in the SF Bay Area. I kid you not. (read the thread) This is not an isolated case, and I know of other examples. Why do people bother to get college degrees again??

This is what the H1B program has bought us folks. People with degrees working for slave wages that won't even enable them to pay back their student loans. In my book, that's going backwards. It's time to stop being fooled by the H1B folly.