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India's Infosys To Hire 10,000 American Workers After Trump Criticism (bloomberg.com)
India's Infosys said it plans to hire 10,000 Americans in the next two years, following criticism from the Trump administration that the company and other outsourcing firms are unfairly taking jobs away from U.S. workers. From a report on Bloomberg: Infosys, which employs about 200,000 people around the world, will expand its local hiring in the U.S. while adding four hubs to research technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. The first location will open in Indiana in August 2017 and is expected to create 2,000 jobs for American workers by 2021, the company said.
Infosys making America great again!
I didn't think you could hire 10,000 new IT workers for minimum wage?
It's still a race to the bottom, now it's just going to be done in a way that's harder to criticize. I wonder how this will impact salaries and the job market.
Very happy with Mr. Trump so far.
I'm sure it can be done!
How nice of them to add 0.5% new Americans to look like they care..... awwwww....
Trump is a bigot.
They meant to hire 10,000 more in India and accidentally did it in Indiana, instead.
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
I'm not moving to Indiana, that's for damn sure.
It's like Trump saying that he will actually donate money he raised for veterans, to veterans. Did not happen until somebody found out that he was not doing it and shamed him into following through.
These "commitments" from Infosys are about the same quality. If there is no law behind it, and they can bribe Trump by buying a condo in his tower at high price, then the matter is settled.
Some of you are under the illusion that Trump is working for you. When it is clear that he is working for himself and couldn't give two hoots about you.
Infosys is one of those companies abusing H1B visas, aren't they?
They're just trying to get the scrutiny off themselves?
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
I'm an American working for an Indian company - one of Infosys' competitors. You really can't blame the Indian companies as it's the onshore CIO who's outsourcing this stuff and the executive team who makes the decision to outsource to offshore. I've said it a buncha times - all we did was respond to an RFP. It's not Infosys' fault - since the standard of living is lower in India than it is here salaries are also lower. If you don't want Infosys, Wipro, Accenture and the like running your IT perhaps it's the American companies that need to consider hiring American. The other thing is that if offshore resources arrive here on an H1B visa they're free to seek other employment. IME onshore salaries are generally competitive or you lose people.
we see things not as as they are, but as we are.
-- anais nin
If these companies broke US employment and immigration laws, then they need to be banned from operating in the US.
These guys are attempting to save their businesses - nothing more.
Tata, Infosys, Wipro, Cognizant and all the other body shops need to be taught a lesson - break the law and there will be real consequences to your businesses.
Haven't they heard there's an IT skills shortage? That's why we have all these H1Bs, right?
Are you certain all the employees of these outsourcing companies have valid credentials?
Are you certain these workers were not displacing American workers at lower wages?
Are you certain all these workers were either as qualified or better qualified than the workers they replaced?
Are you certain all these workers were working in the locations specified on the visa?
If not, then these companies were violating the law. It is the H-1B holder's responsibility to verify and validate these terms. Your defense of "we just responded to an RFP" will not defend you in a court of law.
These companies hold the visas - it is their responsibility to ensure the hiring company is not using them to violate labor laws.
"Just following orders" is not a good defense in court.
When they "discover" that they cannot hire/lure 2000 tech workers in/to Indiana, they will make the claim the indeed there is a tech labor shortage in the US.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
How many on this thread are willing to pay more money for because they dislike the "race to the bottom" in salaries?
It seems like Infosys is trying to get ahead of any criticism regarding the way they use the H-1B program. I do systems integration work so we work with a wide range of these companies. I've worked with people and software from Infosys and TCS as well as the lower-tier guys like Mindtree and NIIT. The problem is that even if you bring the work to somewhere like Indiana, you can't change the fundamental business model and so you'll still get less than optimal service.
All of these consulting firms, whether they're body shops like Infosys and TCS, or white-shoe management consulting firms, operate on a very familiar business model:
- Rely on a gold-plated sales team and rockstar consulting team to sell the dream and come up with the initial proposal
- Once the deal is signed, replace the rockstars with fresh grads or less-than-rockstar experienced consultants for the client-facing stuff, like collecting requirements or delivering PowerPoints.
- In the case of an outsourcing, send in a group to collect all the information about the company's business processes. Body shops sending the work offshore typically use their H-1Bs for this task, while the fancy consulting firms fly in the graduating class of the Ivy League business schools; it's a very common first job for that crowd.
- Send everything that actually involves work offshore or to other cheap "delivery centers" to maximize the profit on the deal
The problem is that whether these cheap delivery centers are offshore or onshore, I think they'll have big problems staffing them with qualified people. Consulting firms squeeze every last dime out of outsourcing deals because they have to break even...and in many cases they have to support a huge raft of executive salaries with big expense accounts on top of that. Consulting firms think nothing of flying senior people in from wherever, for months at a time on full reimbursement, and their customers end up paying for that. When you get down to the people who would be working in Infosys's Indiana office, they're going to try to pay minimum wage or slightly above because the entire model is making the actual work cheap while putting a good face on for the customer.
I don't think I'd like to work there, simply because they have a reputation among experienced IT people and developers. Just because you move the people here doesn't mean the model changes. It will still be a body shop mentality where you're cranking out random Java or .NET code for some corporate website or managing a company's IT systems poorly from remote. At the very least, however, it is domestic entry level work for newbies. Hopefully those newbies will endure a year or two in the middle of nowhere, then use the experience to move on.
That's the weird thing about the Trumpster. He's a big talker and most of the things that he says are BS, but he's probably made more progress with getting companies to bring US jobs back to this country than the Obama administration did in the last 4 years.
Trump hasn't brought any meaningful number of jobs back to the US. He has however falsely taken credit for a bunch of decisions he had effectively nothing to do with. He certainly hasn't done more than Obama because he has done a reasonable approximation of nothing.
Trump's whole promise to bring back manufacturing jobs is based on a false premise. The only way to bring back substantial numbers of manufacturing jobs to the US would be for wages to fall relative to elsewhere. US manufacturing is alive and well but it's not labor intensive manufacturing. We make jumbo jets, not happy meal toys. The only way you get massive number of assembly line workers back to work is to drop wages by a LOT. Since that won't happen, Trump is telling yet another lie.
That doesn't mean that I like him or his policies, but I have to give credit where it's due.
When he actually does something to deserve credit then you should start doing that. No credit due so far.
I work for a small US based consulting firm that does public and private sector work. We are constantly underbid on contracts by the likes of Infosys, WiPro, etc. Many of the contracts clearly stipulate that the work cannot be done off-shore. Everyone knows the market rates for the staff required to complete the project and when these firms come in well under that floor it means they are either lying about who they are going to staff or where the work is going to be done... and 90% of the time no one calls them on their b*llshit because they want the promotion that comes with getting the project in under budget (public sector is a slightly different case, in many cases there are laws stipulating that... everything else being equal... the lowest bid has to be taken unless there is good reason to believe the contractor cannot deliver as promised). Most of the time now we just shrug and walk away, it's not even worth fighting.
Must be fluent in either Hindi or Punjabi...
use the sling. the last ni`ght of AAl major marketing lube is wiped off BSD has always
45 > 44
I can see them hiring the less-than-stellar American employees - the recent grads, the low end of the bell curve, the burnt out ones - and using them to be the face of the company where needed. So these poor schmucks will end up managing the offshore resources until they can't take it any more and leave.
As long as they offer a moderately decent salary there will be people who take it, especially if they spin the job correctly. If they offer remote work they'll get a lot more and possibly better candidates. All American and right her on sovereign soil.
No matter what it's going to be an outsourcing, offshore front. The question is how much will flow through the local hands before it gets to the clients.
I wonder if India is planing on draining the brightest minds from the USA in retaliation. Get a few of the best, and it's worth the other few thousand so-so minds they bring in.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
Most visa workers are not immigrants. Some may become immigrants, sure, but they are two different things.
Table-ized A.I.
Most visa workers are not immigrants. Some may become immigrants, sure, but they are two different things.
In January 2010 there were 12.6 million permanent visa (green card) holders in the US. (source) In 2013 there were about 1.4 million temporary visa holders working in the US. (source)
While not all green card holders are working, it is clear that most visa workers are immigrants. Probably around 80-90%. All temporary visa holders are not immigrants, by definition, but that is clearly not what you meant since you used the word "most". Then again I don't think you knew what you meant, or understand the actual definitions of these terms.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
I completely fail to see how anyone could be averse to Globalism in any way.
Even if it takes your job, or eliminates entire job fields and replaces them with lower priced workers, it is still more beneficial to societies providing these workers than it is detrimental to our society.
Just because it happens to be YOUR job that is vaporizing doesn't mean any of you have any right to complain. After all, your voting practices already did this exact same thing to workers in other industries and it is highly disingenuous to say what is good for the goose isn't good for the gander.
Hypocrites.
Or for the dollar to fall. But that would be bad for WalMart and others who manufacture in China.
The dollar falling would make imports more expensive and exports cheaper but it won't bring more than a marginal number of labor intensive manufacturing jobs back to the US unless it falls by scary huge amounts. The US dollar would have to positively plummet to make it worth the effort to bring that manufacturing back to the US. The economic hardship that would result in the interim would be horrifying. A slightly weaker dollar is not necessarily bad but for it to fall enough to make it worthwhile to bring labor intensive manufacturing jobs to the US something very bad would have to happen.
Basically the assembly line jobs that didn't require a college degree from the 1950s-1970s are gone forever. People lust for them out of misplaced nostalgia but it's a world that no longer exists. We still have a huge and growing manufacturing economy but like farming it employs a relatively small percent of the population and it is likely to shrink further as a percent of the total workforce. The stuff we make is capital intensive rather than labor intensive. The future of the US manufacturing economy isn't in making little toys you buy at Walmart. It's in making complicated advanced products. The important thing is to not let new capital intensive manufacturing jobs leave the country. We need to encourage as many highly educated immigrants to come to the US as possible. Fund as much research as possible. That is the only way the US will avoid a reversion to the mean during the next century economically.
What Americans would want to work for this slave labor company? They've called me a dozen times but I told them that based on their talent level I'm probably only qualified for an executive level position.
Too little, too late. Good bye Infosys
I was very recently working for Infosys, the company is horrible, their intranet for everything is a nightmare. I would never work for them again. They are all very nice, but their internal management is clueless and most projects are staffed only by overseas workers because the management make sup ridiculous requirements project positions so they can claim they were unable to find a worker in the US for the job.
Chicago is less than 30% more expensive than Indianapolis.
That depends on what part you are living in. Here are some actual numbers on the subject. These are averages which may vary by specific location.
Simple fact is that the cost of living difference is substantial and wages often aren't enough higher in the bigger city to compensate.
Add in the intangible benefits of more culture / entertainment, better food, and overall more job opportunities, it's not surprising that major cities attract the best and brightest in our society.
People in big cities far too often seem to think they are better than the people who chose to avoid them. New Yorkers seem to be particularly full of themselves in my experience. Big cities do not universally attract the best and brightest, merely a percentage of them and only for certain industries. Finance? Sure you probably want a big city. Agriculture? Not so much. Manufacturing? Depends on the product. You also conveniently ignore the drawbacks of big cities. Congestion, high prices, cramped living conditions, lack of green spaces, pollution, etc. And I would disagree that the food is universally better in cities or that there is better entertainment. It depends on what suits you. I live in a semi-rural area and I guarantee you I get better produce than almost any restaurant in NYC right off the farm. Same with meat if I want it.
The qualifications issue is one of false or unequal credentials. Diploma mills are a problem in many parts of the world:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes...
There have been accusations by many that some outsourcing firms do not adequately vet the credentials of the candidates they bring over on an H-1B visa.
I suspect a credentials audit of the visa holders would find that some do not possess the credentials they claim to have earned.
all will be of Indian descent.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
But, what are they willing to pay for those 10K workers ? The same amount of poverty level wages they pay to their indentured servants or actual American standard wages. If it is the former, no one will show up and they will say, "we offered but no one took the jobs" and give themselves a public show of legitimacy; If they go with the latter approach, they will piss off their workforce on H-1B visa, as there will be a huge pay gap between two groups. Doesn't sound sincere to me.
__________
The more I know people, the more I love animals
Is this why email notifications from "The Hill" are sponsored by InfoSys this morning?
and they actually believe we"ll be happy with indian conditions ...., 30 seconds into their HR push i went , tkx but no tkx and hanged up
Hiring 10000 American workers so that they can then fire them, thereby fairly taking away American jobs. Problem solved.
They have been draining the US of jobs for so long they have enough money to do it.
What's the angle here? Joking/Not Joking possibilities:
- Infosys has offered a baby bonus and guaranteed job to the children of all their newly naturalized American citizens & employees;
- Infosys now has a confidential agreement with all their Green Card holders, that Infosys will back them 100% becoming American citizens and on a fast track too. In fact they are writing into their annual performance plans;
- the 10,000 workers are in the food services, logistics, transportation, medical, education, healthcare, manufacturing, energy, automotive, tourism, research & development, accounting, legal, construction or medical marijuana industries. Basically, anything but IT.
I did time for one of those Indian companies. The work was training the offshore team to do the work of the America workers who had been RIFFed. The Americans had to assist with the training or lose their termination compensation. They (the Hyderabad-based IT company) wouldn't allow remote work so I had to move to NJ for a 6 mo contract. They wouldn't pay for travel or any relocation costs. Their people were flying to & from India pretty regularly. They wouldn't offer or cover cost of my Healthcare (COBRA at that time). Time spent filling out time cards and entering hours into their dogshit time tracking system were not billable. Pay rate was 1/3 lower than what HAD been my minimum. I was desperate for anything at the time. And they offered to hire me away from the company I was subbing for, which was forbidden by the contract.
It was not a good experience.
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
It's one thing to just poach staff, but Infosys would have to do (better) for citizens what it did for H1-b's - train and place displaced individuals with employers.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Immigration services vet the educational/employment credentials, it has nothing to do with the hiring employer.
Additionally, only certain educational institutions are recognized (not sure if degree by educational institution plays a part or not). My educational institution in Australia (the 2nd largest when measured by # of undergrads*) is not even recognized.
I think it's very unlikely diploma mills are recognized. Having said that, even qualifications from established universities in India are dubious. Cheating and plagiarism are rampant in higher education there (source: former Indian employee's description of attending uni in India) so a degree doesn't necessarily imply that they've learned anything.
One thing that you are correct on though is that the H1B visa program is not policed effectively. I'm swapping to a H1B visa this year and I am in favour of better enforcement.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_universities_in_Australia_by_enrollment#By_all_students
My grammar could have been better. What I really mean is that Qualifications is a non-issue. Once the people are hired if they can do the job it means the job does not need more qualification than what they have. Doesnt matter if the existing people doing the job had much higher qualifications and salaries. If those qualifications are not needed for the job its bad economics to be hiring overqualified folks for mundane IT jobs. Its just like if you hired a PhD to babysit. You do realize that entry level IT work is mind numbingly boring and hell on family life with uncompensated overtime. These are jobs Americans with the brains to do it don't want to do and the Americans desperate enough to do them do not have the brains and education to do them. Only immigrants will take up this kind of work. If you bar immigrants from doing it what happened with fruit pickers will happen with IT shops.
**Life is too short to be serious**
>... will expand its local hiring in the U.S. ...
Foreign companies local hiring?
Look, what the US concern is: foreign staff on US soil, working for US companies, taking US local jobs, yet sending their money back home out of the US.
So the solution now is for a foreign company to hire in the US? To hire the formerly non-employed US locals, who's labor now fuels interests out side of the country? Why don't these foreign companies hire their locals?
Is this a joke?
What the fuck are you talking about ??
Are you saying Sydney Uni is not a recognized institution ?? One of the best universities in the world ?
Are you high ?
It's mind numbingly boring and hell on family life when you're unqualified or under funded for the job. Basically everything should be automated away except for replacing broken hardware. And for that you should have spares sitting ready to be used.
H-1B visas are only supposed to be used for highly skilled positions. It's fraud to use them for entry level positions, especially when an American was previously working in that exact job and had to train their replacement. (There's a loop hole here were the contractor hires the visa holder as then the contractor isn't firing the American. By intent rather than wording, that's illegal. But wording matters exactly. Just like it's legal for the anyone to send false take down notices with no repercussions.)
A visa "guest worker" is by definition not an "immigrant".
Table-ized A.I.
And a permanent visa holder is an immigrant by definition. And since there are nearly 10 green card holders for every 1 temporary visa holder, most visa holders are immigrants. By a large margin.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
A victory for the Don? Nah, Sikka has been trying to move away from cheap Indian labor for a while because he knows it's not working anymore. This was behind his controversial Panaya purchase, which has gotten him in a lot of trouble. US labor buys them political shade while also potentially lowering costs combined with Panaya and Infosys's other software purchases.
H1B visas in particular are temporary.
Table-ized A.I.
Yes, but your exact words were "Most visa workers are not immigrants." This is a false statement. You clearly didn't mean most H1B visa workers are not immigrants, because 100% of H1B visa workers are not immigrants. Your statement was merely derogatory towards all visa holders, and I was merely calling you out on that.
And as for H1B visa holders wanting to become citizens, they are by far the largest source of green card applications from visa holders. In 2016 117,189 visa holders petitioned for their green card, and 89,907 of them came from H1B holders. The #2 source was from L-1 visas, with a grand total of 7,871.
So it is quite accurate to state H1B holders are a significant source of our immigrants, and an even more significant source of our non-family related immigrants. There is no way you can honestly spin H1B visa holders as anything but at the core of what makes our country great.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
The first location will open in Indiana in August 2017 and is expected to create 2,000 jobs for American workers by 2021, the company said.
They claimed that they had to hire the H1B workers because there was a shortage of qualified Americans. But now they suddenly think they can find 2,000 Americans? Legally, doesn't that mean that they must lay-off 2,000 H1B workers because now they suddenly found some American workers?
All of these hire-ees will be the traditional non-English speaking Indian immigrants.
That leaves 90,000 more looking for jobs!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.