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Silicon Valley Says Trump Plan To Reduce Immigration Will Hurt Economy (cbslocal.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBS Local: President Donald Trump's push to cut legal immigration to the United States in half is being met by opposition from Silicon Valley leaders, economists, and even some Republicans senators, who all say legal immigration is key to economic prosperity. The Trump administration Wednesday endorsed the Reforming American Immigration for a Strong Economy Act or RAISE Act, a Senate bill introduced by two Republican senators earlier this year, that aims to cut all U.S. immigration in half. Business leaders, especially those in California's tech industry, say the bill will stymie their ability to fill jobs and grow the U.S. economy. California's economy is the sixth largest in the world and many attribute that success, in part, to immigration. The Information Technology Industry Council, which represents companies including Amazon, Apple, Adobe, Dell, Facebook, Hewlett-Packard, Google, Visa, Nokia, and Microsoft railed against the bill.

Dean Garfield, President and CEO of the council said, "This is not the right proposal to fix our immigration system because it does not address the challenges tech companies face, injects more bureaucratic dysfunction, and removes employers as the best judge of the employee merits they need to succeed and grow the U.S. economy." Garfield argues that the tech industry cannot find enough STEM-skilled Americans to fill open positions and that U.S. immigration policy "stops us from keeping the best and brightest innovators here in the U.S. and instead we lose out to our overseas competitors."

23 of 273 comments (clear)

  1. H1B.... by Zurkeyon3733 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hurts it MORE.

    1. Re:H1B.... by LifesABeach · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I grow tired of H1B liars and those that help them. Then having these stuck up companies call Americans stupid? If one observes, nobody says it in public place with those affected by the impact of H1B visas present.

  2. What Would We Have To Pay Programmers? by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If we couldn't outsource their jobs (and actually get them done, which is a problem with outsourcing) and we couldn't import cheap labor from overseas, we'd have to pay programmers over $200K/year. And that would be terrible, because

    Oh. Never mind.

    1. Re:What Would We Have To Pay Programmers? by computational+super · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It would be terrible because it would hurt the economy. Well, Zuck's own personal economy, anyway. He'd have to go from making 100 times what the average American makes to only 99 times as much.

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    2. Re:What Would We Have To Pay Programmers? by dAzED1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      https://www.cnbc.com/2016/05/1... - the average American doesn't make 1/100th of over $4m per day from birth to present. I don't know what you think Americans make, but...btw, that article is less than 15months old, and he's made $19billion since then. Facebook has 17k employees. That means he could have given each of them a $million in the last 15 months, and still had more left over from that 15months of income to give a thousand average Americans an entire lifetime of income earnings. I know you were just being silly, but people don't really appreciate the...scale...of the income inequality.

    3. Re:What Would We Have To Pay Programmers? by dAzED1 · · Score: 3, Funny

      he would be so incredibly horrible as a president. He would so infinitely better than the one we have right now.

  3. Conflict of interest by x0ra · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Of course SV will be against, they have a huge conflict of interest in the matter. They keep importing under-paid code monkey who accept to work 70h a week in constant stressful environment with no job security, while firing and discriminating against older, more pragmatic, american staffers.

    1. Re:Conflict of interest by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Exactly, they lie through their teeth.

      Under Trump's plan, there would actually be more high-skilled immigrants , but they would no longer be indentured to the sponsoring companies:
      if the wages are too low, they take their green card and walk away (not something an H1-b non-immigrant can do, or else he loses sponsorship).

      Obviously the tech companies hate it, because they can no longer rely on skilled immigrants to undercut skilled Americans. No visa tie-in, no h1-b sweatshops, no people living in fear of pissing off an employer.
      Don't be surprised if Tim Cook starts to speak about "Russian treason" now. (Bezos already does through Washington Post)

    2. Re:Conflict of interest by slew · · Score: 4, Informative

      I would have thought Silicon Valley would have supported this proposal. More (legal) high-skilled domestic labor means downward pressure on wages.

      What exactly are tech leaders railing against?? Higher wages in the future for their gardeners and nannies?

      Maybe. If the "merit" system for proposed green cards makes it harder for low skilled gardeners and nannies to get green cards...

      The proposal sharply reduces the green cards available for so-called "chain" immigration by limiting them to spouses and minor children, eliminating the green-cards currently reserved for parents, siblings, and adult-children that have no quota. It also cuts the number of refugee green cards in half and eliminates the diversity green card (aka lottery green card) and puts everyone else including those that don't get employment based green cards because of quota limits into a new points based system.

      The reason that it is predicted that the number of green cards will go down is that "chain" green cards did not have a quota (diversity had a 50,000 quota), but now the new combination of "chain" + "diversity" will be capped at somewhere between 120,000 and 250,000

      Not that I'm in favor of limiting immigration, but I think most of these folks are simply objecting on political grounds. By making "chain" immigration harder they think it will be more difficult to attract the "skilled" people to the US. I'm not so sure about that actually being the case in reality (hard to say, there are conflicting studies), but it certainly fits their political narrative...

      FWIW, here's the green card proposal they are making. There are two tiers proposed, each would have a crack at 50% of the total green cards allocated on points. As far as I can determine here are how the points are allocated.

      For Tier 1 (aimed at college/professional level folks, 50% of green cards)

      15 points for PhD (10 for a masters, 5 for a bachelors)
      2 or 3 points per year up to 20 for employment in the US (e.g, legally under another work visa like H1 or H2)
      10 points for employment (or job offer) in a job requiring a PhD/masters (8 points for a Bachelors degree)
      10 points for entrepreneurs employing at least 2 people
      10 points for a high demand occupation
      2 points for civic involvement
      10 points for English skills
      10 points for being a sibling or adult child of a citizen
      8 points if you are under 25 (6 points for under 33, 4 points for under 38)
      5 points for a being from a diversity country (e.g., less than 50,000 immigrants/5years)

      For Tier 2 (every one else, 50% of green cards)

      2 points/year up to 20 points for employment in the US (e.g, legally under another work visa like H2 or H3)
      10 points for high-demand occupation employment (or job offer in those occupations)
      10 points for being a caregiver
      10 points for getting a promotion or having long-term employment
      2 points for civic involvement
      10 points for English skills (5 points for basic "knowledge" of English)
      10 points for being a sibling or adult child of a citizen
      8 points if you are under 25 (6 points for under 33, 4 points for under 38)
      5 points for a being from a diversity country (e.g., less than 50,000 immigrants/5years)

  4. Source by SmaryJerry · · Score: 4, Funny

    A San Francisco station is reporting Trump policy is making some people upset? I'm -shocked-.

  5. Depends on what kind of immigrant by Spy+Handler · · Score: 5, Insightful

    because not all immigrants are alike.

    People bringing with them cold hard cash, and spending them in USA = boon for the economy

    People bringing nothing, and actually sending whatever money they make back to their original country to feed their relatives back home = drain on the economy

    People with skills who produce wealth = boon for the economy

    People with no marketable skill who collect entitlements = drain on the economy

  6. BS detector just lit up like a Christmas tree by EndlessNameless · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It hurts their ability to grow the economy? Oh, boo hoo, they have to pay more for American workers.

    If a handful of American salaries turns your project from a profit to a loss, you are running on razor-thin margins to begin with. Maybe your company should be doing something else instead.

    On the other hand, if you're making a decent profit and just want more---get fucked. Public policy doesn't need to hand out special benefits to successful businesses. Right now, the middle class needs a little more help than the shareholders.

    Real immigration means coming over here, making a life, and investing long-term in the well-being of this country. The H1B program isn't immigration; it's indentured servitude V2.0

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  7. Re:Last I checked the plan was to replace by CodeHog · · Score: 3, Interesting

    except they'll have to pay them more.

    --
    Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
  8. Heard before by nukenerd · · Score: 4, Informative

    Has't this sort of thing been heard before?
    Modern American politician : "The economy cannot survive without immigrants"
    Ancient Greek politician : "Civilisation cannot survive without slavery"

  9. Re:Correct me if I'm wrong by PopeRatzo · · Score: 3, Informative

    but I'm pretty sure neither Trump nor any American citizen* has any issues with LEGAL Immigration.

    Yeah they do. Trump wants to severely reduce the number of LEGAL immigrants we take in and his supporters are frothing white supremacists who would completely end all immigration tomorrow.

    Trump has admitted that he wants to stop all legal immigration for one or two years.

    http://www.breitbart.com/big-g...

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  10. Re:Come to Europe... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Plenty of opportunities here. And no Trump.

    Funny thing is... this proposed plan would move US immigration policy closer to that of Canada and the EU, with more emphasis on prioritizing immigrants with particular skills and/or some level of wealth.

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  11. Re:Gee, what a surprise by Tablizer · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Most Silicon Valley executives are centrists, not liberals, and focus more on what their company "needs" than the 99%.

    They want cheap labor without any training needed so they can be more profitable and/or grow faster. That's their primary concern and what they are paid to focus on. They don't spend a lot of time researching or philosophizing on middle class economics, except when they want to sell them something.

    I hate to say it, but I'll side with (gulp) Trump on this one: CEO's look out for their profits, and I'll look out for my paycheck: same thing, just a different angle.

    Whether it slows the general economy is hard to say. While I agree it may make services a bit more expensive, it may also shift money from the 1% to the 99%. It's currently log-jammed at the top.

  12. Dear Silicon Valley, by budsetr · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Eat a dick

  13. Allow me to translate by superdave80 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is not the right proposal to fix our immigration system because it does not address the challenges tech companies face, injects more bureaucratic dysfunction, and removes employers as the best judge of the employee merits they need to succeed and grow the U.S. economy." Garfield argues that the tech industry cannot find enough STEM-skilled Americans to fill open positions and that U.S. immigration policy "stops us from keeping the best and brightest innovators here in the U.S. and instead we lose out to our overseas competitors."

    Translated: "Where the fuck are we going to get our cheap programmers????"

  14. BS by Ensign+Nemo · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "removes employers as the best judge of the employee merits they need to succeed"

    You mean all those Indian managers, who once get a management spot, only hire other Indians? yea, it'd be a shame if they couldn't hire only other Indians.

    I'm sorry but I've personally seen this multiple times in multiple places and it's no longer funny. I've had to deal with the bugs and blame-game that comes from this favouritism so much it's downright aggravating.

    Yes, I know not all Indians are like this, and it's not just Indians, but there are enough that are, that's it's troubling.
    And this isn't even talking about the sweatshop problem that other posters have mentioned.

  15. Re:An Implicit Tax by RightwingNutjob · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You think you can just have stuff for free made by low-rent "other" people, in perpetuity, with no cost to you or your children? Aren't we a little entitled? And by we I mean you and every other armchair economist who's never set foot inside a factory and has to call a repairman to plug in your refrigerator.

  16. Re:Come to Europe... by quonset · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yeah, you tell 'em brother, because nothing like that would ever happen in the United States. No religion would carve out its own enclave in this country or force women to submit to its "teachings". Nor would they harass girls or demand their religious take precedence.

  17. Re:Come to Europe... by 93+Escort+Wagon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Actually, it has exactly the immigration policy I think it has.

    The article you linked to is not about immigration policy. It is a flame-bait piece railing against supposed rampant illegal immigration and decrying how some Canadian cities are declaring themselves "Sanctuary Cities", which in the author's opinion is apparently sending Canada down the toilet. But, even so, that article briefly mentions how "Our rules are tough but fair, they’re applied evenly and they focus on bringing the best people to Canada and benefiting all Canadians."

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