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H-1B Tech Workers May Be Severely Underpaid
DocBones sent a link to a provocative story in The Business Journal of San Jose about how foreign high-tech workers in the U.S. on H-1B visas often earn far less than they are worth, perhaps because the terms of their visas make switching jobs so hard that they can't bid out their services effectively. Industry spokespeople deny any wage differences. Trade groups keep on lobbying to raise the current 115,000/year cap on H-1B visas to 200,000/year. The whole issue is a mass of claims and counter-claims, each one "supported" by statistics and surveys. Is there a "right" side or a "wrong" side here? Does anyone with first-hand experience as an H-1B worker care to comment?
Basically, what a H1-B means is that you're indentured to your employer for about five years. The usual procedure (and the way it worked for me and my friends) is that you get here through a contracting firm. The contracting firm makes heaps of money using you as a hired gun (taking about %25 of your salary, in most cases). You, on the other hand, want to get a job with a big company (not a startup, because if it goes belly up where will you be), where you can stay for a while, and which will apply for a green card for you. This is what happened in my case, I joined a major firm here in the valley. (BTW, you usually get less than your white counterparts because Indians, and most Asian cultures, are not initially used to hard-nosed negotiating/confrontation).
You pretty much as bonded to the employer after this. In my case, I hate my current job, and my current boss. But what can I do? I had better shut up and play the game if I want to get the green card in a few years, so I'll play the game.
Otherwise my H1-B will run out after three years, and I have to go back to India, and wait for some time before I can get another H1-B. And I recently got married, so I'm not about to make waves.
This formula is varied in a few cases (you can get your green card quicker if you're a Ph.D, etc.), but basically, I'll agree with the premise that we're (Indians, Chinese, etc.) are making far less and are bonded to our employers until we get our green cards. In my specific case, my boss, who is Indian (and who has his green card), has made an explicit threat in many cases to Indian workers who are working under him that he will slow down their green card process, etc, if they don't meet his expectations. Management knows of this, but why should they care? If he's caught on this, they can just say they didn't know.
In fact, the more I think about it, the more the situation is screwed up. My boss, for instance, only hires H1-B workers on his team (4/5 people are H1-Bs). There's supposed to be some requirement that he is supposed to search for American workers, but what he does is find an Indian, find some experience that the Indian has that is uncommon, and make that a requirement of the hiring process. That way, he can make a cursory search of the job listings, and say that there isn't a qualifed American worker.
And this works for him. We're all running scared, we'll do whatever he wants, and work like dogs. If someone finds a better job (which happened to a colleague of mine), all my boss has to do is fire him immediately. That way, that person has to get his H1-B transferred to his new company, and with the time the INS takes to do that, the visa might have expired, and you might have to go back. In fact, this is what happened to my colleague, he is in Delhi right now, and my boss uses him as an example to us all the time.
So, OK, it'll be three years for my green card, and then I can get away from this.
So, to conclude my post, I agree that America is getting cheapers, more compliant workers as H1-Bs. And, in all honesty, we are taking jobs from American workers here. But look on the other side. None of my American colleagues work 80 hour weeks - they don't have the reason to. And I know whatever success my company has had is due to a great amount to people like me - so when I see people complaining about H1-Bs on one hand, and crowing about their stock gains on the other, I think it's hypocritical.
And a final note to all the xenophones here - judge me on skills as a technologist, not my country of origin or my skin color. Slashdot (and Americans as a whole), are tolerent, wonderful people, but it's the bigots who stand out. Before you tell me to "Go back to my own country", ask yourself this - why do you think I came to yours? True, I came here to support my family, and myself, but I also truly came here searching for a better way of life. I truly believe that I have something to contribute to America - and remember, and one time or another, your parents or grandparents came here with the same belief! So give us a chance............goodbye...
But, for a company to get an H-1B in the first place they must prove that the position being filled and the salary offered falls within 5% of the locally paid salary for that position.
So, if the job is in CA or NY city you can expect to be paid more than in wisconsin for example.
But, the proof is only when the H-1B is obtained, so 6 years later (the max it can be extended for) you may be earning far less than the norm.
Of course, there are many other different categories of work permit (O-1, L-1, J-1 etc.) that have other requirements.
Work Permit (Status) / Visa Difference:
The INS uses the term Status to define whether you have a right to work in the US. You first enter Status when you get your first work permit. You can stay in status by extending or changing you work permit. If at any time you fall out of status (h-1b expires, you get fired) you are meant to leave the country.
The Visa is the stamp in your passport that lets you in the country. All the while you stay in the US, this Visa stamp can expire and everything is fine. But if you leave the US on vacation, you need to get the Visa stamp renewed before you can re-enter the US. You can only renew the Visa stamp outside of the US and an American Embassy / Consulate. You need you work permit paperwork to get the Visa stamp.
The green card gives you the right to reside in the US, with or without a job. The are many different ways to get a green card (i.e. family sponsored, work sponsored, lottery). Each different cateogory has a numberical limit on it, e.g. the family based categories are all taken for several years to come, but the professional work based categories have green card available.
In the self sponsored categories you have five sub-categories each with different allocations:
1) Super-human, Ph.D etc. say 30,000
2) Professional, B.Sc etc, say 25,000
3) Regular, Lib Arts Degree, say 15,000
4) High school grad, say 10,000
5) Everyone else, say 5000
It is not often known that anyone in the world can apply for a green card, and if acceptable you will be granted one based on availability of the category you applied for. So if you applied for a category 4 green card and got accepted you may be given an allocation numbers of 65,000 - meaning you can come and live in the us, but not for five years.
Mike
Linux Token Ring Project
Most (if not all) of the sweat shops based in the US depend on holding something over the workers. Otherwise, the workers would just go and get a better job. In semi-skilled and unskilled work, they hire illegal aliens. In skilled and tech work, they use H1-B and hold the green card application over their heads (not all companies of course, but plenty apparently do).
The solution is to remove the extortion. In the tech case, make the H1-B portable to any tech position with little or no paperwork required to change jobs. In the case of unskilled and semi-skilled work, allow anybody (illegal or not) who can show current employment to get a temporary work permit. Then watch as the sweat shop operators swallow their own tongues when the realise that without their extortion, their 'employees' are free to report them to the authorities.