Nope. The technical job market in Ireland is a wasteland at present. 10 years experience, including some management and consultancy, and nobody has anything. Layoffs and closures are the order of the day. Good luck to you all.
The permanent residency claim made by this AC is guff, in my opinion. My company is not applying for residency for me, as they know I wish to return home next year. Many of the H1-B workers I know are either returning home voluntarily within their first 3-5 years or have already done so. It is generally considered within the immigrant circles in which I mix that anyone who stays longer than 5 years will probably opt to stay permanently. Some H1-B workers come over here with the intention of staying permanently, but I'm not sure that they would constitute a majority, as the above poster suggests. (Of course, different immigrant worker backgrounds would result in different attitudes to returning to their country of origin.)
With regard to the second point, I've changed jobs twice in 2.5 years, and have had no difficulty so far, other than a three month processing time by the INS of my new application. For those workers who intend to return to their own countries, and who make themselves aware of their legal rights, threats such as those suggested by the AC do not carry much weight.
Then again, maybe my experience, and that of some of my H1-B acquaintances and friends are contrary to the norm...
As an eeveel foreign worker I'd like to inject a few (disjointed) thoughts into the thread. Most companies, though desperate for technical staff, will not hire people who do not meet their technical and personal criteria for a position, regardless of the salary requirements of that individual. Companies are looking for good technical resources, and if they must look outside their own national borders to meet that demand, then what threat is it to established workers already in the labour pool? Naturally, no patriotic individual wishes to see his or her country over-run with migrant workers, but the kneejerk reaction that often accompanies such an influx is, as binarybits has said, usually purely xenophobic in nature. In my own country, technology is booming - I came here by choice for a change of scenery, and similar staff shortages exist there. Foreign workers are becoming commonplace in the tech industry there, and when I return, I fully expect to compete against them in a hopefully burgeoning market.
Additionally, while some companies here will undoubtedly pay below market to a foreign worker who may not know any better (although, with the proliferation of sites like monster.com, etc. if you don't know what your market value is, you've no-one to blame but yourself), most reputable companies will not do so (I work for a reputable company, and am quite happy with the level of remuneration I'm receiving). Companies wishing to employ a foreign worker on a H1-B must show a need for the worker in question, display the going rate for the work and the rate that the worker will be paid (to prevent exploitation) and indicate that the worker is not being brought in to break strike conditions or to "steal" jobs from existing workers.
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Nope. The technical job market in Ireland is a wasteland at present. 10 years experience, including some management and consultancy, and nobody has anything. Layoffs and closures are the order of the day.
Good luck to you all.
The permanent residency claim made by this AC is guff, in my opinion. My company is not applying for residency for me, as they know I wish to return home next year. Many of the H1-B workers I know are either returning home voluntarily within their first 3-5 years or have already done so. It is generally considered within the immigrant circles in which I mix that anyone who stays longer than 5 years will probably opt to stay permanently. Some H1-B workers come over here with the intention of staying permanently, but I'm not sure that they would constitute a majority, as the above poster suggests. (Of course, different immigrant worker backgrounds would result in different attitudes to returning to their country of origin.)
With regard to the second point, I've changed jobs twice in 2.5 years, and have had no difficulty so far, other than a three month processing time by the INS of my new application. For those workers who intend to return to their own countries, and who make themselves aware of their legal rights, threats such as those suggested by the AC do not carry much weight.
Then again, maybe my experience, and that of some of my H1-B acquaintances and friends are contrary to the norm...
As an eeveel foreign worker I'd like to inject a few (disjointed) thoughts into the thread. Most companies, though desperate for technical staff, will not hire people who do not meet their technical and personal criteria for a position, regardless of the salary requirements of that individual. Companies are looking for good technical resources, and if they must look outside their own national borders to meet that demand, then what threat is it to established workers already in the labour pool? Naturally, no patriotic individual wishes to see his or her country over-run with migrant workers, but the kneejerk reaction that often accompanies such an influx is, as binarybits has said, usually purely xenophobic in nature. In my own country, technology is booming - I came here by choice for a change of scenery, and similar staff shortages exist there. Foreign workers are becoming commonplace in the tech industry there, and when I return, I fully expect to compete against them in a hopefully burgeoning market.
Additionally, while some companies here will undoubtedly pay below market to a foreign worker who may not know any better (although, with the proliferation of sites like monster.com, etc. if you don't know what your market value is, you've no-one to blame but yourself), most reputable companies will not do so (I work for a reputable company, and am quite happy with the level of remuneration I'm receiving). Companies wishing to employ a foreign worker on a H1-B must show a need for the worker in question, display the going rate for the work and the rate that the worker will be paid (to prevent exploitation) and indicate that the worker is not being brought in to break strike conditions or to "steal" jobs from existing workers.