The H-1B is a non-immigrant visa in the United States under the Immigration and Nationality Act, section 101(a)(15)(H). It allows U.S. employers to temporarily employ foreign workers in specialty occupations…. The regulations define a “specialty occupation” as requiring theoretical and practical application of a body of highly specialized knowledge in a field of human endeavor[1] including but not limited to biotechnology, chemistry, architecture, engineering, mathematics, physical sciences, social sciences, medicine and health, education, law, accounting, business specialties, theology, and the arts, and requiring the attainment of a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent as a minimum.
And from the Dept. of Labor’s website:
The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) requires that the hiring of a foreign worker will not adversely affect the wages and working conditions of U.S. workers comparably employed. To comply with the statute, the Department’s regulations require that the wages offered to a foreign worker must be the prevailing wage rate for the occupational classification in the area of employment.
The purpose of the H-1B program is (nominally) to allow U.S. employers to hire foreign nationals when there are no U.S. citizens available to fill the advertised position. In practice, the program is regularly used to screw American workers. For example, see “Congress and President Obama Cannot Sit Idly By While Companies Use H-1B Guestworkers to Replace American Workers“:
A recent investigation by Computerworld revealed that hundreds of information technology (IT) workers were laid off by Southern California Edison (SCE) and replaced with temporary foreign workers through the H-1B guestworker visa program, which allows employers to hire temporary foreign workers for up to six years if they have at least a college degree (most work in IT). The replacement H-1B workers are employed by two India-based IT services firms that specialize in outsourcing and offshoring U.S. jobs: Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services. While U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) have publicly criticized the move, it doesn’t look like any action will be taken to reverse it.
SCE describes itself as “one of the nation’s largest electric utilities…deliver[ing] power to more than 14 million people.” SCE earned net profits of $1.4 billion on $13.2 billion in revenues over the past year. The company’s stock price is up 10 percent over that time and it pays its investors a 4.8 percent yield in dividends. An observer could be forgiven for believing that a job delivering safe and reliable power to homes in the United States might be reasonably safe from being offshored to India or even outsourced to temporary foreign workers. But he or she would be mistaken. In fact, the SCE case is just one more example in a long line of cases in which American workers are being replaced by H-1B workers.
Americans should be outraged that most of our politicians sit idly by while outsourcing firms hijack the nation’s temporary foreign worker programs. Unpublished H-1B data from United States Citizenship and Immigration Services reveals the scale of the problem: A majority of H-1B visas are now being used by firms that displace American workers and facilitate the offshoring of high-wage jobs.
In November, as part of his executive immigration actions, President Obama announced sweeping changes to U.S. immigration policies…. Unfortunately, the administration is not considering changes that would help the U.S. workers educated in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) who are hurt by the disastrous flaws in the H-1B program. [Ed.: For example, the SCE workers who just got sacked.]
All the whining that the U.S. doesn’t train enough people in science, technology, and engineering and math (STEM) to meet employer demand? Total bullshit. For reference:
- Beryl Lieff Benderly, Another funny thing happened on the way to the STEM shortage
- Jordan Weissmann, The Myth of America’s Tech-Talent Shortage
- Robert Charette, The STEM Crisis Is a Myth
- Robert Charette, Exposing the Roots of the Perpetual “STEM Crisis”
- Robert Charette, Are STEM Workers Overpaid?
Employers are just looking for ways to drive down wages and benefits any way they can. Remember this:
- Mark Ames, Revealed: Apple and Google’s wage-fixing cartel involved dozens more companies, over one million employees
- Mike Konczal, The Silicon Valley Labor Scandals Prove Minimum Wage Hikes Don’t Cost Jobs
- Jeff Elder (WSJ), Judge Rejects Settlement in Silicon Valley Wage Case