The primary problem with the U.S. green card system for skilled workers is that you are at the mercy of your employer, and the whole application process restarts if for whatever reason you change employers. This vote does nothing to change that.
Even more ironic, now that I am no longer in the U.S. on a work visa, I have more freedom to start a business targeting U.S. customers.
Didn't expect that.
The usual argument given for the lack of freedom for H1B visa holders is that the bureaucrats need to ensure that a H1B doesn't cause a job loss for a citizen. A pencil pusher doesn't even know what it takes to make the pencil [1] he is pushing, and yet somehow he can ensure that a citizen doesn't lose a job! The H1B visa is indentured servitude by the back door, plain and simple.
Anyone who has given some thought to the idea of protecting jobs knows it is an exercise in futility (For a start, Congress must pass an Amish decree [2]: ban all technology invented since 1830, and declare Thomas Edison as the worst job destroyer [3] the world has ever seen. Also it will have to order the arrest and lock up of all entrepreneurs aka wannabe job killers, which is most HN readers). Therefore, I suggest to do away with all the current H1B bullshit, and adopt a point based immigration system where every qualified applicant is given full economic freedom from day one!
[1] I, pencil. http://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/rdPncl1.html
Milton Friedman on "I, pencil" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Gppi-O3a8
I recall Milton Friedman calling the H1B program as just another subsidy for big corporations, but can't locate a reliable source with the full context.
[2] Family Guy 10/7 "Amish Guy" (one of those increasingly rare insightful jokes): http://www.hulu.com/watch/303946/family-guy-amish-guy#s-p1-s...
[3] Bastiat's famous "Candlestick makers' petition": http://bastiat.org/en/petition.html
Also worth reading in this context is Bastiat "What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen": http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html or (for another translation): http://bastiat.org/en/twisatwins.html
You are deliberately and dishonestly misusing these terms.
Slavery is a real problem in the world today. H1B visa holders are not slaves. They are free to quit and work elsewhere whenever they like. Slaves are not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_day_slavery
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/opinion/kristof-the-face-o...
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/opinion/sunday/kristof-fig...
I would not equate the H1B to slavery, but saying H1B holders are free to quit and work elsewhere whenever they like is akin to saying anyone is free to make a million dollars any time they want..Its true in theory, but not so straight forward in reality. For starters many employers will NOT hire an H1B holder, so that narrows your options right off the bat. The companies that do hire H1Bs will often only do that for certain positions, so your career plans had better be exactly in line with those positions..
Red herring. H1B visa holders cannot quit their job if they want to maintain their green card application as the GC process (and multi-year wait) restarts with every job. That's obviously a very strong incentive not to change jobs.
When will the US realize that it is already far from its peak and that today there are (possibly) better alternatives elsewhere?
Get a point based system - now - or watch Chile, China and the rest of the world ROLFStomp you to death.
I'm a freshly minted American (from Canada) and in my 20 person office there is one other American developer (who is also a co-founder).
I've lived in Canada and Europe and the US is by far my preferred place to live, I'm not sure how long it will last though there are generations of Americans that lack the proper skills to compete in the modern economy.
Why would one invest educating one's population if other countries are willing to do that for free?
Long-term, a problem is that, if local education drops too far, you need a huge import of 'human capital' to keep average levels of education constant.
I am fairly sure that is not what the law says though, although I am aware it is often claimed (I suspect falsely) there is such a law.
Actual requirements are here. They don't have to show anything, they just have to attest that in their belief the hiring won't "adversely affect" the "working conditions" of american workers "similarly employed", that there is not currently a strike going on when they bring in the new people, and that they have posted conspicuously a notice of intent at their place of business.
http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/faqsanswers.cfm#lcare...
But then there's a matter of 'prevailing wage' : Whereby one has to define the job to be as menial as possible (so that the employee doesn't suddenly expect a much higher wage bracket), while still making it demanding enough that all their qualifications are 'essential'.
And once the initial paperwork is filed, they're then bound to you for years while waiting in line, since if they lose their job (or have a change in job title), they have to restart the whole process.
Large numbers of people are trapped in bizarre employment situations, waiting on unbelievable bureaucracy - never able to complain on the offchance that the person they're talking to might be having a bad day and send all the documents back (and restart the process)...
This is precisely why I decided it wasn't worth waiting. Too much risk with too many restrictions for too little upside.
While it may seem like a zero sum game (as number of visas is still the same) and thus i have no idea how, yet still lets hope that like in other cases of abolished discrimination everybody ultimately wins.
In my case (as a UK citizen working in NYC), it's a good job that the E-2 Investor Visa (which only exists for countries that the INS deems 'worthy') can be renewed indefinitely.
The flip side of this (and where it starts to get comical) is that as part of the E-2 approval process one has to "intend to leave" once the business is finished - which means that one cannot intend to embark on the Green Card path prior to getting the E-2 visa. It also means that all my (mandatory) payments for unemployment insurance are strictly throw-away money - since I could never claim unemployment in the US anyway. Ho Hum.
