Fed indictments tell how H-1B visas were used to undercut wages

[OhioChick]

Source: Computer World

U.S. announces arrests in several states alleging visa fraud

February 13, 2009 (Computerworld) Federal agents on Thursday said they arrested 11 people in six states in a crackdown on H-1B visa fraud and unsealed documents that detail how the visa process was used to undercut the salaries of U.S. workers.

Federal authorities allege that in some cases, H-1B workers were paid the prevailing wages of low-cost regions and not necessarily the higher salaries paid in the locations where they worked. By doing this, the companies were "displacing qualified American workers and violating prevailing wage laws," said federal authorities in a statement announcing the indictments.

Employers are required to pay H-1B workers prevailing wages, but those wage rates can vary significantly -- by tens of thousands of dollars, depending on the region. How many U.S. workers may have been displaced was not detailed by federal authorities.

The arrests were carried out by federal, state and local agents working in Iowa, California, Massachusetts, Texas, Pennsylvania, Kentucky and New Jersey. The government's action "is the result of an extensive, ongoing investigation into suspected H-1B visa fraud, mail fraud and conspiracy," said Matthew Whitaker, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Iowa, in a statement. The investigation was dubbed Operation Pacific Vision.




Read more: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9127943&intsrc=hm_list

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About damn time...

[ChromeFoundry]

1. They should visit Redmond!!! n/t

[FreakinDJ]

7. The H1B was started by Electronics Mfg Asso.

They lobbied for it
The wrote the legislation
Every year they are in Washington offices bribing lawmakers for the number of visas issued that year.

Its a sweet deal for the Companys and the Corrupt politicians.

[aggiesal]

16. Have you seen Qualcomm in San Diego?

It's like little Calcutta on their campus.

[Hello_Kitty]

2. K and R. Wonder if DU's Globalists will be coming around to defend them. eom

[Ikonoklast]

3. They'll defend them if they don't threaten *their* jobs.

If the shoe is ever on the other foot, they'll squeal like stuck pigs.

[ContinentalOp]

22. H1B Visas? Psh, who cares? That only effects weirdos in California.

Not the REAL, hardworking, unionized Americans in the Midwest.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

11. I have never seen anybody defend visa fraud

A visa is a stamp in a passport, any visa can be obtained legitimately or fraudulently.

We have lots of H1-B's and none of them are in IT, none of them took a job from an unemployed engineer or programmer either. And our lowest paid H1-B made $89,000 last year plus the 8.5% bonus everybody got.

Believe it or not, there are not very many Americans who can practice law in India, can recite the AFTA agreement backwards in three languages or are French tax accountants. International business very often requires the hiring of foreigners, we have more Americans working overseas for us than we have foreigners working here. I am one of the expats - am I stealing a Canadians job?

[Hello_Kitty]

12. ....and here they come!

I really like how you cite highly anomalous circumstances of H1B visa hires (really, how many jobs require reciting an AFTA agreement backwards in three languages?) and act like they are representative of the majority. Nice touch. :thumbsup:

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

14. anomalous? try appropriate!

Our H-1B and L-1 holders are here for very specific reasons, such as an expert on French tax law, an expert on Intra-Asian trade policy and so on. Otherwise known as LEGITIMATE reasons or NOT VISA FRAUD.

Believe it or not you can become an accountant in this country without learning the French corporate tax code. (I know I was suprised too)

Lashing out at individual visa classes is pointless, L-1 visa fraud is a larger problem than H-1B visa fraud in the first place and K-1 visas take the fraud cake.

Prosecute visa fraud of all kinds, fixating on specific visas is pointless.

[JDPriestly]

27. Like anything else, qualified Americans could learn the French tax code

Americans don't have an easy time finding jobs in France -- no matter how proficient they are in French.

With the unemployment rates of today, work visas are going to be a lot harder to get. We just can't afford to pay a qualified American unemployment benefits, food stamps, etc. so that someone from a foreign country can have a job. Sorry, when times were better, the standard may have been more flexible.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

35. you will be happy to know we are stealing jobs from 21 French people

[Confusious]

29. So what, Knowing french tax law is how many jobs?

10? you're defending the thousands? good luck!

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

34. That would be the point

The H-1B and L-1 is for THOSE jobs - NOT entry level IT jobs.

The issue is visa fraud, not a stamp in a passport.

[mcg]

54. I have worked in IT shops where half of the staff are Indians,

many have H-1B visas, and they don't have specialized knowledge that programmers here do not have.
It is all about lower wages.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

56. and that is visa fraud, NOBODY is defending that

okay, somebody probably is - but it isn't me.

[bvar22]

58. You give anonyous, anecdotal testimony....

...of ONE incident where H1B Visas have been appropriate.
Is this your Potemkin Village?

How representative of the overall use of H1B is your anonymous, anecdotal testimony?

There are some isolated populations where the Bush Tax Cits have been beneficial (the top 1%).
Have they been good for America?

[primavera]

89. If that isn't the pot calling the kettle black...

Official estimates - which you will of course dismiss as lies - have always estimated the rate of fraud in the H-1B program to be very low, less than 5%. Yet you're comfortable asserting that the vast majority of H-1B visa applications are fraudulent, and you base this upon what evidence? Let me guess: anonymous, anecdotal testimony, no doubt of disgruntled IT workers who perceive themselves to be victims and foreigners the easiest scapegoat at hand. Yeah, now there's a reliable source of data. :eyes:

[morillon]

59. Things are very different in IT.

The various visa programs are used to bring over people with quite commonplace skill sets. The last company I worked for was importing people from India who had a little sysadmin knowledge and maybe six months of Java experience. If I'd put an ad in the local paper or on Monster for those skills, I would've had dozens of resumes from highly qualified local candidates within hours. And these people would've been citizens or green card holders.

The company I work for now has NO legitimate business need for H-1B or L-1 visa holders, particularly not in IT. The local labor pool has all the skills we need. I'd like to see the company completely cut out sponsorship and sever its outsourcing deals immediately. Every IT project that has been outsourced has utterly turned to shit. One application I used to work on went from an award-winning, highly stable product to one of the most unstable in the company within eight months of these guys getting their mitts on it.

[FreakinDJ]

15. Well Goody for you

Go to the Silicon Valley and spout that drivil and see how many friends you get

Oh wait - you'll have plenty and they'll all be waiving their passport at you asking for an extention.

Beside even the U.S State Dept. list the H1B visa program as the Most Abused Visa Program

[quakerboy]

23. so you are telling me that my fellow graduates

are not willing to learn what they need to to practice law in India, recite AFTA in three languages, or work as a French tax accountant for 89+k per year?

I call bullshit. I had a lot of fellow grads who would jump at the chance to do these things. They were never given the oportunity.

[JDPriestly]

28. You are so right!!!

The Civil Code is no great mystery. Lots of Americans study international law in law school. Besides, in American law schools, we learn to think like lawyers -- to do research and to learn what we need to learn for a specific case or job.

[No Elephants]

36. AFIK. the intternational law taught in U.S. law schools is not the law of any specific

country, be it France, Italy, Bulgaria or Iraq.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

33. and where in the USA might they learn these things?

and how long will it take?

We use the H-1B program as it is intended, to hire those with the most obscure of skills for very specific roles. There isn't a law school in the US that graduates lawyers ready for an Indian courtroom.

We actually did find an American for the AFTA role, but he was a university professor and wasn't interested,

[Hello_Kitty]

38. The majority are not being hired for obscure skills and specific tasks

They are hired to replace American workers in common jobs for lower wages.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

46. that is visa fraud and should be harshly prosecuted

and those fraudulent visas for that purpose are not limited to H-1B's - the large scam of all is consulting companies in India settings up a US division and using L-1 visas to transfer employees to the US where they work as contractors. The probability of many of these body shop visas actually legitimately qualifying for L-1 status legitimately is minimal.

And there is no limit on the number of L-1 viasa issued, but nobody is talking about the L-1.

[cascadiance]

43. Most companies aren't like yours and abuse the system, I've seen it PERSONALLY happen...

... and that was well over a decade ago when I saw it in Silicon Valley... It's been abused for a long time.

Yes, the H-1B program was supposed to be used to help domestic companies quickly get unique sets of expertise that they might not readily get here in the U.S., and don't want to have the normal barriers of getting the Green Card, citizenship, etc. to get in the way to hire foreign workers that might have that expertise. But many of us contend that there's NO WAY that our H-1B Visa cap should be raised, and in fact should be reduced heavily and would still help companies with these rare situations. These companies should be prepared to pay MORE than the prevailing wage to get these sorts of employees, if there truly is a need for their unique experience that domestic workers can't provide. If there truly is a larger market for a certain combination of skills not found here that needs a lot of workers, then our universities should observe this and provide training for it. If these category of workers are getting paid more for these special skills, then more of our workers should want to obtain these skills to get that extra pay and the marketplace should help correct for these deficiencies.

MOST companies use H-1B Visa got get in effect indentured servants to work for them at lower wages.

I've personally seen things like the following:

1) One company's managers that I worked for JOKING that they could get work done for a reduced budget on personnel by going to an external "body shop" who only hired H-1B Visa employees, that instead of providing "contractors" to the company I worked for, provided a "service", and therefore not a measurable salary for each individual that could be measured against the company's domestic employees where the contractors actaully worked at.

The body shop, only hiring H-1B Visa employees, used that to avoid having to compare against other employees and just compared H-1B Visa employees amongst themselves, and therefore could set their salaries to whatever they felt they needed to without having to do that comparison with this loophole. This abuse is why we have the Visa cap being hit so early in the year, and why companies cry for more. Now some of them might want to use it for the reasons that it was intended for (and are in effect getting screwed by those who abuse the system), but many others just want to be able to have more access to cheaper labor, which we CANNOT AFFORD to give now, and shouldn't have been for the last decade or two as well.

2) I've lived next door in an apartment building to a unit where they really STACKED it full of tons of H-1B Visa employees of a given company. When the boss of the company needed a unit to move into himself when the rental market was going crazy, these "indentured servants" were ALL forced to move out, and he moved in. I didn't wait too long to move out of that building, knowing that my rental lease was going up by about 40% shortly with the housing crunch that happened then. These employees didn't even have control over where they lived, let alone what wages they were earning. Anyone also see the connection to how it also affected the cost of housing, if enough of these situations happened around the bay area?

You have to step back from just thinking of it a simplistic global market where everyone has to fight for the same wages everywhere. There are so many different variables here that have created problems for the domestic worker here in competing against these H-1B Visa employees:

1) The cost of living in India (where often times the employee's family STILL lives while they work here) is about a 10th or less of what it is in many places they work here. Our domestic employees have to pay 10 times the costs for their family's welfare than the H-1B Visa employee has to do here.

2) That extra money they don't have to pay to their family is in effect a big savings they sock away for a few years while they work here, and many look at is a big bonus once they live that they can live off of in India and have it go a LONG way in that area which once they move back and work someplace like Bangalore (which they've built up good experience for).

3) Bachelor degrees in India are subsidized (like Bachelor degrees in California USED TO BE during Jerry Brown's term as governor). Though their colleges aren't as good as ours in comparing bachelors' degrees, they are CERTAINLY better than having just a high school diploma (which is the limit of what edomestic employees have subsidized here, unless they are lucky enough to get a scholarship).

4) We've had around two decades of this H-1B Visa abuse and outsourcing abuse by our tech companies. Now, if you are a high school graduate during those two decades and saw this happening, and MIGHT HAVE HAD the good intelligence and skills that with a college education could have made for a good tech career for a domestic worker later, you in many cases likely chose instead other careers here, when you see that many jobs (especially entry level in many cases) are being either outsourced overseas, or outsourced to H-1B employees here. Therefore THAT is why we show up as not as well educated, because college students have made GOOD BUSINESS DECISIONS that the system was working AGAINST any ambitions they might have had for a tech career, and chosen other careers that they might get better job security and financial reward from instead. Especially with the increasing costs of college education here now. When I was in college in the late 70's and early 80's and Silicon Valley was growing, I was lucky that this wasn't happening then, and there was a lot of incentives for people like me to go after this sort of career then. Those incentives don't exist any more, unless our government works to correct these situations now.

It's not just tech workers that are victim to programs like H-1B. Look at some of the even worse abuse that the H-2 program where many companies abused the prevailing wages of New Orleans workers by abusing the H-2B program which had similar "indentured servant" structure that H-1B Visa employees only worse, as these workers were even more slaves when they had a lot more of their livlihood held hostage by these holding their VISAs, with less skills and means to break out of their situations than even H-1B Visa employees might have been.

http://www.workingimmigrants.com/2006/08/new_orleans_suit_over_h2b_gues.html

It is time that we STOPPED this exploitation of virtual SLAVE LABOR programs that we've allowed to happen in this country for so long at the scope they have been if we really want to empower the American worker and restore the Middle Class.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

47. You will find most "body shops" are full of L-1 holders and not H-1B's

The Indian consulting companies bring in their people as inter-company transfers on the uncapped L-1 visa, did any of these people work for the said consulting company before they came to the United States on the L-1 visa?

Probably not, but there is little active enforcement or auditing of L-1 visa applications.

[quakerboy]

52. You are telling me that among the many people of the US

there is not one person, not a single one, in approximately 305,806,000 who could do the things that Microsoft, IBM, or even your company needs done? Not one who could and would be willing to learn the job in a reasonable amount of time in exchange for a reasonable wage?

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

55. We aren't IBM or Microsoft

The problem we tend to have is alot of the Americans who are appropriate for these roles are academics and really just not interested. And other roles the canidate has to be qualified/certified/whatever in their homeland to do the job.

We aren't hiring a French guy to be an American tax accountant, we are hiring a French guy to be a French tax accoutant, he just happens to be doing it from a desk in Orange County.

[OhioChick]

64. Key phrase...."reasonable wage." n/t

[OhioChick]

63. "We use the H-1B program as it is intended, to hire those with the most obscure of skills"

I call bullshit, am in the field and see why H-1B's and L-1's are brought in firsthand.....for cheap labor.

Study Says H-1Bs Aren't the Best or Brightest

http://blogs.eweek.com/careers/content001/h1b_foreign_workers/study_says_h1bs_arent_the_best_or_brightest.html

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

65. you are aware that H-1B and L-1 visas are not limited to high tech right?

Dozens of professions are eligible for the H-1B visa, anybody with a pulse and no criminal record can get an L-1 visa.

and if you happen to know where to find these foreign lawyers, accountants and regulatory folks in the United States, please let me know.

[OhioChick]

67. I am very much aware. n/t

[JDPriestly]

26. As one who knows an American lawyer who speaks three languages, and who wrote

a couple of papers in law school comparing American and German law in a couple of areas, I can say that if law firms/employers looked around and didn't discriminate on other grounds, lots of Americans could compete for the kinds of jobs you describe.

The problem is that employers don't look for qualified Americans. What's more, too many employers apply more stringent standards when looking at American job applicants than they do when looking at foreign applicants.

I know an older woman with a PhD in a field related to mathematics and years of experience in statistical analysis. Oh, and by the way, she speaks and writes fluent American English. Her communication skills are way better than those of the competition from overseas. Guess what? She can't find a decent job because employers prefer younger foreign applicants.

Americans could be found to fill most jobs if employers tried to find them. Thanks to the way we are educated, we Americans can learn anything. The U.S. does not need to issue visas to find qualified employees except for a very small number of jobs.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

32. and we hire them,

Our foreign lawyers are a very small part of our payroll, but their indispensable for their role. You can a western lawyer who has studied foreign legal systems as an academic subject, but they can't just walk into court in Hong Kong.

The foreign lawyers we hire and not lawyers in the United States, they are lawyers in Russia, China, India etc and represent our clients in those countries. They provide legal advice pertaining to litigation in their homelands.

If your a US company involved in litigation in Russia - you really need a Russian lawyer. And if you come to us your Russian lawyer will be a western educated fluent english speaking one.

If your a US company and claim you can't find a dude to install Microsoft Office and therefore need to hire an Indian guy - that is visa fraud and should be prosecuted.

[JDPriestly]

69. To practice law in most parts of the U.S., a lawyer has to be a licensed member of a U.S. bar

association. And most state bar associations require the lawyer to pass a bar exam. The pass rate in California is around 50-60% most years. Considering that entry into law school is quite competitive, that means that individuals who pass the California bar, especially if they pass it the first or second time (some very intelligent, qualified people fail the first time due to anxiety), are the creme de la creme -- by definition intelligent and qualified. Lawyers who aren't licensed in the U.S. cannot appear in U.S. courts and should not be practicing law here.

If a lawyer is practicing law in Russia, why does he or she need to work in the U.S.? That lawyer should work in Russia where he or she is part of the local legal community. If that lawyer is just sitting at a desk and not really going to court, he or she does not need to sit at a desk in the U.S. -- not in this day and age.

Something about your example does not make sense. The lawyer who appears in U.S. courts needs to be in the U.S. That's because in the litigation I am familiar with, opposing counsel can bring an ex parte motion pretty quickly and the last thing you need is an attorney with serious jet lag arguing your motion. If the attorney is handling a case in Russia, he can travel to the U.S. for short periods of time on a tourist visa and work and live in Russia most of the time -- where he appears in court.

I met an attorney in L.A. who was a legal immigrant (came at a fairly young age but spoke good Russian) and was educated partly in the then U.S.S.R. and partly in the U.S. She was not unique. I also have a good friend who is an attorney and who was born in this country but is of Indian descent. In fact, lawyers of Indian descent or ethnicity used to have their own bar association in L.A. County.

So, there is no need to bring in lawyers from other countries on special visas. There are plenty of lawyers with different language skills and cultural backgrounds -- who are Americans. Of course, they would expect to be treated like all other American lawyers -- in terms of pay and equal opportunity. That's the rub, isn't it?

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

71. This really isn't complicated - they aren't practicing law in the US

I don't know if you have heard about this thing called "Globalization" but businesses large and small very often have operations outside the United States, when you are a business operating overseas you will have a need for legal, financial and regulatory affairs services.

Our firm provides US companies with foreign legal, tax/accounting and regulatory services.

To this end we hire foreign professionals who remain active in their profession in their homeland but reside in the United States to serve our American clients. Believe it or not people like to deal with english speakers, face to face in a civilized timezone. We don't need lawyers of Indian or Russian heritage, we need presently active lawyers who can jump on the plane home to represent our clients in their foreign legal entanglements. The legal profession is eligible for the H-1B visa for this very reason.

It isn't complicated, it isn't unusual and we aren't the only ones doing it. It is actually a real growth industry - and for firms that do it well clients will shift more or all of their legal needs to their firm.

Nobody in the US is losing out for the presense of these people,

At the same time we have Americans working for us overseas doing the exact same thing for international companies operating in the United States. I am one of them - I am working in Canada as part of the Regulatory group.

International business requires international people,

[JDPriestly]

76. Do you pay them the same wages and give them the same benefits

as American lawyers with the same qualifications?

And, why do you have the special H1-B visas? Why do they need to reside in the U.S.?

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

78. Accounting for special benefits their paid more

The ones with kids get tuition assistance if they want to send their kid to an ethnic school, they get travel allowances, they get housing allowances if they are maintaining more than one household. Some of those who spend most of their time overseas get use of company owned apartments in the US. They get the same annual bonus as everyone else. The competition for these people is fierce.

I already explained why they reside in the US.

[JDPriestly]

82. Sounds to me like they could do their consulting work just as

easily in their countries of origin -- and travel back and forth as needed. That would be cheaper for your country and just as effective. How often does a client actually meet with his or her lawyer -- not all that often. Most of the contact is usually on the phone or written. In this day and age of internet, you do not need to house these experts in the U.S.

This is especially important for families with children. A child is a citizen of the U.S. if it is born here. You could have a situation in which a child who is in fact a French citizen is being educated in American schools. That child may lose a lot of knowledge of the French language and never be able to compete with students in France in many areas. Take it from one who lived overseas for many years. Moving a twelve-year-old from Europe to the U.S. may work, but moving that kid back to Europe at the age of 17 will be difficult. The education systems just do not permit that kind of transfer for most children.

There are lots of other problems. If these employees are using the special visas to move lock, stock and barrel to the U.S., they are not temporary employees and should go through normal immigration processes to get regular visas. If they are really here only temporarily, they may find that moving back and forth is not such a good experience.

And if you have Americans living in Europe, my advice to them is to buy a house here before they leave to go to Europe, rent it out and keep paying on it. Europeans generally rent and build up no equity. No matter how much money you are making, it can be very difficult to come back to the U.S. in you 40s or 50s and find a good house you can afford.

Take from one who lived in Europe for quite a number of years. You don't need to bring these consultants to the U.S. There is something suspicious about what you are doing.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

85. and let me guess, your the first to complain about foreign call centers

So you can't imagine the appeal to our clients of a local english speaker in their timezone who they can meet with face to face whenever it is required.

We aren't doing anything that other internationally oriented lawfirms aren't also doing - nothing suspicious or unusual about it. There are more than enough clients in Southern California to keep all our Asian lawyers busy. They don't just sit around playing Minesweeper waiting for something to come up every few months.

And just how do you imagine corporations secure and engage foreign professional services? Craigslist and Vonage.

[Baby Snooks]

30. How many have been laid off?

When an American worker is unemployed and can't find work because the positions he or she might be able to apply for are filled by foreign workers with H1-B visas, there is something wrong.

This comes as no surprise to those who fought "immigration reform" and believed the law should have been enforced.

That includes those who remember the words of that great Republican orator and defender of corporate corruption - Barbara Jordan. Who repeatedly warned Congress in 1996 of what would happen if the law was not enforced. Barbara Jordan of course was no Republican but was a great orator and was the best example of a Democrat I can think of. And the Republicans in great part respected her. She cared for all Americans. Who she considered her own along with her own. She was worried about her own but she knew that what would happen to her own would happen to all of us. And she knew you take care of your own first. We have not.

She warned a Republican Congress the way Ronald Reagan warned a Democratic Congress. There's some irony in that. And also a revelation about who Congress serves. And Congress does not serve the American people. Congress does not serve its own.

I really hate being crude and try not to be rude but in this case I will be both. Take your H1-B visas and your "outsourcing" and your "guest workers" and your "globalization" and shove them all up your ass.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

31. We haven't laid anybody off and aren't going to

only one person has been let go in the last year and she and her husband used company owned apartments to host a swinger party.

[Donnachaidh]

48. that says a whole lot about your company and your employees

You're proud of that? :puke:

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

49. you wouldn't have fired them?

Try hosting an orgy on company property, which saw the police called and see if you still have a job. The condos were for long-term visitors, not hosting swinger parties.

Lets see here, we have cut exactly zero jobs, we spend a fortune on training, everybody got a bonus last year, our benefits are excellent and were still hiring.

My god, what a fucking terrible place to work.

[olegramps]

45. How about citing some supported facts?

[mcg]

53. Who is "We"?

You wrote "We have lots of H1-B's and none of them are in IT, none of them took a job from an unemployed engineer or programmer either."

There are many H1-B's in the U.S. in IT and they do take jobs from programmers.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

57. the firm I work for

All our H-1B and L-1 holders are in legal and finance, and virtually all of them in an international legal or finance role.

[JDPriestly]

70. Are the lawyers you employ in California members of the California bar?

And if so, how many times did they have to take the bar before qualifying?

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

72. All the California based American lawyers are

and I don't have a clue, some of them are old enough to be my parents.

[JDPriestly]

75. To become a lawyer in California, you have to go through a

character examination. I do not believe that a person with some sort of special visa could pass that exam. Also, here is the oath that an attorney must take to be admitted to practice in a federal court:

"I, , do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will demean myself as an attorney and counselor of this court, uprightly and according to law; and that I will support the Constitution of the United States."

http://law.jrank.org/pages/4092/Admission-Bar.html

Also, to be admitted to the California Bar Association, you have to comply with the following law:

CALIFORNIA BUSINESS AND PROFESSIONS CODE
6067. Oath. Every person on his admission shall take an oath
to support the Constitution of the United States and the
Constitution of the State of California, and faithfully to
discharge the duties of any attorney at law to the best of his
knowledge and ability. A certificate of the oath shall be
indorsed upon his license.
(Added by Stats. 1939, c 34. p. 354, Sec. 1.)
http://www.1215.org/lawnotes/lawnotes/oath.htm

So, do the lawyers who are here on temporary visas take these oaths? I seriously doubt it. Why would a French citizen swear to uphold the U.S. Constitution.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

79. How many times do I have to explain this?

The international lawyers are not practicing law in California they are practicing law, representing US clients where they came from. In any event the California bar WILL admit foreign lawyers. But if your a foreign lawyer practicing at home there is very little incentive to do so.

[JDPriestly]

83. I respond again. A lawyer needs to be in the country, in the

legal community in which he or she is practicing. Might as well have your residence there. You can travel with no problem.

[cap]

84. send me the email address of the hiring manager who hired H1B's

and I guarantee that I can flood their mailbox with unemployed citizens who are more than qualified and ready to walk in the door the next day to take the places of the H1b's.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

86. Then you have an incredible future as a head hunter

Have you applied to Robert Half Legal yourself? recruiting for these internationally oriented positons is very difficult since from the accounting side of things it just isn't taught here from the regulatory side it is really only learned from having been in the sysytem and from the legal side of things sending an US trained lawyer to practice law in a foreign land is absurd as bringing a foreign trained lawyer to practice in the US. Would you hire a lawyer fresh off the plane to just happened to pass an American bar exam?

Unlike many companies at the moment, we continue to hire most of which will be filled locally by internal referrals.

[cap]

87. I would be willing to do this for your company

I am a graduate of an Ivy League school and a name prep school. Many of our alumni are unemployed right now. There is a good chance, I could find more qualified people than your internal referrals. This is for all levels of experience from newly minted graduate to very senior levels. You need a JD/MBA, fluent language, in country expertise, no problem. We may even luck out and find an American citizen with dual nationality.

Since you are hiring "experts", you are, of course, paying a premium wage for that expertise. So the wage offered, is higher than that of an American worker.

You do know that you have to post the listings for H1Bs on the DOL website as well as in newspapers. :)

I would also request that, in fairness, that you advertise the position (you are legally bound to do so) in a major Sunday paper, not the mid-week edition and that the qualifications listed for the given pay rate are commensurate. You have a new sheriff in town that is pro-labor and the old tricks of advertising in mid week editions of papers that do not reach the target population or of writing job descriptions so finely that only one person can possibly qualify will not work.

I hope that your policy of hiring only from internal referral has changed because that would imply that your advertisements in the newspapers were only formalities for documentation for the visa process and not active solicitations to seek out American workers. As you know, that is illegal.

I would be glad to help you out.

[Sen. Walter Sobchak]

88. we don't need help with LOCAL hiring

You said you could find people for the H-1B's - generally they are paid the same as their American counterparts in similar positions, they do however receive expat benefits for housing, personal travel and their dependents. I get expat benefits working in Canada - although not as rich as the ones they get.

For LOCAL hiring (aka virtually all of it) most positions go through internal referrals, I have mixed feelings about this on one hand it has attracted some excellent people who would not have otherwise been looking, on the flip side it has turned some of the admin side of the office into a party clique.

Anything like a referral internationally speaking would be an L-1 matter as opposed to an H-1B.

All our H-1B positions were advertised, we regularly take out career section newspaper ads for all our open positions monthly, we tend to advertise most positions even if they are ultimately filled internally. H-1B wise what responses we usually get are from long since naturalized immigrants who are many years or even decades removed from their old profession, one guy with a greencard who was still technically a lawyer turned out to be a dissident who refused to travel to China and many are from academics who are prepared to consult, but aren't available 8 months out of the year. We had one prof on the hook last year but he bailed out when he was offered a tenure track position somewhere. We also hear from professors trying to help their former students find work in the US.

I know the knee jerkers have problems with this, but there is a difference between a business that is international in nature hiring foreigners to cover international aspects of their business and firing your entire IT department and bringing in a planeload of new grads from India.

[primavera]

90. You're confusing H-1Bs and permanent labor certs

Permanent alien labor certifications are required to advertise in appropriate publications, and DoL regs stipulate that the ads have to run in at least two consecutive Sunday editions of the most widely read local newspaper. In addition, you have to undertake several other recruitment steps, including publishing ads in national journals, posting the job listing with the state employment services agency, advertising with university placement offices and career fairs, circulating the job description internally using in-house newsletters, listservs, whatever, posting the position description in prominent places at the worksite, along with detailed instructions on how to contact DoL if you have any cause to believe the process is unfair, and so on and so on. If there is a union present, the union representative must be contacted and a formal letter must be obtained stating that the union does not object to the hiring of the foreign worker. In other words, it's vastly more work to hire a foreign worker and undergo a permanent alien labor certification than it would be to simply hire a US worker.

The employer also has to obtain a prevailing wage determination from DoL and has to pay at least as much. They also need to document that they are paying not only the minimum prevailing wage as determined by DoL, but the so-called actual wage which the employer pays other employees within their organization doing similar labor. So, for instance, if DoL found that the prevailing wage for position X in location Y was, say, $50K, the employer would have to pay at least $50K to meet the prevailing wage requirement. Beyond that, if the employer paid their US workers doing job X $70K, the employer would have to pay the foreign worker $70K.

For H-1Bs, the recruitment requirements are somewhat less stringent as the resultant visa is only valid for 3 years, not a lifetime. For an H-1B, the employer needs to post notices of his intention to hire someone in H-1B status, listing the job description, salary, hours to be worked, location work is to be performed, along with instructions on how to contact DoL if anyone has a complaint. The employer is bound by the same prevailing and actual wage requirements that apply to labor certs and they must receive the written assent of any union representative. The employer files a Labor Condition Application with DoL, in which he has to document his compliance with the posting and wage requirements, and if it is approved, they may then petition USCIS for the H-1B visa without further specific recruiting measures.

In both the immigrant and nonimmigrant employment-based visa petitions, the employer can look forward to several months of work to obtain the visa, several thousand dollars of filing fees, and several thousand dollars more for legal fees paid to an attorney. In other words, it's quite expensive and time consuming to hire a foreign worker. Not something most sane people would readily undertake unless they really had a strong reason for doing so.

[FreakinDJ]

4. About Fucking Time

10s of 1000s of electonics workers living in fear for years knowing they will be outsourced or insourced through 30% Discount H1B workers if they so much as ask for a raise

[Double T]

5. But how will wall street and corporate america get more foreign slaves?

We need hundreds of millions more H1B visas so the rest of america can be replaced by slaves.

[pleah]

6. K&R

:)

[KakistocracyHater]

8. they are doing this in Europe too

I want to make this clear, this pattern extends beyond America, that's what caused the British "wild cats" to strike.

[sledgehammer]

9. Good! Better late than never. n/t

[HughMoran]

10. I can vouch for this

I've seen if first hand. The workers (Asian) were really pissed when they realized how poorly they were paid when they finally got their green cards. I had no idea they were paid so little. Then they got sucked into the adjustable sub-prime mortgage scheme. Companies in this country have no morals at all and should be punished.

[FatDave]

13. I've seen them threatened into working off the clock.

Not sure how explicit the threat was, but the H1B worker was donating his time for fear of losing his visa.

[bvar22]

60. Companies are not supposed to have morals.

Companies are supposed to make a profit for their shareholders/owners.
The ones responsible for this are our politicians (Democrats & Republicans) who decided that it would be a good thing to let companies (Corporations) regulate themselves.

No one could have foreseen this outcome.
:rofl:

[ihavenobias]

17. K & R n/t

[McCamy Taylor]

18. This is what the feds are for! Go get 'em!

[Gman]

19. Years ago there were posts here about seminars that taught

how to get around the H1B requirements. Specifically, the attendees were taught to word the job description as narrowly as possible so as to be able to disqualify anyone in the US. Then hire an H1B.

[aggiesal]

20. Then they would advertise in Podunct, Iowa,

where they know there are no engineers. Then they can say that
they advertised and nobody applied for the position.

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

80. That was not about H-1Bs

There is no advertisement for H-1Bs. That seminar was for Labor Certifications, which are the first step in obtaining an employment-based green card.

As for the advertisement, the job description canNOT be too narrow or the Department of Labor (USCIS is NOT involved in the labor cert at all) will reject it (I know first-hand).

[cliffordu]

21. I just broke a sweat at the idea of perp-walking Ballmer.....

[lumberjack_jeff]

24. FROG MARCH! n/t

[xloadiex]

25. Here's the DU thread and video

from a couple years ago. It stuck in my mind because I was so outraged after seeing it. Obviously nothing has been done since then.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=1139261

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1169773

[hootinholler]

37. Only took 'em 20 fucking years!

Who forgot to pay the graft?

Note there are none in Washington State, Maryland or Virginia.

-Hoot

OnEdit: Oops, missed California in OP.

[DCKit]

40. My first hand experience in DC, VA and MD...

says that the H1-B visa holders here work for American companies - government contractors, in particular.

These arrests are meant to send a message to all of these companies. They're being given time to straighten up.

[hootinholler]

41. That's my experience here in the tech setctor also. n/t

[sybylla]

50. It's all about a change in administration

Investigations and prosecutions dropped to near zero under the chimp in the first two years of his admin. from somewhere around 250 in 2000 under Clinton.

I'm glad to see this administration is back to holding corporations accountable.

[midnight]

39. This has been an issue for nurses for so many years.

Thanks for highlighting this greedy system.

[IowaGuy]

42. let's be careful who we're gettin into bed with here....

Matt Whittaker, the District attorney quoted on this is a hard-core flamin' freeper bush-bot....beholden to the ultra right wing "religulous" evangalisto-fascist wing of the party.
He was brought in by Rove during the time of the purging of attorneys that weren't playin' political ball the way the Bush crime family wanted.
He's hangin' by a thread to this job and has no really good prospects for a job after Obama dumps him except for running the day care he owns.

He brought charges alleging extortion and bribery against a local Dem state pol (that also happens to be gay and is hated with a passion by the religious kooks - they wanted his head on a stick bad);
when it went to the jury, the jury saw right through the crap and said not guilty....didn't even deliberate long enough to get a free Subway sandwich out of it for lunch, they felt it was such a complete waste of their time.

Regardless of your feelings on the H1-b visa program, which admittedly is f'd up...Just sayin' this is the type of guy we're dealing with, he's at a desperate point in his life...and things may not all be what appears in the article.

[sendero]

44. I remember as far back as 1983..

.... working for an employer who went out of his way to only hire H1-B folks, cheap.

Truth is, some of them made good, profitable employees, most of them did not.

[Capt13]

73. Who was president in 1983?

[Christa]

51. My husband came here on a H-1B visa

he did not get paid nearly as much as his American colleagues, and as soon as he got his greencard thet fired him.

Go figure :eyes:

[BobRossi]

61. Thank you Spence Abraham.

What a tool.

[Capt13]

62. H2-B ??

I'm an equipment tech (mechanic) at a PGA grade member owned private $$ country club.We have a winter staff of about 12 full timers and a summer staff of 130+. The membership is all crying poor mouth as many of them are struggling to hold onto their summer mansions. So no raises this year. We have 10%+ unemployment and rising. The unemployment office is literally the biggest growth industry in the state. 1 in 5 mortgages are upside down and 8 in 100 are going into foreclosure. I shouldn't complain because the treat their help better than most and it's a nice work place.
Again this year management feels it necessary to to bring in H2-B workers.
These are not jobs picking lettuce!
These guys will be professionally trained in safety procedures and to operate modern, very expensive, state of the art golf course equipment. They get really nice, CHEAP ($200.00/mo)housing, free phone, cable tv, internet access, free 3 meals a day,75% co-oped health/dental care, free uniforms, boots, and a 2009 company car to share.
AND the same wages as the local guys. And more benefits. The management seems to enjoy having resident workers (Tax Breaks ??).(And if I'm not mistaken one of the members owns a staffing service that imports immigrant workers.) They will earn about 20-25K each for the season, sending most of it HOME. Do you know how far that goes in Peru or Bolivia ?
I do not understand how a company in this environment can justify giving away good jobs when there are families, laborers and trades people in this town all their lives and can't find well a paying job, health care etc, unemployment benefits, etc ??
How many other companies farm out 15-20% of their staff like this?
Isn't this "Displacing qualified American workers"? It's not like they couldn't find any if they looked.
I wish I could live for cheap all summer and winter in South America with 20k in my pocket.

[OhioChick]

66. "Isn't this "Displacing qualified American workers"? "

Sadly enough, that it is.

Welcome to DU. :hi:

[KakistocracyHater]

68. so if this is the very same method being used in Europe

that makes this a much larger scam, yes?

[Name removed]

74. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Endangered Specie]

77. I hope they throw the book at them, and that this will torpedo the whole H1-B bullshit

Democrats are supposed to be the party of working men and women, unions, and protecting American jobs. As a party we should take up eliminating H1-B or really restricting it so that it isn't so abused... best just to scrap it, we can train Americans to do the jobs we need being done, especially given our rapidly rising un-employment rate.

I am fortunate that my (future) line or work generally requires U.S. citizenship, but I have seen those who must compete with H1-B workers, Americans don't stand a chance.

It makes me sick thinking about it. :mad: :mad:

[AnneD]

81. Well it's about damn time someone call them out on it......

EOM