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Visa approvals for tech workers are on the decline. That won't just hurt Silicon Valley.
More tech work could head overseas as the US allows fewer tech workers into the country.
https://www.vox.com/2019/2/28/18241522/trump-h1b-tech-work-jobs-overseas
“It’s treated as a zero-sum game, but if these companies don’t get someone with an H-1B, it’s not likely the job will be filled with an American,” said Jeremy Robbins, New American Economy’s executive director.
What’s more likely is that companies will send the work to where there are eligible employees: overseas.
For all the political attention it’s getting, it’s notable that the H-1B program is actually very small. Its annual new and continuing approvals account for just 0.2 percent of the total US workforce of 160 million.
“H-1Bs are not an enormous slice of the workforce,” according to Richard Burke, president and CEO of Envoy Global, a company that helps startups and Fortune 500 companies alike navigate immigration. “But it has become a flashpoint because of one or two instances of abuse,” he said, referring to high-profile cases in which Disney and Southern California Edison replaced their entire IT departments with outsourced H-1B workers. These were cases in which American talent was obviously available, so they shouldn’t have warranted H-1B workers.
In a survey of 400 US hiring managers with experience sourcing foreigner employees, Envoy found that 22 percent said their companies were relocating work overseas due to the current US immigration system. Some 26 percent said they were delaying projects altogether.
“We have a well-known consumer packaged goods company that needed engineers to design containers for their products,” Burke said. “All of their other manufacturing and distribution was in the US, and they very much preferred to hire in the US, but they couldn’t find sufficient candidates.”
Outsourcing and consulting firms — which provide IT services for companies whose main business isn’t tech, and which tend to rely more heavily on H-1B visas as a share of their overall workforces — have received the brunt of the decline in approvals. The situation isn’t as bad for the biggest tech companies, like Google, Apple, and Amazon, which are seeing most of their applications approved. Still, both groups are advocating for more H-1Bs.
https://www.vox.com/2019/2/28/18241522/trump-h1b-tech-work-jobs-overseas
“It’s treated as a zero-sum game, but if these companies don’t get someone with an H-1B, it’s not likely the job will be filled with an American,” said Jeremy Robbins, New American Economy’s executive director.
What’s more likely is that companies will send the work to where there are eligible employees: overseas.
For all the political attention it’s getting, it’s notable that the H-1B program is actually very small. Its annual new and continuing approvals account for just 0.2 percent of the total US workforce of 160 million.
“H-1Bs are not an enormous slice of the workforce,” according to Richard Burke, president and CEO of Envoy Global, a company that helps startups and Fortune 500 companies alike navigate immigration. “But it has become a flashpoint because of one or two instances of abuse,” he said, referring to high-profile cases in which Disney and Southern California Edison replaced their entire IT departments with outsourced H-1B workers. These were cases in which American talent was obviously available, so they shouldn’t have warranted H-1B workers.
In a survey of 400 US hiring managers with experience sourcing foreigner employees, Envoy found that 22 percent said their companies were relocating work overseas due to the current US immigration system. Some 26 percent said they were delaying projects altogether.
“We have a well-known consumer packaged goods company that needed engineers to design containers for their products,” Burke said. “All of their other manufacturing and distribution was in the US, and they very much preferred to hire in the US, but they couldn’t find sufficient candidates.”
Outsourcing and consulting firms — which provide IT services for companies whose main business isn’t tech, and which tend to rely more heavily on H-1B visas as a share of their overall workforces — have received the brunt of the decline in approvals. The situation isn’t as bad for the biggest tech companies, like Google, Apple, and Amazon, which are seeing most of their applications approved. Still, both groups are advocating for more H-1Bs.
There are good graphs at the link that I can't post here. The services companies in red on the bar graph that are using the most % of H-1B labor will be having the most job openings. Tata, Wipro, Infosys, TechMahindra, etc. could care less about your skills and experience, they're just desperate to fill positions on client contracts and your US citizenship is a major incentive since they won't have to pay for your visa fees. DUers should apply to these companies today.
Get it DUers! DU it for America
