New threat: foreigners on L-1 visas

Date: Saturday, July 05, 2003 1:07 PM

JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER

www.ZaZona.com

This is one of the better articles on the L-1 visa issue, and it
clearly articulates why we will not get our jobs back if the H-1B visa
cap is allowed to go back down to 65,000 a year. If H-1B is restricted
companies will use L-1 visas instead. L-1 visas are so much easier to
obtain so it wouldn't be surprising to see H-1B visas used only for
entities that are exempt from the limit and the $1,000 fee such as
public schools, colleges, universities, government agencies, government
funded scientific research institutions, and medical clinics that want
foreign doctors.

One statement by Malone needs further discussion:

The most controversial of those visas go to a handful of
consulting firms based in India, where high-tech workers
are plentiful, English is spoken and salary expectations are low.

Bodyshops such as TATA and Infosys have received most of the ire for
importing L-1s into the U.S. but percentage wise they are only a minor
part of the L-1 problem. Any company that has an overseas office, and
that might be nothing more than a sham office and PO box, can import
L-1s into the United States. Most companies hire their L-1s direct and
don't rely on the bodyshops. Bodyshops are the most controversial L-1
importers because they have received the most publicity, not because
they are the largest employers of L-1s.

Statistics from this article proves my point about the bodyshops:

Total L-1s working in the U.S. = 325,000

Infosys = 1,760 L-1 visa holders
Wipro Ltd. = 1,150

Dell Computers = 21,100 L-1 visa holders (not including H-1Bs!)

Conclusion: Even though TATA is far larger than Infosys and Wipro, Dell
Computers probably employs more L-1s than the all of the bodyshops in
the U.S. combined. The numerical difference is probably even more
dramatic because Infosys and Wipro probably exaggerates their numbers
while Dell probably understates them.

If every Indian owned bodyshop was forced out of the U.S. it wouldn't
make a noticeable dent in the huge number of American workers being
displaced. Bodyshops can avoid paying Social Security and income taxes
so they deserve close scrutiny, but nobody should assume that Indian
bodyshops have a monopoly on fraud, exploitation, tax evasion, and the
wholesale destruction of American jobs. Multi-national corporations
deserve the largest share of the blame and many of them use U.S. owned
contract agencies that moved into the lucrative nonimmigrant
importation business.

http://www.statesman.com/business/content/auto/epaper/editions/today/business_e36f6a3c747d6160002b.html

Workers facing layoffs in a slumping market are spurred to action

By Julia Malone

WASHINGTON BUREAU

Monday, June 23, 2003

WASHINGTON -- Already short on jobs, some American high-tech workers
are mobilizing against a growing threat that they will be replaced by
foreign workers arriving on a once-obscure visa.

Across the country, U.S. workers who once protested that H-1b visa
holders were displacing them, now are focusing on the growing use of
the less-restrictive L-1 visa to bring bargain-priced foreign labor to
major corporations.

Even in a U.S. job market that sank after the high-tech bubble went
bust, the number of L-1 visas has risen and is now estimated at 325,000
temporary workers, who are allowed to stay between five and seven
years.

For employers, the L-1 has growing appeal because it is far less
regulated than the H-1b worker visa, which requires certification that
American workers will not be displaced as well as pay that matches the
prevailing wage.

Moreover, the number of H-1b visas per year is capped. Starting in
October, the limit for H-1bs will drop from 195,000 to 65,000 annually.
L-1 visas have none of those restrictions and no cap.

The most controversial of those visas go to a handful of consulting
firms based in India, where high-tech workers are plentiful, English is
spoken and salary expectations are low.

Infosys Technologies Ltd. said it had 1,760 L-1 visa holders, up from
425 in March of 1999, according to Securities and Exchange Commission
filings. Wipro Ltd. said it has 1,150 workers with L-1s now, compared
with 321 two years ago.

Once transferred here, these L-1 employees are contracted out to run
computer operations for dozens of major companies. Many multinational
companies argue they depend on the L-1 to bring new technologies and
new operations to the United States.

Among those who have "outsourcing" contracts are Hewlett-Packard Co.,
Sun Microsystems Inc., and Siemens Industries, in addition to state
operations in New Mexico, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

Dell Computer Corp., which has been criticized for transferring work
such as tech support to its own overseas facilities, says less than
one-tenth of 1 percent of its 21,100 U.S. employees are here on an L-1
visa.

But the trail of layoffs in high tech is a bitter one for U.S. workers.
Software engineer Judy Shaw learned late last month that her entire
unit of more than 30 workers at Cutler-Hammer, a Pittsburgh division of
Cleveland-based Eaton Corp., was to be terminated by year's end.

The company announced that Tata Consultancy Services, one of the
largest of the Indian companies operating in the United States, would
be taking over her team's projects. A senior company executive
announced the contract, adding that it would save $1 million a year,
Shaw said.

Gary Klasen, a spokesman for Eaton, said last week that hiring Tata was
based on more than money.

"I'm not speaking about cheaper labor," he said. "I'm speaking about an
overall goal to remain competitive in quality, cost and technology."

Klasen said that Eaton was rehiring some of the high-tech workers for
other posts "if their skills and capabilities match the jobs that are
available."

Shaw, who telecommutes from her home in Justin, was not among the few
who qualified. And experiencing the second layoff in as many years has
spurred her into activism.

She is among a growing number of high-tech workers who are telling
their stories on Internet sites, knocking on Congressional doors,
organizing groups and planning demonstrations.

Glenn R. Jackson, a laid-off tech worker from Dawson, Ga., last week
launched the Internet-based National Association for the Employment of
Americans, with partners on both coasts, to build a grass-roots
campaign against work visa programs.

The message is beginning to be heard in the nation's capital.

Prompted by workers laid off by a Siemens facility at Lake Mary in his
Florida district, Rep. John Mica concluded that the expanded use of the
L-1 "was a gray area of law," his spokesman Gary Burns said. Mica, a
Republican, became the first lawmaker to introduce legislation aimed at
curbing the L-1.

Also last week, Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., chairman of the Senate
Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, announced he would hold a
hearing this summer on L-1 visas.

And the Homeland Security Department, which oversees work visas, has
ordered a probe into whether bringing in high-tech workers to provide
basic services for other corporations is an abuse of the L-1 program --
originally designed to allow international companies to bring their top
managers and a few company experts to assist their U.S. divisions.

"My understanding of L-1 is that, no, that is not a legitimate use" if
the workers are out-sourced to another company, said Christopher
Bentley, a spokesman for the department's Bureau of Citizenship and
Immigration Services.

Further, Bentley said, the L-1 visa holder must be an intra-company
transfer of a worker with "special knowledge" of the company's
products, management or procedures. "We're not talking about people who
are just Microsoft Windows experts," he said.

Girish Surendran, resident manager of immigration and human resources
for Tata, or TCS as the company's American division is called, defended
his company's use of the L-1.

"It's a misconception is that TCS contracts employees to other
companies or to third parties," he said. "When we go to a total
outsourcing contract with any company . . . the company has selected us
to do the job because of the expertise that TCS carries with us."

He declined to say how many L-1 visa holders are on its payroll.

juliam@coxnews.com

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