Senate Judiciary Hearing on H-1B
Senate Judiciary Hearing on H-1B
Date: Wednesday, September 17, 2003 5:42 PM
JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER
www.ZaZona.com
The Senate Juciciary Committee had their hearing yesterday on H-1B. The
full transcripts can be found by going to:
http://judiciary.senate.gov/hearing.cfm?id=913
Below are some highlights followed by a news article. Note that Stephen
Yale-Loehr used the flawed Zavodny study and even worse, the AILF
reports that were reveiwed in recent newsletters! Orrin Hatch also
quoted these reports as the bible of truth to "prove" that H-1Bs raised
the salaries of US workers, not lowered them.
This hearing was stacked very heavily in favor of H-1B. The time given
to opposing views was severly limited and only 2 were allowed to speak
(Leahy is not necessarily on our side, but at least he expressed some
doubts). This hearing will be used by the Senate to justify an H-1B
increase.
A statement by Elizabeth C. Dickson was so outrageous, I immortalized
her at:
http://www.zazona.com/shameh1b/Quotes.htm
The Congressional train is rolling, and it's aimed directly at American
workers.
Chairman Orrin G. Hatch
* Since 1952, this visa category (or its predecessor) has allowed some
of the most talented persons in the world to come to the United States.
During this time, our nation became a global leader in technology and
innovation.
* By 2000, even the newly-raised cap was not sufficient to meet the
needs of the industry. For that reason, I sponsored the American
Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act, or AC-21. AC-21 increased the
level of annual numerical limit to 195,000 visas.
* funds raised through H-1B applications have helped provide training
to more than 55,000 American workers, and have funded scholarships for
more than 12,500 students in science and engineering.
* For example, we often hear the accusation that U.S. companies are
using the H-1B visa to hire cheaper foreign workers. However, recently
released figures from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta indicate that
the median annual salary of H-1B visa workers, 98 percent of whom hold
at least a bachelors degree, is $55,000, whereas the median income
for U.S. workers who hold bachelors degrees, consisting of 26
percent of U.S. residents over the age of 25, is $46,000 per year.
* study from U.C. Berkley shows that Chinese and Indian entrepreneurs
are responsible for 29 percent of the technology business in Silicon
Valley; in the year 2000, they created over 72,000 jobs. Given these
statistics, what would be the larger impact of keeping international
talent away from U.S. soil?
Elizabeth C. Dickson
Director of Immigration Services
Ingersoll-Rand Company
* Our Air Solutions Group has employed a foreign national as its
Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) Technical Sales Manager. We
advertised extensively for this position and found no U.S. worker.
* Metrologists have become a professional engineering occupation in
very short supply. Human Resource Managers advise me that they simply
cannot find Americans to fill such positions.
* Our Waterject Cutting Systems business spent 20 months searching
extensively using advertisements and professional recruiters to find an
engineer experienced in industrial robotics and pressurized product
development before finally hiring a qualified individual from Canada.
* Metallurgical engineers have been an identified shortage occupation
for years in the United States
* Ingersoll-Rands Specialty Equipment Business Unit [snip].... We
employ a Vice President and General Manager of this business unit on an
H-1B visa.
* Recently we recruited for a Product Development Engineer for our
Dresser-Rand Advanced Controls systems. We found no U.S. workers that
met our requirements. However, we did fill the position with a U.S.
educated foreign national.
* We have also recently recruited for Product Design Engineers. We have
been unsuccessful in locating a U.S. worker, but did identify another
U.S. educated foreign worker.
* We also recently filled the position of Worldwide Engineering Manager
Drilling Solutions with an H-1B employee. We recruited extensively and
hired an Australian candidate to fill the position.
* Employers currently need and will continue to need H-1B workers.
Through the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and in coalition with businesses
and trade associations across the spectrum, we seek a reasonable,
market driven H-1B policy that recognizes market realities.
* Some argue that H-1B workers displace American workers and lower
American workers wages and working conditions in certain job
sectors. It is hard to displace U.S. workers when you dont have any
U.S. workers to choose from.
* America cannot maintain its global advantage without an adequate
supply of top-quality engineers, including immigrants.
Patrick J. Duffy,
Human Resources Attorney
Intel Corporation
* There are currently 45 Intel Fellows, 13 of whom were born outside of
the U.S. and many of whom immigrated to the U.S. under our
employment-based immigration system. All but one of the foreign-born
Intel Fellows currently work for Intel in the U.S.; the one who works
for Intel outside of the U.S. has himself entered the U.S. in L-1
status for a temporary assignment requiring his unique experience
* We do, however, continue to hire a limited number of employees
requiring sponsorship for those positions where we cannot find enough
qualified U.S. workers with the advanced education, skills and
expertise we need to compete in this global economy. These positions
include Design Engineers at the Master's and Ph.D. levels in fields
such as Electrical and Computer Engineering, as well as Process
Engineers at the Masters and Ph.D. levels in fields such as Chemical
or Materials Engineering. The vast majority of the H-1B workers we
sponsor are educated at U.S. universities.
* We expect that we will continue to sponsor H-1B employees in the
future for the simple reason that we cannot find enough U.S. workers
with the advanced education, skills, and expertise we need.
* hiring such talent through the H-1B program does not displace any
U.S. worker.
* Clearly, the real issue here is the lack of highly-educated U.S.
candidates for the jobs for which we experience shortages.
* Last year more than 95 percent of the employees we sponsored for L-1
visas came to the U.S. on temporary assignments and when their
assignments ended they returned to their home sites to work for Intel
as Intel employees.
* The need for the H-1B program is rooted in the lack of educated U.S.
workers, particularly in engineering and other hard sciences.
* there a need for a cap on H-1Bs
* If immigration law and regulations create barriers to our ability to
hire H-1B workers with the advanced, university level education in
engineering and the hard sciences, Intel and other companies will be
required to move to those countries where the talent resides since we
have not been able to find enough U.S. workers with the advanced
engineering degrees we need.
* The puzzle for our company is why the U.S. government would seriously
consider eliminating a program that only brings value to the U.S.
economy.
* todays H-1B worker is tomorrows U.S. worker whose advanced
education and talent will be available to the U.S. economy permanently.
Mr John Steadman
President-Elect IEEE-USA
http://www.ieeeusa.org/forum/POLICY/2003/091603.html
* The H-1B Visa Is Exacerbating the Problem of Engineering Unemployment
* H-1B Worker Safeguards are Weak and Ineffective
* H-1B Investigative Powers and Enforcement Authority Are Also Limited
* Fee-Based Skills Training Programs are Missing their Intended Targets
* The Impact of the H-1B is Compounded By Abuses of the L-1 Visa
* Increasing Reliance on Guest-Workers Also Fuels Outsourcing
* Policy Recommendations
1. Reduce H-1B Admissions Ceilings and Limit Authorized Stays
2. Strengthen Essential Safeguards for all Affected Workers
3. Improve H-1B Program Administration and Enforcement
4. Increase the Availability and Effectiveness of H-1B Technical Skills
Training
5. Improve the Timeliness and Utility of Statistical Reports
6. Address Immigration Reform
7. Pass the U.S. Jobs Protection Act (S.1452/H.R. 2849)
Stephen Yale-Loehr of
Cornell Law School
and the
American Immigration Lawyers Association
* Today, many industries continue to need highly educated professionals
and turn to the H-1B program to fill these specialized positions that
would otherwise remain vacant.
* Congress has been careful to build in safeguards to the H-1B program
to ensure that H-1B foreign professionals do not undercut wages paid to
comparable U.S. workers.
* An article issued just last week by a research economist for the
Federal Reserve in Atlanta tried to quantify the impact of H-1B
professionals on IT workers, which is one subset of H-1B workers. her
results suggest that the number of H-1B workers does not depress wages
or wage growth. The study also found that H-1Bs do not appear to have
an adverse impact on contemporaneous unemployment rates, although they
may have an effect on unemployment rates a year later. ,,,,, [snipped]
This tends to show that H-1B workers are being paid more than the
average comparable U.S. worker, at least at a national level.
* Another recent review of the H-1B program by the Immigration Policy
Center (IPC) cites data from the National Science Foundation that
foreign-born professionals actually earn more than their native
counterparts when controlled for age and the year a science or
engineering degree is earned.
* H-1Bs are not Cheap Labor
* My own view is that the DOL is enforcing the H-1B program adequately,
and that most employers seem to be complying with the attestation
regime. Supporting this view is the fact that the Labor Department has
found willful H-1B violations requiring debarment from the program in
less than five percent of its investigations.
* Some immigration critics have tended to lump together two very
different nonimmigrant visa categories the H-1B and the L-1
intracompany transferee categories to the detriment of both.
* Globalization, or the cross-border movement of goods, services, and
people, is one of the most important characteristics of this century.
[snipped] Use of H-1B visas encourages work in the United States and
thus can help keep and grow jobs in the United States.
* In considering any changes to the H-1B visa category, it is important
to be aware that the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) as
well as some international free trade agreements (FTAs) contain
immigration provisions relating to the H-1B visa. [snipped].... several
existing international agreements already contain H-1B provisions, and
Congress must make sure that any changes to the H-1B category do not
violate those bilateral or multilateral agreements.
* To ensure the continued viability of the H-1B program, Congress must
decide how to approach the issue and adopt a consistent approach over
time. Some fixes, such as exemptions from the H-1B cap, would provide
long-term relief to targeted areas and industries. [snipped] Potential
areas for exemptions from the H-1B cap include: (1) jobs deemed to be
in the public interest (if the federal government, state, or local
governments or a 501(c)(3) non-profit requires an H-1B professional);
(2) jobs requiring an H-1B professional that a state economic
development agency deems important due to a positive economic impact;
and (3) jobs that facilitate the retention of foreign students educated
in the United States
* An annual cap of 65,000 on H-1B usage is clearly too small. [
snipped] A modest H-1B cap increase to 115,000 for FY 2004 would
alleviate labor pressures associated with economic recovery while
simultaneously permitting employers to hire H-1B workers to fill vacant
specialty positions requiring specific sets of skills.
Senator Patrick Leahy
* I have not yet heard compelling reasons to increase the cap above
65,000, but I look forward to reviewing the testimony of todays
witnesses before making any final conclusions on that issue.
* Statistics released this month by the Department of Homeland Security
indicate that neither Chile nor Singapore have been among even the 20
most frequent users of the H-1B program, and yet we are now devoting
more than 10 percent of the available visas to those two nations. This
is an example of the misguided policies we will have if the
Administration continues to include immigration provisions in the
FTAs it negotiates.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/09/17/HNh1bhearing_1.html
H-1B hearing: Companies say foreign workers needed
Visas for foreign IT workers will drop by two-thirds for 2004 unless
Congress acts
By Grant Gross, IDG News Service September 17, 2003
WASHINGTON -- The yearly number of foreign visas for IT workers and
professionals coming into the U.S. will drop by two-thirds for 2004
unless the U.S. Congress acts, and an immigration lawyer group came to
Congress Tuesday asking that the cap on H-1B visas not be allowed to
slide back to pre-dot-com boom levels.
Representatives of Intel Corp. and Ingersoll-Rand Corp. also argued
that H-1B visas are needed to fill technical positions where they can't
find qualified U.S. candidates, but one panelist told the U.S. Senate
Judiciary Committee that the visa program is taking money from the
pockets of U.S. workers.
"The unemployment rate of electrical and electronic engineers has
reached an all-time high," said John Steadman, president-elect of the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers-USA. "This translates
to hundreds of thousands of unemployed U.S. engineers. These are people
who are degreed and capable U.S. engineers." Unemployment among
electrical and electronic engineers reached 7 percent in early 2003,
Steadman said.
The annual H-1B cap went from 65,000 in the U.S. government's fiscal
year 1998 to 115,000 visas granted a year in 1999 and 2000, then up to
195,000 in 2001 and 2002. The capped H-1B numbers don't include some
workers, such as those employed at universities and some research
organizations, but the caps do affect how many IT workers U.S.
companies can bring into the country. The American Electronics
Association noted, however, that the IT industry's reliance on H-1B
visas was falling, from 65 percent of the capped number in 2001 to 34
percent in 2002.
The number of H-1B visas, used by companies to bring IT workers from
India, China and other countries to the U.S., would go back to a
pre-1999 cap of 65,000 if Congress fails to act by Oct. 1. Stephen
Yale-Loehr, the business immigration chairman of the American
Immigration Lawyers Association, asked the U.S. Senate Judiciary
Committee to allow 115,000 H-1B visas for the U.S. government's 2004
fiscal year. The H-1B visa program, popular with technology companies,
also allows other U.S. businesses to recruit hard-to-find professionals
such as accountants, lawyers and doctors.
Backers of the H-1B program argued Tuesday that the visas aren't taking
away U.S. jobs, because some technology companies still can't find
qualified workers for some positions. Ingersoll-Rand has searched for
more than a year to fill a plastics engineer and an industrial robotics
engineer position, finally settling on a Canadian resident in both
cases, said Elizabeth Dickson, advisor of immigration services for the
industrial equipment manufacturer.
"It is hard to displace U.S. workers when you don't have any U.S.
workers to choose from," Dickson said.
Intel attempts to find U.S. workers before bringing in a foreign worker
with an H-1B visa, said Patrick Duffy, human resources attorney for
Intel, but more than half of the graduate students in physical science
programs at U.S. universities are from outside the country. About 5
percent of Intel's U.S. workforce are H-1B workers, Duffy said, and
many of them eventually become permanent U.S. citizens.
"This small percentage is comprised of individuals possessing unique
and difficult-to-find skills which can only be acquired through
advanced, university-level education," Duffy added.
The U.S. technology industry will be in danger of falling behind other
countries unless the country can continue to attract "the best and
brightest" workers from around the world, Dickson said, "We are looking
for a reasonable, market-driven H-1B policy," she added.
The debate between Steadman and the three other witnesses translated
into conflicts on the Senate committee, with senators sometimes even
expressing conflict within themselves. "We don't want to be a country
that turns down Einstein, but we also don't want to be in a situation
where we flood the market," said Senator Jeff Sessions, an Alabama
Republican.
Steadman and Senator Diane Feinstein, a California Democrat, pointed to
abuses of H-1B visas and of a related program, the L-1, which allows
companies to transfer employees from outside the U.S. to fill
high-level positions. Some companies have used the L-1 visas to import
IT workers who are then hired out to other companies, Steadman charged,
and Feinstein questioned whether some companies employing H-1B workers
were paying the prevailing wage as required. Numerous workers in
California have complained to Feinstein that they've been replaced by
foreign workers paid a third of their salary, she said.
"My view is (the H-1B cap) should go back unless we are able to produce
some stronger safeguards," Feinstein added. "I'm elected to represent
people from California, who are losing their jobs big time."
Senator Saxby Chambliss, a Georgia Republican, said he plans to
introduce legislation this week to close loopholes in the L-1 visa
program.
Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, a Utah Republican, noted that the
sunset of his legislation to expand the H-1B cap to 195,000 will also
result in the loss of a $1,000 fee per H-1B application, which has been
used for training and scholarship programs in the U.S. Since 1998, when
the cap was expanded from 65,000 to 115,000, more than $692 million has
been raised by the H-1B fee, providing training for 55,000 U.S. workers
and scholarships for 12,500 students in science and engineering.
Hatch said the Senate should not tolerate fraud and abuse in the H-1B
program, but he questioned whether it alone was causing the U.S.
unemployment problems. He questioned whether the facts supported
accusations that companies are using the H-1B visa program to hire
cheap labor. The average H-1B worker salary is $55,000, while the
average salary of a U.S. worker with a bachelor's degree is $46,000,
Hatch said.
But Steadman said Hatch wasn't comparing similar numbers. Engineers
typically earn a much higher salary than most other professions
requiring bachelor's degrees, he said, and the presence of foreign
workers is depressing wages.
Yale-Loehr also noted that 22,000 H-1B applications are pending from
last year, and close to 7,000 visa spots were set aside for Chile and
Singapore in recent U.S. free trade agreements with those countries. If
Congress doesn't raise the 65,000 cap, only about 36,000 new H-1B visas
will be available in 2004, he said.
But Steadman urged Congress to look for a longer-term solution to the
lack of qualified engineers and IT workers than raising the H-1B cap
again. He encouraged Congress to invest more money in programs that
encourage U.S. students to study engineering and science. He also asked
Congress to strengthen the U.S. Department of Labor's ability to
investigate H-1B abuses, as is required in the U.S. Jobs Protection
Act, introduced in Congress in July.
Steadman also suggested the H-1B visa program contributes to companies
outsourcing jobs and moving them outside the U.S. Some companies use
the H-1B workers' contacts in their home countries to set up
outsourcing deals, he said.
"These are difficult times for IT and electrical engineering
professionals in the U.S.," said Steadman, an engineering professor
from Alabama. "But there is a lot more at risk here than jobs for our
members. If we continue down this path, the end result is the United
States will make itself increasingly dependent on foreign technical
expertise, both here and abroad."
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