Propaganda Blitz
Propaganda Blitz
Date: Monday, May 15, 2006 5:09 PM
<<<<< JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER No. 1477 >>>>>
The Senate is back and they are debating the Specter immigration bill and
today President Bush is going to address the nation on immigration. Expect
to hear lots of talk about illegal immigration, border security, and other
related issues, but don't expect to hear them talk about the most important
one of all. Microsoft and an alliance of high tech companies want the media
to focus on illegal immigration, but make no mistake about it; their agenda
has nothing at all to do with illegals. Microsoft wants Congress to pass
the immigration bill with a huge increase in employment based visas.
This passage spells out the Bill Gates agenda very clearly:
While lobbying efforts for these provisions have been publicly
overshadowed by the intense debate over how to handle a flood
of unskilled, undocumented immigrants, corporate officials have
quietly continued to press their case.
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates met with congressional leaders in
March, including Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman
Arlen Specter, to discuss the company's ``top legislative
priority,'' Krumholtz says.
Part of any successful political campaign is to mount a media propaganda
blitz. Articles are appearing all over the U.S. claiming the same
monolithic message: "There is a shortage of engineers and programmers.
Unless the U.S. allows more foreign high-tech workers into the U.S.
companies such as Microsoft will be forced to offshore jobs overseas."
This newsletter has a sampling of some of the biased articles appearing in
the mainstream media. They make no pretense at being objective.
Article 1:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2006-04-25-forum-immigration_x.htm?POE=click-refer
Stingy immigration policy stifles U.S. innovation
Today's broken immigration system closes the door on foreign-born
innovators. With arbitrary visa limits and clogged processing, opportunity
is knocking at our door and we're fumbling with the keys.
Article 2:
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/060123/23offshoring.htm
Coming and Going
As offshoring evolves, Indian firms even hire Americans
It doesn't take an economics degree to conclude that one of the main U.S.
exports of the 21st century is likely to be jobs. And by many accounts,
India is at the head of the receiving line. Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates
recently announced that the software giant will nearly double its workforce
in India, to 7,000, and invest $1.7 billion there.
Article 3:
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/business/14466783.htm
In Texas, we shouldn't need a Hispanic boycott to demonstrate the
significance of immigrants. They've been driving growth in the state
economy for more than 30 years. From 2001 to 2003, we temporarily allowed
195,000 H-1B visas a year. Often used by engineers and scientists, almost
all H-1Bs have bachelor's degrees, and half hold advanced degrees. The
annual cap is back at 65,000 visas, and it's not nearly high enough.
Article 4:
http://www.suntimes.com/output/otherviews/cst-cont-workers14.html
U.S. must welcome immigrants with special skills
We should staple a green card to every foreign-born student who completes a
college-level program in engineering. We want those human resources to stay
in this country, help us build and support our businesses and raise
families. We should immediately expand the number of H1-B visas to 500,000
and at the same time improve our own funding of technology education.
Article 5:
http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php/id;1893064997;fp;2;fpid;4
Hyperion CEO eyes ethics, governance
Godfrey Sullivan is approaching his two-year anniversary as CEO of Hyperion
Solutions.
QUESTION: What's your response to unemployed U.S. IT professionals who feel
H-1B workers are stealing U.S. jobs?
ANSWER: There's no simple answer. It's hard to connect the dots between the
high demand for great technical people and the unemployed IT professionals.
It's a complete mystery to me.
Article 6:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1529924.cms
MS, Intel seek skilled immigrants in US
Microsoft, Intel and other technology companies warned that they might be
forced to move more work overseas unless Congress increases the number of
US visas available for such workers. ``We have a couple thousand open
technical spots that we cannot find people to fill,'' says Jack Krumholtz,
managing director of federal government affairs for Microsoft,
Article 7:
http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3603951
Cornyn Pushes for More H1-B Visas: While immigrants marched in the streets
of America this week, Sen. John Cornyn turned his attention to immigrants
in classrooms with high-tech skills.
Article 8:
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aZM1MDJr4Bio&refer=news_index
Microsoft, Intel Push U.S. to Welcome More Skilled Immigrants
Microsoft Corp. currently does almost all its product-development work at
its Redmond, Washington, headquarters. That may change if Congress doesn't
make it easier to hire skilled immigrants, company officials say.
Microsoft, Intel Corp. and other technology companies are warning that they
may be forced to move more work overseas unless Congress increases the
number of U.S. visas available for such workers.
Article 9:
http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=24&issue=20060512
Growing Geek Gap Gnaws U.S. Firms
Many experts say America is entering a crisis in math and science. The oil
and gas, manufacturing, power generation and some tech sectors face
critical shortages of engineers and scientists. The U.S. has maneuvered
through this domestic shortage by tapping a huge pool of international
students that came to prized U.S. institutions for their graduate studies.
Foreign-born students with H-1B U.S. worker visas filled the gap.
Article 10:
http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/homepage/article_1132377.php
Living visa to visa
Filipino on high-tech permit fights red tape, political mood.
Joe makes $27 an hour, two dollars above the $25 government's "prevailing
wage" for a land surveyor. He saves as much as he can and sends money to
his family in the Philippines every month so that his niece and nephew can
attend private school. There an obvious need in America in certain
professions for people like me." But Joe also knows that there is pressure
and that several class-action lawsuits oppose the H-1B visas that American
companies and universities use to import foreign scientists, engineers and
computer programmers. Some anti-immigration activists contend that foreign
workers willing to work for lower wages are displacing American workers,
depressing wages and discouraging Americans from pursuing technical
careers.
Article 11:
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/state/14476318.htm
The other debate: white-collar immigrants
Many immigrant success stories revolve around the basics of the American
dream: a steady job in the land of opportunity. Bayram Yildirim aims
higher: He wants to help Wichita's aerospace companies build the world's
best jets. "If you want to get involved with cutting-edge research, USA is
the place," said Yildi Wichita State is the largest, but far from the only,
employer of highly skilled immigrants in Kansas. According to a federal
immigration database, Kansas businesses in 2004 received about 1,250
H-1Bs--the visa that goes to highly skilled foreign guest workers.
1. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2006-04-25-forum-immigration_x.htm?POE=click-refer
Stingy immigration policy stifles U.S. innovation
Posted 4/25/2006 10:02 PM ET
By Lezlee Westine and Scott McNealy for USA TODAY
What do the founders of Intel, Sun Microsystems and Google -- Andy Grove,
Andy Bechtolsheim, Vinod Khosla and Sergey Brin -- have in common with
Albert Einstein and Wernher von Braun? All are part of America's tradition
of welcoming talented immigrants who have made significant contributions to
our industry.
Einstein changed the way we look at science and energy; von Braun was the
father of the U.S. space program; and Grove, Bechtolsheim, Khosla and Brin
are among the many giants who have changed the high-tech industry.
The innovative companies they built created thousands of jobs and have a
combined market cap of $250 billion. But our longstanding tradition of
being an open door for innovation is at risk.
Today's broken immigration system closes the door on foreign-born
innovators. With arbitrary visa limits and clogged processing, opportunity
is knocking at our door and we're fumbling with the keys.
It wasn't always this way. Several of our nation's Nobel laureates are
foreign-born. The past half-century of scientific research success that has
made our universities the beacon of innovation would not have occurred but
for the contributions of foreign-born students. And the efforts of Grove,
Bechtolsheim, Khosla and Brin alone have generated thousands of U.S. jobs
and hundreds of millions in U.S. tax revenue.
So why the conflict between our laws and our policy?
First, the world is catching on to the job-creating benefits of a strong
math and science education. China and India are graduating hundreds of
thousands of engineers each year. In addition, they and other nations have
established generous tax incentives to lure research and development into
their countries. These factors have made the competition for talent global.
Second, our past success breeds the potential for the next "big thing" in
fields such as biotechnology, nanotechnology and biophysics. By 2012, it's
projected that the demand for technical jobs in science and engineering
will increase by more than 25%, and 39% in math and computer science.
Factor in the tech rebound, and the need will be even greater.
What happened the last time we saw demand for these professionals soar?
Congress created a visa program for immigrants who had unique technical
knowledge, a bachelor's degree and a job offer in the USA.
Under the current system, the federal government provides 65,000 H-1B visas
each year, beginning Oct. 1. Yet the visas made available last October were
spoken for almost two months before that, which means our open door for
innovation is temporarily closed for 14 months.
For foreign-born students graduating from a U.S. college in June, the H-1B
limitations make it difficult for them to find jobs here. We're even
closing the door on those with H-1Bs visas who seek permanent U.S.
residency because of extended delays in a system designed largely in 1990,
when our workforce and economic needs were different.
For the U.S. high-tech community, these laws present a difficult choice:
Innovate or perish. If we can't find professionals to do the job here in
the USA, many will simply move the job to the qualified workers overseas.
A new study by the National Foundation for American Policy, a non-profit
organization, has concluded that the laws are forcing good-paying,
job-creating positions offshore. We know that the long-term solution is
investing in educational programs in math, science and engineering. But we
won't see the fruits of those investments for at least a decade.
In the short term, we should align our immigration laws with our economic
needs. What Congress does now will determine whether our nation stays
competitive in the global economy. Without innovation, we have nothing.
Lezlee Westine is CEO of TechNet, and is chairman of Sun Microsystems.
2. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/060123/23offshoring.htm
Coming and Going
As offshoring evolves, Indian firms even hire Americans
By Richard J. Newman
1/23/06
It doesn't take an economics degree to conclude that one of the main U.S.
exports of the 21st century is likely to be jobs. And by many accounts,
India is at the head of the receiving line. Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates
recently announced that the software giant will nearly double its workforce
in India, to 7,000, and invest $1.7 billion there. IBM has added at least
10,000 Indian workers this year and could employ more than 50,000 Indians
by the end of 2006. Accenture, EDS, and other consulting firms are
following close behind. By 2015, 3.3 million jobs will have been sent
overseas, according to Forrester Research. As the offshoring trend matures,
U.S. firms will contract out increasing amounts of white-collar work like
accounting, drug research, technical R&D, and even cartoon animation.
A small crosscurrent is beginning to flow, however. While some of America's
most well-known companies are suddenly rushing to India, the big Indian
offshoring firms that started the whole trend--companies like Tata
Consulting Services, Wipro Technologies, and Info-sys--are starting to hire
in the United States, where some of their biggest customers are based. The
Indian firms have earned billions by helping Fortune 500 companies slash
the cost of running call centers or performing basic information technology
work, relying on a huge pool of well-educated, English-speaking Indian
workers who earn one-fifth what their counterparts in the West do. But to
expand beyond basic IT work, the Indian firms are finding that they have to
hire Americans who have local connections and understand western business
climates. "You can't be global if you only hire your fellow citizens," says
Jessie Paul, Wipro's chief marketing officer.
The numbers are small so far, and nobody expects a major reversal of the
offshoring trend. But factors that used to tilt jobs toward India and other
low-cost countries are now shifting. Political pressure in the United
States has forced many companies that do government contracting, for
instance, to keep jobs here. Defense giant Northrop Grumman plans to set up
a "homeshore" operation, hiring hundreds of software engineers, in rural
Virginia--where costs are higher than in India but lower than in prime U.S.
cities. Science Applications International Corp., another defense
contractor, recently opened a tech center in Kentucky. Other states, like
Nebraska and Indiana, are offering tax and other incentives that make them
look like an affordable alternative to Bangalore.
In India, meanwhile, the talent pool is starting to get tapped out in
spots, leading to wage increases, frenetic demand for the best workers, and
job hopping. More important, the Indian IT firms are aiming upmarket just
as their bigger American competitors, like IBM, Accenture, and EDS,are
aiming down. "They are certainly trying to move up the chain," says Ron
Hira, a professor at Rochester Institute of Technology and coauthor of
Outsourcing America. "Higher-level consulting services are very
relationship based, so it makes sense that they're hiring more Americans."
Big numbers. For more than a decade, the Indian IT firms were content to
fish the bottom for data-entry work, call center operations, and other
basic back-end tasks that big companies could move overseas without much
risk or notice. As U.S. firms like JPMorgan and Met-Life got more
comfortable with offshoring, they began sending more sophisticated work
like software development and computer programming overseas. Before long,
that had spawned a few of the fastest-growing juggernauts in the global
economy. Wipro, for instance, which is now a $1.8 billion company, doubled
its staff over the past three years and has a profit margin of nearly 20
percent. (IBM's profit margin, by contrast, is about 9 percent.)
Those kinds of numbers have caught the attention of the world's biggest
consulting firms. And with huge U.S. companies now going after the same
low-cost Indian talent, the Indian firms are trying to turn the tables.
Like their more entrenched competitors, the Indian firms are now offering
to take over whole IT departments and become business partners with their
customers. And they're poaching American executives to help get the ball
rolling. Infosys has hired several former Deloitte and Ernst & Young
partners to help jump-start its consulting business. Tata, Wipro, and
Cognizant Technology Solutions, a New Jersey-based offshoring firm, are all
luring American rainmakers from the likes of McKinsey & Co. and
PricewaterhouseCoopers. "We're doing a lot of hiring, both on- and
offshore," says Bob Rugare, who left Ernst & Young last year to become vice
president of Cognizant.
Core IT work--where offshoring firms still earn the bulk of their
money--will continue to flow overseas. And most of the U.S.-based employees
of the offshoring firms will still be foreign nationals in the States on
temporary work visas. But offshoring executives say that they're going to
need an increasing number of Americans, too. "My practice is going to rely
predominantly on local talent," says Paul Cotton, whom Wipro recruited
recently from ConAgra to help run a consulting practice out of Dallas.
Surya Kant, North American president of Indian IT giant Tata Consulting,
says that beginning this year, Tata will recruit American tech and
engineering grads on college campuses such as the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology and the University of Georgia, schools where Tata already
runs research programs. Overall, Tata will hire about 500 Americans this
year, Kant predicts. "It is more expensive," he acknowledges. "But some
work must be done here."
Offshoring firms want to hire people who think globally. The most adept
employees, says Rugare of Cognizant, will be those who have "one foot on
the boat and one on the dock"--adaptable workers who understand and
complement the offshore components of their industry. In the U.S. market,
Rugare sees a strong need for business analysts who understand the back-end
operations of financial institutions and other big companies and can help
design technical requirements that will be fulfilled overseas. "The perfect
candidate," he says, "has an undergrad degree in engineering and computer
science and an M.B.A." Cognizant has also been hiring American specialists
such as doctors, pharmacists, and biostatisticians to help fulfill a big
outsourcing deal with a major drugmaker.
Buyer's market. On the ground floor of the global economy, however, the
welcome mat can still be hard to find. Diane Collier, 43, is a Dallas-area
electrical engineer who was laid off from a local utility last year when
much of the work in her department was offshored to eastern Europe. She has
both technical and managerial experience and says jobs in her field are
still available--but it's a buyer's market, and employers insist on very
specific expertise. "And salaries are lower," she adds. "I'm probably going
to have to take a 20 or 25 percent cut for comparable work."
But no one expects the trend of offshoring to slow. Even as offshoring
firms integrate more Americans into their operations, the pressure on big
public companies to cut labor costs is intensifying. And so are the
opportunities, as the quality of Indian offshoring services continues to
rise. Cognizant says Indian engineers at the firm are working on
cutting-edge technology like next-generation ATMs and new systems for
global securities trading. Kant says that in addition to all the IT work
Tata does, its staffers in India handle automotive design for Detroit,
broadcasting duties for Hollywood, and paralegal work for big law firms.
With some major companies just beginning to look overseas, "offshoring has
not even scratched the surface," he insists. It's time for American
workers, in other words, to get one foot on that boat.
CAN YOUR JOB BE OFFSHORED?
JOBS AT RISK
Computer programming
Software development
Basic systems architecture
Low-to-medium-tech jobs
paralegal research
JOBS THAT ARE SECURE
Government jobs
Specialized website work
On-site program and tech support
High-end technical design
Healthcare
3. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/business/14466783.htm
Posted on Sun, Apr. 30, 2006
Why crack down on immigration?
By Mitchell Schnurman
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
In Texas, we shouldn't need a Hispanic boycott to demonstrate the
significance of immigrants. They've been driving growth in the state
economy for more than 30 years.
But maybe we could use a reminder about their increasing clout, and the
assets and challenges they bring to the mix.
That might boost appreciation and provoke new initiatives to improve the
future.
Immigrants' success at assimilating here -- in particular, their ability to
close the gap in education and income -- will go a long way in determining
Texas' prosperity.
For those who believe that immigration is more threatening than promising,
consider that it accounted for more than half the job growth in the country
from 1996 to 2002.
It may not be surprising that foreign-born workers accounted for 86 percent
of the growth among mechanics and construction workers. But they also
represented 27 percent of the group that includes doctors, scientists and
teachers, and 31 percent of new health and science technicians, according
to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The numbers would be higher, if not for rules that restrict the number of
highly skilled foreigners who want to work here. In fiscal 2006, the annual
cap for so-called H-1B visas was reached two months before the fiscal year
even started.
Immigrants have been a crucial complement to the economy, with their
numbers climbing when times were strong and waning in the downturns. Which
means there's something a lot worse than having immigrants flow into Texas
and the United States: having them not come here.
On Monday, Hispanics and other immigrants are planning rallies and a
consumer boycott in major cities across the country. Their primary goal is
to influence the immigration debate in Washington, which has become
increasingly polarized.
Some lawmakers are focused on reducing undocumented workers and even
punishing them. They propose to build fences between the U.S. and Mexico
and beef up border patrols.
There have been some high-profile raids on employers in the past few weeks
and talk about deporting an estimated 11 million illegals. That notion is
both destructive and impractical.
Others talk about creating amnesty and guest-worker programs, proposals
aimed at helping immigrants improve their lot here and keeping the flow of
foreign-born residents coming.
"The only way to move forward is to move forward together," says Pia
Orrenius, a senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and a
former member of the President's Council of Economic Advisers.
"Somehow, we have to legalize people who are already here," she says. "But
we also need to have a system in place to keep employers honest and make
sure there's a level playing field."
Here's what I'm wondering: Why do anything at all?
The state's population has grown at roughly twice the rate of the nation
since 1970, largely because of the influx of foreign-born residents and a
higher birth rate among Hispanics.
Because immigrants are younger, they also offer a counterweight to the
aging baby boomer generation. Texas ranks as the second-youngest state,
thanks to immigrants, and this demographic trend boosts labor markets,
consumer sales and the housing industry.
But the federal government has intensified its campaign against illegal
immigrants, primarily in the name of national security. It has become much
more difficult for undocumented workers to get driver's licenses and do
their banking.
Rumors of raids on big employers have sent a chill through the immigrant
community, and workers fear mass deportations.
"Illegal immigration was working before, because we weren't enforcing the
laws, and people lived almost as if they were legal," Orrenius says. "Now
we've changed the rules of the game, so we need a more comprehensive
solution."
Which leads to the current debate in Washington. A guest-worker program
would make life easier for many immigrants, Orrenius says, but the rules
can't be too complex or they'll be sidestepped again.
Some current restrictions are confounding. We allow a steady flow of
low-skilled, often illegal, immigrants into the country, and they do many
jobs that natives shun. But they generally take in more in public benefits
than they pay out in taxes -- usually in the form of schooling for their
children and medical care.
(Low-skilled natives also use more than they pay for, because skills, not
nationality, most closely correlate with income.)
The workers who put more into the pool than they take out -- those with
high skills and high income -- are restricted by federal policies.
From 2001 to 2003, we temporarily allowed 195,000 H-1B visas a year. Often
used by engineers and scientists, almost all H-1Bs have bachelor's degrees,
and half hold advanced degrees.
The annual cap is back at 65,000 visas, and it's not nearly high enough. In
2004, the cap was reached five months into the fiscal year, says the latest
Economic Report of the President. In 2005, the cap was reached on the first
day. In 2006, the visas were gone two months before the year began.
Orrenius says the current debate over immigration is similar to past
conflicts. In the 1850s and early 1900s, there were backlashes against
immigrants from Germany, China, Ireland, Italy and Poland.
Today, it's Mexico and Central America that account for 37 percent of
immigrants, followed by Asia (25 percent) and Europe (14 percent).
People often complain that immigrants can't speak and write English, and
Orrenius says that's reminiscent of the literacy laws that were proposed
for newcomers almost a century ago.
She doesn't see much difficulty in our economy absorbing immigrants. They
total about 36 million people, with fewer than 30 percent undocumented. Our
total population is almost 300 million.
The bigger challenge is helping immigrants develop skills more quickly, so
they can earn more and have better prospects. That puts the onus on
education, because high school dropout rates remain twice as high for
Hispanics, even in subsequent generations.
Texas has been confronting this problem for years, dealing with chronic
underfunding in many poorer school districts.
Maybe immigration reform could help.
Many immigrants, especially illegals, pay payroll taxes and never collect
from Social Security. The government keeps track of those numbers, and the
pool was valued at $463 billion in 2002.
Imagine what some of that money could do on the local level.
4. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.suntimes.com/output/otherviews/cst-cont-workers14.html
U.S. must welcome immigrants with special skills
May 14, 2006
BY MARTIN H. SINGER
My father used to tell me a story about a man looking for his keys under
the light of a lamppost. Another man walks by and offers to help him and
asks where he thought that he had dropped the keys. The first man replies
that he thought that he dropped them somewhere down the street. When the
good samaritan asks why the man is looking in this area, the man responds,
"because the light is better over here."
The country is talking about immigration these days. The light's pretty
good. We can see technologists from India and China and Eastern Europe
filling jobs at high- growth companies. We can see other foreign-born
workers working in restaurants, on construction projects, in salons and in
our friends' homes. And, of course, we are all talking about solutions.
Scientists a 'no-cost import'
But solutions to what problem? Most pundits and media-seeking politicians
stand under the wrong lamppost. They talk about lost jobs, the social
burden of immigrant workers, the downward pressure on low-end wages and
anything that will keep us all from shining a flashlight on the very real
crisis confronting America: U.S. competitiveness.
That's right. Today, many claim that we should restrict the number of visas
that enable highly trained but foreign-born and -educated workers to take
jobs in this country. They ignore that the United States has slipped to
sixth internationally in the number of engineering degrees awarded
annually. China graduates four times as many engineers; Japan graduates
twice as many. Half of all U.S. graduate degrees in engineering go to
foreign nationals.
The United States used to welcome workers with special skills. We issued
H1-B visas that permitted highly trained foreign workers to fill
engineering and computer science positions. J-1 visas allowed architectural
and other firms to bring over interns on exchange programs. It was a
no-cost import. It was as if other countries were willingly filling up our
strategic oil reserves. Scientists, who someone else paid to educate and
train, were clamoring to work and settle in our country and help our
companies compete in a global marketplace.
Should we have barred Einstein?
Today, the xenophobes and the protectionists have taken over. In the
aftermath of 9/11, with the same analytic sophistication that identified
WMDs as a great threat, Congress slashed the number of H1-B visas from more
than 200,000 a year to 65,000. American businesses consumed all of the
available visas two months beforethe beginning of this fiscal year.
On one side of the congressional aisle, we hear that Americans must know
the whereabouts of all foreigners. These congressional leaders ignore the
requirement of H1-B visa holders to work for a sponsoring firm -- that has
an address.
On the other side of the aisle, we have the Pavlovian response that
immigrants take "American" jobs. No one has ever offered one iota of
credible evidence that U.S. graduates with engineering, software or other
degrees have lost jobs to H1-B visa holders, but that doesn't stop the
protectionist drool.
There is evidence today that the xenophobic climate in the United States,
coupled with improved opportunity in their county of origin, have motivated
some technologists to leave the United States and go home. Other
English-speaking countries, such as Australia and South Africa, have
established stronger engineering programs at their universities so that
they can train and keep the students that we used to welcome.
As our government increases its hostility to foreigners and denies U.S.
businesses access to necessary resources, technology companies exercise the
other option before them: they outsource. The politicians who puff up their
chests and represent themselves as protectors of the American worker are
doing nothing more than accelerating the tsunami of jobs going overseas.
The panderers, who would use 9/11 to advance an anti-foreigner agenda in
the name of national security, make us less secure by stripping the United
States of valuable human resources. Have they forgotten the role of
foreign-born scientists in our development of defense technologies? Would
they have sent Albert Einstein back home? Not allowed Andy Grove to stay
and build Intel?
We should be talking about solutions. We should address the crisis of U.S.
competitiveness at home and abroad.
We should staple a green card to every foreign-born student who completes a
college-level program in engineering. We want those human resources to stay
in this country, help us build and support our businesses and raise
families.
We should immediately expand the number of H1-B visas to 500,000 and at the
same time improve our own funding of technology education.
If we don't take action, we won't be talking about immigration. The topic
will be emigration as our children take advantage of opportunities in other
countries. I hope that they can get a visa.
Marty Singer is chairman and CEO of PCTEL and chairman of the American
Electronics Association's Midwest Council.
5. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.computerworld.com.au/index.php/id;1893064997;fp;2;fpid;4
Hyperion CEO eyes ethics, governance
Don Tennant
27/04/2006 15:54:55
Godfrey Sullivan is approaching his two-year anniversary as CEO of Hyperion
Solutions, a business performance management software vendor, following a
three-year stint as the company's president and chief operating officer. On
Monday at Hyperion's Solutions 2006 user and partner conference in Las
Vegas, Sullivan spoke at length with Computerworld about a range of issues,
including his take on Scott McNealy stepping down as Sun Microsystems's
CEO, former CA CEO Sanjay Kumar's guilty plea and the H-1B visa
controversy.
[article snipped]
What's your position on the H-1B visa issue?
It's hard to separate H-1B from the geopolitical issues. From a
geopolitical standpoint, we're cutting off our nose to spite our face in
terms of having security constraints around students who want to come study
here be so tight. We have massive brand power here in higher education. For
us to be overly restrictive around H-1B, especially in the student world,
is just asking for new brands to be created some other place where people
can go to get what they used to get here.
From an H-1B standpoint, we can always use more technical talent from other
parts of the world. When we try to hire a chief architect in Stamford,
you'd be amazed at how long that search goes and how hard it is to find
someone. It goes back to the education question, and it's a huge, complex
issue. In the meantime, we ought to be letting more and more H-1Bs through.
What's your response to unemployed U.S. IT professionals who feel H-1B
workers are stealing U.S. jobs?
There's no simple answer. It's hard to connect the dots between the high
demand for great technical people and the unemployed IT professionals. It's
a complete mystery to me.
[the rest snipped]
6. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1529924.cms
MS, Intel seek skilled immigrants in US
[ Monday, May 15, 2006 01:27:16 pmAGENCIES ]
WASHINGTON: Microsoft, Intel and other technology companies warned that
they might be forced to move more work overseas unless Congress increases
the number of US visas available for such workers.
``We have a couple thousand open technical spots that we cannot find people
to fill,'' says Jack Krumholtz, managing director of federal government
affairs for Microsoft, the world's largest software maker. If that
situation persists, he says, ``we're going to have to do more of our
development work abroad.''
The Senate resumes debate on Monday on a broad overhaul of immigration
legislation that includes a proposal to raise the annual cap on so-called
H-1B visas for skilled workers to 115,000 - a 77 per cent increase - and
make it easier for such workers to gain permanent residency.
While lobbying efforts for these provisions have been publicly overshadowed
by the intense debate over how to handle a flood of unskilled, undocumented
immigrants, corporate officials have quietly continued to press their case.
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates met with congressional leaders in March,
including Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, to discuss the
company's ``top legislative priority,'' Krumholtz says.
7. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/3603951
Cornyn Pushes for More H1-B Visas: While immigrants marched in the streets
of America this week, Sen. John Cornyn turned his attention to immigrants
in classrooms with high-tech skills.
The Texas Republican's Securing Knowledge, Innovation and Leadership (SKIL)
bill expands the number of visas allowed for high-tech workers educated in
the United States who are employed as part of the H1-B visa program.
An H1-B visa is a non-immigrant classification used by foreigners who are
sponsored and employed in specialty fields such as technology. The current
H1-B ceiling is 65,000 workers per year, following caps as high 195,000
employees in the early 1990s.
Cornyn's bill raises the H1-B cap and exempts from the annual H-1B cap any
professional who has earned a post-graduate degree from an accredited U.S.
university.
"A crucial part of our growing economy is our ability to innovate. By
investing in science and technology, we can continue to revolutionize our
economy," Cornyn said in a statement. "This bill would help cultivate a
system that ensures these talented people -- and their jobs -- remain
here."
Or, as Bill Gates said last year on a visit to Washington, "The whole idea
of the H1-B thing is don't let too many smart people come into the country.
Basically, it doesn't make sense."
Common sense, however, has never been a hallmark of Congress.
8. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aZM1MDJr4Bio&refer=news_index
Microsoft, Intel Push U.S. to Welcome More Skilled Immigrants
May 15 (Bloomberg) -- Microsoft Corp. currently does almost all its
product-development work at its Redmond, Washington, headquarters. That may
change if Congress doesn't make it easier to hire skilled immigrants,
company officials say.
Microsoft, Intel Corp. and other technology companies are warning that they
may be forced to move more work overseas unless Congress increases the
number of U.S. visas available for such workers.
``We have a couple thousand open technical spots that we cannot find people
to fill,'' says Jack Krumholtz, managing director of federal government
affairs for Microsoft, the world's largest software maker. If that
situation persists, he says, ``we're going to have to do more of our
development work abroad.''
The Senate resumes debate today on a broad overhaul of immigration
legislation that includes a proposal to raise the annual cap on so-called
H-1B visas for skilled workers to 115,000 -- a 77 percent increase -- and
make it easier for such workers to gain permanent residency.
While lobbying efforts for these provisions have been publicly overshadowed
by the intense debate over how to handle a flood of unskilled, undocumented
immigrants, corporate officials have quietly continued to press their case.
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates met in March with congressional leaders,
including Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, to discuss the
company's ``top legislative priority,'' Krumholtz says.
Intel, Oracle
Craig Barrett, chairman of Santa Clara, California-based Intel, the world's
biggest semiconductor maker, says he has spent almost 10 years pressing for
changes to the H-1B program.
``These people are the people that can help drive U.S. competitiveness and
our economy,'' he says. ``Let's make the U.S. the place where they want to
come by choice. Let's welcome them with open arms.''
Because of the visa cap, Intel has begun placing some foreign engineers in
countries with more lenient immigration rules, such as Canada, Ireland and
Israel, says Jenny Verdery, director of workforce policy. ``That trend will
continue until Congress fixes the problem,'' she says.
The need for more skilled immigrants is also a top issue of discussion
whenever executives from Redwood City, California- based Oracle Corp. meet
with members of Congress, says Robert Hoffman, vice president of government
and public affairs for the world's third-largest software maker.
``It's in our mutual interests, company and country, to change our
immigration laws to be much more conducive to our economic growth,'' he
says.
House Opposition
Increasing visas for skilled workers faces opposition in the House of
Representatives, where lawmakers favor enforcing current immigration laws
and tightening border security before creating new ways for more immigrants
to enter the country. The changes are also opposed by the Washington-based
public-policy arm of the 365,000-member Institute of Electrical and
Electronics Engineers.
Paul Kostek, the group's former president and current chairman of its
committee on workplace issues, says an increase in the visa cap would cost
American workers jobs and wages. Technology companies, he says, could fill
their skilled-worker needs by paying higher salaries.
``There are some companies that may not be able to find people if they're
not willing to pay more,'' he says. ``It's a supply-and-demand market.''
Rise and Fall
U.S. companies are now limited to hiring 65,000 skilled immigrant workers
annually under the H-1B program. The cap rose to 195,000 per year in 2001
after Congress responded to increased demand from technology companies. It
was lowered to 65,000 in 2004 after the technology economy slowed.
Demand for the visas exhausted the 2006 supply two months before the year
began.
``We are critically dependent on foreign talent to fill the jobs we
generate in the United States,'' says William Brody, president of Johns
Hopkins University in Baltimore. ``To the extent to which we don't have the
talented people here, the Intels of the world are going to go find the
talent wherever they can.''
Companies are also seeking changes that would make it easier to apply for
and renew the work permits and qualify for legal U.S. permanent residency.
Getting legal residency, and the certificate of proof known as a ``green
card,'' can now cost thousands of dollars and take more than a decade to
complete.
Shreyas Desai, a software engineer who came to the U.S. from India on a
student visa in 2000 and got an H-1B visa two years later, can't apply for
permanent residency because of limits on the number given to Indians. He
says he can't be promoted or get a new job because changes to his
employment status would require him to resubmit his application for a green
card, sending him to the back of the line.
`Literally Suffering'
``We're just suffering, literally suffering,'' said Desai, 27, of Lafayette
Hill, Pennsylvania, who is one of the founders of Immigration Voice, a
five-month-old, 3,500-member advocacy group for skilled immigrants, based
in Dayton, New Jersey.
Congressional debate has focused on illegal immigration and a guest-worker
program for unskilled workers, spurred in part by street protests across
the U.S. on April 10 and May 1 in which hundreds of thousands of
demonstrators demanded legal status for undocumented immigrants. A
guest-worker program would have no effect on skilled workers.
``Most of the media attention is on the illegal aliens,'' says Desai. ``We
just feel like we have been legal, we have been paying our taxes, we've
been playing by the book. We've just been ignored.''
Presidential Support
President George W. Bush, who will speak to the nation tonight on
immigration, supports raising the cap on skilled visas as part of a broader
legal overhaul. ``I think it's a mistake not to encourage more really
bright folks who can fill the jobs that are having trouble being filled
here in America,'' Bush said in a February visit to 3M Co.'s headquarters
in Maplewood, Minnesota.
The provision increasing H-1B visas is part of immigration legislation on
which the Senate will resume debate today after resolving a procedural
dispute over amendments. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist has pledged to
finish the measure by the end of the month.
The Senate proposal raises the visa cap to 115,000 and allows further
increases of 20 percent each year based on demand. It also temporarily
increases the number of green cards available to 450,000 per year to clear
out a backlog of applications, while streamlining the application process.
``There is a tremendous demand for technology workers,'' says Republican
Senator George Allen of Virginia. If employers ``don't have the talent to
do that work, the research and development could be off-shored to other
countries.''
Companies Cope
The costs borne by companies because of visa problems and jobs unfilled is
difficult to quantify because companies have been coping by delaying some
projects or shifting work overseas, says Stuart Anderson, executive
director of the National Foundation for American Policy, a group based in
Arlington, Virginia, that researches trade and immigration issues.
``The continuing problems, because of congressional inaction, are going to
further accelerate that,'' says Anderson, who advocates restoring the old
195,000 limit. Employers ``end up taking their next best option, which is
to do more of the work outside the United States.''
To contact the reporter on this story:
Nicholas Johnston in Washington at njohnston3@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: May 15, 2006 00:23 EDT
9. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=24&issue=20060512
Managing For Success
Growing Geek Gap Gnaws U.S. Firms
BY BRIAN DEAGON
INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Posted 5/12/2006
As a student in New Delhi, India, Raman Khanna scored an A-plus on every
math test he took.
"I would get upset if I got just one problem wrong," said Khanna, managing
director of Diamondhead Ventures in Menlo Park, Calif., and a former chief
information officer at Stanford University.
One reason Khanna rose in the classroom was his teachers. In India they are
revered as role models and are highly passionate about their profession,
especially in math and sciences, he says.
Khanna has developed a different view of U.S. students and teachers in math
and science after having observed his own children attending grade school
in California. Whiz kids in math are stigmatized as nerds and many teachers
don't get the respect -- or pay -- they deserve.
"Kids don't talk about scientists as role models. They talk about athletes
and musicians," he said.
Whatever the reasons, many experts say America is entering a crisis in math
and science. The ripple effects are spreading.
The oil and gas, manufacturing, power generation and some tech sectors face
critical shortages of engineers and scientists. Experts retire and fewer
math and science grads from top colleges are available to take their place.
The brain drain poses a management nightmare for U.S. firms, especially
when it comes to replenishing a pool of innovative talent that's been
behind most U.S. tech breakthroughs in the last three decades.
According to the National Science Foundation, the need for science and
engineering graduates will grow 26%, or 1.25 million, between now and 2012.
The number of jobs requiring technical training is growing at five times
the rate of other occupations. And U.S. schools are nowhere near meeting
the demand, according to multiple studies.
The good news is the government and private sector are trying to fill the
gap.
Tech companies such as Intel (INTC) and Cisco (CSCO) spend millions
annually on scholarships and contests aimed at luring students into the
sciences. Cisco recently hosted a panel, which included President Bush,
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and 250 high-tech leaders, that
discussed America's competitiveness.
Bush said at the event, "Jobs of the 21st century will require a skill
level much different than when you and I went to college. . . . It starts
with making sure our public school system does its job in early grades."
Graduating more students in math and science is an issue that hits right at
the heart of U.S. competitiveness. High-tech manufacturing has grown
rapidly since 1990. It now comprises one-fifth, or more than $20 trillion,
of the world's total manufacturing output.
The U.S. rapidly developed the most intensive high-tech manufacturing
sector in the world. Since 1990, U.S. high-tech manufacturing output has
risen from 12% to 30% of total domestic manufacturing.
Though America remains the leader when it comes to innovation, big changes
around the world have put that lead into jeopardy. Globalization, the
demise of the Cold War and the Internet's emergence have leveled the
competitive playing field. The rapid emergence of Asian economies enabled
them to invest heavily in technology and education. China has made
investments in science and technology a top priority.
One result is a huge increase in global demand for science and engineering
graduates. The U.S. has maneuvered through this domestic shortage by
tapping a huge pool of international students that came to prized U.S.
institutions for their graduate studies. Foreign-born students with H-1B
U.S. worker visas filled the gap.
That worked well throughout the '90s. Then came the dot-com collapse of
2000, accompanied by a mild recession. That led to a curtailment in the
number of H-1B visas being issued. A sharp drop in foreign student visas
followed the Sept. 11, 2001, massacre.
As foreign economies improve and technology infrastructures are created, as
in China and India, foreign students in the U.S. have greater incentive to
return home, or not come to the U.S. at all.
All of this was a clarion as to the declining skill sets of American
students.
According to the NSF, engineering degrees in Asia are awarded at more than
four times the rate as in North America -- including those U.S. degrees
awarded to foreign-born students. And it's not likely to get better soon.
At the K-through-12 school level, only one-third of fourth- and
eighth-grade students are proficient in math and science, and less than 20%
of 12th-graders are at that level.
"By the fourth grade, if students don't catch the math and science train,
they get derailed and the problems get compounded as they go up," said
Jeetan Singh, CEO of HighPointsLearning.com, a site that aims to boost math
learning among K-12 students. "You have to fix the problem from the very
beginning."
"We need more kids with math and science backgrounds and better teachers to
teach them," said William Archey, chairman of the American Electronics
Association.
Not many argue.
"There's no disagreement on this between either of our two political
parties or the White House," Archey said.
The new buzzword in Washington is competitiveness. In February, the White
House unveiled the American Competitiveness Initiative. It commits $5.9
billion in fiscal 2007 for research and development, strengthen education
and encourage entrepreneurship. Over 10 years, the initiative proposes $50
billion to increase funding in R&D.
R&D is vital to economic vitality. About 80% of productivity springs from
domestic R&D, according to the Computer Systems Policy Project.
Numerous bills have been introduced in Congress this year that also focus
on the competitiveness issue, with bipartisan support. These include the
Protecting America's Competitive Edge Act and the National Innovation Act.
Last month, the National Venture Capital Association launched a public
policy awareness program called Magnet USA (Maximizing America's Growth for
our Nation's Entrepreneurs and Technologists).
According to the NVCA, "The present environment in the U.S. is simply not
as conducive to nurturing innovation as it once was for economic, societal
and political reasons."
Among the reasons, it says, is poor math and science performance, growing
curbs on the foreign nationals who have historically taken a leadership
role in the building of emerging U.S. companies, a precipitous drop in
basic R&D investments, and increasing regulation of the U.S. capital
markets that cuts access to growth capital for young companies.
"These are all very important issues if we are to maintain our competitive
edge," said Mark Heesen, NVCA president.
10. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/homepage/article_1132377.php
Saturday, May 6, 2006
Living visa to visa
Filipino on high-tech permit fights red tape, political mood.
By MARCIA C. SMITH
The Orange County Register
He reads the paper, sees the TV news and watches people weigh in on both
sides of the immigration debate. Activists' arguments are tense, their
words sometimes bitter, dripping with intolerance, anger and even hatred.
For now, the issue, which will ultimately be settled in Washington, has
come to his neighborhood streets. There's no doubt that there are some
people who don't want him to become an American, even though he is here
legally with a guest-worker permit he must renew each year.
"Call me Joe, since I'm in America now," he says. "My real name is Jose."
Joe - the immigration debate's verbal cauldron makes him reluctant to share
more than his first name - is a 41-year-old Filipino living in Anaheim and
working as a surveyor for an Irvine real estate development firm.
In 1998, he left his province in the southern Philippines to work in
California as a civil engineer. Favorable wages and opportunities beckoned
him though his parents, two sisters and a brother didn't want to see him
go.
"I had two college degrees (from a Philippine university), followed the
U.S. curriculum and learned from American textbooks," Joe says. "I knew my
skills would be valuable in the United States."
But now, almost eight years into building his career and life in Orange
County, Joe deals daily with the prospect that he may be forced to return
to his homeland.
His high-tech guest-worker visa, known as an H-1B visa, expires Aug. 28.
Joe is uncertain whether it will be renewed, given that Congress caps the
number of H-1B visas at 65,000 each year, which is about 10 percent of
628,595 requests approved by the U.S. Department of Labor in 2004.
He tried to end the yearly drama for work permits by starting down the path
to U.S. legal residency and citizenship in August 2003.
He applied to the U.S. Department of Labor for his labor certification,
which would show a shortage of U.S. workers in his field.
Last year, he was informed that his case had been closed because he had
missed an application deadline. Then his case was reopened last June when
Joe and his immigration attorney, Hilda Surtida, presented the Federal
Express documents showing his application was received on time.
When Joe learned that his case was again inexplicably closed, he joined a
2004 nationwide class-action lawsuit accusing U.S. immigration officials of
paperwork-stalling and procedural foot-dragging that had delayed or
prevented foreign professionals from getting their green cards for U.S.
residency.
"He has been patiently waiting since August 2003 for his application to be
approved, and somehow the Department of Labor messed up his application, so
we are back to Square 1," Surtida says.
His labor certification application, which has been approved by California,
is now awaiting federal approval.
After the federal approval, Surtida said Joe will have to wait another two
to three years for an available visa number, which will make him eligible
to file for a green card with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration
Services.
Green card applications typically take one to two years to approve. That
means Joe wouldn't be a legal U.S. resident at least until 2009, well
beyond the Aug. 28 date his work permit expires.
"I don't know why this is happening," Joe says.
"I follow the law, work hard, show up on time and have made a home here.
Now I'm distracted every day because I don't know where my future will be.
It's out of my control."
Joe makes $27 an hour, two dollars above the $25 government's "prevailing
wage" for a land surveyor. He saves as much as he can and sends money to
his family in the Philippines every month so that his niece and nephew can
attend private school.
He hasn't been home to see his family in eight years. Traveling back to the
Philippines, he says, runs a round-trip risk.
"I'd be gambling with the embassy," he says. "A friend of mine went home
for his mother's funeral and was stopped at the consulate. He had to pay
$500 for a four-hour lawyer consultation and needed to try twice more to
get a visa to come back to the U.S."
Joe's father is 81 years old, and if his father were to fall ill or die,
his family knows that the third-eldest child wouldn't be coming home.
"That's the situation," Joe says. "Everything's on hold. I can't leave
now."
His priority is the job he has held since June 2003. He went to work last
Monday as scheduled and without ever considering joining the nationwide
"Day Without Immigrants" demonstrations.
"My bosses say I'm doing a good job. They praise me for my accuracy,
efficiency and punctuality, and I have seen them fire some American
citizens for not doing a good job," he says.
"There an obvious need in America in certain professions for people like
me."
But Joe also knows that there is pressure and that several class-action
lawsuits oppose the H-1B visas that American companies and universities use
to import foreign scientists, engineers and computer programmers. Some
anti-immigration activists contend that foreign workers willing to work for
lower wages are displacing American workers, depressing wages and
discouraging Americans from pursuing technical careers.
Joe considers himself even more unwelcome in this country than the
estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in a black market of labor who are
generally doing jobs that many Americans don't want.
"I'm disappointed that the government is considering laws to benefit 11
million illegals but doing nothing for 600,000 professionals like me who've
gone through the legal channels," Joe says.
In April, Joe took an exam to become a licensed land surveyor. He won't
know the results until September.
"With my luck, I'll pass the test but already be back in the Philippines,"
he says, laughing.
He worries that he would struggle to find equal work and pay in the
Philippines, where young, recent college graduates are more attractive to
employers.
He has made a home in America. He enjoys "the views" of Southern
California, its beaches and its mountains. He has used his long weekends
and vacation time to visit 20 other American states. "I want to see them
all," he says.
Joe has a handful of American-born friends. They talk about sports, mostly
football but lately the Los Angeles Lakers, who returned to the NBA
playoffs after a one-season absence.
"Did you see Kobe's (Bryant's) shot to win the game? That was incredible,"
Joe says during a lunch break this past week.
He grows quiet thinking about the past eight years, his experiences and his
memories in the American home he created far from home.
He loves his life here, but with his future a subject of a passionate
national debate, it's a life that is now in limbo.
11. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/state/14476318.htm
Posted on Tue, May. 02, 2006
The other debate: white-collar immigrants
BY ALAN BJERGA
Eagle Washington bureau
WASHINGTON - Many immigrant success stories revolve around the basics of
the American dream: a steady job in the land of opportunity.
Bayram Yildirim aims higher: He wants to help Wichita's aerospace companies
build the world's best jets.
"If you want to get involved with cutting-edge research, USA is the place,"
said Yildirim, who came to the U.S. from Turkey 10 years ago. The
33-year-old industrial engineer is an assistant professor at Wichita State
University.
As immigration debates rage nationwide over low-skilled illegal immigrants,
proposals before Congress also touch people like Yildirim, highly educated
workers who come to the U.S. as students, doctors and skilled
professionals.
They're here legally. They do difficult jobs. They add to America's
brainpower, and while they're in the U.S. they keep that power from
competitors -- often their home countries.
Armin Gerhard, associate director of Wichita State's office of
international education, said the school couldn't be the asset it is
without skilled foreigners.
"You want the most qualified people you can get, and the reality is that
many of those are international," he said.
But increasing the number of visas for skilled foreign workers presents
problems. Critics charge that terrorists could exploit the process. They
also say U.S. companies misuse visa programs to bring in cheaper foreign
labor and encourage white-collar outsourcing.
Foreign workers "basically get their training here before they're sent
back" to compete with or replace U.S. jobs, said Ron Hira, a critic of
current guest-worker programs.
Workers in Wichita
Wichita State is the largest, but far from the only, employer of highly
skilled immigrants in Kansas.
According to a federal immigration database, Kansas businesses in 2004
received about 1,250 H-1Bs--the visa that goes to highly skilled foreign
guest workers. Wichita State received about 30 visas, granted mainly for
research engineers and professors.
The number of H-1Bs given nationwide is capped at 65,000 a year, but
various exemptions end up allowing about 220,000 foreigners a year into the
U.S. legally on the six-year visa.
After Wichita State, Wichita's aerospace companies are the state's top
employers of skilled foreign labor. Cessna has about 20 engineers on H-1Bs,
said human resources chief Jim Walters. A shortage of engineers in
specialized fields "compels us to seek talent from all sources," he said.
Like visas for low-skilled workers, programs for highly skilled workers are
based on the idea that businesses face worker shortages. Many foreign
workers are happy to help address that shortage.
Xin Yao teaches management at Wichita State. The 28-year-old Shanghai
native came to Wichita in part because of its strong record of
entrepreneurship, one of her research interests.
The arrangement benefits the city as much as it benefits the workers, she
said.
"Just being a different person walking around campus helps students realize
the world is bigger than their neighborhood," Yao said. "That's my little
contribution to the community."
Regulating immigration
Proposals in the U.S. Senate to reform immigration would increase the
number of H-1Bs. The Senate Judiciary Committee-passed bill still under
debate would raise the ceiling, with exemptions included, to up to 300,000
workers a year.
The U.S. House didn't address highly skilled workers in its security bill,
but lawmakers including Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, have indicated
openness to raising the cap on skilled guest workers.
But critics say they have serious concerns about the program: that foreign
workers pose a security threat, drive down white-collar wages and often end
up working in their home countries anyway.
Since the Sept. 11 attacks, more-stringent security checks have slowed visa
processing. Department of Homeland Security officials say that's made the
U.S. safer, though advocates for more visas fear the additional hurdles
drive away students and workers who pose no security threat.
But the security concerns continue, along with economic ones. Hira, the
critic of current guest-worker programs, is the author of "Outsourcing
America: What's Behind Our National Crisis And How We Can Reclaim American
Jobs." He teaches public policy at the Rochester Institute of Technology in
New York. And he's the son of immigrants from India.
He questions whether there is a shortage of highly skilled workers, and he
suspects that many temporary workers ultimately end up taking U.S. jobs
with them when they leave.
"Right now there's no test on whether a corporation can't find American
workers," he said. He also points to studies indicating that companies that
outsource bring in foreign workers who don't stay. Workers are trained in
the U.S., then sent back overseas to do the same work at a lower wage.
If allowing in skilled foreign workers makes the U.S. more competitive, he
asked, "then why is the government of India lobbying so hard to raise the
(U.S. visa) cap?"
Yildirim said he would like to see programs streamlined to encourage the
world's most valuable workers to come to the U.S. if they want to.
Yildirim has moved beyond the H-1B. He is now a permanent resident, is
married and has a daughter. He and his wife are deciding whether to raise
the 2-year-old in the United States or in Turkey.
His future will depend in part on where the best research is being done, he
said. If the U.S. continues to support the world's best work -- and the
world's best workers -- he said, he can see himself staying in the U.S.
much longer.
"When you live in the USA for a long time, your lifestyle and habits change
quite a lot," he said. "You feel that you are at home."
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