Open Source H-1B Puzzle
Open Source H-1B Puzzle
Date: Wednesday, August 22, 2007 1:58 AM
<<<<< JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER No. 1743 -- 8/21/2007 >>>>>
A new stinker of an article is making its way across the mainstream media and
throughout the internet. It's a transparent piece of propaganda written Jim
Romeo, a former engineer turned MBA turned business writer. Romeo is a
corporate toadie and makes no bones about the type of stuff he writes --
according to his online portfolio he is most qualified to write about
management and business related subjects. He never mentioned labor related
subjects which is a good thing since his latest writing, as well as previous
ones, demonstrates a total lack of interest in anything but the CEO and HR
point of view.
You can find out more about Jim Romeo at the following websites:
http://www.articlewriting.50megs.com/
http://www.jimromeo.net/
Romeo's article uses a classic propaganda technique identified by The
Institute for Propaganda Analysis (IPA) as "selective omission", or stacking
the deck. The way he does it is to totally avoid quoting anyone who disagrees
with his corporatist point of view that there is a shortage of programmers and
a shortage of H-1B visas. The title of the article initiates the charade with
the notion that it has something to do with open source developers -- nothing
could be further from the truth unless you count a few sob stories from H-1B
visa holders. Most of the quotes are from CEOs and business owners.
After the title things go downhill very quickly. Notice that Romeo never
actually quotes an alternative point of view -- he gives a false impression of
objectivity by mentioning detractors as "critics" or marginalizing everyone
else as a few people with "one comment".
Romeo tried to pull a fast one here:
"The H-1B visas play right into the hands of large corporations,"
says Russ Nelson, vice president of an open source firm and member
of the Open Source Software Institute. "First, because they make it
more expensive to hire the worker you want because of the H-1B
overhead. Second, they tie the worker to the corporation that
created the job, so the worker is not free to change jobs.
Russ Nelson is an H-1B critic alright, but only because he doesn't want any
limits to the quantities of workers he can import! This is another classic
technique called bait and switch -- pay close attention to Nelson's true
agenda of open borders globalism and unlimited immigration:
Since most open source firms are small to medium companies, the H-1B
program generally hurts them. I don't understand what problem is
being solved by restricting immigration. If somebody wants to come
to our country and work hard, I see no reason to stop them."
The end of the article is the worst part and perhaps the most misleading:
His view of the whole H1-B process as it is? "I don't think it
benefits anybody."
Guess who said that? According to Romeo it was from an anonymous Canadian that
complained about all the hoops he had to go through to get a visa.
Boo! Hoo! Actually the entire quote is probably fiction because foreigners
don't go through hoops to get H-1B visas -- their employers do. Employers, if
you remember, are required to do all the paperwork and pay all the fees, so
Romeo's reporting seems to be weak on the facts.
How much you want to bet the quote was actually from an Indian? Canadians
would be more likely to use TN visas, that is assuming they were really one of
those "best and brightest" we hear so much about.
I provide three links to the article but by the time you read this newsletter
there will be many more -- and expect many of them to have different titles.
PCworld and Linuxword allow comments. We shouldn't be surprised that the
Washington Post paid Romeo for the article since Melinda Gates, the wife of
Bill Gates, III is on the Board of Directors of the Washington Post
Corporation.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,136231-c,industrynews/article.html
IT Staff Shortage Predicted
http://www.linuxworld.com/news/2007/082007-open-source-h1-b.html
Open source developers face H1-B visa puzzle
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/21/AR2007082100681_2.html
Open-source developers face H1-B visa puzzle
IT Staff Shortage Predicted
Companies say they depend on foreign workers to fill IT positions, but the
demand for H1-B visas is far greater than the quota imposed by Congress.
Jim Romeo, LinuxWorld
Tuesday, August 21, 2007 08:00 AM PDT
According to a July 2007 survey by Gartner Group of 225 U.S.-based
organizations, 66 percent projected some level of increase in IT staff looking
12 months forward. This is up from 61 percent in 2006. The H1-B visa program,
which allows U.S. firms to petition for workers from abroad, has been one
avenue of meeting this demand. But the number of positions needing to be
filled is seemingly way greater than the allowable quota imposed by Congress.
Speak to the open source community about the topic and you are likely to hear
a mixed bag of comments about the H1-B program.
One comment is that the H-1B program is too prescribed. The quotas seem
whimsical and aren't tied to actual demand for that year. Plus, they give too
much weight to objective data without looking at who that person is and what
they can offer. Many very capable open source developers don't have a college
degree and the program does not easily accommodate them. In addition, the
process is costly for an employer to petition for the visa, and also for the
candidate to hire attorneys and consultants to insure that their application
is proper.
H-1B visa petitions by U.S. firms began six months before the start of the
Government's 2007 fiscal year in October of 2006. This date fell on a Sunday.
By noon on the following Tuesday, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration
Services had received more than 130,000 H1-B petitions for workers. That is
more than two petitions for every available visa. Yes, you heard that right --
in one day the quota was exceeded.
In the U.S. Government's 2003 fiscal year, 195,000 H1-B visas were allowed,
but the current number, 65,000, is closer to that imposed just before the dot-
com boom at the turn of the new millennium.
One open source developer who commented on the program is now working in the
United States on an H1-B visa. He wished to remain anonymous as he is
gainfully employed as an open source developer and is working on his green
card application.
"There's a great concern over undocumented immigrants and we tend to get
bundled together with that issue," he says.
His application was an inch and a half thick. He hired a specialist to insure
that all the details were included in the application. He considers himself
lucky in being accepted and being able to work for a notable firm in the open
source community.
But others are highly critical of the process as it is an obstacle to many
open source firms who are often small and midsize businesses.
"The H-1B visas play right into the hands of large corporations," says Russ
Nelson, vice president of an open source firm and member of the Open Source
Software Institute. "First, because they make it more expensive to hire the
worker you want because of the H-1B overhead. Second, they tie the worker to
the corporation that created the job, so the worker is not free to change
jobs. Since most open source firms are small to medium companies, the H-1B
program generally hurts them. I don't understand what problem is being solved
by restricting immigration. If somebody wants to come to our country and work
hard, I see no reason to stop them."
Mike Tiemann was one of the founding partners of Cygnus Support, later Cygnus
Solutions, an open source firm that made the Software 500 list in 1996. The
firm received numerous awards and accolades, and was acquired by Red Hat in
1999.
"The fourth or fifth employee at Cygnus Solutions was an H1-B visa case,"
Tiemann says. "He was a talented programmer from the U.K. who wanted to leave
the U.K. and live in Silicon Valley. The trouble was, even though he had twice
developed software programs that generated millions of GBP of revenue,he never
went to college, and so it was quite a challenge to go through the process.
Nevertheless, with several professors at Stanford University testifying that
his work was the equal of a PhD, we hired him.
He was very productive for us, and delighted living in the U.S."
John Weatherby, Executive Director of the Open Source Software Institute
(OSSI) is less critical of the program and hasn't seen many problems with it.
"I'm sure that the companies who rely on either outsourcing or importing large
numbers of foreign developers have very legitimate reasons and sound arguments
as to why they would like to see an increase in the number of H1-B visas, but
we have not run into that problem, I believe, for a couple of basic reasons,"
Weatherby says.
"We work with lots of software development companies who are either
exclusively open source shops, or employ open source as part of their
solutions and service offering. We're also engaged in project management for
selected open source projects on both a national and global scale. In neither
case have we seen a problem with the H1-B visa situation. "
"We also do work with the U.S. Department of Defense, and again the H1-B visa
situation has not been an issue since most DoD work does not allow overseas or
foreign-national development," he adds. "So they depend on the U.S.'s
homegrown talent."
Mark D. Koestler, a partner in the New York City based business immigration
law practice of Kramer, Levin, Naftalis & Frankel, explains that the H-1B
category is the visa status devoted to professional or "specialty occupation"
positions, such as accountants, lawyers, graphic designers, bankers,
advertising executives and others. Engineering, math and computer science
compose some of the highest demand categories. The H-1B is an employer-
sponsored status, meaning you cannot apply if you do not have a prospective
employer who is willing to file a petition.
According to Koestler, there are the principal requirements that must be
satisfied to qualify for the H-1B category. One is that the proposed position
must require at least a U.S. bachelor's degree, or the equivalent, in a
specific area. In addition, the individual must have that degree, or the
equivalent; and the individual's compensation must be the "required wage" --
the higher of the prevailing wage for the position in the area of intended
employment or the actual wage paid to others holding the position with the
employer. Generally, H-1B status is valid for up to six years with a few
exceptions for longer service.
Critics contend that the program enables foreign workers in the U.S. to take
jobs from American workers. Not surprisingly, executives who use the program
disagree. "This is simply not the case," says Bob Meltzer, CEO of VISANOW, a
Chicago, Illinois based firm who streamlines visa applications for U.S.
employers and foreign workers. "The fact that more than twice as many
applications were filed then visas allotted on the first day of H-1B filing
means that companies cannot fill needed positions."
Meltzer contends that for a technology firm that is seeking to fill its ranks
of software developers, programmers and other information technology
positions, the H1-B visa program is one that is competitive, yet a rich source
for filling much needed technology positions.
Elizabeth Charnock is CEO Cataphora, a firm specializing in sophisticated
software for investigative analytics used by corporate legal staffs and law
firms in document-intense litigation work involving white-collar crime,
securities, and antitrust matters.
"It's difficult to find people" Charnock says. Her firm has had trouble
finding highly qualified IT workers willing to work for her firm. However,
there are many foreign workers hungry for IT jobs. Charnock says that when her
firm posts jobs on Craig's List, they receive many inquiries from workers in
India.
Charnock points out that many job petitions were from outsourcing firms, based
in places like India. These firms simply recruit and place the workers and
profit from the placement.
She cites figures that Infosys, an outsourcing firm that places workers from
India into U.S.-based firms, submitted 5000 petitions for the visas, out of a
total of 65,000 being granted. She compares this to Cisco Systems'
800 petitions, which was ranked 13th in the number of petitions filed.
Staffing firms that specialize in placing foreign workers into U.S.
technology firms are dominating the efforts to attain workers on the H1-B
visa.
San Diego-based staffing firm TalentFuse is one such firm embracing the H-1B
visa program. "Our customer's main criteria are qualified IT professionals
that can get the job done so country of origin does not matter from a business
standpoint," says Brian Margarita, President of TalentFuse. TalentFuse was
recently acquired by SQL Star -- a global staffing firm based in Delhi, India.
"From our standpoint - -TalentFuse is its own H1-B company -- we don't have as
many visa issues because it's an inter-company transfer when our parent
company SQL Star bring students to the U.S. who have gone to school for IT
certification in its facilities located in India, Singapore and Australia.
These qualified IT personal become SQL Star employees. Many are then
transferred to the U.S. to complete projects in the TalentFuse development
centers."
The demand for workers is significant and the supply does not seem to be
getting much better. Technology firms are working on their own solutions to
find talent.
"Next year it can get worse. It's so much disruption," says Charnock. She
cites the recent announcement by Microsoft, who just disclosed plans to open
up a software development center near Vancouver, British Columbia in Canada --
not far from their Redmond, Wash., headquarters. This comes on the heels of a
failure by Congress to raise the cap.
"Unfortunately Congress has been unable to successfully shepherd any of the
proposed H-1B program improvements through the legislative process yet"
says says Leigh Ganchan, an attorney with the law firm of Epstein Becker and
Green's Labor and Employment and Health Care and Life Sciences Practices in
the firm's Houston office. "One Senate proposal would have increased the
annual numerical limitation from 65,000 to a more realistic 115,000 per fiscal
year."
Ganchan feels that anticipating future periods of economic growth is important
and that any such legislative proposal needs a market-based cap escalator to
take effect in the fiscal year following years in which U.S.
employers experience an increased need for H-1B professionals. Such action by
federal legislators may need a voice from employers.
"It is vital that employers be vocal with Congress about the economic need for
a more realistic H-1B program," says Elizabeth Stern, a business immigration
attorney and partner in the Washington, D.C., office of Baker and McKenzie.
Charnock, like Stern, feels that a program with a distinct pool of foreign
workers who have a masters or doctorate degree from a foreign institution
would be a welcomed improvement in the program. At present, there is a
separate pool for advanced degree holders, but the degree must be from a U.S.
institution of higher learning.
"Development of visa pools for foreign-based master's holders and high-
salaried foreign hires are among the options that need to be explored," Stern
says.
Whether a prospective hire has a degree or not, they are just hard to find.
The anonymous open source developer we spoke about earlier explained that his
job was posted for two years before he filled it on an H1-B visa after jumping
through all of the hoops in the application process. "It really put me off,
working here," he explains. "I had considered working in Canada."
His view of the whole H1-B process as it is?
"I don't think it benefits anybody."
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