Once again, sorry about the slow posting. I mentioned over at our family blog that I took the kids down to the Children’s Museum. What a great facility that is. The kids had a great time, but more importantly, so did I. We had kicked around the house for a few hours yesterday morning, and I figured we’d go crazy if we didn’t go somewhere. I gave them a choice between the Children’s Museum and the zoo. They picked the museum. Either was fine with me since I hadn’t been to the museum for a good 20 years; and I’ve never been to the zoo.
In the world of politics, I know that Buyer is busily ducking debates against Ackerson in IN-04; Mitch Daniels is selling a hollywoodized version of himself while Jill Long Thompson’s message hasn’t really penetrated in my neck of the woods, and Straight Talkin’ John McCain is telling prevarications about Obama’s decision to abide by the Pentagon’s wishes with respect to visiting injured troops overseas and, in the muddled view of the world that I am getting while semi-unplugged from the Internet Tubes, this somehow has something to do with Brittany “lets just trust George Bush” Spears and Paris “I sure do love the death tax elimination” Hilton. Oh, and Ted “Bridge to Nowhere, Internet Tubes” Stevens was indicted.
Jason,
Since a few weeks ago you stated you were not in favor of more foreign high tech workers coming into the U.S. on the H1 visa program I thought you should know the House Immigration committee passed a additional(expanded H-1 visas) 550,000 workers and now it goes to the Senate where senator Menendez(NJ) has put a hold on re-authorizing the E-Verify program until this expansion of 550,000 foreign workers is added(E-Verify has already been re-authorized in the House) reason being many senators want to re-authorize E-Verify but do not want the additional 550,000 foreign workers as a condition of re-aurthorizing the program.
Many of these workers will more than likely come from India.Evidence has been presented time and time again that the U.S. is not suffering from a shortage of high tech workers and science and engineering however the foreign workers in these fields work for on average five to eight thousand $ less per yr.
Many immigration law firms are specializing in advising american comapnies how to advertise for american workers in these fields without having to actually hire any therfore being able to say they tried to hire a american but couldn’t find anyone paving the way to hire a foreign worker.There was a video on the internet last yr with a attorney from one of these firms advising a group of business leaders how to do this.
Thanks for the heads-up, PTN. Going to look into that tonight and see who I can write.
I love the term “shortage”. Mike Cole, you around here? Correct me if I’m mistaken, but I thought a shortage was impossable in a free market. It may be that something is in high demand, but then the whole “supply & demand” system kicks in.
Pay enough for something, and you’ll get it. You can’t run out of anything in a free market.
Jason,
The bill that passed the House immigration subcommittee is H.R. 5882 and Menendez’s bill is S.3414.
I haven’t had time to read either yet but I’m assuming of the 550,000 increase would include high tech workers usually there are different types of classifications involved in these things and usually Senator Feinstein calls for the increase in agricultural visa type workers.
I think you’ll enjoy taking a look at this video of Steven’s wiretapped conversation with a business associate:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nHR-E_tZTE
I gave a quick galnce at this bill H.R. 5882 on the U.S. congress website part of it’s supposed to be about recapturing lost visas due to bureacratic delays and a few other things I also read some PDF testimony from June by a strong supporter of the bill a Mr.Eddie Sweeney Senior VP of a company called WORLD WIDE HUMAN RESOURCES at NATIONAL SEMICONDUCTOR WORKFORCE STRATEGY which seems to be a company lobbying for high tech foreign workers for the semi conductor industry.
My email today said it would be a increase of 550,000 foreign workers so there it is hope this helped.I haven’t got time to read through all of it.
Jayson- I’m around here, thankee.
Shortages not possible? Of course they are. But “shortage” is distinct from “wholly unavailable”. The freer the market, the faster capital can flow towards increasing supply into the shortage, in the pursuit of profit.
Looking at what PTN wrote, I’m not sure why you singled me out for a discussion of shortages in markets. PTN’s report says there is not a shortage of high tech workers. What’s the angle? Just looking to tweak the free marketeer?
Oh, I wasn’t trying to single you out, Branden always pointed out that you were the free-market guy.
My point is that the reason behind these visas are because so many businesses claim a shortage of high-tech workers, even though there isn’t one, as PTN said. I was supporting that idea, saying that is isn’t a matter of not having enough high-tech workers, just that companies don’t want to pay the workers what the market rate is.
I’m curious on your view of opening up visas since you are “accused” of being a free market kind of guy. Should we make it easier for non-citizens to be employed when there are Americans willing to do the work?
Well, farmers claim they need subsidies to make growing corn pay, despite corn prices being at record prices. It ain’t all logical. It’s political.
Interesting comment with regard to the claimed shortage: “Companies don’t want to pay the workers what the market rate is.” Not paying the market rate? Are you assuming that the incoming workers are not part of the market? They are. And who sets the market price but the buyer? The seller can post whatever price he wants, but the buyer determines the market, and in labor, the employer is the buyer.
I’m going to answer your question about visas in a way that makes sense to me, because there are probably three or four topics (at least) within that question. Visas implies legal immigration, so we’ll leave the illegals out of this one.
This country has been luring those who would earn the lowest possible wage for at least 160 years, and while it scares the crap out of so many, it certainly didn’t hurt the USA as it became the world’s top economic power. So, I’m not sure why it should be so vexing now. Name your dominant immigrant group from various eras (Germans in the 1840s and 50s, Irish at the same time, Chinese post Civil War, etc.), and they filled precisely the roles these Indian visa-seekers would fill today- supplying the cheapest possible labor. Look also at migration within the USA. Around WW1, great migration happened, with southern blacks leaving Mississippi and Alabama (in particular) for Detroit, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and other northern industrial cities. Such movement has always been attacked as demeaning the wage-earning opportunity of those already here, with always a semi-racist (or more) component lurking. Were we made worse off as a nation for the southern blacks taking factory jobs for less than the northern white population native to Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania? I would point to this particular era as the health of manufacturing in the USA. The declining era in steel making, for example, came when wages were very high. Coincidence? It isn’t the only factor, but it is a factor.
I think that anyone should be able to buy from the widest market possible, whether it’s for food, widgets, or labor. Price isn’t going to be the only factor, and I think we lose sight of this.
I like cheap food, but I really like good food, so I pay a little more for quality. Labor is no different. You still get what you pay for. A solid worker is going to command a premium (unless he’s in a union, in which case he just gets his rate) because there is generally going to be a market for quality. 20 cheap-wage programmers who can’t build a decent website are still less valuable than 2 high-wage programmers who can.
My biggest concern is that in our drive to protect the native population, we could end up preventing native employers from having the best workforce available to them. If some citizens see jobs go to non-citizens who are more productive workers, shouldn’t they get the job? Doesn’t merit matter?
My issue with visas are in regards to changing the rules to increase the pool of labor, as you put it.
I feel that if you want to work here, you should be a citizen. The other side of that is that I feel that we should allow people to become citizens quickly, regardless if they’re from Mexico or India.
If you’re going to work here, live here, and use the services of this country, then you should also vote here and pay taxes here.
If there are enough people willing to come here and leave their citizenship of their home country that the wages get lowered because of the market, fine. I’m enough of a free-market guy to accept that, and I do disagree with trying to make wages falsly high.
However, I don’t feel we should make these exceptions (called visas) so people can remain citizens of their home country and work here for lower wages.
Also, in re-reading your post, it looks like your arguement supports mine, as you say the words “Name your dominant immigrant group from various eras”.
H1B workers are not immigrants, they’re guests.
How hard is emigration for American citizens to go to where their skill sets might find the highest price? Or do other countries pay enough for this to even be an issue?
From what I have seen, those that pay more than the US have far higher taxes, so I don’t think this is an issue.
Or, there is GREAT pay for many positions in Iraq, but the neighborhood is a little rough after midnight and before 11:59pm…
More to your question, Doug…the US pay is highest compared to most places. Doctors, lawyers, and high-tech workers are not paid that highly everywhere else. I think the better access to post-secondary education in other countries floods the market.
I’m sure you’ll also enjoy this parody of the Ted Stevens debacle:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nHR-E_tZTE
There are some places I can think of where Americans can make more money abroad than at home. English teachers in Japan, engineers in Dubai or Singapore. But no, by and large, the highest wage is going to be commanded where the most capital is concentrated in tandem with the greatest demand for skills, which is in the USA.
This is what makes some other countries a bit of a threat. India and China are places that have long had educated people, as Jason points out, but they haven’t had capital. Now they are beginning to accumulate it in their countries, and together with the lower wages they can pay, their countries become ripe for explosive growth.
This is, by the way, exactly what happened with the US in our industrial revolution, and to Britain, which had high wages, protectionist policies, and a world-wide empire to support.
There are lessons for us here.
Jason- On immigration history, if you read the letters of immigrants from the late 1800s (as I laboriously did as a history major), you will see repeatedly that most of the ‘immigrants’ of that day had no intentions of becoming US citizens. They were arriving with a plan: to work, send money home, and then go home with more money.
Many did just that. But more stayed, because the standard of living was better here, and the relative security of employment was better here than in Europe, despite all you could read from Lincoln Steffans, et al.
Point is, we didn’t issue visas then, because we had borders that were, believe it or not, more open then than they are now. One really only had to get past the medical exam if they came through Ellis Island or Boston. If coming from just about anywhere else, the visitor just came on in.
So- would you have the same conditions for Americans who choose to work abroad? I bring it up only because American citizens who do work abroad are required to file their IRS 1040s and send their taxes in. I imagine other countries have similar requirements. After all, someone who was earning around $900/year in India and is now making $35,000/year in the US stands to fatten the Indian treasury at a much healthier clip.
I would have the same conditions abroad. If you’re not going to live or work in the US, then you shouldn’t be a citizen. I agree that there must be some sort of temporary visa, say 1 year, to allow for exceptions and special projects where staff from another country need to come here to do a project. However, 7 years is silly. When 3 years is an average stay at a job, 7 is a career, not a project.
I do agree that the borders were more lax in those days, and I might talk differently if we were going to accept borders that lax again.
However, when the converation is about building walls next to Mexico and deporting brown people, then my respose is to say that before we worry about that, let’s quit doing visas and make it easier for those that are willing to become citizens to do so.