Trump Administration Plans to Require Higher Wages for H-1B Visa Holders

wsj.com

5 pointspetethomas3 comments

Its not clear to me what problem they're trying to solve. If its controlling immigration, higher wages won't dissuade large IT services companies from sponsoring visas because the alternative - i.e. hiring US grads - is likely to be much costlier/harder to scale and require evolving recruiting and culture practices. Far more likely, they absorb the cost or just contribute to service cost inflation.

I'd put this in the blind pig find truffle category. H1-B is perfectly sensible if you read the regulations and the law: if you can't find someone to do the job in the US, you can hire outside. Not "if you can't find someone to do the job cheap cheaper."

The problem is, with enough lawyering, that's exactly what happens: wage suppression. Having met and used some very sharp immigration lawyers, trying to outfox them is going to be very difficult. If you want to change how H1-B actually works, change the economics.

The problem being solved is how to easily do grafts and kickbacks.

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