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Comment by pseudo0 | Hacker News Reader

> You’re assuming without evidence that for any given job, that there will be qualified Americans willing to perform that job who aren’t already happily employed.

You can offer them more money, better work/life balance, a more fulfilling job, etc. When the government allows the hiring of foreign workers on visas, it's tilting the playing field in favor of employers. Why offer a better wage when you can just cry to the government and get an indentured servant at a discount?

Exceptional talent is a different argument - most H1bs are average at best. Claiming to be unable to hire for an entry or mid-level software engineer job is absurd.

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> You can offer them more money, better work/life balance, a more fulfilling job, etc.

If the qualified workers are already fully employed, how will this result in more of them in the short term?

> Why offer a better wage when you can just cry to the government and get an indentured servant at a discount?

The law requires H1B workers be paid the prevailing wage (20 CFR 655.731), and studies indicate that they're paid pretty close to the average wage (https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w34793/w347...) -- well within the statistical band. If we keep in mind that half of all citizens holding a particular job are paid below the average wage, too, then perhaps the hue and cry over pay is overblown.

If employers can't pay the market wage, they can't afford a worker. This is what drives productivity gains for the economy. Inefficient business models die off and are replaced by businesses that can use labor more effectively.

I don't see how this squares with my comment that these workers are being paid within the market wage band.

Don't you see the clear contradiction between the claim that the employer is paying the market wage, and the fact that they can't hire an American worker at that price? Clearly the claimed "market wage band" is wrong if they can't actually hire a qualified American employee at that price.

Note that there are also plenty of other factors besides wage, eg. 24/7 on-call, working in a remote location, mandatory overtime, etc. Even if an employer actually is paying the market wage for the general job category, there is likely a reason why American candidates are not interested.

> Don't you see the clear contradiction between the claim that the employer is paying the market wage, and the fact that they can't hire an American worker at that price?

No, there's no contradiction. Again, you and others seem to be assuming--without evidence--that for any given job opening, there is an additional qualified local resource available in the prevailing wage band. But that's not necessarily the case. You don't have to take large tech companies' word for it; just ask small business owners around you.

This is literally econ 101. Price is a function of supply and demand. If there is a mismatch between supply and demand, the price shifts until they are in equilibrium. There are 165 million workers in the US, for 99.9% of jobs there are plenty of qualified American candidates who can be hired for the right price. Employers are not entitled to hire an employee at a particular wage.

> This is literally econ 101. Price is a function of supply and demand. If there is a mismatch between supply and demand, the price shifts until they are in equilibrium

I have a degree in Economics. This is a theory, and theories don’t always 100% match reality at the microscopic level.

> for 99.9% of jobs there are plenty of qualified American candidates who can be hired for the right price.

You keep making the mistake of positing facts that are not established. We’re done.

You're the one making the extraordinary claim here - that there are jobs that can't be done at any wage by any of the 165 million working Americans, and yet these jobs don't qualify for an O-1 (extraordinary ability) visa. How about justifying your argument instead of constantly burden shifting? It's very tiresome.

In this entire comment thread, you have not managed to name a single example of one of these mythical impossible-to-fill jobs.

I make no such claims. These are claims made by businesses of all sizes and industries across the nation. Absent compelling data that proves the contrary or proves some sort of far-ranging conspiracy among them to suppress wage growth, I’m inclined to believe them. My father was a small business owner and I saw the challenges of hiring people with even basic woodworking skills first hand. As someone who hires SREs I also see it first hand (though I see this as a global talent challenge and not merely the USA).

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