Techies Oppose H-1B Visas

Date: Monday, December 15, 2003 10:13 PM

JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER

www.ZaZona.com

The websites mentioned in this article are:

Rescue American Jobs
http://www.rescueamericanjobs.org/

Federation for American Immigration Reform
http://www.fairus.org/

H-1B Info
http://www.h1b.info/

OutsourceCongress.
http://www.outsourcecongress.org/

No More H-1B
http://www.nomoreh1b.com/

ZaZona.com
http://www.zazona.com/

Although this site wasn't mentioned in the article, I have just been
notified of this great resource:
http://www.awcorg.us/lou.dobbs.tonight/lou.dobbs.tonight.asp

From this page you can get an archive of Lou Dobbs shows.

Others concur. "We're basically a bunch of little organizations
with very little money fighting this thing," says Rob Sanchez,
who created ZaZona.com , a hub for anti-H-1B efforts. "Industry
is in the driver's seat."

The point I was making here is that our organizations are all
volunteer, with the exception of FAIR who has some paid staff. Unlike
corporate funded groups such as the ITAA who have large operating
budgets, every one of us is operating out of our own pocket and with
the donations of those who can spare some of their savings. Many of you
sometimes want us to do more and you have some great idea but we are
often hindered by a lack of resources - not because we lack the desire
to raise the battle to new levels of intensity.

None of us have paid staff so we have to sacrifice tremendous amounts
of time to this battle. The internet isn't free and neither is our
time.

To help the fight to keep American jobs for American citizens, you
should consider donating to any of the above organizations while you
still have a job. Once you lose your career, it will be too late for us
to help, and you won't have the money to donate. Then we all lose.

http://technology.monster.com/articles/h1bdebate/

Techies Oppose H-1B Visas

by Allan Hoffman
Monster Tech Jobs Expert

US technology workers are joining forces to fight efforts to increase
the number of specialty work visas -- known as H-1Bs -- available to
foreign workers.

The H-1B has become a flashpoint for techies hit hard by the
information technology slump. "This is going to be a huge
battleground," says Dawn Teo, communications director of Rescue
American Jobs, an organization founded in August 2003 to combat H-1Bs
and the offshoring of technology jobs.

The H-1B Program

The visas allow foreign workers in a variety of skilled occupations,
from accountants and biologists to fashion models and programmers, to
remain in the US for up to six years. The number of H-1B visas was
capped at 195,000 for fiscal years 2001 through 2003, when Congress
allowed the cap to revert to 65,000.

IT workers constituted the majority of H-1B visa holders during the
'90s, but the percentage of H-1B petitions approved for IT-related
workers dropped from 65 percent in 2000 to 40 percent in 2002,
coinciding with the IT downturn, according to a study from the General
Accounting Office, an arm of Congress.

An Election-Year Issue

Immigration lawyers, industry leaders and technology workers say they
expect the H-1B to become an issue early in 2004, as companies and
industry groups angle to increase the H-1B cap to allow them to hire
more foreign techies. Election-year politics, they say, will inevitably
play a role in how lawmakers approach the issue.

Sheela Murthy, a prominent immigration lawyer, says senior government
officials have told immigration lawyers that the current cap will
likely be reached early in 2004 due to the number of pending cases.

Citing legal fees and other expenses involved in hiring H-1B workers,
Murthy contends employers resort to the visa "only because they have no
choice."

However, technology workers and their advocates contend the H-1B
program is a thinly disguised subterfuge aimed at allowing companies to
suppress the wages of US workers by hiring foreign workers from China,
India and other countries. H-1B opponents say technology workers from
those nations are willing to work for far less than US techies and
often end up staying indefinitely.

Techie Activists

Not known for political activism, IT workers are now intent on voicing
their concerns on the H-1B issue.

Jack Martin, special projects director for Federation for American
Immigration Reform, a group based in Washington, DC, says "appeasing
constituent concerns" -- namely, those of IT workers -- was a factor
when Congress allowed the visa cap to revert to 65,000.

"What we're hearing from the House is they were getting so many
messages from out-of-work tech workers that they were nervous about any
increase," says Martin, whose organization is opposed to the H-1B
program. "To a certain extent, that was true also in the Senate."

Noting techie organizing efforts, Martin says, "They're pretty
impressive in that they're all wired. Now that they really understand
what's happening to them, they've become pretty active."

Advocacy efforts include scores of email newsletters and Web sites,
such as H1B.info and OutsourceCongress.org created by out-of-work and
underemployed techies in a grassroots push to inform the public of IT
worker concerns about H-1B visas and the offshoring of technology jobs.

"We're ticked," says Pete Bennett, an activist from Danville,
California, who runs NoMoreH1B.com. "We've woken up Congress -- they're
calling me now, rather than us calling them."

But many techies, according to Teo, still do not understand how to
lobby politicians. "The message is getting out, but no one knows what
to do about it," she says, noting her organization is making efforts to
help techies organize effectively.

Others concur. "We're basically a bunch of little organizations with
very little money fighting this thing," says Rob Sanchez, who created
ZaZona.com , a hub for anti-H-1B efforts. "Industry is in the driver's
seat."

But all sides agree the debate is no longer so one-sided. "There are
very few people left in Congress who don't understand what this issue
is all about," says Martin. "Now, because they're hearing about it from
their constituents, they have to pay attention."

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