13 Articles Worth Reading
13 Articles Worth Reading
Date: Friday, January 13, 2006 2:51 AM
JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER
January 13, 2006 No. 1400
<<< COMMENTS FROM ROB >>>
It's amazing how many totally different interpretations of economic
statistics can be made. If you believe #1 the glass is half full, but #2
says it's half empty.
Article #3 is one of the best I have seen on H-1B for quite awhile,
Article #6 Senator John Kerry went to India, and boy did he ever kowtow.
Article #13: Since this is the hardest hitting article, what's better than
to use it as the 13th for this Friday the 13th? There is some excellent
data that you can only see by clicking the link to see the web version of
this article.
<<< END OF COMMENTS >>>
Article 1:
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0105JoblessClaims05-ON.html
Weekly jobless claims plunge to lowest level in 5 years
The number of newly laid-off workers filing claims for unemployment
benefits fell to the lowest level in more than five years last week,
providing strong evidence that the labor market is shaking off the effects
of a string of devastating hurricanes.
The Labor Department reported Thursday that applications for unemployment
benefits dropped by 35,000 to 291,000, the smallest number since Sept. 23,
2000, when the economy was in the concluding months of the longest economic
expansion in history. The decline of 35,000 claims was much better than
Wall Street had been expecting and bolstered the belief that the labor
market is on the mend after a rough period in the fall when Gulf Coast
hurricanes caused the loss of more than 600,000 jobs over a period of four
months.
Article 2:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/business/20060106-112021-4866r.htm
Growth of jobs slips to 108,000
Job gains slowed abruptly last month to 108,000 after surging in November,
reflecting a lackluster Christmas hiring season and a slowdown in home
building, the Labor Department reported yesterday. The economy posted a
second straight year of job growth over 2 million in 2005, boosted in part
by the booming housing market. The unemployment rate fell by a half
percentage point to 4.9 percent. But the disruptions caused by three major
hurricanes and record-high energy prices took a toll on the economy by
year's end.
Article 3:
http://www.dailyrecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060109/NEWS01/601090304
High-tech workers feel betrayed by visa hires
New bills side with group that says programs give foreigners unfair edge
An organized group of engineers and computer programmers is backing federal
legislation to cap the number of skilled foreign workers who are allowed to
enter the United States. To them it's personally urgent, and, they say,
it's crucial for the entire country.
Article 4:
http://wistechnology.com/article.php?id=2589
Are guest worker programs causing backlash amid IT downsizing?
Last week, I heard two guests on CNBCs Kudlow Show discuss the American
workforce and what was happening with various jobs. One gentleman was from
the CATO Institute and the other was a Democratic representative (Pascrell)
from New Jersey. The inference from the CATO Institute director that there
is a shortage of skilled people in IT in the U.S. is very questionable. He
is putting forth propaganda to justify the erosion of a lot of middle-class
jobs in this country that will only be the demise of non-related
industries.
Article 5:
http://www.siliconindia.com/shownewsdata.asp?newsno=30484
Hindi a ?critical need?: U.S. Admin
The U.S. administration has asked Americans to learn Hindi as a ?critical
need? to strengthen national security and prosperity in the 21st century.
President George W Bush, while launching the National Security Language
Initiative program (NSLI), will request $114 million in funding for 2007.
Article 6:
http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage.php?storyflag=y&leftnm=lmnu2&leftindx=2&lselect=1&chklogin=N&autono=211502
Kerry says his views on outsourcing misinterpreted
Visiting US senator and Democratic candidate for the 2005 American
Presidential elections, John Kerry, today said that his views on
outsourcing were misinterpreted. He said that he had no problem with
outsourcing based on economic considerations. He complimented India for its
contribution to globalisation on several fronts.
Article 7:
http://news.com.com/2061-10808_3-6026681.html
Sun CEO decries U.S. visa policy
Sun Microsystems Chief Executive Scott McNealy on Wednesday lambasted the
United States' H1-B visa policy that limits how many foreign workers may
come to the country.
Article 8:
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/CSM/story?id=1475360
As Bank Jobs Go Abroad, Are Records at Risk?
More U.S. Banking Jobs Have Moved Overseas, Raising Concerns About Fraud
and Stolen Records
First, U.S. textile jobs were shipped to Asia, then customer service call
centers for U.S. companies cropped up in Manila. Now the back office of the
corner bank has been hauled to Bombay and Bangalore, India. "Security can
of course be an issue, even in the U.S., but it is potentially an even
bigger concern for offshored work," says Norm Matloff, a computer-science
professor at the University of California at Davis, in an e-mail.
"Typically, developing countries do not have the sophisticated security
protections that we have here."
Article 9:
http://www.techworld.com/applications/news/index.cfm?NewsID=5093&inkc=0
Oracle quits technology trade group
Oracle has pulled out of the Information Technology Association of America
(ITAA) for what appear to be national political reasons. The computer giant
chose not to renew its ITAA membership for several reasons, it said, one of
them being that ITAA President Harris Miller is reportedly considering a
challenge to Virginia Senator George Allen, a Republican,
Article 10:
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1907136,00.asp
Outsourcing Pleasure: When Technology Enables Spiritual Suicide
It's one thing when people outsource the most painful work they can think
of to sweatshop labor overseas. While there are moral issues involved in
using prison labor to toil for free to make geegaws Wal-Mart can sell, the
rationale of the sweatshop labor's buyers is understandable from the
strictly "me first" point of view. But where's the logic of outsourcing
pleasure to sweatshops? Most Americans experience no moral qualm about
buying slave-made or sweatshop-made goods if the product is something they
feel they want.
Article 11:
http://sify.com/finance/fullstory.php?id=14113562
Only 1,364 advance degree H1-B visas available
The advance degree H-1B visas are disappearing fast with the latest update
from US Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) showing that only 1,364
visas are now available under this category.
Article 12:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060104/ap_on_bi_ge/chamber_worker_shortage
U.S. Faces Severe Worker Shortage in Future By JIM ABRAMS, Associated Press
Writer
The United States faces a severe worker shortage in the near future, the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce said Wednesday in advocating better education for
Americans and changes in immigration law to allow in more foreign workers.
Article 13:
http://www.eprarie.com/news/viewnews.asp?newsletterID=13460&page=1
Issues With H-1B Program Begin to Erode Equal Opportunity Laws
Did you know that any job classified as H-1B is not open to American
citizens? Thats job opportunity genocide, writes adjunct Northwestern
professor James Carlini. The H-1B program is like heroin to U.S. companies
that are now addicted to it even though the "shortage" of people is long
over.
1. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0105JoblessClaims05-ON.html
Weekly jobless claims plunge to lowest level in 5 years
Associated Press
Jan. 5, 2006 06:40 AM
WASHINGTON - The number of newly laid-off workers filing claims for
unemployment benefits fell to the lowest level in more than five years last
week, providing strong evidence that the labor market is shaking off the
effects of a string of devastating hurricanes.
The Labor Department reported Thursday that applications for unemployment
benefits dropped by 35,000 to 291,000, the smallest number since Sept. 23,
2000, when the economy was in the concluding months of the longest economic
expansion in history.
The decline of 35,000 claims was much better than Wall Street had been
expecting and bolstered the belief that the labor market is on the mend
after a rough period in the fall when Gulf Coast hurricanes caused the loss
of more than 600,000 jobs over a period of four months.
The total for weekly jobless claims was far below the peak of 435,000 set
the week ending Sept. 17, a period when the number of job losses attributed
to Hurricane Katrina totaled 108,000.
The government stopped tracking the impact of Katrina, Rita and Wilma last
week because the weekly increase in storm-related layoffs had dwindled to
slightly more than 1,000. But for the four months that the storms were
tracked, the combined number of layoffs blamed on the hurricanes totaled
more than 600,000.
The better-than-expected improvement in the layoff picture for last week
was certain to raise hopes for a solid performance in job growth for
December.
Analysts are predicting that the economy probably created 200,000 new jobs
last month, with the unemployment rate probably holding steady at 5
percent. That would follow 215,000 new jobs in November after two months in
which job growth had stalled because of the onslaught of massive layoffs in
Gulf Coast states.
Economists are predicting that 2006 will represent another year of steady
growth in jobs of around 175,000 per month. That reflects their belief that
the economy will keep growing at a solid pace this year as business
spending to expand and modernize production facilities offsets expected
slower growth in housing sales and overall consumer spending.
The Federal Reserve has raised interest rates 13 consecutive times and is
expected to boost rates again at Alan Greenspan's last meeting on Jan. 31
to make sure that inflation remains in check. But the Dow Jones industrial
average shot up by 130 points on Tuesday following release of Fed minutes
of the December meeting that suggested the rate hikes are drawing to a
close.
2. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.washingtontimes.com/business/20060106-112021-4866r.htm
The Washington Times
www.washingtontimes.com
Growth of jobs slips to 108,000
By Patrice Hill
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published January 7, 2006
Job gains slowed abruptly last month to 108,000 after surging in November,
reflecting a lackluster Christmas hiring season and a slowdown in home
building, the Labor Department reported yesterday.
The economy posted a second straight year of job growth over 2 million
in 2005, boosted in part by the booming housing market. The unemployment
rate fell by a half percentage point to 4.9 percent.
But the disruptions caused by three major hurricanes and record-high
energy prices took a toll on the economy by year's end. Jobs at department
stores and malls declined by 16,000 last month compared with previous
holiday seasons, after having dropped since the summer.
Construction companies laid off 9,000 workers after having hired 42,000
in November to assist in the massive effort to clean up and rebuild flooded
New Orleans and the storm-wrecked Gulf Coast.
The job growth was in health care, professional and business services,
and manufacturing, which had an uncharacteristically good month with 12,000
new jobs.
Rebuilding activity should continue to boost the economy and jobs this
year, analysts said, but December's flat construction hiring after years of
strong gains is an omen that suggests the end of the five-year housing boom
is starting to weigh on the job market.
"The dip in construction employment -- the first since February 2004 --
was a bit surprising" in light of the rebuilding needs on the Gulf Coast,
and "bodes ill" for the construction sector, said Aaron Smith of Moody's
Economy.com.
The department said two-thirds of a 246,000 surge in construction jobs
last year was generated by the housing boom, and most of a 188,000 jump in
finance jobs also were real estate-related.
Adding in jobs at real estate agencies, home improvement and furnishing
stores, economists estimate that a third to half of the jobs created since
the 2001 recession were generated by the housing market.
Continued strength in jobs at home improvement and gardening stores
shows that consumers remain preoccupied with furnishing and decorating the
millions of homes they bought in recent years, even as the housing boom
fades.
"I'm a believer that the economy will slow, likely significantly, this
year" as rising interest rates continue to undermine housing, said David
Ader, debt strategist at RBS Greenwich Capital Markets Inc. "Where's the
stimulus going to come from? We don't know."
While worries about the fate of housing have plagued Wall Street, the
stock market was cheered yesterday by the moderation of job growth last
month and took it as a sign that the Federal Reserve soon may stop raising
interest rates to cool the economy.
Many economists hope a pickup in business spending and hiring will take
up the slack where housing leaves off this year. They say that steady
growth in jobs and income should underpin the most important engine of
growth -- consumer spending -- and note that wage growth picked up to 3.1
percent last year, the best since 2002.
"The job market still has legs, despite the head fake" created by the
sharp slowdown in job growth last month from 305,000 new jobs in November,
said John Silvia, chief economist at Wachovia Securities.
He said retail hiring for the past three years has appeared weak only
in December. A change in consumer-spending habits caused partially by the
use of gift cards has pushed much of holiday spending past Christmas and
into the new year.
As a result, he said, hiring is likely to bounce back this month.
The flat month for construction may have been due in part to cool, wet
weather in some parts of the country, he said.
Still, Mr. Silvia expects the economy to slow this year as the housing
market cools. That, among other things, will take some of the octane out of
consumer spending that has been linked to double-digit increases in home
values in recent years.
Consumers have been tapping into their growing housing wealth using
home-equity loans and cash-out refinancings to maintain spending and make
up for weak growth in wages.
3. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.dailyrecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060109/NEWS01/601090304
01/9/06 - Posted from the Daily Record newsroom
High-tech workers feel betrayed by visa hires
New bills side with group that says programs give foreigners unfair edge
BY MICHAEL DAIGLE
DAILY RECORD
An organized group of engineers and computer programmers is backing federal
legislation to cap the number of skilled foreign workers who are allowed to
enter the United States.
To them it's personally urgent, and, they say, it's crucial for the entire
country.
"The future is in jeopardy," said Sona Shah of Montclair, a programmer who
has been out of work for two years.
"If engineers are laid off, the innovators, the designers are out of work.
It is a loss of one overall function, one engine of the country's economy."
Shah said she lost training and promotion opportunities -- and then her job
--as her former employer hired foreign workers through the H-1B visa
program and outsourcing.
"There is great concern about the loss of manufacturing jobs, but what
needs to be understood is that 50 percent of engineers work in the
manufacturing sector," Shah said.
Two U.S. representatives from North Jersey said last week that they have
taken up the cause of the displaced American workers with legislation that
would close loopholes in the visa programs.
Rep. Bill Pascrell, D-Paterson, has filed legislation that would address
issues with the H-1B visa program, and Rep. Rodney P. Frelinghuysen,
R-Harding, is co-sponsor of a bill that would make changes in the
administration of the L-1 visa program.
Shah, a member of the Programmer's Guild -- the group of engineers and
programmers that meets monthly at the Morris County Library -- said the
group supports a Pascrell bill filed in November that would cap the annual
H-1B limit at 65,000 and offer other worker protections.
"H-1B workers are essentially indentured servants," said Shah, who worked
with Pascrell's staff for two years to help develop the bill.
"They cannot switch jobs easily, are made captives by the requirements of
the law, are paid low wages and salaries and are exploited," she said.
Dual beneficiaries
Shah said reform of the H-1B program would help two groups of workers:
Americans who are being displaced by foreign workers -- and the foreign
H-1B workers.
She has firsthand experience with the situation of H-1B workers: Her
fianci was hired by her former employer as an H-1B worker. He had more
experience and higher educational degrees, Shah said, but he was paid
$27,000 to perform the same job she did, for which she was paid $48,000.
"In my experience, employers want H-1B workers because they want a captive
workforce. If this continues it is the end of at-will employment," she
said.
John Miano, a programmer and software industry author from Somerset County,
said in a December article for the Center for Immigration Studies that on
average H-1B workers make $13,000 less than American workers in the same
occupation and state. He also said federal immigration data showed that
wages for 85 percent of the foreign computer programmers hired under H-1B
visas were less than the median U.S. wage for the same occupations and
state.
Industry perspective
Computer industry leaders have called for increasing or eliminating the
annual H-1B cap.
In previous lobbying efforts, industry groups claimed that 840,000 U.S.
technology jobs are unfilled annually. In letters to U.S. senators
supporting legislation that would raise the H-1B ceiling, officials from 11
technology and electronics industry associations sought the removal of the
cap to address this shortfall through legislation that also would raise
funds for additional training for U.S. workers.
In 2000, the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant
Colleges sent a cover letter to members of Congress supporting a bill that
at that time called for increased H-1B visas. The letter, written on behalf
of the American Business for Legal Immigration Coalition, also was signed
by about 360 U.S. corporations and universities.
Employee advocate
But some engineering groups dispute the claim that there are not enough
American engineers to fill available jobs. In its position paper on H-1B
visas, IEEE-USA said that from 2001 to 2004, while federal immigration
officials processed 856,000 H-1B visa applications, national unemployment
among high tech managers and professionals increased from 725,000 in 2001
to 1.3 million in 2004.
"It appears that substantial numbers of foreign professionals admitted on
the H-1B and other temporary visas are competing with growing numbers of
displaced citizens and legal permanent residents for jobs in the troubled
high-tech labor markets," the IEEE concluded.
Pat Kunz of Monmouth County, who is living on her retirement funds and
savings after losing her consumer services consulting job at AT&T three
years ago, became unemployed in a two-step process in which her division
was sold to an in-state company that later shipped the jobs to Asia.
"I was not hurt by the H-1B visa program, but by off-shoring," Kunz said.
"It is a symptom of the same disease. People in other countries are willing
to work for one-fifth of that we make here."
Kunz said she feels abandoned, which is why she is supporting the bill to
cap H-1B visas and to make other changes in a program that critics say is
rife with loopholes that foster abuses of the system and workers.
"This was our future. We were told that manufacturing jobs would be sent
overseas, but knowledge jobs would remain here," Kunz said.
"Now the knowledge jobs are being sent away. We can't all be doctors."
Middle-class impact
The effect, said Mike Rinaldi of Hanover, who now teaches science and math
in Rutherford after a career as a computer programmer with Lucent
Technologies, is that "the middle class is under attack."
As a teacher, he asked: "What do I tell my students when they ask why
should I study math or science?"
Rinaldi, a member of the Programmers Guild, met with Frelinghuysen in
December to discuss the H-1B visa bill. He said he is disappointed with the
elected officials he has contacted in the lobbying effort, his first
venture into political action.
"I want my elected officials in Washington to be leaders, but they show no
foresight," he said.
"It's the same for teachers. They just think of the next quarter or the
next election. What will they do when the middle class is gone? Who will
pay for the new schools?"
Pascrell's solution
Shah said she began talking to Pascrell and his staff in November 2004
after she attended a town meeting. The effort produced a bill that
addressed the key loopholes in the visa program, she said.
Pascrell's bill would:
Limit the number of H-1B visas annually to 65,000.
Put in better wage guarantees.
Require employers to actively seek U.S. workers first.
Consolidate administration of the program under the U.S. Department of
Labor.
Limit authorized stays to a single, three-year, non-renewable term, or
for two years, renewable for additional years, for a total of four years.
Pascrell said his bill would put an end to practices allowed by loopholes
in the current law that allow employers to hire foreign workers over
Americans.
He said his bill would mean that 15,000 to 20,000 American workers who have
lost jobs to H-1B workers would have a chance to get those jobs back.
'Americans first'
"Companies need to hire Americans first," Pascrell said. He disputed the
industry claims that there aren't enough trained American technology
workers.
Pascrell said his bill represents an effort in Congress to begin to address
those immigration issues.
"We need to work together and compromise," he said. His bill is not an
anti-immigration bill, but one aimed at addressing serious issues facing
American workers who are losing their jobs, and the rights of foreign
workers who enter the country legally.
The irony of Shah's job loss, Pascrell said, was that she was born in
India, is a naturalized U.S. citizen, and lost her job to an H-1B worker
from India.
Another focus
Frelinghuysen said he shares Pascrell's concerns, but is a co-sponsor of a
bill filed by U.S. Rep. Nancy Johnson of Connecticut that seeks changes in
the L-1 visa program.
"Johnson's bill offers similar job protections to Pascrell's bill, but
covers more ground with more training funds,"Frelinghuysen said. "The L-1
visa program is very open-ended."
Pascrell said the L-1 visa program has substantial loopholes that need to
be closed.
Pascrell and Frelinghuysen said they were pleased that the H-1B cap waiver
provision was taken out of the Senate budget bill.
That provision was not in the House version of the budget bill,
Frelinghuysen said.
"I told Mike Rinaldi that I would not vote for anything that included that
provision,"Frelinghuysen said.
Frelinghuysen praised the Programmer's Group. "They are performing a public
service," he said.
"This is an issue with national interest. I am dead set against raising
H-1B limits and continuing the L-1 program. I have told local industry and
Chamber of Commerce officials that the system has to be corrected. I
understand we are in a global economy, but they need to hire Americans
first."
Basics of H-1B and L-1
The federal H-1B visa program allows skilled foreign workers to take jobs
in the United States for three years if an employer can show that an
American worker cannot be found for that job. In 2001, the U.S. Immigration
and Naturalization Service said that of 164,000 H-1B workers allowed into
the country that year, 55 percent worked in the informational technology
industry, 13 percent were engineers, 8 percent were administrators and 6
percent were college and university educators.
The L-1 visa program allows companies operating in the United States and
abroad to transfer certain classes of employee from its foreign to its U.S.
operations for up to seven years. From 1999 to 2004, 3.9 million foreign
workers entered the United States under this program, according to federal
immigration reports.
In New Jersey during that period, 99,810 workers were given jobs on H-1B
visas, and 105,170 foreign workers were transferred to in-state operations,
immigration reports said.
The current nationwide limit of annual H-1B visas is 65,000, set in 2003.
Congress in 2001 set the limit at 195,000 for three years. A provision to
remove that 65,000 cap was taken out of a Senate budget bill in late
December.
4. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://wistechnology.com/article.php?id=2589
Are guest worker programs causing backlash amid IT downsizing?
By Jim Carlini 01/05/06
Last week, I heard two guests on CNBCs Kudlow Show discuss the American
workforce and what was happening with various jobs. One gentleman was from
the CATO Institute and the other was a Democratic representative (Pascrell)
from New Jersey.
The inference from the CATO Institute director that there is a shortage of
skilled people in IT in the U.S. is very questionable. He is putting forth
propaganda to justify the erosion of a lot of middle-class jobs in this
country that will only be the demise of non-related industries.
Cheaper (not better) workers are what many tech companies are pursuing.
Its all about reducing payroll with foreign workers for the last couple
years and its surprising that the host could not pick up on that. Rep.
Pascrell did.
There are countless IT people who have been either laid off or caught in an
outsourcing frenzy that looks good for immediate corporate gains in cutting
expenses but will impact other areas of the economy drastically as their
$80,000 to $120,000 annual salaries dropped to $30,000 or $40,000 (if they
can even find work).
You can see it in the economy already. Its happening at GM and Ford as
theyre not selling to as large a market any more. People who were making
decent money are now trying to get into any job they can find.
Middle-class people who have been caught in that crunch have had their
purchasing power greatly diminished. New car? You cant pay for a
$100,000-a-year- lifestyle on a $25,000 or $35,000 salary. Others may not
identify with this plight because they still live at home and dont have
mortgages or college tuition.
It will start to show further down the line as refinancing homes, taking
out some equity and going to interest-only mortgages are the stopgaps that
these people have taken. What do they do next year, though? No other
industry is absorbing these people at salary levels anywhere near what they
were making.
Like other Washington think tanks, the CATO Institute is another "position
paper for hire" organization that sees what they want to see based on
contributor visions rather than objective ones. Here is part of the
testimony on the need for immigration reform from Daniel Griswold, director
of the Cato Institute Center for Trade Policy Studies, before the Judiciary
Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security & Citizenship on May 26, 2005:
Thank you for inviting the Cato Institute to testify today on the subject
of immigration reform and the U.S. economy. Our current immigration system
is fundamentally out of step with the realities of American life and
desperately needs comprehensive reform.
Immigrants play an important part in the success of Americas
free-enterprise economy. Immigrant workers willingly fill important niches
in the labor market. They gravitate to occupations where the supply of
workers falls short of demand (typically among the higher-skilled and
lower-skilled occupations).
That hourglass shape of the immigration labor pool complements the
native-born workforce where most workers fall in the middle range in terms
of skills and education. As a result, immigrants dont compete directly
with the vast majority of American workers.
Immigration provides needed flexibility to the U.S. economy [and allows]
the supply of workers to increase relatively quickly to meet rising demand.
When demand falls, would-be immigrants can decide not to enter and those
already here can decide to return home. The result is a more efficient
economy that can achieve a higher rate of sustainable growth without
encountering bottlenecks or stoking inflation.
Americas recent history confirms that American workers can find
plentiful employment opportunities during times of robust immigration.
During the long boom of the 1990s and especially in the second half of the
decade, the national unemployment rate fell below 4 percent and real wages
rose up and down the income scale (including for the poorest one-fifth of
American households during a time of high immigration levels).
Today, the U.S. unemployment rate has again fallen to levels consistent
with full employment and without diminished levels of immigration.
Obviously, immigrants and native-born Americans alike can all find work in
our $11 trillion economy.
Low-skilled immigrants benefit the U.S. economy by filling jobs for which
the large majority of American workers are overqualified and unwilling to
fill. Large and important sectors of the U.S. economy - hotels and motels,
restaurants, agriculture, construction, light manufacturing, health-care,
retailing and other services depend on low-skilled immigrant workers to
remain competitive.
Sure, this is great rhetoric for Congress, but workers on visas dont
actually return home. Also, they arent all minimally skilled. Contrast
his testimony with quick facts from the Web site of
HireAmericanCitizens.org, a group for limiting visas and worker programs:
1. H-1B and L-1 visa holders are temporary non-immigrant foreign workers.
Last year, nine out of 10 American IT jobs went to H-1B and L-1 workers.
There are more than 1 million American IT workers on the street looking for
work.
There are more than 1.5 million H-1B workers in the U.S.
In the next 18 months, one out of 10 American technology jobs will be moved
offshore.
Offshoring requires the use of H-1B and L-1 visa workers.
About 40 percent of the workers in a typical offshoring project are H-1B
and L-1 visa holders working in the U.S. The Indian offshoring firms have
stated publicly that offshoring depends crucially on H-1B and L-1 visas.
These jobs will never come back. We must act now to save the future of
American technology jobs.
The new Bush immigration proposal is yet another American worker
replacement program in disguise. All American workers in all job categories
and pay scales can be replaced by this program.
The addiction U.S. employers have for exploiting non-immigrant guest worker
visa programs and sending jobs overseas has caused significant losses in
wealth and prosperity to middle-class Americans and significant losses in
wealth to our states, cities and communities.
American workers are fighting a daily battle to remain employed and earn an
American wage in an environment that gives preference to cheaper foreign
labor.
Somewhere theres a disconnect between whats talked about in
Washington D.C. as lofty platitudes and whats really happening in
America. Whose facts are right or are they both inflated? By the way, as
American car companies wallow in poor sales, Toyota looks like it will
become the No. 1 car manufacturer in the world. Consumers are looking for
quality.
"Until American car companies put out a quality product, they will continue
to lose share of the market as more people cant afford cars that dont
run as well as their competitors." Is that perception or reality? With many
salaries cut by two-thirds, no one wants to bet any more.
Carlinism: Contrary to some beliefs, outsourcing and offshoring arent
universally positive approaches.
James Carlini is an adjunct professor at Northwestern University. He is
also president of Carlini & Associates.
5. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.siliconindia.com/shownewsdata.asp?newsno=30484
Hindi a ?critical need?: U.S. Admin
Friday, January 06, 2006
WASHINGTON: The U.S. administration has asked Americans to learn Hindi as a
?critical need? to strengthen national security and prosperity in the 21st
century.
President George W Bush, while launching the National Security Language
Initiative program (NSLI), will request $114 million in funding for 2007.
"The NSLI will dramatically increase the number of Americans learning
critical need foreign languages such as Hindi and others through new and
expanded programs from kindergarten through university and into the
workforce," the U.S. State Department said.
"To do this, we must be able to communicate in other languages, a challenge
for which we are unprepared," it said.
The U.S. State Department says post 9/11, it is important to learn foreign
languages to better deal with foreign governments.
6. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage.php?storyflag=y&leftnm=lmnu2&leftindx=2&lselect=1&chklogin=N&autono=211502
Kerry says his views on outsourcing misinterpreted
Our Regional Bureau / Hyderabad January 13, 2006
Visiting US senator and Democratic candidate for the 2005 American
Presidential elections, John Kerry, today said that his views on
outsourcing were misinterpreted.
Stating that every company has a right to chose its own course, the
senator, however, faulted those American companies that made decisions in
favour of business process outsourcing purely on non-economic
considerations.
"We had problem with some people who made their choices purely for the
purpose of taking advantage of tax benefits," Kerry told mediapersons here
after his meeting with chief minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy. He said that
he had no problem with outsourcing based on economic considerations.
Referring to his campaign on the issue of outsourcing during the
presidential elections, he said that it was an issue of loss of jobs, loss
of healthcare, loss of pension benefits and about not providing
alternatives to those who lost their jobs. Kerry said that he only wanted
the companies to be better corporate citizens of his country.
Replying to a question on the significance of his visit to Hyderabad, he
said the city was going through an economic transformation in terms of
business, and outsourcing among other things.
"I thought it important to visit the place to know firsthand and understand
what is happening and what the challenges are," he said. He also said that
both US and India came together to work for the mutual advantage and to the
comfort of all of our workers.
The issues relating to transport, infrastructure, AIDS awareness,
environment, and the outside challenges from China among others came up for
discussion during his meeting with the chief minister, he said.
He complimented India for its contribution to globalisation on several
fronts. Later, he also met the leader of the opposition and former chief
minister N Chandrababu Naidu.
7. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://news.com.com/2061-10808_3-6026681.html
Sun CEO decries U.S. visa policy
January 12, 2006 3:52 PM PST
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--Sun Microsystems Chief Executive Scott McNealy on
Wednesday lambasted the United States' H1-B visa policy that limits how
many foreign workers may come to the country.
McNealy spoke on a panel discussion at the Computer History Museumhere with
his fellow Sun cofounders, Vinod Khosla, Andy Bechtolsheim and Bill Joy. In
it, McNealy observed that Khosla and Bechtolsheim both were born in another
country, as was James Gosling, who was instrumental in the creation of the
Java software technology.
"We are absolutely torching ourselves by not letting all the really smart
people come here to the valley. We shouldn't let them in unless we get them
to commit to staying at least 10 years. Instead, we do the exact opposite,"
McNealy said. "Why don't we want another James Gosling or Vinod Khosla to
set up shop here."
And the Internal Revenue Service hasn't suffered from Sun's international
connections. "How many billions of dollars of taxes have you paid?" McNealy
asked of Khosla and Bechtolsheim. "You are hardly a burden on our society."
Posted by Stephen Shankland
8. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/CSM/story?id=1475360
As Bank Jobs Go Abroad, Are Records at Risk?
More U.S. Banking Jobs Have Moved Overseas, Raising Concerns About Fraud
and Stolen Records
By Patrik Jonsson
ATLANTA, Jan. 10, 2006 - First, U.S. textile jobs were shipped to Asia,
then customer service call centers for U.S. companies cropped up in Manila.
Now the back office of the corner bank has been hauled to Bombay and
Bangalore, India.
From SunTrust in Atlanta to Bank of America in Charlotte, N.C., banks have
hired overseas shops to stay competitive, heighten efficiency and tap a
steady supply of cheap labor.
But as more accounting and investment banking gets sent overseas,
Americans' bank accounts become increasingly susceptible to theft and
fraud, some experts say.
"If you think about the scenario, you have the lowest-paid contractors
furthest away from the main office all with access to sensitive data," says
Paul Bilden, vice president at Covelight, an Internet security company in
Cary, N.C. "It's an incredibly risky proposition."
Bank Customers Often Unaware
Outside a Bank of America branch in Atlanta, customer Pete Johnson says
he's surprised to learn that his bank has offshored some of its processing
work. He's concerned about an increased risk of fraud, and that workers a
half a world away may eye his personal information. "It's an invasion of my
privacy," he says. Still, for now he's not moving his accounts elsewhere,
he says.
Other top banks such as JPMorgan Chase and Wachovia are also at the
forefront of offshoring. Last month JPMorgan Chase announced that it
expects to double the number of Indian employees to 9,000 by next year.
Currently, about 10 percent of employees of U.S. banks work outside the
country. This number is expected to rise to 20 percent -- or 2 million
people -- by 2010, according to a recent Deloitte & Touche study.
"The new frontier is back-office processing done offshore," says Bob Olson,
CEO of Dallas-based Carretek, a contractor that runs back-office shops for
banks in India.
Banks now also have the technological means and regulatory go-ahead from
the federal government to go offshore, says Olson, because of the Banking
Modernization Act of 1999.
But some say shipping back-office bank jobs, such as data processors and
investment analysts, to India also means that banks might be risking their
reputations to compete for business.
Emphasis on Risk Management
In 2004, U.S. banks attributed $19 billion in losses to fraud, according to
TowerGroup, a financial services research firm in Needham, Mass. Some
expect more red ink with offshoring.
"Security can of course be an issue, even in the U.S., but it is
potentially an even bigger concern for offshored work," says Norm Matloff,
a computer-science professor at the University of California at Davis, in
an e-mail. "Typically, developing countries do not have the sophisticated
security protections that we have here."
In April three former employees of Mphasis, an outsourcing company, were
arrested in India for allegedly stealing $350,000 from several of
CitiBank's U.S. customers. They had allegedly tricked the customers into
giving their PIN numbers over the phone, and then transferred the money
into their own accounts.
To be sure, Wachovia and Bank of America say foreign workers will get only
partial access to accounts -- never the whole file.
Banking experts also say that risk management is what banks do better than
any other industry, and there's been little consumer backlash to
offshoring. By hiring firms that monitor workers' activity, bankers say
their overseas operations can withstand audits from the Federal Reserve.
And if problems occur, banks can cover the losses, says Paul Stock of the
North Carolina Bankers Association in Raleigh.
9. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.techworld.com/applications/news/index.cfm?NewsID=5093&inkc=0
Oracle quits technology trade group
Down to party politics.
Grant Gross, IDG News Service
05 January 2006
Oracle has pulled out of the Information Technology Association of America
(ITAA) for what appear to be national political reasons.
The computer giant chose not to renew its ITAA membership for several
reasons, it said, one of them being that ITAA President Harris Miller is
reportedly considering a challenge to Virginia Senator George Allen, a
Republican, said vice president of congressional and legislative affairs at
Oracle, Robert Hoffman.
Allen has been active in technology issues since he was elected to the
Senate in 2000. He is a former governor of Virginia and was a vocal
co-sponsor in 2005 of an anti-spyware bill, along with a bill to extend a
moratorium on taxes unique to the Internet. Many political observers
mention Allen as a potential candidate for US president in 2008.
"It concerned many of us at Oracle that Harris would consider challenging
Senator Allen, considering the great things he's done," Hoffman said. "We
don't think tech issues are partisan issues at all. We as an industry
should support our friends and stand by them."
Miller is a long-time Democrat and hasn't confirmed he is considering a run
for the Senate, but news reports have said he is looking it. An ITAA
spokesman didn't have an immediate response to Oracle's decision.
Other factors contributed to Oracle's decision to leave ITAA, Hoffman said.
Oracle belongs to several other technology trade groups, including TechNet
and the Information Technology Industry Council, and the company has wanted
some consolidation of the dozens of tech trade groups operating in
Washington, Hoffman said. The large number of IT trade groups can be
confusing to members of Congress, he said.
"We should as an industry look at ways we can better work together,"
headded. "There is an enormous amount of overlap."
Miller joined ITAA, one of the largest IT trade groups, in 1995. In
addition to his position at ITAA, he's also president of the World
Information Technology and Services Alliance, a group representing 38
high-tech trade groups from around the world.
10. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1907136,00.asp
Outsourcing Pleasure: When Technology Enables Spiritual Suicide
December 30, 2005
By Jeff Angus, CIO Central
It's one thing when people outsource the most painful work they can think
of to sweatshop labor overseas. While there are moral issues involved in
using prison labor to toil for free to make geegaws Wal-Mart can sell, the
rationale of the sweatshop labor's buyers is understandable from the
strictly "me first" point of view.
But where's the logic of outsourcing pleasure to sweatshops?
According to a recent story from the International Herald Tribune,
Americans are paying Chinese sweatshop labor to play video games for them.
There's a logic to that as well, however twisted; but there are two reasons
the phenomenon is important, and one directly affects IT work.
For those of you fortunate enough to be ignorant of "gold farming," it
consists primarily of third-worlders laboring in rural virtual sweatshops,
plugged in as peasants in character-based games such as EverQuest and World
of Warcraft. Their job is to simply exist in the virtual world, and perform
small tasks that will help them build up credit or "gold," or whatever
currency is internal to the game.
Their employers can then sell this virtual gold to other players for real
money. They can also create entire characters, build them up with specific
characteristics or items with magical powers, and sell them to other
players as well, mostly Americans.
This means that people are willing to pay other people to play games for
them, but also means the American buyer views playing games not as fun, but
as drudgery (like mowing the lawn or scraping the paint off the house or
debugging that circa-1978 Fortran code so it works with the new ERP system
tweaks).
Pleasure outsourcers are not uncommon. There is, apparently, so much demand
for this "service" that there are hundreds of factories producing game
currency to resell, and some of these sweatshops have as many as 300
computers hosting workers to feed the consumer demand.
Factories have beds on-site so workers don't have to leave between shifts.
One gaming worker in the International Herald Tribune story said he works
12 hours a day, seven days a week. He makes about $3 an hour, but most make
under 25 cents an hour.
The "industry" has gotten so big that third parties are setting up
operations to act as broker-bankers to skim part of the pelf flowing from
buyer to seller.
As mentioned above, the offshoring of pleasure, unhinged as it seems, is
actually an important trend worth noting for two reasons:
First, this says a lot about the character of the buyers.
It's not specifically a moral issue; most Americans experience no moral
qualm about buying slave-made or sweatshop-made goods if the product is
something they feel they want.
The little turkey-thermometer character indicator that's popped up here is
that some individuals so desperately feel the need to own and display
"success" that they are willing to spend money to achieve a fake one.
We're not talking about something as significant as lying about military
decorations or job history or college awards. We're talking about a video
game.
Widespread gross personal inadequacy feeds this kink and drives people to
behave in ways that undermine even their own chances to experience the
pleasure of learning the game's system or getting the adrenaline jolt or
even the satisfaction of winning their own "battles."
It's a bit like the Roman Coliseum, where all the excitement is vicarious,
lived through others. Maybe, as Robin Williams once said about cocaine use,
"It's God's way of telling you you have too much money," but more likely
the drive to outsource recreation is the sign of neurotics under stress.
Next page: Why gold farming portends bad things for IT.
The second reason this trend is worth understanding is that the offshoring
of computer-related activity has moved from the corporate to the personal.
It's individuals who are contracting out their keyboarding, pointing and
other interactions to China.
And once this market is vibrant (it may already have reached this point),
how long can it be before developers, data entry specialists and other IT
people start contracting out the content of their actual paid jobs to
sweatshop labor, merely acting as broker-bankers and perhaps (if we're
lucky) QC agents to tune it or mark it as their own, like a dog marking a
fire hydrant?
Read more here about the potential costs of outsourcing.
The offshoring of pleasure indicates that the sellers will adapt quickly to
whatever buyers feel they want, so there won't be constraint on the seller
side.
And as one of my bosses, Sean Gallagher, pointed out to me, there was a
Doonesbury cartoon a couple of years ago that portrayed individual IT
employees secretly offshoring their actual work -- some people may already
be running with this model.
Would that be a bad thing?
Probably. On the good side, it would require initiative and entrepreneurial
creativity to build and maintain such an offshore relationship, and those
aptitudes are useful if you can harness them for your department's
purposes.
But, as I've written before, outsourcing functions to outside the building
the end users work in is the death of high-quality potential.
If people actually farm out their work surreptitiously (and the trend makes
the attempt, at least, seem inevitable), IT management will lose both some
quality and the ability to affect it. It could become a management hassle
of major proportions.
In a culture where surreptitious outsourcing of pleasure is becoming
common, the surreptitious outsourcing of drudgery seems almost inescapable.
Jeff Angus is a management consultant and has been working with IT since
1974. He has held IT management positions in user interface design,
marketing, operations and testing/analysis. Look for his book, "Management
by Baseball: A Pocket Reader." Jeff's columns have appeared in The New York
Times, The Washington Post, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the Baltimore
Sun.
11. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://sify.com/finance/fullstory.php?id=14113562
Only 1,364 advance degree H1-B visas available
Wednesday, 04 January , 2006, 08:18
New Delhi: The advance degree H-1B visas are disappearing fast with the
latest update from US Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) showing
that only 1,364 visas are now available under this category.
Against the stipulated cap of 20,000 visas under the H-1B advance degree
exemption for fiscal 2006, as many as 16,478 visa petitions had been
approved, and 2,158 additional petitions were pending in December-end 2005,
according to latest data by USCIS.
The rush for these visas before the limit gets exhausted is apparent from
the fact that while 3,302 such visas were available on November 29, 2005,
only 1,364 visas remain on offer now.
Under the current law, while the annual cap on the H-1B category is 65,000
(down from 195,000 in financial year 2003), the Congress has created an
exemption for 20,000 foreign nationals earning advanced degrees from US
universities. |Read more Finance news.|
H-1B visas allow employers to have access to highly educated foreign
professionals who have experience in specialised areas and who have at
least a bachelor's degree or the equivalent.
Given the high demand for skilled temporary workers in the US, the 65,000
H-1B visas cap was reached even before the start of the Federal
Government's fiscal year 2006 (which began on October 1, 2005), prompting
organisations such as IT Association of America (ITAA) to demand a
significant increase in the number of visas for the current year and future
years.
In November, the US Senate cleared a provision approved by Senate Judiciary
Committee for hiking the visa limit by 30,000.
However, the US House of Representatives passed its version of the Budget
Reconciliation Bill which did not include the provisions related to the
recapture of unused H-1B and immigrant visa numbers from the previous years
as passed by the Senate, and instead imposed a $1,500 fee increase on
intra-company L-1 visas.
12. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060104/ap_on_bi_ge/chamber_worker_shortage
U.S. Faces Severe Worker Shortage in Future By JIM ABRAMS, Associated Press
Writer
Wed Jan 4, 1:42 PM ET
The United States faces a severe worker shortage in the near future, the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce said Wednesday in advocating better education for
Americans and changes in immigration law to allow in more foreign workers.
Chamber President and CEO Thomas Donohue, at a news conference outlining
business prospects in 2006, said the country is ill-prepared to deal with
the impending retirement of 77 million baby boomers.
"We have yet to secure an adequate supply of working taxpayers to run a
growing economy and support an explosion of retirees," he said in his
organization's report on the state of U.S. business.
Donohue said that working to pass new immigration law that includes a guest
worker program will be among the Chamber's top legislative priorities in
the new year. He said the Chamber opposed a bill passed by the House in
December, which tightens border security and requires employers to verify
the legal status of workers but does not address the guest worker issue.
He dismissed as a "crummy argument" criticisms that the business community
wants a guest worker program to secure access to cheap labor. "What
American companies want is labor, and we are going to be significantly
without it," Donohue said.
The Senate is expected to take up the immigration issue next month, and
Donohue said his group will be "working to obtain a bill that provides the
workers and is in keeping without our legacy as a welcoming nation."
Donohue said the Chamber has traditionally stayed out of school reform at
the state and local level, but has changed its thinking in a global
environment where China graduates eight times, and India five times, as
many engineers as the United States.
He said the Chamber plans to measure and rank the performance of state
school systems, with the aim of helping businesses decide where to locate.
The Chamber is also working with other business organizations to double the
number of math, science and engineering graduates by 2015.
Donohue said that among the business group's other legislative goals this
year will be passing legislation to shore up pension plans, finding a
solution to the asbestos litigation crisis, promoting health savings
accounts and other new approaches to reducing the number of those without
health insurance, and opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the
Outer Continental Shelf to environmentally sound oil and gas exploration.
13. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.eprarie.com/news/viewnews.asp?newsletterID=13460&page=1
Issues With H-1B Program Begin to Erode Equal Opportunity Laws
Published on 1/11/2006
Carlinis Comments, ePrairies oldest column, runs every Wednesday. Its
mission is to offer the common mans view on business and technology
issues while questioning the leadership and visions of "pseudo" experts.
CHICAGO Did you know that any job classified as H-1B is not open to
American citizens? Thats job opportunity genocide, writes adjunct
Northwestern professor James Carlini.
The H-1B program is like heroin to U.S. companies that are now addicted to
it even though the "shortage" of people is long over. There are many local
people who are underemployed and dont have an equal opportunity to jobs
that are being restricted and awarded to foreign workers only.
Unsurprisingly, this isnt just happening in the IT area.
This affects the American economy as a whole. Politicians from all parties
should be aware that this H-1B issue is starting to erode equal opportunity
laws. There should also be bipartisan championing of turning around this
issue as the people who lost jobs and will continue to lose jobs are not of
one economic sector or political party.
Did you know that Cook County, Ill. was the fifth-largest area that gave
away U.S. jobs in 2004? More than 21,000 jobs at corporations, educational
institutions and even educational school districts were restricted from
people being able to apply due to the jobs being labeled for H-1B.
These arent technology jobs. There are job orders for accountants,
architects, attorneys, copywriters, credit managers, physicians,
psychiatrists, teachers, hedge fund analysts and many other jobs that
dont seem to have any rare skill set that a citizen couldnt fill.
This is from one site opposing the H-1B program:
According to New York Daily News columnist and prominent immigration lawyer
Allan Wernick, employers can sponsor "H-1B status even if qualified U.S.
workers want the job. Unlike for most employment-based permanent residence
visas, to get your H-1B status, an employer need not prove the
unavailability of a U.S. worker."
When looking at the number of imported workers and offshore contracts per
state, the highest numbers are in those states with the highest tax
deficits. As an example, California employs by far the highest number of
special visa holders at approximately 30 percent of all H-1B workers in the
U.S. and, at an estimated fiscal year 2004 deficit of $18 to $26 billion,
has by far the highest tax deficit of any state.
Other states with the highest employment of special visa holders include
New York (estimated fiscal year 2004 deficit of between $10 and $12
billion), Texas ($4 to $7.8 billion), New Jersey ($4 billion) and Illinois
($3.6 billion).
The bottom line in all of this is that when corporations import H-1B and
L-1 visa holders, they are being subsidized heavily by the taxpayers of
their state.
"Contrary to the laws intent, the program can be used to fill any job at
almost any wage," said IEEE-USA President Gerard Alphonse. "The vast
majority of employers are not required to recruit American workers first."
That is exactly whats happening. Do these jobs count in the unemployment
statistics? I would hope they dont because they arent open to
Americans who could easily fill them.
Its also very hypocritical to see Chicago companies touting their
community involvement with ads and commercials yet they "backdoor" good
jobs and neglect the local people who buy their products and services. So
much for local loyalty. United Airlines had 231 jobs in the $70,000 to
$90,000 range for financial and IT workers. With all the job loss in
Chicago, there were plenty who could have filled those positions.
As there are thousands of jobs you could never apply for, I thought it
would be interesting to highlight some of the ones I dont feel are
"unique" to exclude from citizens. While there are thousands of IT-type
jobs you would expect, there are also a lot of great jobs that in the last
couple years many local qualified people would have really wanted.
Only Jobs You Dont Want?
When companies like Accenture and Bank One can lock out 19,000 jobs in the
Chicago area for foreign workers only in the last couple years, there is
something definitely wrong with the system.
These are not jobs at the $35,000 range. They are not even jobs at just the
$50,000 range. Many are in the $70,000 to $80,000 range and some exceed
$100,000 (including an IT director position and an attorney position at
Bank One). There are other six-figure jobs at Motorola, Leo Burnett,
Booz-Allen and other Chicago-based companies where citizens have been
locked out.
So much for the Cato Institutes argument that the H-1B program is good
for the economy or the statement that H-1B candidates "only take jobs
Americans dont want". That is the biggest lie since one think tank said
smoking isnt bad for you. To me, their credibility went to zero. The
same applies to the reporters who invite them onto their programs to try to
"educate" the viewer on issues.
Last weeks column stirred up many people on the validity of H-1B workers
and the jobs they take up. There were some common elements. "Train and
replace" seems to be a common "rite of passage" for local workers in order
to get their severance package and then go on to underemployment.
In doing some detailed investigations to understand more about H-1B jobs, I
found some new things that shocked me. Can any of our leaders in Washington
see the negative impact that this program is having? It sure seems to have
created a longer-term recession in the Chicago area.
What Are Unions Doing About Job Opportunity Genocide?
H-1B jobs are stealing opportunities away from many Americans (not just IT
workers). Chicago Public Schools have opened up opportunities for H-1B and
so have other school districts. We are paying property taxes to fund job
opportunity genocide.
Check out this Web site, which shows the hundreds of jobs restricted to
H-1B status. Look in Elgin, Ill. and see how many teaching jobs in school
district U-46 are being restricted for non-citizens.
Sure, some U-46 requests are for bilingual teaching positions, but you
cant tell me that a couple hundred are all for Hispanic teachers. Look
at their requests. There is also a request for a Japanese teacher at $19.60
an hour. So much for encouraging IT people with multiple degrees to go back
for teaching certificates when districts are doing a wholesale sellout to
cheaper labor with teacher unions just sitting around collecting their
dues. I thought unions were supposed to protect jobs?
With so many people still unemployed or underemployed, school districts
want foreign workers? Where are the unions? Where are the local school
boards? What about the commitment by politicians to their constituents?
Fallibility of Job Creation Numbers
One big thing to emphasize is that H-1B is affecting more than just
technology jobs. Some reader feedback gave some added insights about IT
H-1B job opportunity genocide and questionable unemployment rates:
Once again, you are right on the mark with your article in ePrairie about
guest worker programs. Being a systems engineer for 25 years, I know many
IT people who arent working, taking low-paying jobs, getting out of IT
and who are performing contract work.
An interesting thing about contract work is that many of the contract
houses will no longer 1099 you or make you sign employment agreements.
If I take a job for two days with one contract house, a job was created. If
I get another contract job from another contract house, another job is
created. There is no reporting going back to the government on whether
Im still working there, that I have only worked two days or that I have
stopped working that job.
I feel this is producing a false "full employment rate" and the rate of
unemployment is actually quite higher. Some quotes I have heard say the
unemployment rate is actually closer to 20 percent.
If we are at full employment, why are there only nine pages of want ads in
the Jan. 2, 2006 edition of the Chicago Tribune? Why is it that Monster.com
and Dice.com have mostly headhunter jobs? They are collecting resumes to
try and solicit clients to place workers in some cases.
I hear about the shortage of IT people from companies like Microsoft. Many
of us are out there wanting to work and were competent, experienced and
complete with business acumen. The cost of their certification programs and
testing are a big reason why theres a perceived shortage of IT people.
Its great to see someone who can look beyond the cooked statistics
released to the media about jobs, venture capital, economic growth and the
political agendas. Thanks for your informative columns.
Thank you for your feedback. Its time for all of you to contact your
legislators. For your senator, check out this Web site, and for your House
representative, see here. This isnt immigration bashing. This is
affecting our economy and its not a one-industry issue. Fix the flaw in
this program.
Carlinism: H-1B jobs are nothing more than foreign indentured servants that
lock out equal opportunity.
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