more on youtubegate
more on youtubegate
Date: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 5:45 AM
<<<<< JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER No. 1716 -- 6/26/2007 >>>>>
The firestorm over the youtube videos continues.
Article 1:
http://www.businessweek.com/print/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jun2007/db20070621_912042.htm
Outsourcing: How to Skirt the Law
Article 2:
http://informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=200000148
Lawyer Group Responds To Controversial YouTube Video
Article 3:
http://www.dailyreportonline.com/Editorial/News/new_singleEdit.asp?individual_SQL=6%2F25%2F2007%4014924_Public_.htm
Pa. law firm s immigration talk hits YouTube; U.S. senator demands
investigation
Article 4:
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/local/sfl-flzcareers25nbjun25,0,2211382.story?coll=sfla-business-headlines
Jobs of future hard to identify
Article 5:
http://vdare.com/roberts/070623_economy.htm
Goodbye To The City Upon A Hill And To Its Fabled Economy
Article 6:
http://cbs5.com/local/local_story_173211114.html
YouTube Video On Foreign Workers Stirs Debate
Article 7:
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07173/796195-28.stm
City law firm's immigration video sparks an Internet firestorm
1. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.businessweek.com/print/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jun2007/db20070621_912042.htm
Top News June 22, 2007, 12:01AM EST text size: TT
Outsourcing: How to Skirt the Law
Want to hire cheaper foreign workers instead of Americans? A lawyer tells you
how to game the immigration systemand it's all on YouTube by Moira Herbst
The video looks as though it could have been shot at almost any sleepy
corporate seminar in the country, with one camera panning between a man in a
suit and tie standing at a podium and others seated nearby. But the dialogue
is riveting: It's a group of lawyers openly discussing strategies for helping
their clients pretend that they're trying to recruit American workers -- as
required by law -- while they, in fact, hire cheaper foreign workers.
"[O]ur goal is clearly not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker,"
says Lawrence Lebowitz, director of marketing for the Pittsburgh law firm
Cohen & Grigsby, before an audience of employers at the firm's conference.
The seminar provides details on how employers can meet the government's
requirements for the Permanent Labor Certificate program (PERM), which lets
employers sponsor foreign workers for permanent residency if they can
demonstrate no U.S. worker can fill a job. The trick, according to Cohen &
Grigsby attorneys, is to only go through the motions of hiring Americans
without ever intending to.
The video, which has been posted on YouTube (GOOG), is now sparking a sharp
backlash. On June 21, Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Representative Lamar
Smith (R-Tex.) fired off a letter to Cohen & Grigsby demanding an explanation
for its advice, as well as going so far as to ask for the names of its
clients. "Your firm's video advises employers how to hire only foreign labor,
while making it nearly impossible for a qualified American worker to get a
job," they wrote. "We look forward to hearing from you on how such advice is
ethical and does not undermine the programs by enticing fraud and misuse."
(See the lawmakers' letter here.) A public relations firm representing Cohen &
Grigsby did not return phone calls seeking comment.
Temp Work Program Under Fire
The same day, the legislators wrote a separate letter to Labor Secretary
Elaine Chao. They asked for information about how the government is managing
the program for temporary work visas, known as H-1Bs. The workers that are
sponsored for permanent residency typically come into the country on such
temporary visas. "[W]e are concerned that companies are abusing the H-1B visa
program," the lawmakers write. "The video explicitly shows how attorneys are
aiding companies in this effort." Grassley and Smith then voice concern about
the Labor Dept.'s failure to monitor fraud in the visa system, and they
request a breakdown of exactly how anti-fraud dollars are spent.
The video may complicate the prospects for immigration reform this year.
While most of the debate has been over what to do about low-skilled workers,
including the 12 million illegal immigrants already in the U.S., the policies
for high-skilled workers are now becoming controversial, too.
Microsoft (MSFT), Intel (INTC), Google (GOOG), Oracle (ORCL), Motorola (MOT),
and a host of other leading technology companies have called for new policies
to make it easier for skilled workers to come into the U.S., including by
making available more H-1B visas.
But the temporary worker program has come under heavy fire this year. The
program was originally set up to help U.S. companies hire foreign workers with
specialized skills that the companies couldn't find among American workers.
Now, however, the most active users of the program have become outsourcing
companies, particularly those from India, including Infosys Technologies
(INFY), Wipro (WIT), and Satyam Computer Services (SAY). That has led critics
such as Grassley to question whether the U.S. program is being used to
facilitate the outsourcing of American jobs (see BusinessWeek.com, 5/15/07,
"Crackdown on Indian Outsourcing Firms").
Tech Labor Shortage Called a Myth
The Cohen & Grigsby video was originally posted online by the law firm itself
as a way to promote the conference. Then Kim Berry, president of the
Programmers Guild, an advocacy group for U.S. tech workers, took excerpts of
the footage, edited them into a five-minute clip, and posted it on YouTube.
The video has received tens of thousands of views so far.
Berry says the video is not exceptional, but rather exemplifies the way
employers are systematically abusing the H-1B visa program for high-skilled
workers to avoid hiring Americans who demand higher salaries. "The idea that
there's a labor shortage in the tech sector is a myth," says Berry.
"Hundreds of thousands of qualified Americans can't find work as visa workers
continue to fill positions."
Employers don't have to prove that they can't hire Americans to employ an H-1B
visa worker. But if they want to sponsor that worker for permanent residency,
then they need to take a series of steps to prove no U.S. worker is qualified,
including placing ads in newspapers, reviewing risumis, and interviewing
potential candidates. That employers appear to be gaming that part of the
immigration system, with its higher hurdles, is disconcerting to some experts.
"What's disturbing about this from a public policy standpoint is that the PERM
is supposed to be the gold standard,"
says Ron Hira, professor of public policy at Rochester Institute of
Technology. "If you can circumvent those rules, it begs the question of what's
going on elsewhere."
Brendan Boyd, a computer programmer in Austin, Tex., is one out-of-work
American who is upset about the country's work policies. He was laid off from
a freelance position at Raytheon (RTN) last fall and has since been unable to
find work. "I've been on 15 or 20 interviews in the past few months, and I can
tell they're phony," says Boyd. "They ask overly simple questions and don't
even ask me about my tech qualifications. It's a sham."
Join a debate about overseas outsourcing.
Herbst is a reporter for BusinessWeek.com in New York.
2. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=200000148
Lawyer Group Responds To Controversial YouTube Video
The American Immigration Lawyers Association advises employers to meet the
legal requirements when hiring foreign nationals, even if the process is "far
from perfect."
By Mary Hayes Weier, InformationWeek
June 22, 2007
The American Immigration Lawyers Association released a statement Friday about
practices employers must take before hiring foreign nationals following a
controversial YouTube video.
The association is "dedicated to the rule of law and to the good faith
application of our laws, and condemns the use of charade or manipulation to
achieve regulatory compliance," begins the statement. "The association is
committed to the highest standards of excellence and ethics in immigration
practice and does its utmost to educate its members about these standards."
On Monday, InformationWeek reported that the law firm of Cohen & Grigsby
posted video from a seminar on YouTube that shows attorneys advising clients
on how to minimally advertise job postings to best avoid hearing from
"qualified and interested" U.S. workers. Federal law requires that an employer
make a permanent job posting available to qualified U.S. citizens before
hiring a foreign national.
The firm later removed the video, but not before the Programmers Guild, a
group of IT professionals critical of U.S. immigration policy, recorded and
ran their own, edited version of it on YouTube.
In a statement released Friday, the firm said, "Cohen & Grigsby has a
responsibility to ensure that our clients are both fully aware of and
compliant with all of the relevant laws governing the employment of
international workers. To that point, we stand by the substance of our recent
Immigration Law Update Seminar. We regret the choice of words that was used
during a small segment of the seminar. It is unfortunate that these statements
have been commandeered and misused, which runs contrary to our intent."
Thursday, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) sent a
letter to the firm asking for records of people their firm and its clients
have hired using H-1B visas, and a letter to U.S. Department of Labor
requesting an investigation into the firm's practices.
The association's letter states that to "protect U.S. workers from unfair
employment practices and protect foreign workers from exploitation and abuse,"
employers seeking to hire foreign nationals for a permanent job should include
the following steps in the labor certification process (which, by the way, is
not a requirement for an H-1B visa):
Six different forms of recruitment, including print ads in widely-circulated
Sunday newspapers and 30-day job postings with state labor agencies.
A requirement that the employer obtain confirmation of the prevailing wage for
the position and offer and pay at least that wage.
Compliance records that include the employer's review of applicants for the
position.
Meanwhile, the association seeks to reassure employers that it understands
their pain. "The permanent labor certification process is far from perfect.
Its requirements are mechanical, and generally do not reflect how employers
ordinarily recruit for positions," the statement reads. "While imperfect, the
labor certification requirements provide an important check and balance on
employers who seek highly qualified workers to fill important positions in
their companies."
The association also criticized a proposed point system being debated in
Congress as part of immigration reform that would give immigrants preferential
treatment based on such things as English fluency and education, and
ultimately employers less flexibility in who they want to hire.
"An employer/employee relationship combined with a strong labor market test is
the best protection for all workers, " the statement reads. "Reforms to our
immigration system must preserve and protect this important nexus and vital
worker protection. De-coupling the immigration process from any grounding in
an employer relationship and establishing a 'point system'
that would require no proof of a labor shortage in the occupation, as
contemplated by the immigration bill currently pending in the U.S. Senate, is
an invitation to a disastrous immigration policy."
3. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.dailyreportonline.com/Editorial/News/new_singleEdit.asp?individual_SQL=6%2F25%2F2007%4014924_Public_.htm
Monday, June 25, 2007
Pa. law firm s immigration talk hits YouTube; U.S. senator demands
investigation By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI, Associated Press Writer
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- A U.S. senator wants an investigation into the ethics of
a law firm whose YouTube video highlights how to circumvent the law to obtain
visas for foreign employees.
Attorneys say it's not illegal -- but Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, has asked
Labor Secretary Elaine Chao to examine the firm's tactics.
The video shows attorneys for Cohen & Grigsby, one of the largest law firms in
Pittsburgh, explaining at a conference on immigration how to obey laws that
require Americans be given top priority for jobs while still ensuring
foreigners are hired.
"The goal here of course is to meet the requirements, number one, but also do
so as inexpensively as possible, keeping in mind our goal. And our goal is
clearly not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker," Lawrence
Lebowitz, the firm's vice president of marketing, told the audience in May.
Grassley, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee's immigration
subcommittee, sent a letter to Cohen & Grigsby, demanding to know how many
visa petitions have been filed by the firm in the past five years. He
denounced the firm's tactics as discrimination.
Initially, Cohen & Grigsby placed footage from the conference on YouTube.
Then the Programmers Guild, a group that opposes current immigration laws,
edited it, added background music and uploaded its version to the video-
sharing site.
"The attorneys aren't doing anything illegal," said Kim Berry, president of
the Programmers Guild. "There is something wrong with the law."
Cohen & Grigsby said in a statement that it stood by the substance of the
talk, but regretted "the choice of words that was used during a small segment
of the seminar." The firm added that its statements had been "commandeered and
misused."
The video clip appears to confirm the suspicions of many who accuse companies
of placing want-ads in newspapers to show the Department of Labor it is
recruiting Americans, knowing all along that they won't attract qualified
applicants.
Palma Yanni, a Washington, D.C.-based immigration lawyer, said the department
requires companies to make a good-faith effort to hire an American before
applying for a work visa for a foreigner.
"By encouraging employers not to make a good-faith effort, they are violating
the rules, period," Yanni said of Cohen & Grigsby's tactics.
4. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/local/sfl-flzcareers25nbjun25,0,2211382.story?coll=sfla-business-headlines
Jobs of future hard to identify
My advice: Take in all the projections you can find and season with a grain of
salt.
June 25, 2007
DEAR JOYCE: I have volunteered to give a presentation on promising new careers
and careers that are being reinvented at my son's high school in the fall.
Help me out.
Speaking informally, a new or emerging occupation is one that has blossomed
fairly recently, often within the last 10 years. Examples: global positioning
systems technician, electronic commerce specialist and ergonomist.
An evolving occupation is one that has existed for some time and is
reinventing itself or adding new specialties. A nurse specializes to become a
forensic nurse. A linguist adds computer expertise and becomes a computational
linguist. An automotive service technician concentrates on hybrids and becomes
an alternative fuels technician.
Work content of an occupation changes as tools and technology become
available; teachers teach using computers as well as chalkboards. And the
opposite: The title of an occupation may change although its updated tasks are
the same; fiber optics engineers and radio frequency engineers are usually
considered electrical engineering specialties rather than distinct
occupations.
Most new and emerging occupations are small and will not grow up to offer
large numbers of jobs. The horticulture therapy aide was cited as emerging in
1976; its status remains unchanged today. So we already know about most of the
promising careers of the future, from health care to entrepreneurship. But
uncertainties grow deeper than ever.
While profitable-sounding occupations such as fusion engineer, leisure
consultant and robot technician appear on many forecasting lists, such
opportunities may be scarcer than we think if the infrastructure of good jobs
for U.S. workers continues to fray.
Any version of "It's a waste of time to predict what your kid will grow up to
do because most likely the job hasn't been invented yet," has become a cliche.
The good-old-Yankee-ingenuity-to-the-rescue perspective is now endangered by a
smudge on the nation's crystal ball. The smudge is the growing job drain for
U.S. workers -- a factor that makes practical career forecasting iffier than
ever these days. Why?
U.S. technology is being washed offshore and awarded to cheaper labor at
prices that wouldn't pay American workers' rent, much less mortgages. A soon-
to-be published paper by the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research
will report new evidence suggesting that moving jobs overseas has hurt the
U.S. economy considerably more than has been suggested by U.S.
Department of Labor numbers.
On the high end, suppose that your child, having noted that health care is a
prosperous career choice, wants to become a radiologist. A number of U.S.
hospitals now outsource the reading of CAT scans to radiologists in India and
Australia, usually overnight. Americans are also traveling outside the U.S for
dentistry and surgery. How will globalization affect future health-care worker
demand in this country even as legions of Baby Boomers age and require health
services?
And when jobs are not offshored, young, pliant and cheaper workers -- driving
down American wages and working conditions -- are brought onshore through a
half-dozen visa programs, especially H1-B visas aimed at information
technology professionals.
An uproar last week centered on grainy seminar videos posted on the file-
sharing site YouTube by a Pittsburgh immigration law firm. The seminar
educated employers on the nitty-gritty of how to use legal loopholes to ensure
foreign workers get the jobs and Americans don't. In other words, the legal
eagles explained exactly how to beat the system protecting U.S.
citizens -- Americans shafting American workers.
The shocker came when the seminar moderator, a partner in the law firm,
admitted: "Our goal is clearly NOT to find a qualified and interested U.S.
worker." One recommended tactic: Avoid advertising jobs in certain media that
attract lots of qualified U.S. job seekers. Even more disturbing was
University of California, Davis, computer science professor Norman Matloff's
observation that the seminar under fire was not produced by a rogue law firm:
"What this firm is doing is legal and standard."
The law firm has pulled the offensive YouTube videos.
A fountain of virtually all occupational information is the government's
Occupational Outlook Handbook, free online at www.bls.gov/oco. Contacts for
state and local forecasts appear in the opening section of the Handbook.
Magazines, including Money, U.S. News & World Report and Forbes, print
occasional or annual best-job lists.
My advice: Take in all the projections you can find and season with a grain of
salt. There are more scary wild cards in today's occupational stew than I have
seen in my many years of covering careers.
5. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://vdare.com/roberts/070623_economy.htm
June 23, 2007
Goodbye To The City Upon A Hill And To Its Fabled Economy By Paul Craig
Roberts
"We shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us."
John Winthrop
America is being destroyed. Many Americans are unaware, others are
indifferent, and some intend it.
The destruction is across the board: the political and constitutional system,
the economy, social institutions including the family itself, citizenship, and
the character and morality of the American people.
Those who rely on the Internet for information are aware that the Bush regime
has successfully assaulted the separation of powers and civil liberty. Both
Bush and Cheney claim that they are not bound by laws that impinge on their
freedom of action or that interfere with their ideas of the power of their
offices. Bush has issued presidential directives that permit him to make
himself a dictator by declaring a national emergency.
Cheney asserts that his handling of secret documents is not subject to
oversight or investigation or bound by a presidential order governing the
protection of classified information.
The foundation of social organization -- marriage, family, and parental
control over children -- is disintegrating.
Mass unassimilated and illegal immigration has destroyed the meaning of
American citizenship and forced large numbers of Americans into unemployment.
For example, Steve Camarota at the Center for Immigration Studies reported on
June 20 that state employment data show that in the first six years of the
21st century 218,000 high school graduates in the state of Georgia have been
employment- displaced by immigrants. [ Employment Down Among Natives In
Georgia]Moreover, wages have stagnated, putting the lie to the claim that
there is a shortage of workers. If there were a labor shortage, wages would be
bid up and rising.
Many Americans are unconcerned that the US government in behalf of an
undeclared agenda has invaded two countries, killed hundreds of thousands of
foreign civilians, produced 4 million Iraqi refugees, rejected the Geneva
Conventions and reverted to medieval torture dungeons. It does not trouble
them that their government blocked ceasefires and UN resolutions so that
Israel could bomb and murder Lebanese civilians and destroy the country s
infrastructure.
Americans, whose ethical behavior toward others was once reinforced by having
to look oneself in the mirror, now have a different ethos. Many cannot look
themselves in the mirror unless they have pulled a fast one and advanced
themselves at someone else s expense. It is not only crooked prosecutors, such
as Michael Nifong, who get their jollies from destroying their fellow
citizens.
A Google search will call up enough information to make the case for these
points many times over. However, the destruction of the US economy, though far
advanced, is still largely unknown. It is to this subject that we turn.
For a number of years Charles McMillion of MBG Information Services and I have
documented from BLS nonfarm payroll jobs data that the US economy in the 21st
century no longer creates net new jobs in tradable goods and services. In the
21st century, job growth in "the world s only superpower" has a definite third
world flavor. US job growth has been limited to domestic services that cannot
be moved offshore, such as waitresses and bartenders and health and social
services.
These are not jobs that comprise ladders of upward mobility. Income inequality
is worsening, and education is no longer the answer.
The problem is that middle class jobs, both in manufacturing and in
professional occupations such as engineering, are being offshored as
corporations replace their American workforces with foreigners. I have called
jobs offshoring "virtual immigration."
The latest bombshell is that even those professional jobs that remain located
in America are not safe. There is a vast industry of immigration law firms
that enable American corporations to replace their American workers with
foreigners brought in on work visas.
For years Americans have been told that work visas are only issued in cases
where there are no Americans with the necessary skills to fill the jobs.
Americans have been reassured that safeguards are in place to prevent US
companies from using the work visas to replace their American employees with
foreigners paid below the prevailing US wage. Now, thanks to a video placed on
"YouTube" by a US law firm, Cohen & Grigsby, marketing its services, we now
know that it is easy for US companies to legally evade the "safeguards" and to
replace their American employees with lower paid foreigners.
The video shows Lawrence Lebowitz, [send him mail] Vice President for
Marketing for the law firm of Cohen & Grigsby, together with a panel of the
law firm s attorneys, explaining to an audience of employers how to use
loopholes in the laws governing the work visas to hire foreign workers in
place of Americans. Lebowitz says, "our goal is clearly, not to find a
qualified and interested US worker."
Cohen & Grigsby s legal experts describe the strategy for ensuring that no
American firm has to hire an American. The advertising requirements can be met
by advertising the job in obscure or ethnic newspapers in locations where
there are no likely job candidates. If a qualified American candidate turns
up, "have the manager of that specific position step in and . . . go through
the whole process to find a legal basis to disqualify them for this position -
- in most cases there doesn t seem to be a problem."
The "prevailing wage" requirement is evaded, for example, by making the
offered salary and raises contingent on receipt of the green card, usually
3 or 4 years away, or by disguising the job by understating the job
requirements. For example, a job requiring an advanced degree can be listed as
requiring a bachelor s degree, but filled with a foreigner with a higher
degree. As the higher degree is not listed as a job requirement, the employer
is able to secure the foreign employee below the prevailing wage.
University of California computer science professor Norman Matloff has an
excellent presentation available at his online site about the lack of
impediments to the ability of US firms to replace their American employees
with foreigners. Matloff says to keep in mind that Cohen & Grigsby "is NOT a
rogue law firm." The advice provided by Cohen & Grigsby is the standard advice
given by the hoards of immigration attorneys who are personally cleaning up by
putting Americans out of work.
Except for Lou Dobbs on CNN, the US TV and print media have so far ignored the
astounding story. Where are the headlines: "US Jobs: No American Need Apply"?
Chances are high that economists will ignore the story also. Economists have
made fools of themselves with their hyped claims that jobs offshoring is a
great benefit to America and that any attempt to stop it would bring hardship,
failed companies, and lost American jobs. When a profession gets egg all over
its face, it closes ranks and goes into denial.
Unlike the post-depression generation of US economists, recent generations of
economists have been indoctrinated with confidence in business. They believe
that business knows best and that the free market will prevent or correct any
mistakes. Many economists today are well paid shills for special interests.
Others, simply careless, have assumed that statistical measures of high rates
of US productivity and GDP growth were indications of the benefits that
offshoring was bringing to Americans.
Only a few economists, such as myself and Charles McMillion, noticed the
inconsistency between alleged high rates of productivity and GDP growth on one
hand and stagnant real median incomes and rising income inequality on the
other. Somehow the US economy was having GDP and productivity growth that was
not showing up in growth in the incomes of Americans.
Thanks to economist Susan N. Houseman and the March 22 issue of Business Week,
we now know, as I reported in the print edition of CounterPunch (June 1-15,
2007) and online at VDARE.com, that much of the growth in US productivity and
GDP was an illusion created by statistics that mistakenly attributed
productivity gains achieved abroad to the US economy.
With the ladders of upward mobility for Americans dismantled by offshoring and
work visas, with the very real problems in mortgage and housing markets, with
the very real stress put on the US dollar s reserve currency role by Bush s
trillion dollar war that is financed by foreigners, with the downward
revisions in US GDP and productivity growth that are now mandatory, and with a
variety of other problems that I haven t the space to deal with, the fabled US
economy is a thing of the past.
Just like America s prestige. Just like the world s goodwill toward America.
Just like American liberty.
The eyes of all peoples are still upon us, only for different reasons. Whom
will we attack next? When will we be bankrupt? What good is the American
consumer market when the mass of the people are employed in third world jobs?
How much longer will those trillions of dollars held by foreign governments be
worth anything? How long before Americans will be knocking on European doors
claiming political asylum?
6. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://cbs5.com/local/local_story_173211114.html
Jun 22, 2007 7:00 pm US/Pacific
YouTube Video On Foreign Workers Stirs Debate
Sue Kwon
Reporting
(CBS 5) A video posted on YouTube is stirring anger and debate in Silicon
Valley. It shows attorneys with Cohen & Grigsby telling their corporate
clients how to get around Federal rules around hiring foreign workers.
"Our goal is not to find a qualified U.S. worker," the attorney at the podium
said in the video. "That, in a sense, sounds funny but that is what we are
trying to do here."
It's no secret foreign workers often come highly skilled with lower salaries.
A system administrator who wanted to be identified only as "Dave"
defended outsourcing in the technology industry.
"My company has job openings and it's hard to find good people, even junior
people not just senior people," he said.
The Programmers Guild is an anti-outsourcing group with 1,500 members says
nonsense. The group edited and reposted the law firm's clips on YouTube after
the law firm pulled down video of the full session.
"We estimate tens of thousands of Americans lose job opportunities to the
tactics shown in that Cohen & Grigsby video," said Kim Berry, President of the
Programmers Guild.
Kim says the video has prompted 2 lawmakers to call on Labor Secretary Elaine
Chao to investigate unfair practices where companies call for applications
with no intent to hire close to home.
The attorney in the video is heard saying. "If necessary, you (companies) have
to schedule an interview to find a legal basis to disqualify them (US
applicants) for this position. In most cases this doesn't seem to be a
problem."
Cohen & Grigsby would not allow CBS5 to view the session in its entirety and
issued a statement.
"We regret the choice of words that was used during a small segment of the
seminar," the statement said. "It is unfortunate that these statements have
been commandeered and misused, which runs contrary to our intent."
7. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07173/796195-28.stm
City law firm's immigration video sparks an Internet firestorm Friday, June
22, 2007
By Anya Sostek, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
What started as a simple marketing video for Downtown law firm Cohen & Grigsby
has resulted in an Internet firestorm encompassing tens of thousands of
YouTube viewers, Lou Dobbs and the U.S. Secretary of Labor.
The video features portions of Cohen & Grigsby's "Seventh Annual Immigration
Law Update," held May 15 at the Pittsburgh Hilton, Downtown.
The segment of the video drawing all the attention is one in which lawyers
from Cohen & Grigsby's highly regarded immigration practice advocate methods
to comply with a law requiring employers prove that they have tried to find
qualified American workers before applying for a green card for a foreign
worker. The lawyers urge the audience, in so many words, to do exactly the
opposite.
"Our goal is clearly not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker,"
said partner Lawrence Lebowitz on the video. "And, you know, that in a sense
that sounds funny, but it's what we're trying to do here."
When Kim Berry, president of an organization called the Programmers Guild that
opposes the issuance of visas to foreign workers, watched the video clip after
he received it in an e-mail on Saturday, he thought it was anything but funny.
Mr. Berry shortened the video from the version that he received, adding
subtitles and music for emphasis. "I grabbed the two masters and edited it
down, just to make it more convenient for the few hundred people I thought
might want to watch it," he said. "I didn't expect it to get 44,000 hits in
three days."
By the end of the weekend, political blogs of all stripes -- from DailyKos to
National Review's The Corner -- had linked to the video, which just so
happened to play nicely into issues raised in the immigration bill that the
U.S. Senate is debating this week.
Yesterday, Cohen & Grigsby put out a statement that while the firm stands by
the substance of the seminar, "we regret the choice of words that was used
during a small segment of the seminar. It is unfortunate that these statements
have been commandeered and misused, which runs contrary to our intent."
The firm already removed its version of the video after a Monday article in
the online publication Information Week detailed the controversy.
But Mr. Berry's version remains on the Internet and by Tuesday, the story was
widespread enough to be featured on CNN's "Lou Dobbs Tonight," with Mr.
Dobbs saying that "the law firms and everyone else, they're just basically try
to [stick it to] the American worker."
Cohen & Grigsby, one of Pittsburgh's top 10 largest law firms, had found
itself embroiled in the 24-hour news cycle fueled by cable news and the
blogosphere. And it was about to get worse.
Yesterday, U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) sent a letter to U.S.
Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao asking her for assistance in "reviewing the
video and investigating the law firm's unethical procedures."
What made the video into such an Internet hit, said Mr. Berry, is that it
validated long-held suspicions that he and others had been unable to
substantiate.
"It's proof from the attorneys themselves that they are getting resumes from
qualified Americans and they are going through all sorts of steps so that
Americans don't get jobs," he said. "It shows what's really happening behind
the curtain."
But the issue is slightly more complicated than it is being portrayed on the
Internet, said Crystal Williams, deputy director for programs at the American
Immigration Lawyers Association in Washington, D.C.
When companies apply for a green card for a worker, she said, it's often for
somebody that they already have brought over on a temporary visa and is
working at the company. But in order to fill the green card requirement that
there are no qualified American candidates, the company needs to redo the job
search -- even though they already have somebody working in that position.
"It sounded a lot worse than it is," said Ms. Williams. "They were talking
about the electronic labor certification and that is a program that is very
formalized. By its very nature, it's a little bit twisted."
That twisted process leads to what Mr. Berry considers to be "fake"
newspaper advertisements for jobs that are essentially already filled with
green card candidates. For years, he's been tracking such ads in his hometown
newspaper, The Sacramento Bee.
In the Cohen & Grigsby video, attorneys advocated placing advertisements in
newspapers -- where they would be less likely to find qualified workers --
versus more fertile recruitment venues such as Monster.com or campus
recruitments. "Certainly we are not going to try to find a place where
applicants would be most numerous," said Mr. Lebowitz, who is also an adjunct
professor of immigration law at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law.
If a company does find an undeniably qualified American candidate through
newspaper advertising, "if necessary schedule an interview, go through the
whole process to find a legal basis to disqualify them for this particular
position," said attorney Jennifer L. Barton on the video.
Those particular sections of the video "sounded bad," Ms. Williams said. "I
don't know that they are common practice."
Advertising positions in places where a company would not find job applicants,
she said, is "kind of the opposite" of the correct process.
But the real problem, said Ms. Williams, is the immigration process itself.
"Nobody's happy with it -- that's about the one consensus we can get, and that
includes the Department of Labor," she said. "That being said, no one's been
able to come up with a better one."
(Anya Sostek can be reached at asostek@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1308.)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Newsletter Homepage:
http://www.JobDestruction.com/shameh1b/JobDestructionNews.htm
Support this Newsletter and www.JobDestruction.com by donating:
www.zazona.com/Donations.htm
To Be removed from this mailing list, reply to this email with UNSUbSCRIBE in
the subject window
Back to archives