This was never about talent. It's about companies hiring foreigners on h1b visas at below market wages where their life in the USA is contingent on their job performance forcing them to work harder and longer than their peers to remain in the country. It's a situation that only benefits companies, while harming US citizens who have to compete with the lower wages of foreigners.
I work in a global company. As an interviewer, I don't even know if the person I interview is a US citizen. I don't even know if they live in the US or another country, and I'm probably not allowed to ask. I just rate their performance. And everybody is paid the same.
I think the situation is quite simple. Companies want the best candidates they can get, and the larger the recruitment pool, the better.
If tomorrow you were to tell (let say) Google they now need to hire only US citizens, would they lower their hiring bar, or would they expand their Shanghai or Zurich offices? Are US citizens entitled to work at Google more than others for the sole reason they have a particular citizenship?
> Companies want the best candidates they can get, and the larger the recruitment pool, the better.
Yes, at the lowest wages they can get. Increase supply -> lower prices (wages) -> more corporate profits!
However, there are those who believe that corporate profits are not the highest good. Some of us also care about the earnings of American workers.
Also, "best candidates" alone does not "best company" make. You need people who can work well together—which requires some degree of culture fit. Immigration restrictions help preserve the cultural homogeneity that makes collaboration and social trust possible.
> Yes, at the lowest wages they can get. Increase supply -> lower prices (wages) -> more corporate profits!
I don't understand this.
At least in tech megacorps, immigrants get paid the same as americans. They're also very good, and if they were to hire only americans, their talent pool would be worse. They're not 'cashing in' on cheaper labor.
No one is saying corporations cannot offshore and move the jobs overseas and hire workers from that country. What we are saying is that it is disingenuous to bring those workers into the country and claim there is a skills shortage; that is a bald faced lie.
Sorry. That is double-speak. Yes, there is a shortage of cheap talent; but there is no shortage of skills and no shortage of labor. If you want cheap labor, corps are welcome to move offshore.
> which is less than the Americans would otherwise get paid if there were fewer immigrants
Why do you think so?
Where are all the people good enough to work in Big Tech but they have better options than a job that pays $300k to a new grad? What work are they doing right now which pays them more than Big Tech would?
if you really don't understand this, then a quick refresher on supply and demand.
A market price is determined by the intersection of supply and demand. Do you understand this concept? If not, I can use examples or link to better explanation.
Adding highly skilled immigrant workers to the labor pool will marginally effect labor prices (most likely hold them from rising, not decreasing them). So the talent pool would be smaller, maybe worse / maybe better, but definitely higher priced.
Your entire comment assumes people of different cultural backgrounds cannot collaborate on technical challenges. As someone who manages a team where almost everyone is from a different country I don't see where you got this from. A Laplace transform is a Laplace transform, whether you learn it in a school in India or Nigeria or Lichtenstein.
Your comment is veering uncomfortably close to bigotry.
> Your entire comment assumes people of different cultural backgrounds cannot collaborate on technical challenges.
No it doesn't. It's not black and white. Of course, some amount of cross-cultural collaboration is not only possible, but desirable. But there are also challenges that need to be managed, and some degree of shared assumptions that need to be instilled. If you don't carefully control and limit immigration to a sustainable level, you get stuff like this: https://slate.com/technology/2022/07/caste-silicon-valley-th...
How do you see this as a immigration problem and not a company culture problem? You are again assuming people from a certain place are a certain way. Now you have firmly crossed into bigotry.
> You are again assuming people from a certain place are a certain way.
(BTW: I'm an immigrant, I'm talking about myself here) Yes people from a certain place do tend to be a certain way. They are not all 100% exactly the same, of course, but culture is a real thing that exists*. Assimilating into a different culture is slow and difficult, and not everyone is equally good at it. If you non-selectively import people from cultures A-Y into culture Z faster than culture Z can assimilate them, the result will be conflict between all the different cultures.
* I've always found it strange how many people will insist that they love "diversity" and "different cultures", and then in the same breath deny those things exist at all. Actual cultural diversity requires boundaries, otherwise you just get an ugly broken mish-mash.
The “lack of local talent” is a fallacy. It’s “lack of talent at the prices I want”. Some people don’t take kindly to having their “product” replaced by a 1/2 price aliexpress clone
Why? All big and even medium tech companies have dev offices in EU and India. As example since it's much easier to deal with visas say in Ireland a lot of hiring was shifted to Irish offices.
I do want to follow up to my own comment here, and just mention that I realize that capital's entire point is to get us to blame each other instead of capital (e.g., American software vs Indian|Chinese|etc software).
The moral of the story is that two things can be true at the same time: A lot of H1Bs are rightfully thrilled at the opportunity to work for decent US companies and make decent money to provide for their family. While a lot of American engineers are rightfully wary of the knock-on effects of hiring workers who can be cheaper and more 'malleable' (in a manner of speaking).
1/ Employment provides training and experience. If the h1bs are given access to the jobs (training and experience), then is it the American's fault that they are no longer considered "best"?
2/ h1b increases labor supply, not the demand. More supply, means lower wages for everyone.
1/ Training is only effective if you can fill the function of the job and learn from it. Many software engineering jobs people claim are stolen by H1B hires are filled by human beings more likely to meet the bar. Many American candidates just don’t. Filling a software role is hard.
2/ Demand for software is not static. Good software drives demand for more engineers in many cases, intra or extra-company. There is probably a non zero rate of wage suppression per marginal h1b currently. But an American economy with no h1b employees could feasibly have a much lower average sde salary. It is not an Econ 101 problem.
1/ Training goes all the way down the pipeline to colleges. If x% of students are foreign, then Americans didn't have the opportunity to get the education.
Again... the skill issue falls apart when you consider teams at tech companies having 1 non-American national origin or caste. I'm very skeptical that, between two foreign candidates with the same U.S. education and experience but different national origins, the fact that the candidate whose nationality matches the current team composition is selected can be explained purely as a matter of skill.
2/ Great, lets train up more American engineers to push the demand higher.
People are not as capable as you think they are and software engineering (well) is actually difficult. You cannot just push more people in. People are not fungible.
There is truth to your statement, but high salaries and demand encourage locally capable people to enter the industry.
Consider growth of CS graduates in the past 5 years or the number of people that transitioned into tech (like myself).
In 2026, this signal is not as clear: with the uncertainty of tech, increased output with less labor due to AI, and growing competition amongst workers (citizen or otherwise). We may see a shift in studies to other fields.
I find this hard to believe. Recruiters would not allow an applicant not eligible to work in the US pass to the next stage of the hiring process. Your role must not have the visibility that recruiters have.
What I'm saying is that I don't know if they are US citizens or not. From the look of it, most are not though. As for eligibility to work there, I suppose that's validated before with the recruiter.
> I just rate their performance. And everybody is paid the same.
For some visa classes, the law says you should hire an American citizen if they can do the job - not if they rank first at whiteboards or fizz-buzz.
> If tomorrow you were to tell (let say) Google they now need to hire only US citizens, would they lower their hiring bar
Does it really matter? To a point, obviously, but a lot of people are good enough for the role without being the world's best. The bar for getting into Google has dropped since its early days, and Google keeps breaking profit records quarter after quarter.
This entire "hire the best or nothing" mindset has led to a dysfunctional hiring process that's a pain to both employers and employees, and is prima facie unachievable.
> you should hire an American citizen if they can do the job
I went for a job in the US back in the late 80's (Specialist on hardware).
California it was exceptionally strict. While I was more than qualified it took months of the company advertising in the US, and at the end of it all an American was hired.
The second job for another company in California, same deal except they only advertised in the local newspaper (which felt off), and when I finally got an interview they said they couldn't hire me but recommended places in Mexico to jump the border if I ever wanted a job. Noped out of that fast.
Did eventually get to a spend a couple of years in the US in the 90's. It was the same hoops to jump through as the first company. Wasn't easy or fast.
No idea what it is like now. But I had seen the racism of "They are an immigrant, so they were only hired because we can pay them cheap", not as bad as my Indian co-workers though.
> not if they rank first at whiteboards or fizz-buzz.
As an interviewer, I don't rank candidates. I have my set of questions, some candidates solve them, others don't. You can argue that it's the bar to do your job properly. Should politicians tell big tech companies what's the bar for being a successful SWE?
> When it comes to national interest, the argument for "meritocracy" falls apart quickly.
A lot of US tech exists because of skilled foreign workers. I'm not sure what would be the tech industry without them.
Someone in your org does - an individual or committee: that's the entire purpose of the hiring pipeline. I've interviewed candidates at multiple companies small and (extremely) big, and interviews always have to give recommendations for ranking purposes (out of 10/100, or (strong-/)yes / maybe / (strong-/)no)
I am not attacking you personally, but the fact remains: in some circumstances hiring "the best" - when they happen to be a non-citizen - can be in contravention with the law depending on the visa class and whether you failed to find an American capable of doing the job.
Don't just take my word for it, big tech companies have lost or settled multiple AG suits because they tried to hide job postings from Americans, e.g. by posting SWE/PM jobs in some podunk, print-only Farmers-Weekly-type magazines.
> A lot of US tech exists because of skilled foreign workers.
I fully agree. Unfortunately being skilled doesn't grant them the right to vote, and as young people keep finding out, those who write (and sign) laws care a lot about what actual voters think and feel. You have to get into office first before you can do the hard labor-policy stuff.
> Companies want the best candidates they can get, and the larger the recruitment pool, the better.
Did you write this with a straight face? Companies want candidates that are good enough for the lowest possible price.
Yes, US citizens are more entitled to be employed for US based jobs than importing someone from a different country to do the job. If Google wants an office in Zurich then Swiss candidates there should be more entitled instead of asking Switzerland to import foreign workers to fill the positions.
Big tech companies aren't patriotic, they work for their shareholders. They don't care about US or Swiss citizens. They'll open offices wherever there's a high density of talents, and where they can import qualified foreign workers. I'm pretty sure there aren't many SWEs from Switzerland at Google Zurich offices. If the US wants to restrict visas, automatically a portion of these jobs will be moved abroad.
I have no idea what point you're trying to make now. Companies are free to open an office wherever as long as 1) they hire local talent over immigrants 2) they are willing to deal with whatever policies countries put in place to "fight" offshoring.
A company can decide to open an office in India where there is cheap talent as long as they pay the taxes put in place by US/EU governments to prevent offshoring. That's the game.
Maybe try to express yourself a bit more clearly, because once again, I have no clue what your point is now.
My point is that US can restrict visa all they want, it won't prevent companies to move somewhere else where they can get better talent and/or cheaper labour. So all this whining about H1B taking the jobs Americans feel entitled to is a bit misplaced - because this is all this discussion is about. It's all the more ironic when it comes from conservatives who claim to promote free market, globalization and meritocracy.
Now local talent over immigrants, each country has different policy, and it certainly affects where companies decide to open foreign offices. For instance, would OpenAI open an office in London if all they can hire are British citizens?
Being paid the same as the other guy doesn't necessarily mean the wages themselves stayed the same. Adding H1B candidates to the talent pool exerts downward pressure on salary due to the law of supply and demand. I can't say for sure whether the allure of a green card or threat of deportation play a material factor in lowering the average salary that H1B immigrants are willing to accept. But in an environment where talent is treated as fungible (even if it isn't always so), any such downward pressure affects everyone.
That's the parent's argument. Prevailing wage in country A is X. Prevailing wage in country B is Y, and according to your numbers X > 2Y. Person from country B emigrates to country A and accepts wage 1.9Y, putting downward pressure on the jobs in country A at wage X.
You don't need the carrot of a green card or the stick of deportation to make a software engineer on an H1B accept a depressed wage, because it's not depressed relative to their alternatives.
The idea is that the "same wage" you are talking about is too low to hire enough employees in the time needed that the company needed so they had to look abroad for people willing to work for that amount.
I've never heard of a company giving a standard wage for a team. All the companies i've worked for (Tesla, Apple, Applied materials) give me a specific offer... Not a single person on any of my team's got paid the same. Some negotiate the base offer, some come with a higher base offer based on experience.. etc. So, based on the fact that no single US worker gets paid the same, it's very hard to imagine what you are saying is true.
It’s a common pattern to say ‘company X laid off thousands of employees but then applied for thousands of H1B visas’ which very much gives the impression that the company has just fired a few thousand Americans and hired a few thousand foreigners.
What actually happens is: a company has a global workforce of 100000 or so. 50000 of them are in the US. 5000 of them are in the US on H1Bs, 45000 of them are Americans.
Company does a 10% layoff: 4500 Americans, 500 people who are in the us on visas, and 5000 people around the world.
Headline: “Company X lays off 10000”
Then the H1B renewal numbers come out and what do you know company X is applying for 4500 H1Bs, to retain their existing H1B staff who weren’t affected by the layoff.
Headline: “After laying off 10,000 staff company x applies for 4500 H1B visas”
Unstated in such a headline: 5500 of those layoffs were foreigners; the company still employs 40500 Americans.
To bring it back to your point: you cited this article as evidence for the claim that Microsoft laid off ‘thousands of domestic employees’; the article does not say where the thousands of layoffs were and explicitly contains a quote from an MS spokesperson that says “H-1B employees were also impacted by job eliminations in the U.S.”
The problem is the H1B visa is a lottery not a points based system. As someone who applied for an H1B 5 times and never got it, despite being highly skilled and having a PhD and a well paying job. The only way in was on an intern visa or an Einstein visa. Insane system
Then fix that. This administration is eager to point out problems and propose "just don't do that" as a solution. The problem is that to them, pretty much everything is a problem, so they're proposing we do nothing.
Employment based and immigrant are not opposite categories of visa - these are orthogonal axes.
There are employment-based nonimmigrant visas like H1B and L1. Being a nonimmigrant visa means it doesn’t grant you a right to immigrate but some (including H1B and L1) are ‘dual intent’ visas meaning you can apply for an immigrant visa while in the US as a nonimmigrant.
There are employment-based immigrant visas, which have categories like EB1, EB2. Like all immigrant visas these are also known as ‘legal permanent residency’, LPR, or ‘green cards’.
There are also non-employment-based visas that are both nonimmigrant (eg visitor visas, student visas) and immigrant (eg family based green cards)
H-1B / L-1 are non-immigrant visas, immigrant visas are green cards yes. Pausing green card processing in consulates after (on sketchy legal grounds) forcing folks to not do adjustment of status for getting an immigrant visa inside the country is, indeed, how the admin is trying to get around doing their job the way the INA intends them to.
That only means you won't be denied if you express immigration intent during interview. Besides that it's nothing special. There is no special path to GC/naturalization for H1Bs.
If you mean the memo earlier this year, it was about tourist visas and similar doing aos in country when they are not dual intent visas, which makes it iffy.
They explicitly said that for h1b and l1 aos wouldn’t be affected as they are dual intent visas.
Actually they get normal wages now. H1B’s get hired because H1B’s are now in hiring, recruiting, HR, etc.. they stack the candidate pool with their own shamelessly. I’ve seen it first hand.
It’s wild to me that the US tries to resolve labor issues with immigration control rather than just having good unions. Back in the 80s we decided we wanted free commerce at the expense of all else. Well guess what, that means you’re competing with the global labor pool. This shit is like trying to have your cake and eat it to; we want only the upside of the global neoliberal order, and try our damndest to outsource all its downsides.
Nonsense. Job applicants at the H1B level are all highly competitive, well-educated specialists of some sort.
You can't hire scab helicopter blade design engineers. Not even from abroad. You have a small pool of those who qualify looking for work (or actively keeping their ears alert for new work), muddied by many people tangentially quasi-qualified who want a job.
After you filter (imprecisely, but as well as you can), the pool is small, and you don't have enough qualified applicants to routinely work one group against another.
They are doing that now too, however the problem is that h1b is used for roles outside of tech, believe it or not, and if you measure everything by Bay Area tech salaries a bunch of necessary but lower paying jobs will go unfilled
So rural people get screwed because most doctors won't go to a rural hospital, and the rural hospital doesn't have the budget of a fancy city, so it can't entice doctors, rural people get screwed.
