Guess Who's Getting the Most Work Visas?

[OhioChick]

March 6, 2008, 5:00PM EST
Indian outsourcers top the list of companies bringing foreign workers to the U.S. on the H-1B
Program.

The program for what are known as H-1B visas was originally set up to allow companies in the U.S. to import the best and brightest in technology, engineering, and other fields when such workers are in short supply in America. But data just released by the federal government show that offshore outsourcing firms, particularly from India, dominate the list of companies awarded H-1B visas in 2007. Indian outsourcers accounted for nearly 80% of the visas approved last year for the top 10 participants in the program. The new data are sure to fuel criticism of the visa program from detractors such as Senators Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.). "These numbers should send a red flag to every lawmaker that the H-1B visa program is not working as it was intended," said Grassley in an e-mail.

REVOLVING DOOR?

Infosys Technologies (INFY) and Wipro (WIT), both based in Bangalore, top the list of visa recipients in 2007, with 4,559 and 2,567 approved visa petitions, respectively, according to data from the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services. Each visa allows the companies to bring one worker to the U.S., where they have substantial operations providing tech support and other services to corporations, complementing services provided from India. Overall, six of the top 10 visa recipients in 2007 are based in India; two others among the top 10, Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTSH) and UST Global, are headquartered in the U.S. but have most of their operations in India.

Microsoft (MSFT) and Intel (INTC) are the only two traditional U.S. tech companies among the top 10. Microsoft received 959 visa approvals, or one fifth as many as Infosys, while Intel got 369.

Critics such as Grassley and Durbin charge that the outsourcers are abusing the U.S. program. The work visas, they say, are supposed to be used to bolster the U.S. economy. The idea is that companies like Microsoft, Google (GOOG), or IBM (IBM) can use them to hire software programmers or computer scientists with rare skills, fostering innovation and improving competitiveness. Instead, critics say, companies such as Infosys and Wipro are undermining the American economy by wiping out jobs. The companies bring low-cost workers to the U.S., train them in the offices of U.S. clients, and then rotate them back home after a year or two so they can provide tech support and other services from abroad. "Valuable high-tech jobs are on a one-way superhighway overseas," said Durbin in an e-mail.

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_11/b4075062465238.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_top+story

[ChromeFoundry]

1. No surprise but

at least Grassley and Durbin are acknowledging this practice.

[mac2]

2. One party wants to expand work visas and the other wants

amnesty...santuary cities, etc. All of them bad for American professionals and workers.

My neice wants to go to college for nursing but the UNC university in her town (cheaper to live at home) only trains 60 of them. There is a nursing shortage but instead of training our own they are bringing in Indians for that too.

[MadMaddie]

3. This is a problem...

1. With the nursing shortage why aren't these schools expanding their programs
2. Why are they bringing non-English speaking people over to take Americans jobs.

All other countries protect their citizens from this why doesn't the US..oh wait...never mind.

[FloridaJudy]

8. Most educated Indians speak good English

Since India has over 20 different languages, people from one region may not share the same mother tongue with those of another, and English is the default language for communication.

What's appalling is the drain on other countries resources when doctors and nurses are recruited to work in the states. Most of those countries need all the medical personnel they can get. And why should the US spend perfectly good money that could be thrown down the rat-hole in Iraq to train professionals? :sarcasm: Also, immigrants are more easily intimidated: just threaten to revoke their green cards if they complain about working conditions.

I'm the daughter of immigrants, and some of my most intelligent and productive colleagues are here on work visas, but we need to put the brakes on some of this nonsense before we all lose.

[mac2]

9. Ya because the Queen's English was forced on them.

[MadMaddie]

15. I meant no disrepect to you and other immigrants...

I blame the employers for abusing immigrants with intimidation and the government for no audits or penalties for these companies.

Many of my productive colleagues are on work visas also. I dont' blame them for trying to take care of their families and access more opportunities.

But the bottom line is we have to make sure that American's have first shot at available jobs. The US lost 63,000 jobs last month.

[mac2]

19. Religious organizations are bringing in "workers"

and abusing that immigration status also. Whole churches with one type of immigrant is suspicious to me. Most new in the last few years with Cook County (Chicago and O'Hare Airport) declaring themselves "santuary areas for illegal immigrants" (yes...they use that word...illegals).

Immigrant workers for religious run hospitals are threatened with return if they complain, etc.

Chinese families are moving into my neighborhood and are members of these "Faith Based churches". I informed my state representative yet nothing is done. We are lawless and everyone is taking advantage to strip us of our wealth and jobs. It really is a security issue also.

Yes...I blame our lawless government for destroying this country. Both parties I'm afraid. The "royal pain in the butts" in Congress think they're plantation owners.

[IronLionZion]

5. Good for your niece, this country can certainly use more nurses

I'm curious as to who is to blame for the shortage though. Maybe hospitals don't have the money to pay them enough? As for the schools, I read in TIME that there aren't enough nursing professors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nursing_shortage#US_nursing_shortage

[SharonAnn]

17. Women have left nursing because of two things: Money and Patient Care

Talented, educated women now have other opportunities that pay better (and have regular hours)

Nurses want to provide good patient care, not the cheapest and least patient care that they can get away with.

[mac2]

20. It's profiteering even by "religious organizations"

Many South American countries live in poverty and over population because of their policy for power and wealth. They are just like international corporations.

[petgoat]

6. Very few liberals understand the effect of 11 million strikebreakers

on the job market for the least fortunate citizens.

It's driving a wedge between liberalism and the underclass.

[mac2]

10. Thanks for the link for 911 questions.

Our illegal wars were all based on 911 attacks yet they fail to find out the truth. Seems like a "conspiracy for PNAC" to me.

You've seen that photo/cartoon of the administration at the Hague? That's what should happen. It was a criminal act.

[mac2]

12. Divide and Conquer

[1776Forever]

4. H-1B Close to Hillary's Heart - Just as East Indian Pay Offs are to Bill & Her!

Hillary Clinton Pushes For More H1B Visas and OutSourcing - on YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhLBSLLIhUs

And this:

http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/may/30vin.htm

Vin Gupta: The man the Clintons love

Aziz Haniffa in Washington, DC | May 30, 2007

Vinod 'Vin' Gupta, 60, founder, chairman and CEO of infoUSA -- one of America's largest consumers of information with millions of clients -- is probably the single biggest contributor to the Democratic Party over the years.

He is a longtime Clinton benefactor, who has suddenly found himself thrust into the public domain in the wake of major articles in the New York Times and the Washington Post regarding his use of his company's private jet to fly the former President and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton on personal, business and campaign trips.

Some shareholders in infoUSA have filed a lawsuit alleging that all of this was 'a waste of corporate assets', and an effort by Gupta to 'ingratiate himself', with these high-profile guests.

(snip)

Gupta, besides being one of the single biggest individual contributors -- whom Kapur by now had coveted and cultivated -- was afforded the honour of introducing Clinton, which he did with rousing gusto.

From then on, Gupta courted the Clintons and in turn, was afforded the opportunity of spending a night in the White House Lincoln Bedroom -- the first Indian American to do so.

As his sustained contributions to the Democrats continued to flow, Clinton offered him the post of first Counsel General to Bermuda and then the Ambassadorship to Fiji, both of which Gupta declined. While he maintained this was for business reasons, it was rumored to be because there were doubts his nomination would be confirmed by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee due to alleged violations of Securities and Exchange Commission rules.

Just before his second term ended, Clinton appointed Gupta as a member to the prestigious Board of Trustees of the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. But even with Clinton out of the White House, Gupta's friendship with the now former President grew, and he brought him on as a consultant to infoUSA and, according to the lawsuit, beyond nearly $3 million in consulting fees, had flown the Clintons and himself to Acapulco, Mexico, on a vacation in 2002 and also to Switzerland, Hawaii and Jamaica. He was also said to have provided corporate jets for Mrs. Clinton at least seven times since 2002, although it was unclear whether he had done so after she began her Presidential campaign.

....................

[OhioChick]

13. You May Find This to Be Interesting....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x4935982

[hootinholler]

7. It will remain this way until IT can organize.

Very few union shops in IT.

-Hoot

[OhioChick]

11. If Corps

catch wind of a possible union organization.......you can kiss your job goodbye.

[hootinholler]

14. Oh I know that. At will and all that. n/t

[rosetta627]

16. http://www.washtech.org/

The only IT unionizers I'm aware of.

[lovuian]

18. H1B Visas are not going to make any sense when US is in a

depression

India wants the Money
why don't we pay Americans instead
this is why America is in a Depression
Wage suppression

[Lydia Leftcoast]

21. Officially, employers are allowed to use HB1 visas ONLY if they can't

find qualified employees here.

They used to be required to advertise the open positions publicly for a month before being granted those visa slots.

Now it looks as if they skip that step.

[agincourt]

22. Once Bush and his cronys

Sent all those IT jobs offshore or open to H-1B pay undermining, our source of individuals to buy houses went south. NO ONE, absolutely no one in our mainstream media is tying Bush outsourcing policy with the housing crisis. Or the credit crisis as well. It's always the same shit spewed out, "they should have made the loans harder to get", "we're in a natural down cycle nothing goes up forever", yada yada yada and not tying it to the source, Bush policies.