this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2024
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Having more H1B visas doesnt help the worker. Most of them are snapped up by giant consulting companies, and that likely wouldn't change much. Adding a million more is just the status quo, but worse for Americans.
What would make H1B better would be giving visa holders 6 - 12 months to find a new job instead of 2. That would give them way more leverage to quit bad employers, drastically reducing abuse and low wages.
Somehow i doubt the billionaire class is looking to improve employee treatment and pay, though.
That's what a visa is. It's when a country allows a non citizen to take up residency for a specific reason, for a specific amount of time. When i said specific companies get them, I mean the contractor companies have basically a visa procesing pipeline to hire tens of thousands of elible people and then farm them out to misc companies. Im talking mega corps like Mckinsey, Avande, etc. They aggresive apply for and sponsor ever single H1B visa holder they can.
The H1B visa stays with the employee, not the company though. Right now, the employee has to get a job/sponsor in under 60 days to maintain the H1B visa. That gives any company, including these contracting houses, huge leverage over these workers to abuse them and keep wages down. Extending that to 180 days instead of 60 would force wages up for H1B, as many of them are excellent at their jobs, which would also not let the billionare class use them as a wedge to drive american wages and quality of life down.
There is a negative 0 chance the billionaires pushing for more visas will also push for an extension of this time frame. The threat is the entire appeal of the visa to them.