To: H-1B/L-1/offshoring e-newsletter Sat Jul 27 15:35:21 PDT 2013 As most of you know, a major point I make about the H-1B work visa program is that employers use H-1B to avoid hiring older (cutoff point only age 35!) Americans. Younger workers are cheaper, not only in salary but in benefits (less likely to have a family, etc.). The vast majority of H-1Bs are young. This topic came up by surprise in a "forum" on immigration yesterday, reported in "Andrew Mason Talks Immigration Reform at Zuckerberg Forum in Chicago," Chicago Tribune, July 27, http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-andrew-mason-mark-zuckerberg-20130726,0,806014.story Of course, the panel at a real forum would have speakers from both sides of the issue, certainly not the case here. But someone from the audience spoke briefly during the Q&A, countering what the "united" panel said: "When an audience member, who identified himself as a University of Chicago-educated network engineer who's looking for work and frustrated because 'Silicon Valley millionaires' are biased toward young workers, none of the speakers volunteered a response. On the sidelines of the event, however, [Rep. Bill] Foster addressed the issue of competition between foreign and domestic workers, saying the creation of high-tech jobs for skilled immigrants tends to beget more such positions. He also urged tech startups to examine ageism, which he described as 'a continual worry.'" It's not surprisng that none of the speakers responded. They undoubtedly know the problem, and are, as the old saying goes, PART of the problem. I doubt that Foster would support the provision that was originally in the Senate bill but shot down after heavy industry lobbying. It would have required employers to give hiring priority to Americans of equal OR GREATER qualifications as the foreign applicant. That "equal or greater" clause would have helped a lot with the age aspect of H-1B. Meanwhile, of course, the Senate bill retained a provision that in essence give automatic green cards to huge numbers of new foreign graduates in STEM--almost all of whom will be young, thus making the age problem even worse. Unfortunately, the unjustified scapegoating of the Indian firms has clouded the issue regarding H-1B. The problems--cheap labor, exploitation of immobile labor, etc.--pervade the entire industry, not just the Indian firms. In the cheap labor category, yes, H-1Bs are on average paid less than U.S. citizens and permanent residents of the same age, skill sets and so on, but the big savings comes from hiring young H-1Bs instead of older Americans. This point is rarely covered by the press, let alone members of Congress. Norm Archived at http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/Archive/MasonCalledOut.txt