Foreign Workers' H1B Visa Malpractices Affecting the American Economy
According to the current immigration laws, H1B (non-immigrant visa for persons of specialized knowledge in fields like architecture, education, medicine, etc.) workers of foreign origin are required to remain in employment (30+ hours/week is considered full-time) and receive regular paychecks to continue to reside in the US. When an H1B worker gets laid off work and receives no paychecks, he or she has to leave the country at once (usually there is a 10-day grace period beyond the day of termination) or transfer/apply for a new H1B visa with another employer or petition for another visa such as B-1, F-1, H-4, etc. to stay legally in the US.
Consultancy companies bring in workers on the H1B program and place them on projects with clients. Here are a few ways in which consultancy companies violate this law.
- When a worker terminates a project with one client but does not have a new client to transition to, although legally he/she must receive monthly wages to keep a valid H1B visa, many companies provide them neither work nor pay. It is common to see foreign workers unemployed for 6-18 weeks at a time with invalid residency status (out-of-status according to law) still residing in the US.
- Companies are required to inform the DOL when an employee is unemployed or does not receive paychecks to revoke his/her H1B status. But they do not follow this in order to hold on to the employee for future use.
- By law, employers must pay the airfare to an employee who has to return to his home country due to a lapse in the visa status. But many do not honor this requirement in order to cut costs.
- Many consultants hold back employees' petition papers related to H1B visa and other applications such as I-140 and I-485 (applications for immigration) to prevent employees from moving to a better paying or stable job.
- Consultants even make false claims about an individual's skills in the original visa petitions and tailor their resumes to improve their chances of approval at the USCIS.
- Many consultants do not provide health care benefits to their employees. Many employees are forced to work long hours without compensation. Many companies do not even have clear policies on paid leave for their H1B workers.
- Some consultancies are believed to provide false pay stubs (for employees who are jobless) to the USCIS to falsify their H1B visa validity when they apply to extend the visa status.
These companies take huge risks of legal violations because the returns on their actions are exorbitant. IT contracts typically pay between $40 - $200 per person, per hour. The consultancy companies make about 25-30% of contracted wages for very little work on their part. Many employees have to find their own clients - the companies do nothing to bring in projects for their employees.
Many IT professionals willingly experience the trauma of being hooked to such slave-drivers to get a footing in the dreamland of America. Naturally, work life is very stressful for such a worker. Many projects are very short, being merely 3 to 6 months in duration. It is hard to find a new client every time one contract ends, particularly in the present times when unemployment is at an all time high. Their wages are lower than average American workers. While this makes it harder for the foreign worker's families, it also creates a workforce with readiness to move on to jobs that pay less or jobs they do not have skills for.
Naturally, this depresses wages for the American workers. Because it is very commonplace, the average IT consultant victimized by such fraud willingly shares his or her experiences. The forums on immigration lawyers' sites like Murthy and Visapro are full of anguished cries for help and stories of distress from such workers from all over the world.
In the recent years, the US government has been more concerned with illegal immigration hurting low-end jobs but has turned a blind eye to what is brewing in the white-collar job sector. Only this week, news has surfaced that 11 arrests have been made for fraudulent practices of visa-issuance in an FBI investigation.
There is significant pressure from the government on banks receiving TARP money to not hire H1B workers. This, however is an inadequate step in improving the conditions for American workers. Eliminating visa-malpractices is crucial to making more jobs available to the educated middle-class Americans who alone provide the working mass capable of propelling the country out of its downward spiral.
Strong laws must be enforced to monitor and audit such companies. The DOL and USCIS should start by tapping on the H1B employees at consultancies to glean the facts and set things straight for the American economy and the misused foreign workers.
Published by Lami Eyer
Eyer is a voracious reader and loves writing. View profile
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17 Comments
Post a CommentSuch self-indulgent idealism. We are the current embodiment of America's great immigrant past -- as if paradigms never change, resources never become limited, frontiers never close. You prattle and crow with an assumption of moral advantage, but the cold truth is that a few of you are profiting from the relative barbarousness of the many. The cost-depressing consequence of so many impoverished hut-dwellers is a well-understood mechanism.
And our slavish worship of the free market means that we'll interfere only a little in this game of find the new equilibrium. But the job prize only tilts your way because of significant cultural flaws that you tolerated for too long. It's only that you guys come cheap -- don't kid yourselves. It's not the hard work or cleverness. In a world of 7 billion those sorts of thing are common and priced to move.
Anyway, eventually we'll find someone cheaper, because that's all we really care about -- squeezing a buck where we can, and devil take th
yes of course because they are taking their jobs from them.
This is very true that people come from other country are ready to do work at low cost and this affects the local employees. Source: http://www.immigrationvisaus.com
Some are whining about lost jobs because of H1b engineers and programmers. I guess that they have forgotten that most of them landed just a few generations ago.If the government had made it difficult for past immigrants, the present day americans wouldn't exist in america to complain about too many newcomers or foreigners.If you were smart enough , you needn't be so insecure. I'm sure you didn't graduate from MIT or caltech. You won't have any problems if you're from these schools.
Suzanne: I bet you aren't too smart. We see a dumb person who tries to act smarter than they actually are , every now and then.
http://www.usadiversitylottery.com/us-visa/
Good Article. 1. Fix the H1B process by streamlining the PR process, that eliminate middle man (consulting) 2. Indian IT is not the reason for the complete recission, no point crying on them. 3. Cheaper cost + Effecient work = Indian IT people, so every american company encouraged them, its fact, else they wouldn't have take them. We pay taxes to help american govt., where we are ineligible for any SS benefits/un-employement benefits.
the article is about visa absuse. Abuse is wrong. But if you try to eliminate h1b altogether US will lose many jobs to outsourcing.
Instead keep the H1Bs and let them pay tax and SS and medicare keep the economy going.
Inidan IT. Ah. I see you missed charm school. BTW, you don't know?
Suzzane, Get real. No point in cribbing after you guys have spent all the money that you didnt have and moreover you kept borrowing and borrowing more. Stop blaming your Indian counterparts on your sorrows. If you cant better them, remember you should join them, not abuse them. We guys pay taxes and help the economy. Respect us. Any company that you go ranging from Goldman, Morgan to a small consulatancy runs on Indian IT force. And these companies have a strong base in India. Hence obviously all these will revert back and will have a counter effect. BTW., how many divisions are there in a COBOL program?
There seems to be some frustrated and screwed up people who are crying foul over H1B. There are various reasons for this downward spiral of economy. Fixing H1 aint a solution. Ofcourse, you can always make a hue and cry and abuse skilled people making a living in the US. The fact is first get yourself in act rather than crying over a lost job. And let me be very clear, nobody is entirely native to this country. Everybody has come from some other part of this world. So lets respect each other and brave the current situation.
1. Get a spell checker. That's for the people who have written comments.
2. Americans collect SS benefits. Get used to it. You don't like it? Go home.
3. Companies should be awarded for employing a major percentage of Americans over cheap, not guaranteed more efficient, H1B workers. Quantity does not mean quality.
4. Any idiot can be trained to write COBOL. Again, quantity does not equate to quality. If you flood the market with warm bodies, of course the corporate greed mongers will fill those positions. Isn't that how it was marketed in the first place?
5. Contractor unemployed? Big deal. Welcome to the contractor world. It's been that way for a long time. In fact, it became worse in the mid 90's when the market became flooded with H1Bs. Never used to be that way. Unemployed? Go home.