Round 3: H-1B Battle - American engineers vs. senior Democrats!

If companies have shortage

If companies have shortage in Engineers, let's them have H1B worker, but they should give full scholarship in requested discipline to US teen. This way shortage will be gone in very short time and will be no need for H1B. Write to your Senator to make this a law.

If corporations do business

If corporations do business outside US, I don't see why anyone should have problem when they hire people from outside.

http://www.boeing.com/news/releases/2006/q1/060111a_nr.html

I am a H1B Holder with a MS

I am a H1B Holder with a MS in CS. In a Short Span of Five years I have developed Products and For sure Created atleast 60 more Jobs. Thats my contribution to Workplace. I have paid more than 120K In taxes thats my contribution to US. I want to Live and Work But I am sitting in the Legal GC line for ever. Unless the whole immigration and H1 B is reformed People will misuse like the way Corporate are outsourcing, Offshore Consulting gaints use H1B in a improper fashion and Last the illegal People geting Amnesty.
I am at a crossroad After Studying hard and Working Hard for Last 8 years I dont see my status and place within the society clearly defined. My Salary is stagnant for last three years and in near future I may have to go back to my home country Since USA is trying not to let me make USA my home country I am very saddened by this state of Affair

Thank you for this

Thank you for this information and summary.

I will support Senator Webb and will contact my local representatives to warn them about the destruction of the American engineering profession.

There is a conflict between nationalism and hyper-capitalism. Some other countries support their local "citizens" and their professions.

Our politicians only protect lawyers, themselves and the ultra-rich or big business. They take the money and run.

There is no debate/discussion as to why do we pay taxes to the federal government for national protection. Protection from whom?

Russia lost because it went bankrupt and was corrupt.

Most of our companies are racing to the bottom in their local, median pay, but, they are getting bigger bonuses than ever.

Our national government must do more to suport and protect its citizens rather than its corporations. Why do we ask our citizens to fight? To protect the corporation or America? Is America a collection of citizens or "place" for the headquarters of multi-national corporations?

Maybe US engineers need to organize into stronger and more vocal groups to make other voters realize thst the "high-tech-good" , middle-class jobs are leaving this country as well as our competitive infrastructure.

Many in the Congress and Senate just don't know and are not exposed to what is really going on.

Study predicts steep decline

Study predicts steep decline in IT jobs

By AMANDA PINTO

apinto@wiltonvillager.com

STAMFORD — The city is expected to see the nation's greatest loss in information technology [IT] jobs between 2004- 2015, a Washington D.C.-based think tank reported earlier this month.

The Brookings Instution report, titled "The Implications of Service Offshoring for Metropolitan Economies," found that 28 cities across the country are likely to lose between 2.6 and 4.3 percent of jobs to offshoring — higher than average losses.

CT Jobs

Stamford is expected to be hit the hardest, followed by Boulder, Colo., Lowell, Mass., San Fransico, Calif., and San Jose,, Calif., according to the report.

The impact of offshoring jobs has yet to slam Stamford, Director of Economics Michael Freimuth said.

"We have not seen that yet although IT jobs [nationally] have gone overseas," he said. "Some of the vacancy rates are reflective of a shrinkage of IT, whether it's a trend remains to be seen."

Howard Wial, an economist who co-authored the report, said Stamford has almost two times the average concentration of IT service jobs, making it more susceptible to significant losses.

The three most vulnerable positions are those seen as more routine than sophisticated — jobs like computer programmer, software engineer, and data entree keyer.

Based on labor statistics, Wial said he expects Stamford to lose between 20 and 24 percent of these jobs that existed in the city in 2004.

Fourteen cities are expected to lose at least 17 percent of these jobs during this time frame, Danbury and Hartford are also listed among those in that category.

Wial also projected that 20 to 24 percent of Stamford's multimedia artists and animators, which accounted for 80 city jobs in 2004, will be offshored by 2015.

High wages contribute to companies' desire to move jobs overseas, Wial said, but high productivity can dissuade employers from doing so.

Freimuth said while offshoring figures are troubling, they are the product of a steep cost of living, and structural changes within private companies.

There is little local government can do about these companies' decisions, he said.

"It's hard to fight, it's kind of a global change," he said, adding that offshoring is prevalent nationwide. "It's sort of an evolution that occurred, we see growth in other fields and IT ceases to be an element of that."

(Since 17% of American IT jobs will be gone by 2015 why do we need more IT workers? The answer is that we don't!!!) There is no justification for an H-1b increase. So if you are an American worker then contact your Congressional Representative.

http://www.house.gov/writerep/ )

One reason that the major

One reason that the major media will not cover this story is that they are complicit in the exploitation of this "government subsidy" program.

Back in 1993, before The Wall Street Journal began exploiting the special visa programs that arose from the Immigration Act of 1990, they covered the issue of the glut of U.S. scientists and engineers.

See: Black Hole Opens In Scientist Job Rolls, by G. Pascal Zachary, Page B-1, April 14, 1993.

A generation of physical scientists is learning that the most
important rule of nature is the law of supply and demand.

Only a few years ago, the idea of a glut of physical scientists
was considered absurd. Most politicians and educators loudly
called for more scientists, citing presumed industrial benefits.
Now with industry, academia and government labs curtailing
hiring, "no one would say there is a shortage," says Kenneth M.
Brown, resources director at the National Science Foundation.

Indeed, the oversupply of physical scientists -- chemists,
astronomers, physicists and mathematicians -- could go on for
many years. Unemployment among physical scientists is estimated
at less than 3%, but the level has doubled in three years. Math
and physics show the highest levels of joblessness in nearly 20
years. Chemists over the age of 50 and in the petroleum industry
have been especially hard hit, the American Chemical Society
says.

At the moment, biologists and related researchers appear to have
better prospects than physical scientists. That's because of the
maturing of the biotechnology industry and increased government
funding on research such as the Human Genome Project, says Betty
Vetter, executive director of the Commission on Professionals in
Science and Technology.

Among those facing the most dire prospects in the physical
sciences are holders of newly minted doctorates. Nearly 13% of
new Ph.D. recipients in mathematics, for instance, are
unemployed, the highest level since 1975.

And even young scientists in such hot areas as computing are
finding fewer job offers, forcing them to consider less glamorous
posts at industrial labs. "It used to be that the top Ph.D.s
coming out of Stanford, MIT and places like that had faculty jobs
waiting for them," says David Liddle, president of Interval
Research Corp., a private lab in Palo Alto, Calif.

The situation for scientists is so dire because of three
converging factors: cutbacks by corporations that once maintained
lavish basic research but are now concentrating on applied
development; the sharp decline in funding for some Big Science
and military research projects, such as Star Wars and the Space
Station; the availability of first-rate scientists from the
former Soviet Union.

"We are facing a classic industrial problem," says Rustom Roy, a
materials scientist at Pennsylvania State University and a critic
of generous government subsidies to scientists. "In the past, we
overbuilt capacity. . . .We don't need any more science."

Aggravating the situation is the availability of thousands of
Russian scientists who work in their native land for as little as
$100 a month. And the best of the Russians are landing faculty
posts in the U.S., in many cases edging out U.S. citizens. (A far
lesser number from other former Eastern bloc countries are too).
Major U.S. universities defend the practice of hiring Russians,
even at the expense of qualified U.S. candidates. "We want to
hire the best people we can get, period," says Lawrence C. Evans,
a mathematician at the University of California at Berkeley.

Science advocates argue that the influx of foreigners strengthens
the U.S. They say the difficulties facing many U.S. scientists
facing are temporary.

"It's hard to imagine a world where we need fewer" scientists,
says Robert Park, an executive with the American Society of
Physics who believes the U.S. can always benefit from training
more scientists.

But some struggling young physicists might argue with him.
Consider Gene Nelson, a 41-year-old physicist in Middleburg
Heights, Ohio. Mr. Nelson is an instructor at a nearby community
college earning $300 a week with no fringe benefits. He says he
can't find a better job. "I've had people say to me: Rewrite your
resume, leave out your Ph.D., and you might get a job," he adds.

In his last job, Mr. Nelson earned $50,000 a year designing
medical diagnostic devices but was let go when his employer
canceled his project. He then launched a company to supply
handwriting-recognition software for computers but left the
business after spending much of his savings. Next he sought
engineering jobs, but gave up soon after a company that makes
toilets for yachts turned him down for a post as a designer.

Mr. Nelson is qualified for many engineering jobs -- all too
qualified. Employers think he has the wrong skills. "I'm nervous
about bringing on a Ph.D.," says Ed McKiernan, president of
Sealand Technology Inc., the Big Prairie, Ohio, toilet maker that
decided against hiring Mr. Nelson. Since Sealand relies on just a
few designers, the team must hew to a conventional path. "We're
not set up for someone designing a futuristic sanitation device
for the 21st century," Mr. McKiernan says.

Still, a Ph.D. in physics carries great weight with some
companies. Microsoft Corp., a maker of computer software, employs
about 50 physics Ph.D.s. But physicists at Microsoft are writing
software, not doing physics.

Other physicists have moved into even more remote fields. After a
few years of failing to land a permanent job, Kevin Aylesworth
abandoned physics in 1992 to take a job with a law firm as a
technical consultant. Though he earns more than $75,000 by
"applying some of my specialized knowledge," he is still bitter
about his stunted career in physics and blames the science
establishment for creating the false impression that there are
not enough scientists to go around.

Unlike Mr. Aylesworth, many newly minted physics Ph.D.s will do
almost anything to stay in their field. One common practice is to
accept a series of postdoctorate fellowships, originally designed
as a hiatus between permanent jobs. Postdocs can receive salaries
in the $40,000 range plus health insurance, but often these slots
must be renewed yearly. "It makes me feel like a scientific
migrant," says Robert Zacker, a postdoc at the Naval Research
Laboratory in Washington.

Mr. Zacker received his Ph.D. in 1987 and still has never held a
permanent job in physics, even though he specialized in polymers,
one of the least theoretical branches of the field. "It wasn't
like I decided to be a poet," he says.

Some physicists have extended their scientific lives by shifting
into hot areas of research. John Quackenbush received a Ph.D. in
particle physics in 1990, then was shocked when he found it
impossible to gain a yearlong postdoctorate fellowship, no less
the teaching position he covets. After cobbling together various
grants for a year, Mr. Quackenbush began studying molecular
biology on a lark. Last year, he landed a five-year post funded
by the Human Genome Project, which sought a handful of
researchers from other disciplines.

"I'd love to be doing physics," he adds, "but I'm happy to have
the privilege of doing science."

Abundance of Ph.D.s

Though demand lags for physical scientists, U.S. universities are
producing more Ph.D.s. Chart shows the number of degrees awarded
in each category.

1991 1986
Chemistry 2,194 1,903
Physics & Astronomy 1,408 1,187
Mathematics 1,040 729
Computer Science 797 399

Source: National Research Council

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

(c) 1993 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

___________

That was 1993. Here's today's picture. Please take some time to look at the paltry salaries that Dow Jones is paying their H-1Bs in high cost of living areas.

http://beta.h1b.info/lca_search.php?
Your search for DowJjones found 5 companies, 176 approved H-1B applications and 177 jobs.

__________

See also:

"No Ph.D.s Need Apply," by Sharon Begley, pp 62-63, Newsweek, Dec. 5, 1994

"Scientist's Heated Debate on Immigration Mirrors Issues Argued Throughout U.S." by Robert Finn, The Scientist, Page 1, November 27, 1995

"We're All in this lifeboat together" Gene Nelson's speech at the National Academy of Sciences headquarters, Washington, DC - April 13, 1996

Note how old these articles are.

If the major news outlets

If the major news outlets would only cover this issue, the voters would be against it, and politicians will hear them. Most people would get mad if they found out the truth.

It's very suspicious that this story is barely covered on TV news. Nicely written here though.

I guess by the time their done with Anna Nicole and Britney breaking news, there's not enough time to cover these trivial matters.

ORGANIZATION Write Me

ORGANIZATION Write Me In

Grassroots

We the people have the responsibility to take back the control of our cities our counties and our states. And as we eventually grow in numbers we will retake the House the Senate and the Presidency. When We the People win the control of government from the political parties that have forgotten what we the people truly need from government and not the devastating agendas of the Republicans and Democrats, who have both forgotten the people, then we shall reclaim our freedoms and liberty.

Our elective process should be more about ‘what we can do for each other’, and not the ‘negative ads’ that have now become the norm. We need new blood in the political process to change the direction that the current political parties are taking and replace them all with true independents not connected to any current political party and we the people propose to start the ‘Write Me In’ campaigns nationwide.

Write me in and I will write you in. We can as a people retake government from the political parties and give it back to the people.

The goal of this web site is to enable that endeavor and offer mutual assistance to get real people into the political process that are not connected to the current political parties and offer a presence for real people.

We are united, for the people, by the people and not ‘for the corporations, by the corporations and of the corporations’ as our current party politicians are beholden to all the corporate monies that are polluting the government of our country for policies that only benefit the corporations and not the people of our country and now is the time for every citizen of this great country to take that stand and bring the goal of government to benefit the people and not the corporations.

We as a country need to take back our seats of government from the politicians that catered to the corporations and elect representatives of the people for the people that will work for the people and not the corporations. So we need to counter the status quo politico's with Write Me In candidates for all elected positions from the cities and our counties and our states then the House and Senate and Presidency will be for the people and by the people and not not beholden to the corporations for the corporations by the corporations.
We need to change the Electoral process and we need to start NOW.

Ask not what the corporations can do for you but ask what the people can do for the people.

First the city, then the county and next the state then we will have the country.

The final word from the people to the Politicians is to borrow one from the past and "Just say No to H1B's" and kick this Habit and addiction once and for all.