Life Musings

I've often heard computer programmers and IT personnel say that the high-tech labor shortage is just a myth--that big business only supports the H-1B visa program because companies want cheap labor. They say that there is plenty of American high-tech manpower to go around, so companies are being dishonest when they say that they need to recruit from abroad. (Other high-tech workers, such as engineers, also make this claim. I tend to hear it more often from programmers and IT people though, possibly because of their sheer numbers.

I'm sympathetic to the people who make this claim, especially when they do have a hard time finding a job. I think that common sense dictates that not all computer people are equally skilled, nor do they have the same backgrounds and skill sets. It's a bit naive to say that companies should have no trouble recruiting Americans with the proper skills, simply because there are US workers out there with the right diplomas.

Moreover, I wouldn't give much credence to the claim that H-1B are simply a source of cheap labor. Don't get me wrong; I'm sure that they sometimes are. However, I daresay that the alleged 'statistics' which show that they are severely underpaid are both simplistic and unreliable.

As one article said,

Some critics point to the minimum salary requirements for H-1Bs, as given
on the labor certifications that are filed with their visa applications. We
should note, however, that these are just the minimum salary requirements, and
that the actual salary levels paid can be much greater. For example, the
National Foundation for American Policy asked a prominent law firm to examine
the salary figures from 100 randomly selected H-1B cases in their client files.
These files contained both the prevailing wage level and the actual salary
levels as reported to the USCIS. On the average, the average wage was more than
22% higher than the prevailing wage. Nor does this figure consider possible wage
increases that may have been granted after the applicant had been hired.

Additionally, we should not that your average H-1B applicant will be
fairly young-typically, a recent college graduate. As a result, these applicants
can be expected to earn much less than Americans who work in the same field.
This is yet another reason to believe that these claims of underpaid H-1Bs are
grossly exaggerated. In fact, the National Science Foundation reports that
foreign-born professionals (H-1B or otherwise) actually earn more than their
American counterparts when one compares individuals with the same ages and
degree levels, and when one considers the year in which these degrees were
granted.