[diogenescynic]

>Limits of any kind make no sense at all.

They are trying to protect US citizens from losing their jobs (or getting wages cut) due to a sudden availability of cheap labor. A government is rightfully concerned with making sure its own citizens are gainfully employed. Citizens vote, foreigners don't. Every person within those borders who does not have a job puts a drain on the rest of the country. Someone without a job outside of those borders does not. So bringing someone across those borders while an unemployed person is within them is a net economic negative.

Look at the biggest H-1B recipients: http://www.myvisajobs.com/Reports/2015-H1B-Visa-Sponsor.aspx It's all low quality outsourcing shops like Infosys and Cognizant.

These laws/protections are intended to prevent a race to the bottom. If the public subsidizes the operation of a company through security, education, and infrastructure, the community that makes that investment is entitled to ensure that the fruits of that investment go to other members of the community.

[makecheck]

The thing is, "protection of US citizens" assumes a lot about what actually happens to companies, and it assumes a lot about what the citizens themselves are doing.

First, are you willing to pay $500 more for every product, and $10 more for every meal? Companies have to compete, and they are responding to what is necessary to survive. If a company employs 5,000 U.S. citizens and can't compete, it may stumble and lay off 1,000 U.S. citizens, or fail entirely and shed 5,000 U.S. jobs, all because it wasn't allowed to bring in a few immigrants to grow a little.

Entire companies (and successful companies, like Google) have been started by immigrants, creating potentially thousands of jobs for U.S. citizens. There is no reason to automatically fear immigrants; many of them are brilliant people.

A lack of a paid job does not make you a "drain" on society, either! What about children? What about volunteer work in communities? For that matter, I have met some astoundingly lax and irresponsible people over the years that have paying jobs, to the point where I almost thought of them as a net negative to the company.

[diogenescynic]

>First, are you willing to pay $500 more for every product, and $10 more for every meal? Companies have to compete, and they are responding to what is necessary to survive. If a company employs 5,000 U.S. citizens and can't compete, it may stumble and lay off 1,000 U.S. citizens, or fail entirely and shed 5,000 U.S. jobs, all because it wasn't allowed to bring in a few immigrants to grow a little.

You're playing fast and loose with the facts. $500 for every product and $10 for every meal? That doesn't seem like an intellectually honest scenario. Where is that based in reality? Skilled immigration and non-skilled immigration are totally different. No one here is begrudging the immigrants picking fruits and doing farm labor. The issue is when companies lie/cheat/commit fraud to outsource jobs that Americans do want and are qualified/willing to do, all for the sake of driving down wages.

Not to mention most of those 'products' are manufactured in China already so there isn't going to be much price increasing there. Second, what a ridiculous scenario where a company has to choose between hiring 'a few' immigrants to save 'thousands' of US workers. Again, where are you drawing these examples from? Clearly not reality.

You didn't acknowledge what I said and again shifted the goal posts to another issue entirely. This is a pointless conversation if you can't even listen to the other side.

[davidw]

Throwing up walls isn't going to protect people from the US. It's a facile and ultimately unproductive response that plays to fear. The answer is to make US workers competitive in a global marketplace. And it absolutely is possible to compete on things other than price.

And while his numbers are invented, the concept is spot on: producing some things is expensive in the US, perhaps too much so to be competitive.