And of course the objections to your idea highlight the point that hb1s have generally not been about finding people with unique skills but rather about getting cheap labor on a tight leash.
Maybe you should have paid them as much as what they would make at Google then. Having to compete on salary,benefits, and working environment is the true meaning of an open and free market, not a rigged market as the current H-1B system is.
Google in a hypothetical case would then offer a lower salary to cover the visa cost, and/or deem it too much trouble to bring the H-1B on board. This leaves the H-1B worker operating in a suboptimal market. The issue of visa fees does not confront the H-1B employee, only the employer which sponsored them in the first place. Besides it should cost slighly more to bring in an H-1B than current parket rates. Maybe then more natives would be hired.
Is should be slightly more expensive to bring in immigrants
because one of the governments missions voters expect is to ensure that there is a job market where there are good well-paying jobs, not a market where it is flooded with immigrants that have driven down wages. Having American citizens and green card holders idled or having to work in a lower paying job is not a true free market because only the employers are benefiting.
Once the domestic pool of potential employers has dried up, then employers will bring in the slightly more expensive foreign labor.
Sizeable number of visa interviews sponsored by startups are rejected at the consulate. They find it very difficult to differentiate an authentic startup from a phony body shop.
The issue is that companies won't take on the risk and hassle of sponsoring a visa. Employees will arbitrage this by taking any job they can get until they can get sponsored, then leave.
It's not necessarily about pay, it's about wanting to work for a big name like Google.
I think the best solution, as others have suggested, is that the new employer has to buy out the visa costs. This is the deal I made when my employer paid to relocate me to the Bay Area -- if I left in the first two years, I would have had to repay my moving costs.
And of course the objections to your idea highlight the point that hb1s have generally not been about finding people with unique skills but rather about getting cheap labor on a tight leash.