[drzaiusapelord]

>To date, as we all know, the H-1b system has primarily been used to arbitrage for lower wage by Indian companies

This isn't really true, or it is, but only in high profile yet minority cases.

H1B abuse is more about hiring someone at near competitive wages and telling them they're working 60 hour weeks and slowly getting rid of native workers who won't stand for that. So now your IT department is 12 people instead of 20. That's significant cost savings even if you're matching salaries. H1B's aren't typically paid less, they're worked like dogs instead. They can't easily migrate to a new employer, thus the abuse. This is the problem that needs fixing the most. The salary issue is secondary and something of a red herring as you can raise salaries but still have this abuse and it will do nothing for American workers who have been victimized by H1B abusers.

I don't see Trump or anyone addressing the indentured servitude aspects H1B creates. Considering most H1B's are clearing 80-120k, codifying 100k or more will do next to nothing. Worse, the only H1B bill I see has a 130k suggested salary but which can be contested and you can bet every HR company will do that.

These bills are mostly smoke and mirrors. H1B needs to be either completely scrapped or be re-done under a new program to allow H1B holders to switch jobs easily. Ideallym, if these people are truly hard to find hires they should be put on a fast path to naturalization and all costs paid for by the employer instead of this weird middle ground H1B currently creates where you're supposed to be super valuable but naturalization is up in the air. If it costs, say, $250k or more per head to bring them as a flat-fee and to express naturalize them, that'll stop abusive hiring I imagine. Corporations really need to have more skin in the game here and H1B's need to be naturalized quickly to avoid second class status.

[Gargoyle]

>H1B abuse is more about hiring someone at near competitive wages and telling them they're working 60 hour weeks and slowly getting rid of native workers who won't stand for that.

If the native workers won't stand for it, the wages for it aren't actually "near competitive".

[ElysianEagle]

Agreed 100%. People seem to be focused entirely on the salary aspect, but my observations match yours quite well. I've worked for almost 10 years in the industry and with numerous H1-Bs, and I can't recall anyone being underpaid in total comp (I've had discussions on pay with a good number of them). However, they were always the yes-men - working long into the night to meet some ridiculous deadline, remoting in on weekends because the boss needed something done etc etc.

[DrScump]

  near competitive wages and telling them they're working 60 hour weeks

"wage(s)" implies pay per hour worked. If you're spreading "near competitive" wages across a 50% longer workweek, the per-hour isn't actually competitive, is it?