[bfrs]

A GC grants economic freedom to indentured servants (H1B visa holders is the politically correct term). The longer freedom is denied the more profitable it is for the corporate masters. One of the tricks of this modern day slave trade is to lobby Congress to set a quota (about 30% of the demand) on the number of people who are set free each year. For the groups with the largest numbers of indentured servants, additional quotas are lobbied for. As long as the dollar was strong and life was shit in the third world hells these people came from, this system worked. The corporate masters recognize that the game is now up.

The usual argument given for the lack of freedom for H1B visa holders is that the bureaucrats need to ensure that a H1B doesn't cause a job loss for a citizen. A pencil pusher doesn't even know what it takes to make the pencil [1] he is pushing, and yet somehow he can ensure that a citizen doesn't lose a job! The H1B visa is indentured servitude by the back door, plain and simple.

Anyone who has given some thought to the idea of protecting jobs knows it is an exercise in futility (For a start, Congress must pass an Amish decree [2]: ban all technology invented since 1830, and declare Thomas Edison as the worst job destroyer [3] the world has ever seen. Also it will have to order the arrest and lock up of all entrepreneurs aka wannabe job killers, which is most HN readers). Therefore, I suggest to do away with all the current H1B bullshit, and adopt a point based immigration system where every qualified applicant is given full economic freedom from day one!

[1] I, pencil. http://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/rdPncl1.html

Milton Friedman on "I, pencil" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Gppi-O3a8

I recall Milton Friedman calling the H1B program as just another subsidy for big corporations, but can't locate a reliable source with the full context.

[2] Family Guy 10/7 "Amish Guy" (one of those increasingly rare insightful jokes): http://www.hulu.com/watch/303946/family-guy-amish-guy#s-p1-s...

[3] Bastiat's famous "Candlestick makers' petition": http://bastiat.org/en/petition.html

Also worth reading in this context is Bastiat "What Is Seen and What Is Not Seen": http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html or (for another translation): http://bastiat.org/en/twisatwins.html

[yummyfajitas]

...indentured servants (H1B visa holders is the politically correct term)...modern day slave trade...

You are deliberately and dishonestly misusing these terms.

Slavery is a real problem in the world today. H1B visa holders are not slaves. They are free to quit and work elsewhere whenever they like. Slaves are not.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_day_slavery

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/opinion/kristof-the-face-o...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/opinion/sunday/kristof-fig...

[nanijoe]

"H1B visa holders are not slaves. They are free to quit and work elsewhere whenever they like."

I would not equate the H1B to slavery, but saying H1B holders are free to quit and work elsewhere whenever they like is akin to saying anyone is free to make a million dollars any time they want..Its true in theory, but not so straight forward in reality. For starters many employers will NOT hire an H1B holder, so that narrows your options right off the bat. The companies that do hire H1Bs will often only do that for certain positions, so your career plans had better be exactly in line with those positions..

[yummyfajitas]

For starters many employers will NOT hire an H1B holder, so that narrows your options right off the bat.

For starters many slave owners will torture and/or murder a slave if they try to escape, or don't do their work properly, so that narrows your options right off the bat.

In contrast, in the worst case, an employee on an H1B will be flown to India/China/Australia/wherever, where he is free to live his life.

See the distinction?

If you want to argue that we should replace a temporary work visa not intended to be part of a path to citizenship (the H1B) with another type of visa, go ahead. But don't do it with hyperbole that trivializes slavery.

[nanijoe]

I'm not sure why you see the need to make a distinction, when the first thing I said was that I would not equate the H1B to slavery. What you did not clarify, was your statement that H1Bs were free to get another job any time they wanted

[jbarham]

> H1B visa holders are not slaves. They are free to quit and work elsewhere whenever they like.

Red herring. H1B visa holders cannot quit their job if they want to maintain their green card application as the GC process (and multi-year wait) restarts with every job. That's obviously a very strong incentive not to change jobs.

[bfrs]

Current U.S. immigration policy can be summed up as: The only way you can immigrate is to be a bitch for an approved company for as long as it pleases to keep you as a bitch. If you are a good bitch, i.e., will work long hours and sleep under the desk without whining for janitor grade pay and no equity, and don't quit on getting a better offer elsewhere, you will be promoted to the next level: government bitch, where you can have the pleasure of paying taxes without any representation.

[gsk]

This is very well said. I was on H1B and was suffocating due to lack of freedom (oh, the irony). Moved to UK 5 years ago on a points based system, a british citizen now, working on my first startup.