[darth_avocado]

H1B is an easy scapegoat. You see people of certain nationalities on visa and think ohh the companies are bringing in cheap labor. The reality is that most of them would be citizens if the immigration laws were created equal. You wouldn’t see that many people on visa if they didn’t have to stay on it for decades.

People come from Europe all the time and become citizens, and you don’t say “ohh look at all these foreigners on visa taking away all the jobs and suppressing the wages” because they transition to citizenship and you don’t see them on visas for long.

Create a fair immigration system and you won’t see H1Bs around for long.

[ahzhou]

+1B. Unfortunately no one cares about legal immigration in the US so all this talent is sitting around for decades and wondering why years or decades assimilation isn’t enough to walk through the front door.

One of the major competitive advantages of the US is that it brain drains the rest of the world through its education system and career opportunities, but that’s starting to dwindle after a decade of neglect. US’s loss and Canada’s win, I guess.

[pseudo0]

Canada has one of the worst housing markets in the world, mediocre pay for software engineers, and a slowly collapsing public healthcare system (and private healthcare is illegal). Many of those issues are exacerbated by Canada's ridiculously high per capita immigration rate. The US has its own dysfunctions, but Canada does not look like a model to emulate.

[cat_plus_plus]

You guys have no clue about US immigration system. There are equal green card quotas for each country, which is the main merit path to citizenship. Of course some countries have a huge population or huge demand for US visas, but that still means that green cards for that country are equal in number to green cards from other countries. And for example, there are a lot of countries in Africa.

On the other hand, children of undocumented immigrants get citizenship without any quota. So there are many more new citizens from Mexico and Central America vs Europe. I am not saying they are bad citizens, but there is some rational limit to immigration that protects native culture from sudden disruption against wishes of existing citizens. So, defining what is fair is not as easy as you might think.

[darth_avocado]

It is really very easy.

1. If you want equality then apply it to H1B itself. Why is it that you want equality when it comes to green cards that give people equal rights, but not when you want to bring them in to do work? Apply country caps for H1B visa and let’s see how that works. Equality for employment green cards but not for visas is not a system of equality.

2. Apply equality everywhere else as well, family immigration especially.

3. You could design a system that is more equal if you really wanted. You are quick to blame huge populations, but also ignore the fact that countries like India and China are almost as big as Europe. Take into account the size as well if you wanted equal representation.

Defining fair is not easy, but you can at least try.

[Ekaros]

For small European country. I remember one my co-workers. He used to work in USA for some years, got green cards for himself and family, I think in months. Then returned here and simply just returned those cards.

The system truly isn't equal. And from outside is bit bizare.

[joenot443]

I think when you have a country which many more people want to live in than it can realistically sustain, you're bound to end up with a system which isn't equal. It's like a game of musical chairs with 500 people and 5 chairs.

The US has 50m foreign-born residents, the second highest is Germany at 16m. There's no country on Earth which takes in more immigrants (I'm actually one of them!) yet my whole life I've seen nothing but people demanding that they take in even more.

[rramadass]

>Create a fair immigration system and you won’t see H1Bs around for long.

You hit the Nail right on the Head!

H1B is being used as an easy scapegoat for all the ills plaguing the US labour market.