[esturk]

That would mean Facebook would get the same quality of engineers in India vs. grad students from India that are studying in US. Frankly, this is far from the case. In fact, most grad students from India studying in the US are by far of a higher quality than just a regular engineer in India.

From what you've written, you're equating engineers as commodities (as in they are no different from each other), which is quite insulting to the actual engineers here from India and China. They are just better and Facebook knows this. They want the better quality and they are willing to pay more (than those in India) for it, but they won't go so far as to greatly inflate the salary of the entire software engineering occupation in America.

[jsudhams]

"Most grad students from India studying in the US are by far of a higher quality" --- This is completely wrong. The one who go to study abroad are definitely are the TOP 10% at all in terms are talent and quality. It is only that their parents were able to send them to additional tuitions (private coach session apart from school time) and was educated and have money send them. I myself know at least 100s students who are far better than those who go to college in USA or other countries. Please note that exceptions are the one who go to Stanford, Berkley and few top notch ones but even they only get students who have money not the one who have passed excellent scores.

[philwelch]

My point is that, for Facebook's interests alone, they would rather hire the same engineer in India than in the US because after they move to the US you have to pay them more than if they stayed in India. The effect of immigration reform is that more engineers will move to the US, which is against Facebook's interests.