Debate Now A discussion about the efficacy of Trump's merit based criteria for immigration eligibility

[Indeependent]

Discussion Rubric:
So, one of Trump's stated changes to immigration policy mean that rather than vying for jobs the low end of pay scales, the only immigrants that will be admitted will be ones who can compete at the upper middle segment of them. Well, okay....that's not doing anything helpful for people who qualify only for low-wage (or relatively so) jobs, and such people are the ones griping about immigrants "taking their jobs." Moreover, people in the skill ranges into which immigrants must now fall have long competed quite effectively against immigrants. To wit, in my firm the only reason we hire/sponsor immigrants for jobs ("H1B immigrants") is because we can't find Americans who are qualified for them and who have also applied for them.

Thread Topic/Questions:

• How much good do you think will come as a result of the "merit" criteria Trump has stipulated for aspiring immigrants to the U.S? What is the nature of the good you think it will do? How and why will the new policy produce the nature and extent of "goodness" you've posited it will deliver?

Thread Rules:

1. Support your answer with something sound and credible, i.e., a strong inductive or deductive argument.
2. Do not post an opinion -- your own or anyone else's -- that is not supported with a sound and credible argument. Include links for existential and behavioral assertions you provide to support your opinion/claims/premises about things and that are less obvious than is the mere existence (or lack thereof) of a nose on one's face.
3. Adhere strictly to rules one and two, along with USMB stipulated SDF rules.

3 million H1-Bs replaced Americans in good paying IT & software development positions.

 

[Indeependent]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

 

[Scott1952]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Census Bureau said almost half of legal immigrants cant speak good english. 15% cant speak english at all. But lets just assume so we can pull out the "phobe" card.

How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Do you know?
Yes, it's a phobe thing. Every student of a foreign language knows you don't become actually proficient in it until you are "immersed" in it by going to a country where it is written and spoken all around you. So immigrants will learn the language once they get here, if it's so important to you. Why is that?
I don't know how what you said in any way contradicts what I said.

When I was in graduate school we had visiting students from Iran, Sudan, Argentina and Mexico, usually for about a year. They had trouble speaking English but they were excellent in reading and writingEnglish. Plus, If they are at a graduate school level, most scholarly articles are not translated to Sundanese. The are usually in English French, German, Spanish sometimes and Russian, Chineseis big now.

 

[Scott1952]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

That is because most H1B visas from India was bringing in workers to work in their family business. Sometime bad Businesses see attached: Lakireddy Bali Reddy - Importer of Sex Slaves

 

[Unkotare]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

Proof?

 

[usmbguest5318]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

Proof?

He's not going to have any. The simple fact is that the Indians who come to the U.S. to work on H1B visas are among the so-called elite of India -- anyone who's got a college degree -- and they all speak fluent English. (They have to. What U.S. business would sponsor them for an H1B visa if they didn't speak English?) They may speak it with an accent and at a pace that makes it sometimes hard for our American-English-accustomed ears to readily understand until we get used to it, but it's fluent English that they speak.

 

[Indeependent]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

Proof?

He's not going to have any. The simple fact is that the Indians who come to the U.S. to work on H1B visas are among the so-called elite of India -- anyone who's got a college degree -- and they all speak fluent English. (They have to. What U.S. business would sponsor them for an H1B visa if they didn't speak English?) They may speak it with an accent and at a pace that makes it sometimes hard for our American-English-accustomed ears to readily understand until we get used to it, but it's fluent English that they speak.

I have worked with many of them.
Their English is horrendous and their code sucks.
Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?
They are cheap labor.

 

[usmbguest5318]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

Proof?

He's not going to have any. The simple fact is that the Indians who come to the U.S. to work on H1B visas are among the so-called elite of India -- anyone who's got a college degree -- and they all speak fluent English. (They have to. What U.S. business would sponsor them for an H1B visa if they didn't speak English?) They may speak it with an accent and at a pace that makes it sometimes hard for our American-English-accustomed ears to readily understand until we get used to it, but it's fluent English that they speak.

I have worked with many of them.
Their English is horrendous and their code sucks.
Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?
They are cheap labor.

Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?

Actually, no. Have you considered that your development lifecycle methodology, and your colleagues/bosses execution of it is less than first rate?

The people who staff my projects write excellent functional program specification and test plan documents and the Indian developers and non-Indian developers use those documents to write code that does exactly what the program specs instruct and that performs as expected when the code is tested prior to being implemented.

I'm sure there are subpar Indian developers, but those developers are not among the thousands employed in my firms off-shore development unit and the hundreds of Indian developers whom I've staffed on myriad projects I've managed over the past 20+ years.

 

[Indeependent]

What I'm scratching my head about is the "speak English" requirement.
How does anyone in a skilled position who does NOT speak English function effectively in an American workplace? Anyone know? My assumption is that the vast majority of those folks do speak English, or they wouldn't be coming here to work. So the law doesn't change up the type of folks who would be coming here with skills in the first place. But it sends a signal to Trump's xenophobic base.

One other question, are these PERMANENT immigrants the bill is talking about, or the temporary workers that flood the country? Or isn't there actually a difference?

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

Proof?

He's not going to have any. The simple fact is that the Indians who come to the U.S. to work on H1B visas are among the so-called elite of India -- anyone who's got a college degree -- and they all speak fluent English. (They have to. What U.S. business would sponsor them for an H1B visa if they didn't speak English?) They may speak it with an accent and at a pace that makes it sometimes hard for our American-English-accustomed ears to readily understand until we get used to it, but it's fluent English that they speak.

I have worked with many of them.
Their English is horrendous and their code sucks.
Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?
They are cheap labor.

Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?

The people who staff my projects write excellent functional program specification and test plan documents and the Indian developers and non-Indian developers use those documents to write code that does exactly what the program specs instruct and that performs as expected when the code is tested prior to being implemented.

Bullshit.
Don't even try going there.
Or perhaps the people who write the specs are mediocre.
Too bad there's way too much bad code out there for you to hide the truth.
I have too many business people in my neighborhood who say otherwise and many of them are high up in financial firms.
Indians are cheap as all hell and that's why the Board of Directors caters to their investors,

 

[usmbguest5318]

Most Indian H1-Bs do not speak English.

Proof?

He's not going to have any. The simple fact is that the Indians who come to the U.S. to work on H1B visas are among the so-called elite of India -- anyone who's got a college degree -- and they all speak fluent English. (They have to. What U.S. business would sponsor them for an H1B visa if they didn't speak English?) They may speak it with an accent and at a pace that makes it sometimes hard for our American-English-accustomed ears to readily understand until we get used to it, but it's fluent English that they speak.

I have worked with many of them.
Their English is horrendous and their code sucks.
Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?
They are cheap labor.

Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?

The people who staff my projects write excellent functional program specification and test plan documents and the Indian developers and non-Indian developers use those documents to write code that does exactly what the program specs instruct and that performs as expected when the code is tested prior to being implemented.

Bullshit.
Don't even try going there.
Or perhaps the people who write the specs are mediocre.
Too bad there's way too much bad code out there for you to hide the truth.
I have too many business people in my neighborhood who say otherwise and many of them are high up in financial firms.
Indians are cheap as all hell and that's why the Board of Directors caters to their investors,

I've no interest in getting into a "pissing match" with you about the quality of Indian developers.

There are plenty of legitimate reasons for the differences in yours and my observations.

One of the more likely ones is that my firm is a consulting firm and as such our development subsidiary in India competes with firms like TCS, Google and Infosys for newly minted computer science graduates. In the parent firm we hire no junior-level developers (programmers having fewer than six years of programming experience with a given set of languages).

The parent firm's career path is "up or out," which means that even if one's career is primarily technical, within a predefined period, one must make partner/principal or leave, and upon making partner, the only way one is going to write code is if there's literally nobody else around and there is literally no other alternative. Another business-model-driven reason we don't in the parent firm hire entry level programmes is because we bill technical consultants at rates well over $100/hr, and our project timelines assume a level of expertise that, if the developers don't exhibit it as we principals expect/assume they will, it'd be impossible to deliver projects on time and within budget. Our clients would not appreciate that and firm revenue and our client base would suffer as a result.

Since I've mentioned the above, in the interest of completeness and accuracy, I'll also note the overwhelming majority of Indians I've worked with in the U.S. are not H1B visa holders, but rather L1B visa ("specialized knowledge" employee transfer) holders. We do also have some H1B holders too, but far fewer than L1Bs. Be that as it may, the type of visa has nothing to do with the holders' skills and abilities.

 

[Indeependent]

Proof?

He's not going to have any. The simple fact is that the Indians who come to the U.S. to work on H1B visas are among the so-called elite of India -- anyone who's got a college degree -- and they all speak fluent English. (They have to. What U.S. business would sponsor them for an H1B visa if they didn't speak English?) They may speak it with an accent and at a pace that makes it sometimes hard for our American-English-accustomed ears to readily understand until we get used to it, but it's fluent English that they speak.

I have worked with many of them.
Their English is horrendous and their code sucks.
Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?
They are cheap labor.

Ever notice how often you have to update their Apps due to bugs?

The people who staff my projects write excellent functional program specification and test plan documents and the Indian developers and non-Indian developers use those documents to write code that does exactly what the program specs instruct and that performs as expected when the code is tested prior to being implemented.

Bullshit.
Don't even try going there.
Or perhaps the people who write the specs are mediocre.
Too bad there's way too much bad code out there for you to hide the truth.
I have too many business people in my neighborhood who say otherwise and many of them are high up in financial firms.
Indians are cheap as all hell and that's why the Board of Directors caters to their investors,

I've no interest in getting into a "pissing match" with you about the quality of Indian developers.

There are plenty of legitimate reasons for the differences in yours and my observations.

One of the more likely ones is that my firm is a consulting firm and as such our development subsidiary in India competes with firms like TCS, Google and Infosys for newly minted computer science graduates. In the parent firm we hire no junior-level developers (programmers having fewer than six years of programming experience with a given set of languages).

The parent firm's career path is "up or out," which means that even if one's career is primarily technical, within a predefined period, one must make partner/principal or leave, and upon making partner, the only way one is going to write code is if there's literally nobody else around and there is literally no other alternative. Another business-model-driven reason we don't in the parent firm hire entry level programmes is because we bill technical consultants at rates well over $100/hr, and our project timelines assume a level of expertise that, if the developers don't exhibit it as we principals expect/assume they will, it'd be impossible to deliver projects on time and within budget. Our clients would not appreciate that and firm revenue and our client base would suffer as a result.

Since I've mentioned the above, in the interest of completeness and accuracy, I'll also note the overwhelming majority of Indians I've worked with in the U.S. are not H1B visa holders, but rather L1B visa ("specialized knowledge" employee transfer) holders. We do also have some H1B holders too, but far fewer than L1Bs. Be that as it may, the type of visa has nothing to do with the holders' skills and abilities.

Then you have a very unique situation.
The several million H1-Bs out there are inferior.

 

[USApatriotz]

14 out of 15 immigrants depend on welfare! That MUST end! We need a MERIT based immigration system like Canada & Australia!

 

[frigidweirdo]

Discussion Rubric:
So, one of Trump's stated changes to immigration policy mean that rather than vying for jobs the low end of pay scales, the only immigrants that will be admitted will be ones who can compete at the upper middle segment of them. Well, okay....that's not doing anything helpful for people who qualify only for low-wage (or relatively so) jobs, and such people are the ones griping about immigrants "taking their jobs." Moreover, people in the skill ranges into which immigrants must now fall have long competed quite effectively against immigrants. To wit, in my firm the only reason we hire/sponsor immigrants for jobs ("H1B immigrants") is because we can't find Americans who are qualified for them and who have also applied for them.

Thread Topic/Questions:

• How much good do you think will come as a result of the "merit" criteria Trump has stipulated for aspiring immigrants to the U.S? What is the nature of the good you think it will do? How and why will the new policy produce the nature and extent of "goodness" you've posited it will deliver?

Thread Rules:

1. Support your answer with something sound and credible, i.e., a strong inductive or deductive argument.
2. Do not post an opinion -- your own or anyone else's -- that is not supported with a sound and credible argument. Include links for existential and behavioral assertions you provide to support your opinion/claims/premises about things and that are less obvious than is the mere existence (or lack thereof) of a nose on one's face.
3. Adhere strictly to rules one and two, along with USMB stipulated SDF rules.

The problem is these educated people will just take the jobs of the educated, because education in the US isn't sufficient.