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by alephnerd5 hours ago |
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upvoteby moomin4 hours ago|
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A lot of people’s problems with H1B visas has nothing to do with protecting American jobs. The truth is H1B visa are a method of exploiting foreign workers. Make H1B run for a fixed time period and not be tied to a specific job and you’ll simultaneously boost the supply of highly-skilled workers and ensure they get a fair market price.
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upvoteby alephnerd4 hours ago|
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> Make H1B run for a fixed time period

They already are.

> not be tied to a specific job

I agree, and lobbied for that on the Hill years ago but this was during the DREAM act battle [0] so it got nowhere.

> you’ll simultaneously boost the supply of highly-skilled workers and ensure they get a fair market price

I agree.

[0] - https://www.politico.com/story/2013/12/nancy-pelosi-immigrat...

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upvoteby DangitBobby4 hours ago|
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Is it hypocrisy? Or is it "I support whatever I think is good for the American consumer and America generally"? Most real people couldn't give less of a fuck about market fundamentals and purity.
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upvoteby alephnerd4 hours ago|
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There are only ~440,000 Americans employed in computer-related work [0] compared to ~4,000,000 Americans employed in the automotive industry [1], ~1,700,000 Americans in the transportation manufacturing industry [2], and ~500,000 in electronic components manufacturing [3].

More American consumers would be negatively impacted by layoffs in well paid manufacturing industries that are fairly geographically distributed like the automotive industry than an industry that is consolidated in a handful of single party states like the software industry.

More bluntly, SWEs primarily live in single-party states like California, Washington, NY, and Texas; represent a fraction of employees Americans; and work in a politically irrelevant industry (if the tech industry was actually politically powerful the H1B rule would have never been proposed). In essence American SWEs are politically irrelevant and do not matter as they cannot swing elections.

[0] - https://www.bls.gov/oes/2023/may/oes151299.htm#nat

[1] - https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iagauto.htm#emp_national

[2] - https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iag336.htm

[3] - https://www.bls.gov/iag/tgs/iag335.htm

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