I'll say this, if the democrats had taken over in the 2024 elections, we wouldn't have a debate like this - them and the RINOs would have settled it in a back room somewhere. Open-air debates are good and thank God for the miracle of Trump moving his head at the last second...
Yes, Mick, the vigor and openness of this debate (whatever nastiness at times intrudes into it), is great to see. Watching Elon get schooled by the unwashed masses on is own platform is actually quite exhilarating. Woo-hoo!
Don’t you just love the way those outside of Trump world( still reeling from his victory) are couching the visa disagreements as ‘civil war ‘ in the MAGA movement. No, this is what honest debate looks like. It’s going to be messy because representative democracy is messy and having candid, uncomfortable but well intentioned disagreements among those who want to make a better country is the lifeblood of a free and independent thinking citizenry. The very fact that people in the new Republican Party can air these differences freely, sets them apart from the Democrat party which is famous for its robotic, lockstep unanimity… even as they walk synchronously off the cliff.
The Left always wanted to paint the Right as being anti immigration just because we are pro legal immigration. The truth is America First doesn’t mean you only ever have native born citizens do any and all jobs. It means let’s do what is necessary to make the country great. What’s becoming clearer is that the H1b visa program has been abused to some degree. Ok, so let’s not throw babies out with bath water and let’s make sure the process is more just and meritocratic and that in the effort to get the best and brightest we don’t discriminate against native born citizens and/ or create more chain migration. It can be done with legislative adjustments from the new congress so let’s get to it. And let’s revel in the reinvigoration of real debate amongst all participants in the quest to make this country as good as it can be.
Bingo and thank you! H1B is very complicated in a lot of ways. Importantly, this debate is "allowed" by the Right and not forbidden, subject to cancelation, as it would probably be on the Left. This is actually healthy and hopefully smart people with influence are paying attention.
Sasha, the battle is over. MAGA won, Elon and Vivek lost. H-1B, despite whatever fig leaf justifications have been used in the past to defend it as filling gaps in our tech workforce, has been revealed to be a lie. It is little more than a form of high tech indentured servitude in which moderately skilled third worlders aspiring to a better life are brought in to work cheap, work long, and not complain, all for the benefit of "tech bros." Talented and ambitious Americans of all backgrounds (there are still more than a few of them out there) are put on the backburner in tech, the same way they have in so many other industries. Because, you know, they expect to be treated with a measure of respect as workers, and that's bad for the corporate bottom line.
And when Americans dare to complain about being displaced and replaced in their own country, the bloody shirt of "racism" is waved in their face. Proving once again, that issues we think are about race are really about labor, with a racial overlay. Been that way from the get go in 17th century colonial Virginia; and the beat goes on today.
H-1B must be ended, or at least radically reformed so that it does not give "tech bros" of dubious philosophical and moral bents economic incentives to continue to undermine the American middle class. End of story.
The battle is done and MAGA far from ripped apart. When Bannon started calling for resumes and work product to prove the visa holders were superior to Americans the argument was over. The "tech bros" went dead quiet. Other than for some mealy mouth comments about maybe some reform called for.
I personally think its going to be good luck with that.
About 10 years ago I hired and H1B. I spent 6 months looking nationally for someone who could do a highly technical job for a good salary (six figures) and received a handful of mid-quality applicants. The H1B I did hire called me about 7 years later to thank me as he had just had the proudest day of his life; he became a US citizen.
I know H1Bs are abused but the US has a crappy public education system that forces many companies to justifiably rely on H1Bs from countries with good public education systems.
A few years ago, I read the exam that a porter - a porter - for the national India railroad has to take just to be considered. I doubt 1% of US public high school graduates would get more than 35% of the questions right.
Yeah I agree, the election was illegal vs legal immigration. Certainly some backing Trump wanted basically zero immigration but it's pretty unclear what percentage that is or was. I could understand reducing immigration somewhat but the main thing is stopping illegal immigration and getting that under control.
I am in a STEM industry, industrial robotics and automation. The past couple years have been pretty tough in the manufacturing sector, so business is not as strong as it could be (as you would expect with all the money printed by Joe Biden). Yet, there is a big shortage of technical people to design and operate automation systems. Maybe STEM grads want to work in research. But if they want to work on plant floors, there are a lot of jobs and will be even more if Trump can refocus policy on domestic manufacturing. The worker shortage has drive up employment costs enormously to the point where I can't afford to hire anyone. Average salaries are well over $100K. So I am not sure where all these grads went, but not into manufacturing
I too spent over 40 years in the automation business and have seen applied technologies for manufacturing in all industries worldwide. I agree with Brian that manufacturing does and will need more adept STEM graduates. The problem is largely the bad PR manufacturing gets as dumb and dirty - not anymore. Modern plants are usually very hi tech and many times a very clean environment (depending on the industry).
However, STEM grads and H1B candidates aren't the major problem. Tax laws make all the difference in the world as to where plants get located. We moved the best-selling automation controls in the US to Singapore for manufacturing largely based on favorable tax laws and favorable hiring policies there. Reshoring to the US will largely depend on tax laws under the new administration and is ability to make them stick. Placement of tech grads will follow.
The bias against white males has been a deciding factor in hiring for the last 30 yrs. This woke policy has been helpful in getting more females and minorities into the manufacturing sector but at a severe cost to the base of the country's top talent pool. If we want to decrease immigration through lower paid H1B hires, then revitalize the base of the country to strive for a meaningful education and career in "making stuff." It's what made us a great country in the first place.
Very well said. I left out the Woke / DEI piece as it gets a lot of play. But that has not helped with STEM and manufacturing. Our dumb trade policies and agreements (NAFTA, USMCA, TPP, WTO) that encouraged off-shoring manufacturing for higher domestic margins (encouraged by Big global Biz) are a much bigger factor. They are short sighted and are risking American national security. This needs to get corrected the next 4 years. I think there is bi-partisan support for it.
We need good tax laws, deregulation & also support for Industrial Policy. We should be Supporting American Manufacturing companies. All countries do it, we shouldn't be the only ones who don't.
Manufacturing has always been a red headed step child for engineering. In California we have had a huge decline in manufacturing, defense and civilian. And it’s expensive and hard to run a business in California. And so many companies outsource their manufacturing to China, producing competition that then under prices them and takes their market.
The CA situation is just sad. I am based in AZ and most of my business comes from CA. But it is an uphill battle to keep that business as much of it has moved the past 8 years, quite a bit to TX. Plz fire Gavin Newsom and get someone with common sense running CA
This is fascinating. I deeply support American Manufacturing & I buy Made in USA (usalovelist.com). I am a physician, I tell my young patients to go into skilled labor jobs.
You mentioned a shortage of technical people to design and operate automation systems. What does that mean? How can we get kids into this field? What should I advise patients & maybe also my own kids? How do they get trained in this field? is it on-the-job training or a degree program?
Thank you for asking. Young people can either get a 4 year or 2 year degree. 4 years (electrical or mechanical) is needed to get a design engineering job with a major equipment builder like Deere, ABB or Fanuc (robots). You can get manufacturing plant tech jobs and with smaller machine builders with a 2 year robotics degree. Most states have one or more votechs offering this Associates Degree. You can get your hands on equipment faster with the votech background. There are a LOT of jobs on this path and the smaller companies are generally not as woke and concerned with DEI. Here is a partial list. Living in MN most of my career, I know Dunwoody on this list very well but there are many others, like Oakland Comm College in Detroit: https://www.collegefactual.com/majors/engineering-technologies/electromechanical-engineering-technology/robotics-technology-technician/rankings/top-ranked/associates-degrees/
The education component is a tricky one. I work in an IT related industry and profession and took quite a few courses to learn about what I do. With that said I think there is WAY too much time required in higher education; to learn and do what I do it would be much more efficient to learn it in a professional environment working for a company being trained.
I see community colleges and even votech high school programs for robotics. A shorter putt than an engineering degree. Also some vendors like Google offer online courses in programming and robotics and AI. Enough knowledge to get familiar with current tech and stimulate employment opportunities. Encouraging any STEM curriculum through any level is a start to developing a new workforce that can adapt this tech to manufacturing companies. Even tech trade schools for new cars include some level of electrical knowledge that is portable to the manufacturing of those cars.
When the US began outsourcing manufacturing overseas, politicians and other elites said, "Learn to code". I myself worked days as a painter, a soldier, etc., and went to school nights and learned to code. I was able to get work in IT. But then a funny thing happened: I noticed that most IT was being turned over to Indian programmers, and it has gotten to the point where US college grads who have a degree in computer science cannot find work because there are no entry level positions available.
This is very much an 'America First' issue, and as much as I admire Elon, I am opposed to his views on this.
He is not born American. He sees America differently than natives. But he is American ideology first (Constitutional principals). He has said this many times. He spent $40B of his own money to return Twitter to Free Speech. We can't blame him if he tries to find a way to profit on that investment. So far, not so much
For that matter, the 2nd richest person, and maybe just as influential, Jensen Huang, is also not American born. He is Taiwanese as is his wife. But he loves American freedoms, including free markets. Sergey Brin is also not American born, is a Russian. But he loves what America has done for him with Google. I don't see the issue. That is the great thing about America and merit-based immigration
I am not here to attack Elon Musk, he has accomplished a great deal. He may need to bring in people with highly specialized skills and education. My own IT experience involved common business and government applications, and that field is almost completely dominated by programmers brought in from one foreign country.
Had a friend just experience this, twice. Lost first job to outsourcing to India and found a contracting job and fixed their three year old problem no one else could solve. Lost that job too.....to outsourcing.
In my workplace in March 2020, when we were told that those who can work from home must do so, every youngster split within a half hour. The older employees were scratching our heads, ok…thinking, how can I work without my office necessities? What does that say about their work ethic?
Anyone in the work force (say, like Gen X working with Millennials and incoming Zoomers) know through experience that a lot of these kids don’t respond to emails and concern themselves with what pronoun should go under their email signature. This of course, is a generalization, and not true for all, but too many of these younger employees don’t work hard. Some can’t speak the King’s English or write very well. So, there is that.
There are journalists doing a deep dive into H-1B visas and finding what happens in practically all government – a well-intended program goes corrupt because of the usual – greed - and it’s not just for tech hires anymore.
So, that said, why not allow first dibs to Americans who QUALIFY for the job? There are smart stem American kids who are underemployed because of DEI (I’ve witnessed it too many times.) But, when the hiring squad wants the best (duh) and may automatically assume the younger American is a slacker, we have problems. And we certainly can pump up the STEM training for Americans, pronto!
But the moral of the story is that human nature is self-serving always, and that’s why government becomes corrupt – who runs the government? Until we acknowledge what it is – TOO MUCH GOVERNMENT, nothing will change.
“But the moral of the story is that human nature is self-serving always,“
Human nature is too irrational for humanity to survive with the weapons we now have plus there are the whims of Mother Nature with things like super volcanoes that can destroy us all at any time. That’s why we need AI, not to rule us but to help us to survive and flourish.
Human nature is too irrational for humanity to survive "
This statement is evergreen. But yet we continue to survive even as human nature has shown no signs of changing since at least the beginning of recorded history.
Never before have we had the weapons that could kill us all. If we had the weapons we now have a hundred years ago it’s highly unlikely we’d be here now.
Yes! Precisely. This is why I am in agreement with Elon Musk that humans will evolve into cyborgs with increasing medical implantation of bio-mechanical components that are repairable / replaceable and with AI intelligence through technologies like his Neuralinks (Medtronics also has this technology for over a decade, so not just Musk) that assist injured humans, see, feel, hear and connect our minds to a network. In this way, we can even become immortal. But as we do, our organic parts, which nature dictates breakdown over time, will become obsolete and will be replaced. It is inevitable. Like Musk proposes, most likely, it will be for the good, with some small chance for evil. I won't be around for the climax and so hope younger people will benefit from this cyborg future.
“Infinite and finite, complex and simple, He is nature above nature, being above being. Maker of all, he is made in all, Unmoving, he enters the world, Timeless in time, unlimited in limited space, And he who is no thing becomes all things.” Eriugena, medieval theologian.
I lean conservative but I'm not blinded by ideology (at least I don't think I am ;) ) My spouse works in the high tech industry so he has seen first hand the positive that HB1 visas bring to our country. Like you said, I voted T because of the illegal invasion that is happening on our southern borders, not because a qualified South Asian wants to work at Google. Bannon loves dumping on Elon... he's definitely Isolationist America First. I'm not against America first, but not by shooting ourselves in the foot along the way. Controlled immigration has helped America tremendously in the past. That said, the cynical part of me wonders how much of this is psyops. Perhaps Musk is distracting the Left with this "controversy" to keep them from whining about Trump appointees. Don't the hearings start soon? I'm sitting back and not getting myself all worked up about it. Trump does love the drama, and I strongly suspect he'll go with the HB1 visas.
The single most important issue is illegals. We want all 20 million gone. We should also target legal immigrants from undesirable countries like Haiti, Syria, Afghanistan. Get rid of them, too.
That's a huge amount of work.
While that goes on, leave the H1B program. Review its effects. If it's as bad as some think, then reform it in 2027.
I think we'd all live with H1B if the first two priorities I outlined can be accomplished.
I truly appreciate the discussion on this wide ranging topic of ‘immigration’ without the absolute labeling that occurs when the other side participates. Whatever policies/actions come out of this debate I feel much more confident that the US will be a better place!😊
Great comments by your readers. Canada is an interesting country to consider. It has led the West in immigration since WW2 ended. First from across Europe, then from the Commonwealth countries and then everywhere else. There were few problems until Trudeau tripled the immigration levels in the last five years even though the economy was flatlining and is in the world's largest real estate bubble. Now, even left-leaning Canadians are fed up and Trudeau is going to suffer a historic defeat.
Progressives can implement useful policies, like immigration, but they can't be trusted to shepherd those policies in the long-term.
In 25 years, if Canada is somehow still a country, it will be about 35% White (split into two languages and many subsets), 25% South Asian (divided across many religions and backgrounds), and 40% everything else (Black, East Asian, Latino, Middle Eastern, Indigenous, mixed races). Victor Davis Hanson pointed out that there's never been a nation without one majority group that has succeeded over the long-term and it appears that he will be correct in the case of Canada. A main concern is that with AI and automation advancements there will be a lot of people with too much time on their hands and not enough money to do what they want. It's a shame, just a few short years ago, almost all Canadians envisioned a much more harmonious future.
MAGA is way too smart for this government op to fracture us. Remember?:
“The New York Times and Politico represent the best interests of the DOJ and FBI. The Washington Post represents the interests of the CIA and ODNI. CNN represents the interests of the U.S. State Dept.”
Remember @MikeBenzCyber and his lectures on how our government has controlled the narratives and media since 1948?
We - MAGA - aren't against H1B's or immigration at all, but we recognize the system has been completely politicized and controlled by 95% democrats in D.C. and their DEI bullshit as the comments above show. We recognize Bannon and Musk are right to certain points.
Here is another example from someone who has gone through the process:
Trump has a track record. His first term had two kinds of policy - the declaratory policy, which he announced in speeches, tweets, and pressers - and the actual policy which came from his cabinet choices. And what happened was that the people who enacted his actual policy totally sabotaged his declaratory policy. People are beginning to see a repeat of this. Clearly, H1-B visa imports won't make *America* or *Americans* great again - and the imports tend - especially those from India - to advantage their own ethnicity. Indians hire other Indians, and that's it, if you're not from India, you're not in the club. And that *will* set up conflict - and has in the recent past.
MAGA is just a slogan to Trump, useful to him to get power, if his choices are any indication, it's just more declaratory policy to be subsumed and sabotaged by his actual policy. The "tech bros" want H1-B people for cheap labor which can be easily exploited, worked to the bone, and then discarded - that's how they make their billions. They don't care about MAGA, either, and the cheap labor they get is roughly worth what they pay for. I've seen this firsthand, doing neural nets research - a weekend of work to get a solid result versus three years of going nowhere - and crap code to boot. But the short-term benefit is greater, at least so far as the bottom line is concerned - and that's all the "tech bros" care about. They're apatriotic and amoral, their only loyalty is to the increase of their assets, just like an alcoholic's loyalty to drink. They know no country, only their portfolio. What these guys want is cheap slave labor, willing to work under oppressive conditions with no job security, so they can minimize their cost of labor and pocket the difference - and that's how they get rich. In other words, they're predatory capitalists. H1-B visas can be easily pulled - so if people coming in under those visas try to organize a union or strike for higher pay and benefits, they're out of the door and out of the country. And that's all this is - they're bottom feeders looking for people willing to slave for them for 80 hours a week - and pay them the least they can get away with - and that, compared with what they'd get in India, is a rich man's income - in India. Here, it's a race to the bottom. If Ramaswamy and Musk want to move their operations to India, that's their choice. Note also that both of them make most of their money from the Blob - Musk has been a major defense contractor for over 20 years, see https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/department-of-government-efficiency. I wouldn't trust either of them farther than I could throw them. In fact, none of the tech guys mentioned are worth a tinker's damn, they're good at conning university-educated people into working for them on the cheap, because they come up with interesting ideas (which is up to the smart people they hire to bring to reality), but they're cunning, not smart. People who are good at doing science are easily conned into doing it on the cheap, because cutting-edge science is a high, it's an obsession, and it's really all you want to do - and the people like Musk et al know this. It's why the real science gets done by grad students and post-docs - and scientists with independent means (like, for example, Alan Rockefeller). Untenured faculty have to engage in politics - the academic type, which makes Capitol Hill look like a Sunday School, and they have to stick tightly within the established orthodoxy and not come up with any new ideas - and by the time they get tenure, they're so firmly stuck within the orthodoxy that they *can't* come up with new ideas. Go look for Thomas Kuhn's "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" for details - it's an explanation of why physics has been chasing down the infinite and lucrative rabbit hole of "string theory" for the past 40 years - they're the descendants of the people who claimed that planetary orbits were circular, and added epicycles to explain away the aberrations in their theory...If the US is to become a nation again, those types have to go to the side of the road, otherwise it's just more self-interested sabotage - and we've seen this before.
You make some excellent points but in the future please divide your posts into much smaller and spaced paragraphs. Massive walls of texts are difficult to read and downright impossible on a mobile device.
Noted. I generally don't use phones to read text, that's what desktop machines, or laptops or tablets are for, phones are for short texts or conversation - or as hotspots for laptops or tablets. And "massive walls" are difficult for those with short attention spans, and in that case, it's important not to have short attention spans... for any number of reasons. Last week, I read Alexei Navalny's memoir, Patriot, in three days - 480 pages. People with short attention spans would find that impossible. Attention span is important for reasoned thinking, making critical analyses of arguments, and so forth, skills which are lacking in our current society which is based on reflexive emotional responses, elicited by reaction to certain stimuli. The latter makes people vulnerable to amygdala hijack with its consequences: https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/fear-outrage-amygdala-hijack-social
Thanks. It has nothing to do with attention span. It's more to do with my aging eyes. There's a reason why paragraphing is an important element in standard written English. In my case in fact I was able to put it in Wordpad and divide it up.
Looking at black type on white screens is inherently tiring to the eyes, which is why I use white - or off-white - type on dark backgrounds, it's that nasty blue light which messes things up. Not so for print, I can easily read the typefaces in 18th and 17th century printed documents - and some of those are pretty tiny. Caslon and Garamond are favorites, I prefer serif fonts as opposed to the sans-serif which you see here.
The coalition that resulted in the election of Donald Trump is both incredibly powerful and terrifyingly fragile. In my more cynical moments, I believe that the only thing we have in common is that, unlike the rest of the country, we have held on to our sanity. We are "normal America" in all its diversity, which means that there are issues at every level on which we will disagree with each other, even on issues very close to our hearts, and which we consider non-negotiable.
But we MUST negotiate, even over non-negotiables. Tucker's interview with the head of the Teamsters' Union is remarkably eye-opening to the significance of negotiation and compromise.
When Hurricane Helene devastated Appalachia, neighbors pulled together regardless of unresolved disagreements. As horrendous as the hurricane was, the enemy that President Trump and his allies and supporters face is potentially orders of magnitude more dangerous. Ben Franklin said it best: “We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.”
I think that the H1B discussion was necessary and healthy. Since at least the 80s the working class, farmers and middle class have seen their country strip mined & sent overseas. We have built up the middle class of China and India on the backs of the middle & working class in the US. An easy way to stop that is to compensate US workers appropriately. Why have wages been flat for at least 20 years? Why have more jobs in the past few years gone to non-citizens in the US instead of citizens? Why is there a crisis of young men "not launching?" These are all healthy things to discuss & fix. Not just another big government or tech fix that makes more billionaires and fewer good middle class jobs for citizens.
It looks like there are different reasons why we have foreigners being put in these jobs because they are willing to work for less.
I agree that we need to be competitive in this high tech job market. We need these people.
The problem is also that we don’t have children who are qualified to enter into these jobs! As an example: I live in Oregon where the former Governor( extreme Left) lowered the requirements for students to graduate( to be fair to the nonwhite kids)! We are the fourth worst State for Education. It’s these ill guided attitudes from the far left. DEI and the anti White attitude is also part of this problem. It will take decades to fix this broken education system.
We need to stop the infighting within the party! We are grown- ups! Let’s act that way! Use your common sense!
The talking-heads and wannabe influencers are vying for a seat at the table of the incoming admin…it’s who they are…it’s to be expected! The mockingbird media has grabbed on to “civil war” just like they grabbed on to “existential threat” and others…same old, same old…
Not to worry…it’s called debate, and it’s healthy.
I'll say this, if the democrats had taken over in the 2024 elections, we wouldn't have a debate like this - them and the RINOs would have settled it in a back room somewhere. Open-air debates are good and thank God for the miracle of Trump moving his head at the last second...
Yes, Mick, the vigor and openness of this debate (whatever nastiness at times intrudes into it), is great to see. Watching Elon get schooled by the unwashed masses on is own platform is actually quite exhilarating. Woo-hoo!
Don’t you just love the way those outside of Trump world( still reeling from his victory) are couching the visa disagreements as ‘civil war ‘ in the MAGA movement. No, this is what honest debate looks like. It’s going to be messy because representative democracy is messy and having candid, uncomfortable but well intentioned disagreements among those who want to make a better country is the lifeblood of a free and independent thinking citizenry. The very fact that people in the new Republican Party can air these differences freely, sets them apart from the Democrat party which is famous for its robotic, lockstep unanimity… even as they walk synchronously off the cliff.
The Left always wanted to paint the Right as being anti immigration just because we are pro legal immigration. The truth is America First doesn’t mean you only ever have native born citizens do any and all jobs. It means let’s do what is necessary to make the country great. What’s becoming clearer is that the H1b visa program has been abused to some degree. Ok, so let’s not throw babies out with bath water and let’s make sure the process is more just and meritocratic and that in the effort to get the best and brightest we don’t discriminate against native born citizens and/ or create more chain migration. It can be done with legislative adjustments from the new congress so let’s get to it. And let’s revel in the reinvigoration of real debate amongst all participants in the quest to make this country as good as it can be.
Bingo and thank you! H1B is very complicated in a lot of ways. Importantly, this debate is "allowed" by the Right and not forbidden, subject to cancelation, as it would probably be on the Left. This is actually healthy and hopefully smart people with influence are paying attention.
Great take, Rooster.
Thank you sir.
Sasha, the battle is over. MAGA won, Elon and Vivek lost. H-1B, despite whatever fig leaf justifications have been used in the past to defend it as filling gaps in our tech workforce, has been revealed to be a lie. It is little more than a form of high tech indentured servitude in which moderately skilled third worlders aspiring to a better life are brought in to work cheap, work long, and not complain, all for the benefit of "tech bros." Talented and ambitious Americans of all backgrounds (there are still more than a few of them out there) are put on the backburner in tech, the same way they have in so many other industries. Because, you know, they expect to be treated with a measure of respect as workers, and that's bad for the corporate bottom line.
And when Americans dare to complain about being displaced and replaced in their own country, the bloody shirt of "racism" is waved in their face. Proving once again, that issues we think are about race are really about labor, with a racial overlay. Been that way from the get go in 17th century colonial Virginia; and the beat goes on today.
H-1B must be ended, or at least radically reformed so that it does not give "tech bros" of dubious philosophical and moral bents economic incentives to continue to undermine the American middle class. End of story.
I am all for radical transformation of H1b. I can see the benefit, but there is no reason to import hacks to work for lower wages.
Google doesn't need to hire hacks to save a few pennies on payroll.
The battle is done and MAGA far from ripped apart. When Bannon started calling for resumes and work product to prove the visa holders were superior to Americans the argument was over. The "tech bros" went dead quiet. Other than for some mealy mouth comments about maybe some reform called for.
I personally think its going to be good luck with that.
End of story? Please...
About 10 years ago I hired and H1B. I spent 6 months looking nationally for someone who could do a highly technical job for a good salary (six figures) and received a handful of mid-quality applicants. The H1B I did hire called me about 7 years later to thank me as he had just had the proudest day of his life; he became a US citizen.
I know H1Bs are abused but the US has a crappy public education system that forces many companies to justifiably rely on H1Bs from countries with good public education systems.
A few years ago, I read the exam that a porter - a porter - for the national India railroad has to take just to be considered. I doubt 1% of US public high school graduates would get more than 35% of the questions right.
Yeah I agree, the election was illegal vs legal immigration. Certainly some backing Trump wanted basically zero immigration but it's pretty unclear what percentage that is or was. I could understand reducing immigration somewhat but the main thing is stopping illegal immigration and getting that under control.
Among stem graduates the fake shortage of stem graduates has been a hot button issue for 40 years. H1b’s just added rocket fuel to the debate.
Per the census bureau only 28% of stem graduates work in stem:
https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/06/does-majoring-in-stem-lead-to-stem-job-after-graduation.html
I am in a STEM industry, industrial robotics and automation. The past couple years have been pretty tough in the manufacturing sector, so business is not as strong as it could be (as you would expect with all the money printed by Joe Biden). Yet, there is a big shortage of technical people to design and operate automation systems. Maybe STEM grads want to work in research. But if they want to work on plant floors, there are a lot of jobs and will be even more if Trump can refocus policy on domestic manufacturing. The worker shortage has drive up employment costs enormously to the point where I can't afford to hire anyone. Average salaries are well over $100K. So I am not sure where all these grads went, but not into manufacturing
I too spent over 40 years in the automation business and have seen applied technologies for manufacturing in all industries worldwide. I agree with Brian that manufacturing does and will need more adept STEM graduates. The problem is largely the bad PR manufacturing gets as dumb and dirty - not anymore. Modern plants are usually very hi tech and many times a very clean environment (depending on the industry).
However, STEM grads and H1B candidates aren't the major problem. Tax laws make all the difference in the world as to where plants get located. We moved the best-selling automation controls in the US to Singapore for manufacturing largely based on favorable tax laws and favorable hiring policies there. Reshoring to the US will largely depend on tax laws under the new administration and is ability to make them stick. Placement of tech grads will follow.
The bias against white males has been a deciding factor in hiring for the last 30 yrs. This woke policy has been helpful in getting more females and minorities into the manufacturing sector but at a severe cost to the base of the country's top talent pool. If we want to decrease immigration through lower paid H1B hires, then revitalize the base of the country to strive for a meaningful education and career in "making stuff." It's what made us a great country in the first place.
Very well said. I left out the Woke / DEI piece as it gets a lot of play. But that has not helped with STEM and manufacturing. Our dumb trade policies and agreements (NAFTA, USMCA, TPP, WTO) that encouraged off-shoring manufacturing for higher domestic margins (encouraged by Big global Biz) are a much bigger factor. They are short sighted and are risking American national security. This needs to get corrected the next 4 years. I think there is bi-partisan support for it.
We need good tax laws, deregulation & also support for Industrial Policy. We should be Supporting American Manufacturing companies. All countries do it, we shouldn't be the only ones who don't.
Manufacturing has always been a red headed step child for engineering. In California we have had a huge decline in manufacturing, defense and civilian. And it’s expensive and hard to run a business in California. And so many companies outsource their manufacturing to China, producing competition that then under prices them and takes their market.
The CA situation is just sad. I am based in AZ and most of my business comes from CA. But it is an uphill battle to keep that business as much of it has moved the past 8 years, quite a bit to TX. Plz fire Gavin Newsom and get someone with common sense running CA
This is fascinating. I deeply support American Manufacturing & I buy Made in USA (usalovelist.com). I am a physician, I tell my young patients to go into skilled labor jobs.
You mentioned a shortage of technical people to design and operate automation systems. What does that mean? How can we get kids into this field? What should I advise patients & maybe also my own kids? How do they get trained in this field? is it on-the-job training or a degree program?
Thank you for asking. Young people can either get a 4 year or 2 year degree. 4 years (electrical or mechanical) is needed to get a design engineering job with a major equipment builder like Deere, ABB or Fanuc (robots). You can get manufacturing plant tech jobs and with smaller machine builders with a 2 year robotics degree. Most states have one or more votechs offering this Associates Degree. You can get your hands on equipment faster with the votech background. There are a LOT of jobs on this path and the smaller companies are generally not as woke and concerned with DEI. Here is a partial list. Living in MN most of my career, I know Dunwoody on this list very well but there are many others, like Oakland Comm College in Detroit: https://www.collegefactual.com/majors/engineering-technologies/electromechanical-engineering-technology/robotics-technology-technician/rankings/top-ranked/associates-degrees/
The education component is a tricky one. I work in an IT related industry and profession and took quite a few courses to learn about what I do. With that said I think there is WAY too much time required in higher education; to learn and do what I do it would be much more efficient to learn it in a professional environment working for a company being trained.
I see community colleges and even votech high school programs for robotics. A shorter putt than an engineering degree. Also some vendors like Google offer online courses in programming and robotics and AI. Enough knowledge to get familiar with current tech and stimulate employment opportunities. Encouraging any STEM curriculum through any level is a start to developing a new workforce that can adapt this tech to manufacturing companies. Even tech trade schools for new cars include some level of electrical knowledge that is portable to the manufacturing of those cars.
Bring it, Ray, I'm guessing you gots the facts.
When the US began outsourcing manufacturing overseas, politicians and other elites said, "Learn to code". I myself worked days as a painter, a soldier, etc., and went to school nights and learned to code. I was able to get work in IT. But then a funny thing happened: I noticed that most IT was being turned over to Indian programmers, and it has gotten to the point where US college grads who have a degree in computer science cannot find work because there are no entry level positions available.
This is very much an 'America First' issue, and as much as I admire Elon, I am opposed to his views on this.
That's 'cuz Elon is not really "America First." He's Elon First. I like the guy, but let's be honest. And remember that going forward.
He is not born American. He sees America differently than natives. But he is American ideology first (Constitutional principals). He has said this many times. He spent $40B of his own money to return Twitter to Free Speech. We can't blame him if he tries to find a way to profit on that investment. So far, not so much
For that matter, the 2nd richest person, and maybe just as influential, Jensen Huang, is also not American born. He is Taiwanese as is his wife. But he loves American freedoms, including free markets. Sergey Brin is also not American born, is a Russian. But he loves what America has done for him with Google. I don't see the issue. That is the great thing about America and merit-based immigration
I am not here to attack Elon Musk, he has accomplished a great deal. He may need to bring in people with highly specialized skills and education. My own IT experience involved common business and government applications, and that field is almost completely dominated by programmers brought in from one foreign country.
Had a friend just experience this, twice. Lost first job to outsourcing to India and found a contracting job and fixed their three year old problem no one else could solve. Lost that job too.....to outsourcing.
Yes it's a real issue. I have watched American programmers teach Indian techies all they know and then be turned loose.
In my workplace in March 2020, when we were told that those who can work from home must do so, every youngster split within a half hour. The older employees were scratching our heads, ok…thinking, how can I work without my office necessities? What does that say about their work ethic?
Anyone in the work force (say, like Gen X working with Millennials and incoming Zoomers) know through experience that a lot of these kids don’t respond to emails and concern themselves with what pronoun should go under their email signature. This of course, is a generalization, and not true for all, but too many of these younger employees don’t work hard. Some can’t speak the King’s English or write very well. So, there is that.
There are journalists doing a deep dive into H-1B visas and finding what happens in practically all government – a well-intended program goes corrupt because of the usual – greed - and it’s not just for tech hires anymore.
So, that said, why not allow first dibs to Americans who QUALIFY for the job? There are smart stem American kids who are underemployed because of DEI (I’ve witnessed it too many times.) But, when the hiring squad wants the best (duh) and may automatically assume the younger American is a slacker, we have problems. And we certainly can pump up the STEM training for Americans, pronto!
But the moral of the story is that human nature is self-serving always, and that’s why government becomes corrupt – who runs the government? Until we acknowledge what it is – TOO MUCH GOVERNMENT, nothing will change.
“But the moral of the story is that human nature is self-serving always,“
Human nature is too irrational for humanity to survive with the weapons we now have plus there are the whims of Mother Nature with things like super volcanoes that can destroy us all at any time. That’s why we need AI, not to rule us but to help us to survive and flourish.
"
Human nature is too irrational for humanity to survive "
This statement is evergreen. But yet we continue to survive even as human nature has shown no signs of changing since at least the beginning of recorded history.
Yep, Homo Sapiens: 150,000-200,000 years old, and still going strong!
Never before have we had the weapons that could kill us all. If we had the weapons we now have a hundred years ago it’s highly unlikely we’d be here now.
Yes! Precisely. This is why I am in agreement with Elon Musk that humans will evolve into cyborgs with increasing medical implantation of bio-mechanical components that are repairable / replaceable and with AI intelligence through technologies like his Neuralinks (Medtronics also has this technology for over a decade, so not just Musk) that assist injured humans, see, feel, hear and connect our minds to a network. In this way, we can even become immortal. But as we do, our organic parts, which nature dictates breakdown over time, will become obsolete and will be replaced. It is inevitable. Like Musk proposes, most likely, it will be for the good, with some small chance for evil. I won't be around for the climax and so hope younger people will benefit from this cyborg future.
Do you believe in God of the bible?
“Infinite and finite, complex and simple, He is nature above nature, being above being. Maker of all, he is made in all, Unmoving, he enters the world, Timeless in time, unlimited in limited space, And he who is no thing becomes all things.” Eriugena, medieval theologian.
I lean conservative but I'm not blinded by ideology (at least I don't think I am ;) ) My spouse works in the high tech industry so he has seen first hand the positive that HB1 visas bring to our country. Like you said, I voted T because of the illegal invasion that is happening on our southern borders, not because a qualified South Asian wants to work at Google. Bannon loves dumping on Elon... he's definitely Isolationist America First. I'm not against America first, but not by shooting ourselves in the foot along the way. Controlled immigration has helped America tremendously in the past. That said, the cynical part of me wonders how much of this is psyops. Perhaps Musk is distracting the Left with this "controversy" to keep them from whining about Trump appointees. Don't the hearings start soon? I'm sitting back and not getting myself all worked up about it. Trump does love the drama, and I strongly suspect he'll go with the HB1 visas.
The single most important issue is illegals. We want all 20 million gone. We should also target legal immigrants from undesirable countries like Haiti, Syria, Afghanistan. Get rid of them, too.
That's a huge amount of work.
While that goes on, leave the H1B program. Review its effects. If it's as bad as some think, then reform it in 2027.
I think we'd all live with H1B if the first two priorities I outlined can be accomplished.
I truly appreciate the discussion on this wide ranging topic of ‘immigration’ without the absolute labeling that occurs when the other side participates. Whatever policies/actions come out of this debate I feel much more confident that the US will be a better place!😊
Great comments by your readers. Canada is an interesting country to consider. It has led the West in immigration since WW2 ended. First from across Europe, then from the Commonwealth countries and then everywhere else. There were few problems until Trudeau tripled the immigration levels in the last five years even though the economy was flatlining and is in the world's largest real estate bubble. Now, even left-leaning Canadians are fed up and Trudeau is going to suffer a historic defeat.
Progressives can implement useful policies, like immigration, but they can't be trusted to shepherd those policies in the long-term.
In 25 years, if Canada is somehow still a country, it will be about 35% White (split into two languages and many subsets), 25% South Asian (divided across many religions and backgrounds), and 40% everything else (Black, East Asian, Latino, Middle Eastern, Indigenous, mixed races). Victor Davis Hanson pointed out that there's never been a nation without one majority group that has succeeded over the long-term and it appears that he will be correct in the case of Canada. A main concern is that with AI and automation advancements there will be a lot of people with too much time on their hands and not enough money to do what they want. It's a shame, just a few short years ago, almost all Canadians envisioned a much more harmonious future.
MAGA is way too smart for this government op to fracture us. Remember?:
“The New York Times and Politico represent the best interests of the DOJ and FBI. The Washington Post represents the interests of the CIA and ODNI. CNN represents the interests of the U.S. State Dept.”
Remember @MikeBenzCyber and his lectures on how our government has controlled the narratives and media since 1948?
We - MAGA - aren't against H1B's or immigration at all, but we recognize the system has been completely politicized and controlled by 95% democrats in D.C. and their DEI bullshit as the comments above show. We recognize Bannon and Musk are right to certain points.
Here is another example from someone who has gone through the process:
https://x.com/johnkonrad/status/1872817287855567358
Trump has a track record. His first term had two kinds of policy - the declaratory policy, which he announced in speeches, tweets, and pressers - and the actual policy which came from his cabinet choices. And what happened was that the people who enacted his actual policy totally sabotaged his declaratory policy. People are beginning to see a repeat of this. Clearly, H1-B visa imports won't make *America* or *Americans* great again - and the imports tend - especially those from India - to advantage their own ethnicity. Indians hire other Indians, and that's it, if you're not from India, you're not in the club. And that *will* set up conflict - and has in the recent past.
MAGA is just a slogan to Trump, useful to him to get power, if his choices are any indication, it's just more declaratory policy to be subsumed and sabotaged by his actual policy. The "tech bros" want H1-B people for cheap labor which can be easily exploited, worked to the bone, and then discarded - that's how they make their billions. They don't care about MAGA, either, and the cheap labor they get is roughly worth what they pay for. I've seen this firsthand, doing neural nets research - a weekend of work to get a solid result versus three years of going nowhere - and crap code to boot. But the short-term benefit is greater, at least so far as the bottom line is concerned - and that's all the "tech bros" care about. They're apatriotic and amoral, their only loyalty is to the increase of their assets, just like an alcoholic's loyalty to drink. They know no country, only their portfolio. What these guys want is cheap slave labor, willing to work under oppressive conditions with no job security, so they can minimize their cost of labor and pocket the difference - and that's how they get rich. In other words, they're predatory capitalists. H1-B visas can be easily pulled - so if people coming in under those visas try to organize a union or strike for higher pay and benefits, they're out of the door and out of the country. And that's all this is - they're bottom feeders looking for people willing to slave for them for 80 hours a week - and pay them the least they can get away with - and that, compared with what they'd get in India, is a rich man's income - in India. Here, it's a race to the bottom. If Ramaswamy and Musk want to move their operations to India, that's their choice. Note also that both of them make most of their money from the Blob - Musk has been a major defense contractor for over 20 years, see https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/department-of-government-efficiency. I wouldn't trust either of them farther than I could throw them. In fact, none of the tech guys mentioned are worth a tinker's damn, they're good at conning university-educated people into working for them on the cheap, because they come up with interesting ideas (which is up to the smart people they hire to bring to reality), but they're cunning, not smart. People who are good at doing science are easily conned into doing it on the cheap, because cutting-edge science is a high, it's an obsession, and it's really all you want to do - and the people like Musk et al know this. It's why the real science gets done by grad students and post-docs - and scientists with independent means (like, for example, Alan Rockefeller). Untenured faculty have to engage in politics - the academic type, which makes Capitol Hill look like a Sunday School, and they have to stick tightly within the established orthodoxy and not come up with any new ideas - and by the time they get tenure, they're so firmly stuck within the orthodoxy that they *can't* come up with new ideas. Go look for Thomas Kuhn's "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" for details - it's an explanation of why physics has been chasing down the infinite and lucrative rabbit hole of "string theory" for the past 40 years - they're the descendants of the people who claimed that planetary orbits were circular, and added epicycles to explain away the aberrations in their theory...If the US is to become a nation again, those types have to go to the side of the road, otherwise it's just more self-interested sabotage - and we've seen this before.
You make some excellent points but in the future please divide your posts into much smaller and spaced paragraphs. Massive walls of texts are difficult to read and downright impossible on a mobile device.
Noted. I generally don't use phones to read text, that's what desktop machines, or laptops or tablets are for, phones are for short texts or conversation - or as hotspots for laptops or tablets. And "massive walls" are difficult for those with short attention spans, and in that case, it's important not to have short attention spans... for any number of reasons. Last week, I read Alexei Navalny's memoir, Patriot, in three days - 480 pages. People with short attention spans would find that impossible. Attention span is important for reasoned thinking, making critical analyses of arguments, and so forth, skills which are lacking in our current society which is based on reflexive emotional responses, elicited by reaction to certain stimuli. The latter makes people vulnerable to amygdala hijack with its consequences: https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/fear-outrage-amygdala-hijack-social
Thanks. It has nothing to do with attention span. It's more to do with my aging eyes. There's a reason why paragraphing is an important element in standard written English. In my case in fact I was able to put it in Wordpad and divide it up.
Looking at black type on white screens is inherently tiring to the eyes, which is why I use white - or off-white - type on dark backgrounds, it's that nasty blue light which messes things up. Not so for print, I can easily read the typefaces in 18th and 17th century printed documents - and some of those are pretty tiny. Caslon and Garamond are favorites, I prefer serif fonts as opposed to the sans-serif which you see here.
The coalition that resulted in the election of Donald Trump is both incredibly powerful and terrifyingly fragile. In my more cynical moments, I believe that the only thing we have in common is that, unlike the rest of the country, we have held on to our sanity. We are "normal America" in all its diversity, which means that there are issues at every level on which we will disagree with each other, even on issues very close to our hearts, and which we consider non-negotiable.
But we MUST negotiate, even over non-negotiables. Tucker's interview with the head of the Teamsters' Union is remarkably eye-opening to the significance of negotiation and compromise.
When Hurricane Helene devastated Appalachia, neighbors pulled together regardless of unresolved disagreements. As horrendous as the hurricane was, the enemy that President Trump and his allies and supporters face is potentially orders of magnitude more dangerous. Ben Franklin said it best: “We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.”
I think that the H1B discussion was necessary and healthy. Since at least the 80s the working class, farmers and middle class have seen their country strip mined & sent overseas. We have built up the middle class of China and India on the backs of the middle & working class in the US. An easy way to stop that is to compensate US workers appropriately. Why have wages been flat for at least 20 years? Why have more jobs in the past few years gone to non-citizens in the US instead of citizens? Why is there a crisis of young men "not launching?" These are all healthy things to discuss & fix. Not just another big government or tech fix that makes more billionaires and fewer good middle class jobs for citizens.
It looks like there are different reasons why we have foreigners being put in these jobs because they are willing to work for less.
I agree that we need to be competitive in this high tech job market. We need these people.
The problem is also that we don’t have children who are qualified to enter into these jobs! As an example: I live in Oregon where the former Governor( extreme Left) lowered the requirements for students to graduate( to be fair to the nonwhite kids)! We are the fourth worst State for Education. It’s these ill guided attitudes from the far left. DEI and the anti White attitude is also part of this problem. It will take decades to fix this broken education system.
We need to stop the infighting within the party! We are grown- ups! Let’s act that way! Use your common sense!
The talking-heads and wannabe influencers are vying for a seat at the table of the incoming admin…it’s who they are…it’s to be expected! The mockingbird media has grabbed on to “civil war” just like they grabbed on to “existential threat” and others…same old, same old…
Not to worry…it’s called debate, and it’s healthy.