I heard from a guy who joined FB recently, his team have to leave the video connection on all day during covid wfh. So everyone in the team can see each other just like they were in the office. Thats a bit too much big brother for my liking..
If this was truly the case, then anyone can certainly renounce and become an illegal immigrant here in the U.S. themselves. Of course not a single American would even consider renouncing while planning to stay in the US in order to receive this mythical "better than citizen" treatment, it would be absurd. Thus highlighting the absurdity of that statement.
I'm Mid-Atlantic now so quite a bit cheaper to live than SF. They range from $120-$150k plus a $10-$20k bonus every year since we've been in business, with company paid for health care, 401k full matching, and all the rest of the benefits short of the gimmicky valley stuff, plus they've always had work from home and flexible hours privileges even before COVID. I only pay them because they're worth it, I'm a self funded company so we all have to catch what we eat. If we had to start charging significantly less for our product their pay would decrease in a similar ratio to our revenue. To be honest I think the H1-B route isn't worth it even if you were trying to maximize profit at all cost. It really only makes sense when you need to get someone with a high level degree to live is a crappy rural place to staff a military contract or something similar where you legitimately can't find anyone willing to do it with the quals you need. Indentured servitude doesn't yield the highest level of performance, and as you certainly know it's not only possible but likely to see a multiple X delta in productivity from a great dev vs a journeyman dev in a way you wouldn't see with, say mechanical engineers. I'd happily compete with a company that was trying to beat me by hiring H1-B workers all day long, in fact I've been involved in some interesting conversations about how that indicates a weak competitor.
I work w/a few H1B-s. The ones worth their salt did undergrad/grad in the US or Canada. It's become a giant contractor farce and a lot of the imports who've got H1Bs through their contractors don't seem to be vetted at all. To the point where I question if their CV is even legitimate. A few learn on the job, but most are just rotated out by another clone. What spooks me is these contractor companies lobbying to increase the h1b quota. Not that I fear competition, but h1b's without vetting qualifications is just a giant scam at this point. Schools abroad I fear, have caught up to it and are just churning diplomas like a paper mill.
Are these staffing some kind of federal contract? I'd tend to agree from my last few years in the military that they do use the H1-B a lot (ironically). But I also tried pretty hard to get U.S. citizens with masters degrees in ops research to fill GS-12 positions and it was impossible. You just can't force people to take the jobs where the federal system classes them so you end up going around it using contractors who in turn hire using H1-Bs because they're the only ones who will take the jobs. On the other hand, I still maintain it would be easy to out compete an H1-B staffed company in the tech startup world.
it's corporate, no US contracts. It should be easy to out compete a bad staffing company. I'll take green kids out of college with decent senior projects 8/10 times over an non-vetted F1/H1Bs w/3 yrs of experience. I struggle to get some of the f1s/H1Bs to apply new efficient methods and just get pushback because they've learned a certain way that gets the job 80% done and takes 10x as long. A lot of it lies on management and HR's lap. I swear we've had at least 2 contingents that I don't even know if they studied what they said they studied. As in they don't even know how to use excel level bad.
I applaud you, sir. And, my hope is that all business leaders have that attitude. But most corporate Tech project are not looking for the next Mark Zuckerberg. Much like the US Army is not looking for the next Captain America. They just need bodies to fill an agreed upon project headcount. Lowest cost bidder wins and we have practically snuffed the development of our local talent pool.
I'm not opposed to the hiring of H1B/f1 talent even over domestic talent, but as it stands in my company, it's ripe for fraud and staffing agencies just turn a blind eye to it. I can call a uni and get a transcript, i'm not sure most staffing agencies are doing this w/foreign workers since their business model relies on putting as many bodies out there on high paying jobs to get their cut.