Retiring from a career in tech

[Elysium]

You may be underpaid for the amount of hours you need to put in I am guessing. I know this type of environment, and the full time employees with benefits gets exploited. Consider going contracting, if healthcare is not a problem for you, meaning you can get it elsewhere. As contractor they won't ask all the extra hours unless they really need it. I can tell the when the employer is looking to exploit the potential hire, they will insist you have to be an employee because the role is a "strategic" one, and I say no thanks! That is code word for me that they expect added hours and weekend calls etc, for same pay. If you can't do contracting, then re-location to cheaper area is another option, you could get almost similar pay in east coast for experienced devops engineers/system architects, but costs are lower than Bay Area.

[Dottie57]

... because of management demands for more and more work in a smaller amount of time.

Hear, hear.

I believe these tight deadlines and due dates destroy the humanity in us.

I have a good relationship with my coworkers. Some of us even hang out during weekends or holidays.

Several years, we had a project that had fallen severely behind and everyone was under tremendous stress. Unfortunately my mother passed away right in the middle of it. I had to take a couple days off to take care of her affairs. Some of my usually very well mannered coworkers made it sound like my mother died at the most inconvenient time. I couldn't believe my ears.

Huge amounts of stress changes behavior. Sorry your co-workers were not more compassionate.

[KyleAAA]

They do it as justification for more H1Bs. Nothing personal - just business

That doesn't reflect reality, in my experience. For example, several companies I've worked for have large engineering offices in China and India. The company would MUCH rather hire locally in those countries than hire H1Bs domestically, because it would be far cheaper to do so. The financial incentive runs counter to more H1Bs.

Interesting. An ex-coworker left to work for a large tech company in the US and in his view he thought companies domestically hired H1Bs because they were cheap labor. He thought overall they were not particularly skilled. I have no first hand knowledge.

They aren't cheaper at all. And actually tend to be more skilled, IME. What is true is that non-managers without access to actual compensation data often think they are paid less when they aren't. The H1B offenders are mostly the consulting shops. Companies hiring FTE directly pretty much never pay less for H1Bs.

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

[blahblahsunshine]

I am four years your junior and just punched out from my tech career. Reading your post reminds me how fortunate I am for being able to leave the place I worked and just relax. There is only so much clock time remaining on your working career and also on your life. I'd consider the prospect of falling into the 75% of people who think they will work to 65 only to wind up not doing so. Could be you only have a handful of years in your career remaining... (I mean this in a good way) Get ready

FWIW I couldn't be happier with how things are...but I am only recently into it too.

[sjl333]

That doesn't reflect reality, in my experience. For example, several companies I've worked for have large engineering offices in China and India. The company would MUCH rather hire locally in those countries than hire H1Bs domestically, because it would be far cheaper to do so. The financial incentive runs counter to more H1Bs.

Interesting. An ex-coworker left to work for a large tech company in the US and in his view he thought companies domestically hired H1Bs because they were cheap labor. He thought overall they were not particularly skilled. I have no first hand knowledge.

They aren't cheaper at all. And actually tend to be more skilled, IME. What is true is that non-managers without access to actual compensation data often think they are paid less when they aren't. The H1B offenders are mostly the consulting shops. Companies hiring FTE directly pretty much never pay less for H1Bs.

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

[KyleAAA]

Interesting. An ex-coworker left to work for a large tech company in the US and in his view he thought companies domestically hired H1Bs because they were cheap labor. He thought overall they were not particularly skilled. I have no first hand knowledge.

They aren't cheaper at all. And actually tend to be more skilled, IME. What is true is that non-managers without access to actual compensation data often think they are paid less when they aren't. The H1B offenders are mostly the consulting shops. Companies hiring FTE directly pretty much never pay less for H1Bs.

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

[Kenkat]

I think your first step is to get yourself to the point of relative financial independence. It doesn’t have to be “50x earnings financial independence“ but rather “if I had to, I could make it work financial independence”.

Once you get to that point, you can dictate your terms to a degree. You can’t be a jerk about it, but I am going on 57 in an IT job. Unless the building is burning down, I pretty much stick to a 40 hour work week. Let the next generation take the reins a bit. That took some mental adjustment on my part but I let some other people lead a bit and it’s been good overall.

I recently switched to a slightly different focus in my specialty and under a new VP (who I’d worked for before) because I didn’t like what I was doing anymore. He kind of dropped a hint one day and I grabbed it. I subtly implied I was thinking of retiring from that company (I’m eligible now) and doing something else which perhaps led to that hint being dropped. No, don’t do that was they reply. So I switched jobs a bit - same salary band, etc. So, I’m mostly happy to keep grinding for a little longer. Mostly.

Money = options. Sounds like you are close.

[sjl333]

They aren't cheaper at all. And actually tend to be more skilled, IME. What is true is that non-managers without access to actual compensation data often think they are paid less when they aren't. The H1B offenders are mostly the consulting shops. Companies hiring FTE directly pretty much never pay less for H1Bs.

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

[m@ver1ck]

when I first came to the US in 2000, I was making 55K a year since I was working for an exploitative ‘consulting’ company.

I switched jobs within 6 months of landing in the US and then made 100K a year. In Austin, TX too.

Unfortunately that job sucked and they had layoffs - and I had to move to New Jersey in 2001 where I then made only 90K as starting salary. No idea whether that was less or more than my American peers. I did make 10K more than my French Canadian friend.

The company that paid me $100K in TX charged $400/hr for my work to IBM.

[MathIsMyWayr]

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

Now I see how easy it is for unsubstantiated stories to circulate these days. As KyleAAA implied, the number one goal of hiring managers is not to save on wages, but to hire the best candidate within the boundaries. He knows that his job is not secure like anybody else's. He has to be careful with hiring. Bad hiring decisions will leave an indelible black mark on him. Abuse of H1B program is not to be ruled out, but top tier companies have to focus on competition. Someone said at my former company "money is not an issue, but success is"

[MathIsMyWayr]

when I first came to the US in 2000, I was making 55K a year since I was working for an exploitative ‘consulting’ company.

I switched jobs within 6 months of landing in the US and then made 100K a year. In Austin, TX too.

Unfortunately that job sucked and they had layoffs - and I had to move to New Jersey in 2001 where I then made only 90K as starting salary. No idea whether that was less or more than my American peers. I did make 10K more than my French Canadian friend.

The company that paid me $100K in TX charged $400/hr for my work to IBM.

Wait, earning $100k in Austin, TX should be considered a fairly decent salary in 2000/2001. Tech was on a steep downhill trajectory. Unless you possessed high demand high level skills, there is nothing to complain about.

[KyleAAA]

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

Not a lot of employers exploit the h1b system. Only a few do. And if you report them, USCIS actually does take action. Including against Boeing. Seriously, go submit a report right now. If what you say is true it's a slam dunk action will be taken. If you actually care about preventing this exploitation, spending 5 minutes to file a report is the easiest thing you can do.

[novemberrain]

HR knows how to low ball if they are h1b. Its very true that H1B employees have less power on that area

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

This is impossible. H1Bs have a minimum salary requirement of some $60k which is roughly $30 per hour.

Your post is factually wrong

[sjl333]

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

This is impossible. H1Bs have a minimum salary requirement of some $60k which is roughly $30 per hour.

Your post is factually wrong

This was 2-3 years ago ...not recent. So min. Salaries may have changed. They posted the H1B visa salaries/contract at our job site to let everyone know H1b visa personnel were in our work force. I think it was some kind of legal requirement of some sort. The contract literally stated 55k so my math is a bit off... More like $27.50/hr.

[sjl333]

I own the budget and decide on offers. HR isn't involved in the negotiation at all. They aren't even consulted by hiring managers. And btw, they have 3 other offers even if they are on H1B. I don't have leverage. The HR tools will prevent me from entering an offer below range, but not from going over range. This is how it works pretty much everywhere in tech hubs.

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

Not a lot of employers exploit the h1b system. Only a few do. And if you report them, USCIS actually does take action. Including against Boeing. Seriously, go submit a report right now. If what you say is true it's a slam dunk action will be taken. If you actually care about preventing this exploitation, spending 5 minutes to file a report is the easiest thing you can do.

Your first statement is false and naiive IMO. Just because your company doesn't exploit the H1b process doesn't mean that other companies do not. Please do some Google research and you will see tons of info out there on how a lot big companies exploit this system.

[KyleAAA]

I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.

If true, that is HIGHLY illegal. Unambiguously illegal. I encourage you to submit an anonymous tip: https://www.uscis.gov/report-fraud/uscis-tip-form

Sure, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees in Aerospace if you break immigration and labor law.

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

They dont want to hire american workers because they cost 3x the price and usually american workers can jump ship to any other major aerospace player, and there are a lot of major players people can jump too.

Long story short, when I got hired on to the team for this specific company, it consisted of 8 US workers and 8 H1B workers. They ended up getting rid of 5 of the US workers because they were "too expensive". So only three of them were left (including myself). Some of the H1B workers got laid off as well but most of them stayed because they have nowhere else to go. But at the end, all of the US workers ended up leaving due to the shitty environment (myself included) so now the team is filled with all H1B workers.

Why would a US worker want to stay in that type of environment when demand is high right now on the defense side and we can easily just jump ship? Anyways lesson learned - never go to a commercial company run by bean counters - they will figure out a way to outsource the work if they can. Look up what Boeing has been doing. They have been creating "design centers" in Russa and India, and then they start to outsource a large amount of work over there so that they can layoff hundreds of engineers on the US side. Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article. The executives don't realize the saying "penny wise, pound foolish". Good for short term profits but very bad for long term success of the company. Boeing is a great example of this.

Not a lot of employers exploit the h1b system. Only a few do. And if you report them, USCIS actually does take action. Including against Boeing. Seriously, go submit a report right now. If what you say is true it's a slam dunk action will be taken. If you actually care about preventing this exploitation, spending 5 minutes to file a report is the easiest thing you can do.

Your first statement is false and naiive IMO. Just because your company doesn't exploit the H1b process doesn't mean that other companies do not. Please do some Google research and you will see tons of info out there on how a lot big companies exploit this system.

It is neither false nor naive. My sources are quite a bit more solid than "google research." Seriously, go file a report. It would take less time than debating it.

[knightrider]

This is impossible. H1Bs have a minimum salary requirement of some $60k which is roughly $30 per hour.

Your post is factually wrong

Aren't there also big overheads with H1B's? Companies have to pay placement costs to the firm supplying the H1B. Then there are more HR costs also. So it ends up costing similiar to a US employee.

For every good H1B there are a few that are rather useless. Even the "good" ones are really just good at technical stuff. They don't bring much out of the box thinking to the table.

[novemberrain]

For every good H1B there are a few that are rather useless. Even the "good" ones are really just good at technical stuff. They don't bring much out of the box thinking to the table.

That is equally true for non H1Bs

[geerhardusvos]

Devops might be one of the exceptions to the ageist tendency in the industry to marginalize people once they hit their 50s but I'd still consider that a factor in your decisionmaking. Contracting might be an option, you'd have more control over our schedule that way.

If you are doing long term contracts as a contractor/consultant, you will likely have less control of your schedule and less flexibility (when compared to FTE), but it does depend on the industry, role, terms, etc.

[beyou]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

There was a similar culture in NYC (I worked in IT in the financial services industry).
Problem people are facing is that these jobs in cheaper cities are often moving there with firms from Seattle, SF and NYC,
along with their associated culture. I have colleagues who moved to our new office in a low cost area complain about the hours locals are willing to work (vs what we are used to from NYC). Which culture will dominate...TBD. Better chance of a good work life balance
in a cheaper city but look carefully before you leap.

[KyleAAA]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

There was a similar culture in NYC (I worked in IT in the financial services industry).
Problem people are facing is that these jobs in cheaper cities are often moving there with firms from Seattle, SF and NYC,
along with their associated culture. I have colleagues who moved to our new office in a low cost area complain about the hours locals are willing to work (vs what we are used to from NYC). Which culture will dominate...TBD. Better chance of a good work life balance
in a cheaper city but look carefully before you leap.

I moved from Atlanta to Seattle. The work culture is night and day. And even in Seattle, it's trivial to find a company which prioritizes WLB in Seattle. Even most of the big names don't require working more than 40 hours, except maybe Amazon and FB.

[beyou]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

There was a similar culture in NYC (I worked in IT in the financial services industry).
Problem people are facing is that these jobs in cheaper cities are often moving there with firms from Seattle, SF and NYC,
along with their associated culture. I have colleagues who moved to our new office in a low cost area complain about the hours locals are willing to work (vs what we are used to from NYC). Which culture will dominate...TBD. Better chance of a good work life balance
in a cheaper city but look carefully before you leap.

I moved from Atlanta to Seattle. The work culture is night and day. And even in Seattle, it's trivial to find a company which prioritizes WLB in Seattle. Even most of the big names don't require working more than 40 hours, except maybe Amazon and FB.

One of the firms in NYC with a terrible rep for no WLB, opened an office in Atlanta to hire techs.
I doubt they will adjust as much as locals would prefer.

Surprised to see you didn't include Microsoft on your list of exceptions (I have heard it's not a great place to work, but that might
be more politics than WLB possibly, not sure).

[KyleAAA]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

There was a similar culture in NYC (I worked in IT in the financial services industry).
Problem people are facing is that these jobs in cheaper cities are often moving there with firms from Seattle, SF and NYC,
along with their associated culture. I have colleagues who moved to our new office in a low cost area complain about the hours locals are willing to work (vs what we are used to from NYC). Which culture will dominate...TBD. Better chance of a good work life balance
in a cheaper city but look carefully before you leap.

I moved from Atlanta to Seattle. The work culture is night and day. And even in Seattle, it's trivial to find a company which prioritizes WLB in Seattle. Even most of the big names don't require working more than 40 hours, except maybe Amazon and FB.

One of the firms in NYC with a terrible rep for no WLB, opened an office in Atlanta to hire techs.
I doubt they will adjust as much as locals would prefer.

Surprised to see you didn't include Microsoft on your list of exceptions (I have heard it's not a great place to work, but that might
be more politics than WLB possibly, not sure).

Microsoft is often referred to as a country club in the industry. It's famous for its excellent WLB and average tenure there is much higher than for most other large tech companies. It also pays less except at the very high levels.

[beyou]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

There was a similar culture in NYC (I worked in IT in the financial services industry).
Problem people are facing is that these jobs in cheaper cities are often moving there with firms from Seattle, SF and NYC,
along with their associated culture. I have colleagues who moved to our new office in a low cost area complain about the hours locals are willing to work (vs what we are used to from NYC). Which culture will dominate...TBD. Better chance of a good work life balance
in a cheaper city but look carefully before you leap.

I moved from Atlanta to Seattle. The work culture is night and day. And even in Seattle, it's trivial to find a company which prioritizes WLB in Seattle. Even most of the big names don't require working more than 40 hours, except maybe Amazon and FB.

One of the firms in NYC with a terrible rep for no WLB, opened an office in Atlanta to hire techs.
I doubt they will adjust as much as locals would prefer.

Surprised to see you didn't include Microsoft on your list of exceptions (I have heard it's not a great place to work, but that might
be more politics than WLB possibly, not sure).

Microsoft is often referred to as a country club in the industry. It's famous for its excellent WLB and average tenure there is much higher than for most other large tech companies. It also pays less except at the very high levels.

BG can't be too happy about that.

[KyleAAA]

There was a similar culture in NYC (I worked in IT in the financial services industry).
Problem people are facing is that these jobs in cheaper cities are often moving there with firms from Seattle, SF and NYC,
along with their associated culture. I have colleagues who moved to our new office in a low cost area complain about the hours locals are willing to work (vs what we are used to from NYC). Which culture will dominate...TBD. Better chance of a good work life balance
in a cheaper city but look carefully before you leap.

I moved from Atlanta to Seattle. The work culture is night and day. And even in Seattle, it's trivial to find a company which prioritizes WLB in Seattle. Even most of the big names don't require working more than 40 hours, except maybe Amazon and FB.

One of the firms in NYC with a terrible rep for no WLB, opened an office in Atlanta to hire techs.
I doubt they will adjust as much as locals would prefer.

Surprised to see you didn't include Microsoft on your list of exceptions (I have heard it's not a great place to work, but that might
be more politics than WLB possibly, not sure).

Microsoft is often referred to as a country club in the industry. It's famous for its excellent WLB and average tenure there is much higher than for most other large tech companies. It also pays less except at the very high levels.

BG can't be too happy about that.

Why not? He created it. The DNA BG forged in the 80s and 90s is still very much felt. Most of the things Satya is changing have more to do with the Ballmer era IME.

[rgs92]

This was posted up above:
________
I can't speak for tech as I'm in aerospace. But I can assure you that in aerospace, H1Bs are much cheaper than US employees. I was getting paid 3x 4x their rate and we were doing the same type of work. The company I used to work for on the commercial side exploited this to the max and I was literally surrounded by cheap foreign labor. I was the lead engineer and I told my boss this wasn't working . Some of the H1b engineers were causing too much trouble and kept complaining about their rates. He literally told me "they are cheap labor that's why we keep them on , make it work."

Don't get me wrong, some of them were good engineers , but a lot of them were bad too.

So The happiest day of my life was when I left this place because it was so ridiculous how badly they were exploiting the H1b process. Went to the defense side and never looked back.
________

Thanks for posting this comment. This was exactly the same situation in big telecom going back to the early 1990s (and has continued ever since). My boss regularly told me that upper management felt they could always get someone from offshore to do any sort of systems work for a dollar an hour, either on-site or offshore-based. This was exactly how he phrased it.

They got rid of many thousands of systems people (developers especially, but then analysts/requirements people/ testers / etc.). They usually kept project managers to try and manage all the new hires. The legacy systems slowly fell apart and it was continuous crisis.

The actionable advice from this is to just try and stick it out and get as much money as you can as long as your job lasts because the grass isn't any greener in IT regardless of the industry you are in. Either retire, go into an entirely different field, or stay where you are. Good luck.

[beyou]

I moved from Atlanta to Seattle. The work culture is night and day. And even in Seattle, it's trivial to find a company which prioritizes WLB in Seattle. Even most of the big names don't require working more than 40 hours, except maybe Amazon and FB.

One of the firms in NYC with a terrible rep for no WLB, opened an office in Atlanta to hire techs.
I doubt they will adjust as much as locals would prefer.

Surprised to see you didn't include Microsoft on your list of exceptions (I have heard it's not a great place to work, but that might
be more politics than WLB possibly, not sure).

Microsoft is often referred to as a country club in the industry. It's famous for its excellent WLB and average tenure there is much higher than for most other large tech companies. It also pays less except at the very high levels.

BG can't be too happy about that.

Why not? He created it. The DNA BG forged in the 80s and 90s is still very much felt. Most of the things Satya is changing have more to do with the Ballmer era IME.

BG worked Paul Allen so hard Paul left the company.
BG did not believe in weekends nor vacations, thought them a waste of time.
He freely admits to this way of running the business in the early days, not speculation on my part.

[KyleAAA]

One of the firms in NYC with a terrible rep for no WLB, opened an office in Atlanta to hire techs.
I doubt they will adjust as much as locals would prefer.

Surprised to see you didn't include Microsoft on your list of exceptions (I have heard it's not a great place to work, but that might
be more politics than WLB possibly, not sure).

Microsoft is often referred to as a country club in the industry. It's famous for its excellent WLB and average tenure there is much higher than for most other large tech companies. It also pays less except at the very high levels.

BG can't be too happy about that.

Why not? He created it. The DNA BG forged in the 80s and 90s is still very much felt. Most of the things Satya is changing have more to do with the Ballmer era IME.

BG worked Paul Allen so hard Paul left the company.
BG did not believe in weekends nor vacations, thought them a waste of time.
He freely admits to this way of running the business in the early days, not speculation on my part.

And he changed his views and built a different culture over time. Not speculation on my part.

[redpony]

because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr

That would have been very hard to do and outright fraud if true. I would not put it past shady outfits to come up with some creative way to do it though. My company got out of the business of hiring visa candidates because of the onerous paperwork needed to prevent just that. Perhaps they meant hire somebody in another country.

Do you know about the 737MAX MCAS issues? The MCAS software was supposedly outsourced to a contractor in India (cheaper labor rate). Not 100% sure of the accuracy of that but something I read in an article.

We had to do a case study on that and could not find anything to support it.
This was the article that drew the inference : https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... -engineers

Which then goes on to say:

"Boeing said the company did not rely on engineers from HCL and Cyient for the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, which has been linked to the Lion Air crash last October and the Ethiopian Airlines disaster in March. The Chicago-based planemaker also said it didn’t rely on either firm for another software issue disclosed after the crashes: a cockpit warning light that wasn’t working for most buyers."

[jerrysmith]

Consulting is a good choice but have you considered working for a University? I do cybersecurity for one and while there are moments (it is IT after all) it's the most laid back job I've ever had. You'll want to wait for covid to pass of course.

[TechFI]

Let's get some perspective here. Even at the most brutal tech companies like FB, Amazon and Netflix, working up to 60hrs/wk ain't a big deal. If you look at comparable careers compensation wise like management consulting (60-80hrs/wk), investment banking (80hrs/wk), medicine (not sure how many but neverending education and residency)... we in tech have it "pretty good".

No offense OP, but you sound like a slacker. If you're in a profession that pays close to $200k/yr, you're not a in a job where you're counting the hours like some min wage worker. Now slacking is fine if you're heading to retirement, after all, the term rest-and-vest ain't there for nothing. What you need to do is to find a company that has a rest-and-vest culture.

[mrspock]

Let's get some perspective here. Even at the most brutal tech companies like FB, Amazon and Netflix, working up to 60hrs/wk ain't a big deal. If you look at comparable careers compensation wise like management consulting (60-80hrs/wk), investment banking (80hrs/wk), medicine (not sure how many but neverending education and residency)... we in tech have it "pretty good".

No offense OP, but you sound like a slacker. If you're in a profession that pays close to $200k/yr, you're not a in a job where you're counting the hours like some min wage worker. Now slacking is fine if you're heading to retirement, after all, the term rest-and-vest ain't there for nothing. What you need to do is to find a company that has a rest-and-vest culture.

I'd also point out, most of those working at the FAANG companies with poor WLB can be easily retired by 50, most probably much much sooner than this. At my company I don't know too many long time engineers who didn't retire in their 40s. Seems like a reasonable trade to me.

I work long hours, but my perspective is that I'm in a "pro league" of my profession, and it's intense, it's long hours, and like in pro sports, it's unlikely you are going to be able to keep it up deep into your 40s, but on the flip side, the comp is "pro sports" like as well, so it's a fair trade. The biggest thing is treating your body like a somebody in a sports league, prioritize maintaining your health otherwise these hours can take a toll on your body and mind. Depression, sleep and stress related health problems are pretty rampant. If you are working 60hrs a week, you need to be at the gym another 5-8 hours each week on top of that to maintain your body/mind and monitor your health carefully with your doc.

[TheNightsToCome]

Let's get some perspective here. Even at the most brutal tech companies like FB, Amazon and Netflix, working up to 60hrs/wk ain't a big deal. If you look at comparable careers compensation wise like management consulting (60-80hrs/wk), investment banking (80hrs/wk), medicine (not sure how many but neverending education and residency)... we in tech have it "pretty good".

No offense OP, but you sound like a slacker. If you're in a profession that pays close to $200k/yr, you're not a in a job where you're counting the hours like some min wage worker. Now slacking is fine if you're heading to retirement, after all, the term rest-and-vest ain't there for nothing. What you need to do is to find a company that has a rest-and-vest culture.

"medicine (not sure how many but never ending education and residency)"

Unless you are in a "lifestyle" specialty (e.g., derm), the hours are often brutal. As a cardiologist I've spent many years taking every other night and every other weekend (and every other holiday) call; emergencies in the middle of the night that involve responsibility for another person's well-being and high liability as well.

My lifestyle is better now than it has ever been in medicine because I managed to negotiate a position without call, but I still get in at 6 am and average 12 hour days, and I work from home on Saturday and Sunday as well. This feels comfortable to me relative to what most of my career has entailed.

I burned out and worked as an equity analyst for four years in my 40s and felt like I was on vacation every day -- quiet reading at my desk, coffee breaks whenever I liked, relaxed conversation with colleagues. In contrast, my practice is a head long sprint all day long. I can take 20 mins for lunch at my desk most days now, but in years past I had to munch on carrot sticks from a baggie in my lab coat pocket and put off bathroom breaks for hours at a time.

Here is a day-in-the-life interview for the morbidly curious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BwtRH99eMY

[TechFI]

Let's get some perspective here. Even at the most brutal tech companies like FB, Amazon and Netflix, working up to 60hrs/wk ain't a big deal. If you look at comparable careers compensation wise like management consulting (60-80hrs/wk), investment banking (80hrs/wk), medicine (not sure how many but neverending education and residency)... we in tech have it "pretty good".

No offense OP, but you sound like a slacker. If you're in a profession that pays close to $200k/yr, you're not a in a job where you're counting the hours like some min wage worker. Now slacking is fine if you're heading to retirement, after all, the term rest-and-vest ain't there for nothing. What you need to do is to find a company that has a rest-and-vest culture.

I'd also point out, most of those working at the FAANG companies with poor WLB can be easily retired by 50, most probably much much sooner than this. At my company I don't know too many long time engineers who didn't retire in the 40s. Seems like a reasonable trade to me.

I work long hours, but my perspective is that I'm in a "pro league" of my profession, and it's intense, it's long hours, and like in pro sports, it's unlikely you are going to be able to keep it up deep into your 40s, but on the flip side, the comp is "pro sports" like as well, so it's a fair trade. The biggest thing is treating your body like a somebody in a sports league, prioritize maintaining your health otherwise these hours can take a toll on your body and mind. Depression, sleep and stress related health problems are pretty rampant. If you are working 60hrs a week, you need to be at the gym another 5-8 hours each week on top of that to maintain your body/mind and monitor your health carefully with your doc.

That's a pretty good analogy... although the comp is off by an order of magnitude (at least) compared to pro sports.

[bling]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

[bling]

Here is the problem:

While I love the work I do, and I love the high (to me) paycheck, I am getting tired. I still feel very young and healthy and I have many interests (cooking, music, hiking, reading, the arts, etc, etc) and rarely get bored. The work I do in my current career is just one of my many interests.

However, my peers are very different. Most of them are interested and enthused about their work to the exclusion of everything else. They work 50 hour weeks, participate in on call schedules, and take so little time off they end up in a situation where they need to take PTO or they will lose it. They end up taking the PTO, but I will receive emails, ticket updates, and other indications that they are still working on their PTO days. This phenomenon seems widespread in the industry (at least in the Bay Area) not just at my current company.

this is all you. set your boundaries and stick to them. there's time for work, and then time outside of work. i've worked at companies like this before, and not once was anyone let go for "working 40 hours a week", so long as they got their work done. are these people the top candidates for raises, bonuses, promotions? no, the people working 50 hours a week are more likely to get that. but, none of that is of interest to you right now so why play the game? do what you want, not what your colleagues want.

[sjl333]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

You obviously did not read my response thoroughly enough. Aerospace has very very limited options for H1b type work since a lot of the work requires US citizenship. So second and third tier type aerospace companies that work on commercial type work know this. The Indian recruiting firm knows this ... And H1Bs will do whatever it takes to stay in the US so they take these low ball offers and get treated like slaves. They have no where else to go because there is nowhere else to go , and everybody knows it.

Im done arguing about this with people. I've seen this first hand for two years at where I was. I'm just some random guy on the internet so whether you believe me or not it's up to you.

Tech may not do this... But I can assure you with 100% confidence that it's exploited in aerospace, at least for the company I worked for.

[stocknoob4111]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

$160k in Austin is probably not the median (talking about base salary not total including bonus), more like $130-140k, not sure about DevOps specifically but talking about Sr. Software Engineer with around 20+ years experience, similar payscale I believe and in the Dallas area.

Southern California is worse, I looked for many jobs there and they were paying around $120-130K with around a $10k bonus. The Bay area pays well though but the COL is through the roof.

[TechFI]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

Seriously, H1B is a complicated topic that most Americans don't know what they are talking about.

FAANG H1Bs are not slaves, they are paid competitively, highly talented and qualified. Job switching can be risky especially in the current political climate, AC21 is in theory only. Also, there are issues about mobility in terms of switching fields or 'significantly' changing job titles/roles. Remember, the USCIS adjudicator is a clueless govt worker.

WITCH H1Bs aka the Indian outsourcing companies are slaves. They are not qualified and often have fake work experience and qualifications They are underpaid, and megacorp use them to get rid of American workers.

This is why you often see 2 narratives on the left and right. Both are correct. If we banned WITCH companies 90% of the problem will be solved.

[sjl333]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

Seriously, H1B is a complicated topic that most Americans don't know what they are talking about.

FAANG H1Bs are not slaves, they are paid competitively, highly talented and qualified. Job switching can be risky especially in the current political climate, AC21 is in theory only. Also, there are issues about mobility in terms of switching fields or 'significantly' changing job titles/roles. Remember, the USCIS adjudicator is a clueless govt worker.

WITCH H1Bs aka the Indian outsourcing companies are slaves. They are not qualified and often have fake work experience and qualifications They are underpaid, and megacorp use them to get rid of American workers.

This is why you often see 2 narratives on the left and right. Both are correct. If we banned WITCH companies 90% of the problem will be solved.

Thank you techFi. I don't know what WITCH stands for but that's exactly what it was , Indian outsourcing companies hiring H1Bs at low rates to help get rid of american workers. The Indian outsourcing company was called quest global ... Horrendous company. Previous posters keep denying it but they have no clue what is going on in other industries.

[TechFI]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

Seriously, H1B is a complicated topic that most Americans don't know what they are talking about.

FAANG H1Bs are not slaves, they are paid competitively, highly talented and qualified. Job switching can be risky especially in the current political climate, AC21 is in theory only. Also, there are issues about mobility in terms of switching fields or 'significantly' changing job titles/roles. Remember, the USCIS adjudicator is a clueless govt worker.

WITCH H1Bs aka the Indian outsourcing companies are slaves. They are not qualified and often have fake work experience and qualifications They are underpaid, and megacorp use them to get rid of American workers.

This is why you often see 2 narratives on the left and right. Both are correct. If we banned WITCH companies 90% of the problem will be solved.

Thank you techFi. I don't know what WITCH stands for but that's exactly what it was , Indian outsourcing companies hiring H1Bs at low rates to help get rid of american workers. The Indian outsourcing company was called quest global ... Horrendous company. Previous posters keep denying it but they have no clue what is going on in other industries.

Wipro, Infosys, TCS, Cognizant and HCL. They're the largest 5 outsourcing companies and take up precious H1-B space. Yes, there is a limit of H1-B visas that can be issued out each year. So truly deserving workers sometimes don't ever get a H1-B and leave the country because of this H1-B 'lottery' issue, and then we get a bunch of lesser qualified workers replacing American workers.

[KyleAAA]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

You obviously did not read my response thoroughly enough. Aerospace has very very limited options for H1b type work since a lot of the work requires US citizenship. So second and third tier type aerospace companies that work on commercial type work know this. The Indian recruiting firm knows this ... And H1Bs will do whatever it takes to stay in the US so they take these low ball offers and get treated like slaves. They have no where else to go because there is nowhere else to go , and everybody knows it.

Im done arguing about this with people. I've seen this first hand for two years at where I was. I'm just some random guy on the internet so whether you believe me or not it's up to you.

Tech may not do this... But I can assure you with 100% confidence that it's exploited in aerospace, at least for the company I worked for.

While this does happen, it is rare. Even in aerospace. There are just a few bad actors responsible for the vast majority of fraud. Don't try to take a small issue and make it larger than it is. The H1B program itself is vastly beneficial to the US economy. Let's clean up the few bad actors rather than trying to scrap the whole system. And you could have remedied this specific situation already if you'd filed a report. Did you file a report?

[KyleAAA]

Move out of the Bay Area and work for either large legacy tech or Fortune 500. You could make $160k someplace much cheaper, like Austin, Nashville, or Atlanta. And you wouldn't have to deal with the Bay Area work culture.

$160k in Austin is probably not the median (talking about base salary not total including bonus), more like $130-140k, not sure about DevOps specifically but talking about Sr. Software Engineer with around 20+ years experience, similar payscale I believe and in the Dallas area.

Southern California is worse, I looked for many jobs there and they were paying around $120-130K with around a $10k bonus. The Bay area pays well though but the COL is through the roof.

I'm not sure why you would only use base salary. A large component of tech compensation is variable. Everybody in tech uses Total Compensation when talking about pay. As you can see, TC in Austin runs the gamut:

https://www.levels.fyi/comp.html?track= ... rch=austin

[sjl333]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

You obviously did not read my response thoroughly enough. Aerospace has very very limited options for H1b type work since a lot of the work requires US citizenship. So second and third tier type aerospace companies that work on commercial type work know this. The Indian recruiting firm knows this ... And H1Bs will do whatever it takes to stay in the US so they take these low ball offers and get treated like slaves. They have no where else to go because there is nowhere else to go , and everybody knows it.

Im done arguing about this with people. I've seen this first hand for two years at where I was. I'm just some random guy on the internet so whether you believe me or not it's up to you.

Tech may not do this... But I can assure you with 100% confidence that it's exploited in aerospace, at least for the company I worked for.

While this does happen, it is rare. Even in aerospace. There are just a few bad actors responsible for the vast majority of fraud. Don't try to take a small issue and make it larger than it is. The H1B program itself is vastly beneficial to the US economy. Let's clean up the few bad actors rather than trying to scrap the whole system. And you could have remedied this specific situation already if you'd filed a report. Did you file a report?

False. It is not rare. It is highly prevalent across multiples of industries. Please read techFI response above . He has referenced the WITCH companies that abuse the system. What you are saying is completely false and ignorant. High level execs and bean counters abuse the H1B system to higher cheaper labor and displace american workers across multiple industries.

And yes, I do believe they should do away with the H1b system. The system is filled with too much fraud, corruption, and exploitation.

[KyleAAA]

I agree it is illegal and should be banned - but like i said - A LOT of companies exploit the h1b system to hire cheap labor. The h1b personnel have no choice but to accept the low salary or else they will be deported back to India. That is why they are willing to take a low rate, because $25/hr is still better than living in India. For the company, its great, because they hired somebody at $25/hr instead of hiring an american at $80/hr, and they know this H1B person cannot leave the company since they are "sponsored" by the company. The only way they could leave the company is to get sponsored by a different comapny, but in aerospace, it is very very hard because not many aerospace companies hire Non-US citizens. So if you work on the commercial side, some of these companies (Think Boeing, Collins Aerospace, etc) that have work that is non-ITAR related can exploit the H1B visa process to hire cheap foreign labor - basically legalized slavery.

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

You obviously did not read my response thoroughly enough. Aerospace has very very limited options for H1b type work since a lot of the work requires US citizenship. So second and third tier type aerospace companies that work on commercial type work know this. The Indian recruiting firm knows this ... And H1Bs will do whatever it takes to stay in the US so they take these low ball offers and get treated like slaves. They have no where else to go because there is nowhere else to go , and everybody knows it.

Im done arguing about this with people. I've seen this first hand for two years at where I was. I'm just some random guy on the internet so whether you believe me or not it's up to you.

Tech may not do this... But I can assure you with 100% confidence that it's exploited in aerospace, at least for the company I worked for.

While this does happen, it is rare. Even in aerospace. There are just a few bad actors responsible for the vast majority of fraud. Don't try to take a small issue and make it larger than it is. The H1B program itself is vastly beneficial to the US economy. Let's clean up the few bad actors rather than trying to scrap the whole system. And you could have remedied this specific situation already if you'd filed a report. Did you file a report?

False. It is not rare. It is highly prevalent across multiples of industries. Please read techFI response above . He has referenced the WITCH companies that abuse the system. What you are saying is completely false and ignorant. High level execs and bean counters abuse the H1B system to higher cheaper labor and displace american workers across multiple industries.

And yes, I do believe they should do away with the H1b system. The system is filled with too much fraud, corruption, and exploitation.

I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about techFI's points. I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about the points you are trying to make. You are not deeply knowledgeable about the subject. It is not highly prevalent. There are a few bad actors committing essentially all the fraud. You could do far more to stop the fraud by filing a complaint rather than arguing about it. The most common problem are false qualifications. Applications will sometimes include degrees that don't exist and fake work experience. But even in those cases, paying much less than American workers is illegal and if companies had to pay market wages to under-qualified workers, the problem would disappear overnight. All that needs to be done to protect American workers is enforce laws already on the books. Seriously, file the report already.

[sjl333]

i don't know why every discussion about H1B has this mentioned, but it's simply not true. H1Bs are not "slaves" to their employers. the AC21 was enacted in 2000 which allows workers to change employers without affecting their status. yes, the new company needs to do some extra paperwork to take over the sponsorship, but if you're actually high-skilled there will be multiple companies knocking on your door to hire you.

are there abuses of the system? sure. some companies pick the lowest possible title like "super junior engineer" to pay the lowest prevailing wage. the immigrants are happy to be in america so they accept it, even though their skills should have them with a better title (and thus higher wage). nonetheless, even if they are taken advantage of, work here for a year, get the experience, jump ship and get that 20-50% pay raise and now you're on the same track as a citizen.

You obviously did not read my response thoroughly enough. Aerospace has very very limited options for H1b type work since a lot of the work requires US citizenship. So second and third tier type aerospace companies that work on commercial type work know this. The Indian recruiting firm knows this ... And H1Bs will do whatever it takes to stay in the US so they take these low ball offers and get treated like slaves. They have no where else to go because there is nowhere else to go , and everybody knows it.

Im done arguing about this with people. I've seen this first hand for two years at where I was. I'm just some random guy on the internet so whether you believe me or not it's up to you.

Tech may not do this... But I can assure you with 100% confidence that it's exploited in aerospace, at least for the company I worked for.

While this does happen, it is rare. Even in aerospace. There are just a few bad actors responsible for the vast majority of fraud. Don't try to take a small issue and make it larger than it is. The H1B program itself is vastly beneficial to the US economy. Let's clean up the few bad actors rather than trying to scrap the whole system. And you could have remedied this specific situation already if you'd filed a report. Did you file a report?

False. It is not rare. It is highly prevalent across multiples of industries. Please read techFI response above . He has referenced the WITCH companies that abuse the system. What you are saying is completely false and ignorant. High level execs and bean counters abuse the H1B system to higher cheaper labor and displace american workers across multiple industries.

And yes, I do believe they should do away with the H1b system. The system is filled with too much fraud, corruption, and exploitation.

I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about techFI's points. I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about the points you are trying to make. You are not deeply knowledgeable about the subject. It is not highly prevalent. There are a few bad actors committing essentially all the fraud. You could do far more to stop the fraud by filing a complaint rather than arguing about it. The most common problem are false qualifications. Applications will sometimes include degrees that don't exist and fake work experience. But even in those cases, paying much less than American workers is illegal and if companies had to pay market wages to under-qualified workers, the problem would disappear overnight. All that needs to be done to protect American workers is enforce laws already on the books. Seriously, file the report already.

Wait I'm confused. So are you saying that you agree or disagree with TechFIs post ? I'm assuming you are saying you disagree with his post based on the conclusions you are making.

Secondly, when you keep saying that it's "rare", I just don't agree because I'm aware of multiple aerospace companies that do this. If it was just one company , then I would maybe agree with you. But when it's multiple companies (typically second tier or third tier type companies ) doing this , I dont think I can classify it as "rare".

I will look into filing the report sometime this week. The US workers that got displaced tried to sue the outsourcing company as well as the main company, I don't think they got very far though.

[KyleAAA]

You obviously did not read my response thoroughly enough. Aerospace has very very limited options for H1b type work since a lot of the work requires US citizenship. So second and third tier type aerospace companies that work on commercial type work know this. The Indian recruiting firm knows this ... And H1Bs will do whatever it takes to stay in the US so they take these low ball offers and get treated like slaves. They have no where else to go because there is nowhere else to go , and everybody knows it.

Im done arguing about this with people. I've seen this first hand for two years at where I was. I'm just some random guy on the internet so whether you believe me or not it's up to you.

Tech may not do this... But I can assure you with 100% confidence that it's exploited in aerospace, at least for the company I worked for.

While this does happen, it is rare. Even in aerospace. There are just a few bad actors responsible for the vast majority of fraud. Don't try to take a small issue and make it larger than it is. The H1B program itself is vastly beneficial to the US economy. Let's clean up the few bad actors rather than trying to scrap the whole system. And you could have remedied this specific situation already if you'd filed a report. Did you file a report?

False. It is not rare. It is highly prevalent across multiples of industries. Please read techFI response above . He has referenced the WITCH companies that abuse the system. What you are saying is completely false and ignorant. High level execs and bean counters abuse the H1B system to higher cheaper labor and displace american workers across multiple industries.

And yes, I do believe they should do away with the H1b system. The system is filled with too much fraud, corruption, and exploitation.

I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about techFI's points. I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about the points you are trying to make. You are not deeply knowledgeable about the subject. It is not highly prevalent. There are a few bad actors committing essentially all the fraud. You could do far more to stop the fraud by filing a complaint rather than arguing about it. The most common problem are false qualifications. Applications will sometimes include degrees that don't exist and fake work experience. But even in those cases, paying much less than American workers is illegal and if companies had to pay market wages to under-qualified workers, the problem would disappear overnight. All that needs to be done to protect American workers is enforce laws already on the books. Seriously, file the report already.

Wait I'm confused. So are you saying that you agree or disagree with TechFIs post ? I'm assuming you are saying you disagree with his post based on the conclusions you are making.

Secondly, when you keep saying that it's "rare", I just don't agree because I'm aware of multiple aerospace companies that do this. If it was just one company , then I would maybe agree with you. But when it's multiple companies (typically second tier or third tier type companies ) doing this , I dont think I can classify it as "rare".

I will look into filing the report sometime this week. The US workers that got displaced tried to sue the outsourcing company as well as the main company, I don't think they got very far though.

I am agreeing with their post. I am disagreeing with yours.

[sjl333]

While this does happen, it is rare. Even in aerospace. There are just a few bad actors responsible for the vast majority of fraud. Don't try to take a small issue and make it larger than it is. The H1B program itself is vastly beneficial to the US economy. Let's clean up the few bad actors rather than trying to scrap the whole system. And you could have remedied this specific situation already if you'd filed a report. Did you file a report?

False. It is not rare. It is highly prevalent across multiples of industries. Please read techFI response above . He has referenced the WITCH companies that abuse the system. What you are saying is completely false and ignorant. High level execs and bean counters abuse the H1B system to higher cheaper labor and displace american workers across multiple industries.

And yes, I do believe they should do away with the H1b system. The system is filled with too much fraud, corruption, and exploitation.

I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about techFI's points. I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about the points you are trying to make. You are not deeply knowledgeable about the subject. It is not highly prevalent. There are a few bad actors committing essentially all the fraud. You could do far more to stop the fraud by filing a complaint rather than arguing about it. The most common problem are false qualifications. Applications will sometimes include degrees that don't exist and fake work experience. But even in those cases, paying much less than American workers is illegal and if companies had to pay market wages to under-qualified workers, the problem would disappear overnight. All that needs to be done to protect American workers is enforce laws already on the books. Seriously, file the report already.

Wait I'm confused. So are you saying that you agree or disagree with TechFIs post ? I'm assuming you are saying you disagree with his post based on the conclusions you are making.

Secondly, when you keep saying that it's "rare", I just don't agree because I'm aware of multiple aerospace companies that do this. If it was just one company , then I would maybe agree with you. But when it's multiple companies (typically second tier or third tier type companies ) doing this , I dont think I can classify it as "rare".

I will look into filing the report sometime this week. The US workers that got displaced tried to sue the outsourcing company as well as the main company, I don't think they got very far though.

I am agreeing with their post. I am disagreeing with yours.

Okay now I'm even more confused. You are making zero sense .

If you agree with techFI statement, then I guess you are agreeing with my statements . He clearly states the WITCH companies abuse the system and treat their employees like slave. That is exactly what I saw where I was working , an Indian outsourcing company treating their employees like dirt and under paying them.

[KyleAAA]

False. It is not rare. It is highly prevalent across multiples of industries. Please read techFI response above . He has referenced the WITCH companies that abuse the system. What you are saying is completely false and ignorant. High level execs and bean counters abuse the H1B system to higher cheaper labor and displace american workers across multiple industries.

And yes, I do believe they should do away with the H1b system. The system is filled with too much fraud, corruption, and exploitation.

I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about techFI's points. I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about the points you are trying to make. You are not deeply knowledgeable about the subject. It is not highly prevalent. There are a few bad actors committing essentially all the fraud. You could do far more to stop the fraud by filing a complaint rather than arguing about it. The most common problem are false qualifications. Applications will sometimes include degrees that don't exist and fake work experience. But even in those cases, paying much less than American workers is illegal and if companies had to pay market wages to under-qualified workers, the problem would disappear overnight. All that needs to be done to protect American workers is enforce laws already on the books. Seriously, file the report already.

Wait I'm confused. So are you saying that you agree or disagree with TechFIs post ? I'm assuming you are saying you disagree with his post based on the conclusions you are making.

Secondly, when you keep saying that it's "rare", I just don't agree because I'm aware of multiple aerospace companies that do this. If it was just one company , then I would maybe agree with you. But when it's multiple companies (typically second tier or third tier type companies ) doing this , I dont think I can classify it as "rare".

I will look into filing the report sometime this week. The US workers that got displaced tried to sue the outsourcing company as well as the main company, I don't think they got very far though.

I am agreeing with their post. I am disagreeing with yours.

Okay now I'm even more confused. You are making zero sense .

If you agree with techFI statement, then I guess you are agreeing with my statements . He clearly states the WITCH companies abuse the system and treat their employees like slave. That is exactly what I saw where I was working , an Indian outsourcing company treating their employees like dirt and under paying them.

No. I said from the beginning that fraud happens and that it is a small group of companies almost entirely responsible. But H1B application fraud and underpaying relative to US workers is already illegal, so event if the WITCH companies abuse those workers, the American megacorp is still liable. Abuse is not prevalent and tossing out the H1B system would be extremely harmful to the economy. It is easier to target the few abusers than scrap the system. Let me reiterate to be clear: nobody, anywhere, ever has claimed abuse never happens. I didn't argue that. Nobody has argued that. But it is not widespread. The vast, vast, vast majority of companies play by the rules. The few who don't should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. That's where filing a report comes in.

[sjl333]

I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about techFI's points. I am deeply, deeply knowledgeable about the points you are trying to make. You are not deeply knowledgeable about the subject. It is not highly prevalent. There are a few bad actors committing essentially all the fraud. You could do far more to stop the fraud by filing a complaint rather than arguing about it. The most common problem are false qualifications. Applications will sometimes include degrees that don't exist and fake work experience. But even in those cases, paying much less than American workers is illegal and if companies had to pay market wages to under-qualified workers, the problem would disappear overnight. All that needs to be done to protect American workers is enforce laws already on the books. Seriously, file the report already.

Wait I'm confused. So are you saying that you agree or disagree with TechFIs post ? I'm assuming you are saying you disagree with his post based on the conclusions you are making.

Secondly, when you keep saying that it's "rare", I just don't agree because I'm aware of multiple aerospace companies that do this. If it was just one company , then I would maybe agree with you. But when it's multiple companies (typically second tier or third tier type companies ) doing this , I dont think I can classify it as "rare".

I will look into filing the report sometime this week. The US workers that got displaced tried to sue the outsourcing company as well as the main company, I don't think they got very far though.

I am agreeing with their post. I am disagreeing with yours.

Okay now I'm even more confused. You are making zero sense .

If you agree with techFI statement, then I guess you are agreeing with my statements . He clearly states the WITCH companies abuse the system and treat their employees like slave. That is exactly what I saw where I was working , an Indian outsourcing company treating their employees like dirt and under paying them.

No. I said from the beginning that fraud happens and that it is a small group of companies almost entirely responsible. But H1B application fraud and underpaying relative to US workers is already illegal, so event if the WITCH companies abuse those workers, the American megacorp is still liable. Abuse is not prevalent and tossing out the H1B system would be extremely harmful to the economy. It is easier to target the few abusers than scrap the system. Let me reiterate to be clear: nobody, anywhere, ever has claimed abuse never happens. I didn't argue that. Nobody has argued that. But it is not widespread. The vast, vast, vast majority of companies play by the rules. The few who don't should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. That's where filing a report comes in.

Ok I think I now understand this disconnect. The main problem between our differences is that I believe you are in the tech field and I'm in a completely separate field (aerospace). So everything with what you are saying may be completely true within your field. I was only portraying my experiences that I saw within my own field. Its probably just best to agree to disagree since we are coming at the problem from two different perspectives, because I do not agree with any of your points.

All I can say is what I experienced, in my industry, was real abuse of the system.