Microsoft: H-1B visa employees crucial to US economy

[bart95]

WASHINGTON: As IT companies in India and the US started filling petitions for the most coveted H-1B work visas, software giant Microsoft has stressed on importance of the visa in retaining America's competitiveness and urged the US Senate to pass a bill pending before it in this regard.

"While the vast majority of our US workforce is comprised of US workers, the individuals we employ in H-1B status-- educated at some of the best universities in the US and around the world--are crucial to our business," said Brad Smith, general counsel & executive vice president, Legal & Corporate Affairs, Microsoft.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/Microsoft-H-1B-visa-employees-crucial-to-US-economy/articleshow/12519608.cms

[bart95]

1. nice youtube of Microsoft's Bill Gates in a congressional session

in time: 3:50 to 5:30 of video

&feature=player_embedded

[bart95]

2. youtube of immigration lawyer's advice to corporate HR

[madrchsod]

3. i guess we do`t have enough IT workers

i wonder why we don`t have enough IT workers?

[bart95]

4. USAToday 'Workers asked to train foreign replacements'

'Almost one in five information technology workers has lost a job or knows someone who lost a job after training a foreign worker, according to a new survey by the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers. The study is the first to quantify how widespread the practice is. '

'It's a terrible thing to ask someone to train their replacement and ship the job overseas," Hudgins, a Democrat, says. "This is way beyond election-year politics. It's a shift in our economy. It's not a partisan issue."

Many feel powerless. In 2003, Kevin Flanagan was laid off from Bank of America after training foreign workers. He shot and killed himself in the parking lot in Concord, Calif.

His death galvanized other information technology workers, who have staged protests against outsourcing. Members of Congress opposed to the practice also have used his case as a call to action.

"We were very saddened by the death of our associate," says Bank of America spokeswoman Mary Waller. (then she snapped her fingers and asked 'where's that bailout? LOL)


http://www.usatoday.com/money/workplace/2004-04-06-replace_x.htm

[MurrayDelph]

12. My last job in the computer industry was almost two years ago

I worked for a multinational corporation. Every quarter, to make their quarterly reports look better, they would lay off a few more American employees, and replace them with employees from the Indian "consulting" firm they also owned.

The most-common way these consultants "worked" was by sending an e-mail to the remaining American workers, informing them that a system (that THEY were supposedly in charge of) was no longer working and would we "please do the needful."

[bart95]

5. US senator working on bill to allow more visas to Indians

US senator working on bill to allow more visas to Indians

New York, Mar 25, 2012,(PTI)

Amid Indian IT firms' concerns over restrictive US visa policies for their employees, a top American senator has assured that he is working on a bipartisan bill that will reform immigration laws and allow more Indians to come to America.

Influential US Senator from New York Chuck Schumer and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid met noted Indian-American hotelier and Chairman of Indian-American Democrats Sant Singh Chatwal at his Manhattan hotel here on Friday.

During the nearly hour long meeting, the three discussed India-US bilateral relations, with Chatwal raising concerns of Indian IT corporations regarding problems faced by them in obtaining work visas like H1B and L1 for their employees.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/237070/us-senator-working-bill-allow.html

[pscot]

10. Schumer whoring for campaign dollars

Treasonous bastard.

[bart95]

11. Reid is the more disturbing one in that article

since he's the leader - shows this isnt just a 'rogue senator'

[hootinholler]

6. Fuck you Brad Smith

You mean that the H1-B visa program is crucial in suppressing US worker wages. Making your company more profitable is not crucial to the US economy. Putting more money in the hands of workers is actually crucial to the US economy.

[bart95]

7. all of microsoft's real 'innovations' were prior to the h-1b flood era

anything they really did that was 'new' was in the 1990s

and everything since has just been bug ridden bloatware enhancements, with many corporate clients even demanding operating system downgrades to older versions on new computers

[hootinholler]

8. Microsoft had only 1 innovation

And it really isn't that innovative. It is buying competition and failing that embracing the competing technology and killing it through extending it into something that will only work on a M$ tech stack. I personally know of at least 2 businesses that included being bought by M$ in their strategy for success.

Yes, I'm biased. I've witnessed it happen. I'm a software developer with 20+ years of experience being fucked over by M$.

Oh, BTW, I'm unemployed at the moment and no one wants to pay for graybeards.

[bart95]

9. that's true

in a true technical discussion, it's debatable that they ever had ANY innovations, but most people dont know that, they just been ruthless aquisition/marketing monopolists/strangleholders

but my comment was more in the common knowlege area of their marketed products, that there's really little new that they've released since the 1990s

[pscot]

13. So you detect no difference between WindowsME

and Windows7? I agree their business model sucks, and Gates has skimmed an unconscionable amount of loot off the top, but Microsoft standardized the interface. Granted, they did it by creating a monopoly, and they certainly stifled their competition in the process, but if it weren't for Microsoft we probably woulnd't be able to have this conversation.

[bart95]

14. ' but if it weren't for Microsoft '

we'd be having this conversation on apple, linux, netscape (all more innovative) or on a product made by a company that MS hadnt put out of business

XP released in about 2000, was more stable than win98, but any time i've ever released something like that, i didnt call it a 'new release' or an innovation, i called it a 'bugfix' and appolgised for having the bugs in the first place