Blogger uncovers fake jobs posted by Department of Labor in H1-B visa scandal.

[crispini]

Wow. This is the first I've heard of this anywhere on the internets. The whole story is here, and it's WELL worth reading the whole thing and checking out the links:

http://carriesnation.blogspot.com/2007/08/pearl-street-scam.html

Here's a snip......

Many job seekers in Detroit are well aware of the multitudes of technical jobs listed in the Sunday Free Press, all bearing the same 700 N. Pearl St., Suite 510, Dallas, TX address. It seemed for a while that this mysterious entity was the only place hiring on earth. This phenomenon was also reported in several other parts of the country, as discussed on these Dice and Indeed job board threads.

These ads rarely list the name of the employer. However, for the most part, the ads include extremely lengthy details of the job duties as well as required educational and work experience requirements. Here's one I found for the Minneapolis area that's cached from the Star Tribune site. Here's a rare listing from Yahoo Hot Jobs which actually features a company name, in this case, Halliburton. Finally, just to show that it's not only IT jobs that are being advertised, here's a job listing for an Art Director position located in the Dallas area. To my eyes, at least, all three jobs require a heckuva lot of responsibility and knowledge that would be awfully hard to obtain during the 1 to 2 years of experience time frame they are looking for.

(snip)

I'm begging someone to correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm forming my own opinion on what's happening based on all of these links that I've read. It appears that the Department of Labor, through its Team Exceed contractor, is working hand-in-hand with employers to post phony job ads in order to fulfill the job advertisement requirements for purposes of helping foreign workers obtain their Green Cards for permanent resident status. As Kim Berry describes in his Programmers Guild website, these positions have already been filled by H-1B employees. The jobs are posted, apparently with the help of American taxpayers, simply to collect resumes so they can been be nitpicked to death in order to disqualify every American worker who applies.

This is incredible, and if true, needs to be spread all over the internet ASAP to try to get some MSM coverage.... Do check out all of the original, it's incredible! And please :kick: & R if you agree that the story is worth sharing!

Edited to add:
I got to the Carrie Nation story through the coverage from the Dallas Observer blog:

http://blogs.dallasobserver.com/unfairpark/2007/08/plaza_of_the_unamerican_anyone.php

[smtpgirl]

1. Because, hopefully the American applicant

would ask for market wages and nothing LESS!!!

Haliburton, figures, DickHead strikes again

[BearSquirrel2]

23. Unfortunately ...

Unfortunately, what is written on H1-B applications often is not what is remunerated. Once the H1-B worker is in the US they have no flexibility to move from one company to another. Ratting out your employer for not paying you makes your H1-B application VOID ... This means you get sent home.

So who is gonna complain????

[pnwmom]

2. This is all too believable.

I'd like to know what ridiculous explanation they're going to come up with.

[valerief]

22. Executive privilege. nt

[illinoisprogressive]

3. I've seen these type of ads here and wondered why so many and what is was about.

[TahitiNut]

4. The odds are huge that an ad that's VERY detailed is a pro forma H-1B scam.

After many years in Silicon Valley, I've seen too many to count. In the Valley, they were often run on Tuesday and/or Wednesday ... just to further cut down on the number of responses. It's no surprise that they don't find a "good fit" (especially for the salary) and then can claim to have made a "good faith" (ha!) effort and could find no American citizen (or permanent resident) that matched the requirements. It's also no surprise that the ad perfectly matches an H-1B applicant's resume - since that's what they use to write it.

Many of these companies are owned and/or operated by immigrants who come in under the visa waivers for investors and business operators ... often from Taiwan or India, in the Valley.

[crispini]

5. THAT is pathetic.

Honestly. I have some good friends that have come in under legit H1-Bs, so I have no problem with the basic idea, but this abuse is ridiculous.

[LoZoccolo]

18. Law firms give seminars about how they assist in this process; here's video of one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbFEgFajGU

From what I heard, the law firm put this on YouTube so that people who missed a part of the seminar could watch the video later, but then the Programmers' Guild got ahold of it!

[dkofos]

27. I was hoping that someone would post that video again. Thanks

[crispini]

36. I can't believe that!

"Our goal is clearly NOT to find a qualified US worker"

right out in the open!

[amandabeech]

17. If immigrant investors and business people, here under e-visas, I

imagine, won't hire U.S. citizens and legal residents, or simply won't hire anyone not from their own ethnic group, they are violating EEO laws up the wazoo.

I've read and heard about all kinds of EEO problems with immigrant employers (and landlords) who simply will not abide by our equal employment rules. I've also read that Silicon Valley types segregate people of the same ethnic groups into teams and then pit them against one another. Despicable!

[TahitiNut]

20. In our collective guilt over the bigotry that infests our society, we seem to forget ...

... that the societies and cultures from which we welcome others are themselves often even more pervasively bigoted. Sexism, for example, is far more pervasive in Japanese culture - particularly in employment. For us to expect that people from such cultures won't behave in ways consistent with those cultures of origin is naive - EVEN those who 'escape' such bigotries. Being a 'victim' of such bigotries INCLUDES the infection of such bigotry. Women can be and often are SEXISTS. Non-whites can be and often are RACISTS. This is much of why I focus on the disease rather than the diseased - on the bigotry and not the bigot. The 'enemy' is the virus - not the infected person.

[amandabeech]

54. I couldn't have said it better.

One of my roommates is Japanese-Canadian, and she says that women in her field in Japan have lots of problems gaining rightful recognition and promotion.

The other roommate is from Turkey. She left because there are only a few neighborhoods in the big cities where a woman can live on her own without constant harassment. She, unfortunately, hates Jews, "because I am a Muslim." She also doesn't like African-Americans. She doesn't see the prejudice against women as part of the same problem as her views on other ethnic and racial groups.

[Blue_Tires]

6. ttt...i've fallen victim to similar scams in my eternal job search

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

7. Not an H-1b scam - this is and has been the law for quite some time

This job advertisement process is at the core of the Labor Certification and hundreds of immigration attorneys handle these types of cases every day. Any alien offered a permanent job by an employer can try to obtain permanent U.S. residence based upon that employment. Often, as the material above suggests, the alien is already working for that employer in a temporary H-1b (6 year limit) classification and the employer seeks to make the employment permanent. A Labor Cert therefore is not an H-1b, but it is a a petition for permanent immigration (green card). An H-1b is temporary immigration. To make an alien in the H-1b classification into a permanent resident, the employer must file a Labor Certification with the U.S. Department of Labor (there are other upper level immigration classifications such as major world class scientists or researchers who might be in H-1b but who can file an immigrant petition without going through the Labor Certification process). If that form is certified, then he can file a form I-140 with U.S. immigration to get the green card for his employee. As part of the process of filing the Labor Certification (Form ETA 750 A&B) with the Department of Labor, the employer must offer that same job to the American public. In other words, the very job through which the employer seeks to obtain permanent residence for that alien must be described in the ad placed in a local newspaper. These ads therefore are for jobs that will never really be offered in good faith to the American public. The posting of the ad is a requirement that is part of the Labor Certification.

The reasoning behind the advertisement process and the offering of that job to the public is to protect the American worker. If any qualified American worker responds to the ad and sends in their resume, it will prevent the alien from getting the Labor Certification certified and, after that, getting the green card. The Labor Certification process is one of the most challenging and difficult ways for an alien to get a green card. The job must be a specific job that falls within one of the categories of the federal government's Dictionary of Occupational Titles. It cannot involve an illegal combination of jobs (such as an aviator/mechanic - which coincidentally the alien might have experience in). It cannot involve arcane job duties that are outside the DOT definition. The alien cannot count any of his/her experience gained while in the H-1b category with the specific employer who is filing the Labor Certification as part of the experiential requirement listed on the ETA 750 A form. The offered wage also must conform to the prevailing wage paid in the area where the employment will take place. The wage must also be appropriate to the requirements as to academics and experience required in the ad and on the ETA 750 form. If the alien has a Ph.D. and that's listed as a job requirement, the employer must raise the wage accordingly. In that case, more American workers will respond to the ad because of the higher wage involved.

The employer is required to review the resumes from any American workers received as a consequence of the ad and contact any qualifying worker. They are supposed to conduct a job interview and take notes. Only if no American worker who applies for the job is qualified, according to the listed duties in the ETA form (if the Form ETA lists an academic requirement or experiential requirement, for example, that the American job applicant cannot meet) then and only then can the employer proceed to file the the ETA 750 with the Department of Labor on behalf of the alien. The employer must describe specifically why each American worker who responded to the ad did not qualify for the offered job. The Department of Labor is very demanding and the employer runs a veritable gauntlet of requirements and nit-picking of the ETA form, the job ad process, and other issues. Once the ETA 750 is certified by a certifying officer, the employer can then file the immigrant petition together with the signed and certified Labor Certification with the USCIS (United States Citizenship and Immigration Service).

Incidentally, the employer has to pay for the advertisements, not the U.S. taxpayer. There has been enormous fraud in the past in Labor Certifications, especially in the resume and job applicant screening process. Also, many of the smaller employers have never had any intention whatsoever of offering the position to the American public and are not really offering the job to an alien because they can't find anyone else. Usually, the H-1b comes over because he knows the owner of the company and is from the same home country and benefits from this relationship in getting the employer to file for his green card through a Labor Certification. I think the entire process has been unfair to American workers, even though much of the fraud has been eliminated. I think something better has to be devised. However, the job adverisement process is something that has been going on for years, with literally hundreds if not thousands of immigration attorneys handling tons of these types of cases.

[drm604]

9. Sounds like a scam to me.

If they just going through the motions with no intention of actually hiring then it's a scam. Even if what they are doing were perfectly legal (which I doubt) it's still ethically a scam.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

11. This has nothing to do with H-1bs and is definitely not a scam

It involves a Labor Certification, a way of getting a green card. You can't get permanent residence with an H-1b.

One of the few ways an alien can legally immigrate to the U.S. is through employment. Unless the alien is "extraordinary" or "outstanding", the employer must file a Labor Certification with the U.S. Department of Labor on behalf of the alien before being able to petition the Immigration authorities. Part of that process requires the employer to define exactly what the job duties are on the form ETA 750 and also list any academic or experiential requirements for the job. Those same job duites and requirements must by law be advertised and offered to the American public. The idea is that before a permanent job can be offered to an alien, and before he can base a green card petition on it, it must first be offered to the American public at large and if any American worker is qualified, the alien doesn't get approved. The rationale is to prevent the alien from getting a job for which there are available and qualified American workers in the region. It's not fair to American workers who have to go to a job interview for a job that isn't really being offered to them. But the idea is that American workers in general will benefit, if the alien is prevented from getting a permanent job that American workers in the region were qualified to do.

It's not a scam at all. It's the law and it's a very big part of the field of immigration law. Maybe people want to call the process a scam and I don't suggest that it's perfect, because it's not. But this is mainstream immigration law and one of the principal ways aliens get green cards and have been getting green cards for years and years.

[crispini]

14. it seems to me, however, that these job postings contravene the spirit of the law.

They may fulfill the letter of the law, but if a job posting is so specific and so ridiculous and so unrealistic that no American worker will apply for it, then, basically, it doesn't show that there are 'available and qualified' workers in the region. It shows that they have made up some BS job that no human being (even the proposed immigrant) can even do, and then they get to put their ringer in there for cheap.

[drm604]

15. Regardless,

if they're advertising for employees with no intention of hiring, and doing so in order to get green cards, then it's a scam. I don't care how long it's been going on or how mainstream it is. There are lots of unethical practices and outright scams that are "legal", have been going on for years, and are a big part of a field.

Just because everyone is exploiting a technical loophole, and has been for years, doesn't make it ethical or right. If this is one of the principal ways aliens get green cards then this is a major scandal that needs to be publicized and corrected.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

40. This is not a technical loophole and it's not exploiting a technicality

To repeat, it is one of the major, CENTRAL, PRIMARY ways in which aliens get green cards in this country. It is not a scam being carried out by private shysters. It is the process created and supervised by our federal government for requiring aliens to prove that they are not taking a job away from an American citizen. They do that by offering the same job being offered to the alien to the general public. If any Americans are available and qualified, the alien doesn't get the job.

[drm604]

43. I'll also repeat.

If they're advertising for employees with no intention of hiring then it's a scam. If they fully intend to preferentially interview and hire a qualified American citizen if one responds then you are correct. However, I'm not getting the impression that that's what's going on here.

[crispini]

44. Did you read the whole of the original post?

In particular, THIS job posting:

Work closely with management and users to analyze specify and design business applications. Analyze work processes procedures and data information needs to identify suitable areas for automation. Coordinate interpret develop test and implement client/server imaging and web-based software programs and/or applications. Develop user guides/instructions and train users on new/modified software programs and/or applications. Simultaneously support the development of multiple projects and enhancements. Communicate with internal users and management regarding day-to-day production issues and concerns and assist users by making recommendations regarding alternative solutions and the development of new systems to enhance the users' work environment. Provide ongoing support including off-hours on-call duty for performance and maintenance of claims imaging accounts payable and related systems. Apply troubleshooting techniques to identify evaluate and resolve software application issues. Previous experience must include work with: Web-Based Development involving ASP VBScript JavaScript Java Applets ActiveX Controls HTML XML IIS and Jscript; Desktop & Report Development involving VB Visual Studio Visual Source Safe VBA Windows API COM/DCOM and Crystal Reports; Relational Databases including SQL Server T-SQL Oracle API; and Object Oriented Programming.*** Please reference the ETA case number P-05187-99450-BWr9 on all resumes or they will not be considered. *** Applicant Must Reference (P-05187-99450BWr9) in response.

Nobody IN THE WORLD has that kind of resume. Seriously! It is ridiculous to expect ANY HUMAN BEING to have that skillset. That job description is just not realistic. It's made up. This is not any kind of "offering of that same job to the general public." It's a scam fake job made up to satisfy the letter of the law while contravening its spirit.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

55. The advertised job must be virtually identical to the alien's proposed job

That is how it works. In the Labor Certification process, the Certifying Officer at the U.S. Department of Labor goes over the job description of the alien's proposed job as written out on the Form ETA 750A at box #13. Here's part of the form the employer must submit:

http://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/pdf/eta750a.pdf

The wording of the advertisement placed in a newspaper that tests the labor market must have wording virtually identical to that above description. Furthermore, the alien must verify that he has each and every skill or ability in that job description.

As far as the job duties that you listed from an ad, I don't find them that astounding. What we don't know here is the basic name of the job and its classification. It MUST exist somewhere in the DOT - Dictionary of Occupation Titles - (which are two gigantic volumes printed by the federal government) that list every type of job. And the advertisement cannot involve the job duties of more than one DOT classification. The number assigned in the DOT must appear on the ETA 750 form. The description you provided looks like some kind of software engineer, probably working for an industrial company that also has an Internet presence. The engineer must work with management to design business applications. Nothing that arcane there. Developing software for automation. Nothing that arcane there, if it's the type of software engineer who works in industry. Developing and testing web-based software that the engineer creates. Nothing odd. Develop user guidelines for the software he creates. Nothing that strange there. Communicate with users and management in the company regarding day-to-day production issues. This feedback while software is being developed for those applications would be normal and expected. Providing off-hours support regarding troubleshooting of software designed for accounts payable systems is understandable. Troubleshooting software application issues is normal.

I find nothing that strange or out of place here. I don't see an illegal combination of job skills from more than one classification. I don't see job duties that would go beyond the normal skills for the DOT classification, although it would help clarify things if we knew the DOT classification and if I could look up the government stated normal job duties in that classification. Any description of the job at first might seem difficult to understand until you've worked in the field for awhile. Of course immigration law is not an exact science (no law is). The Adjudicating Officers at the USCIS are often very poorly trained, as well as the Certifying Officers at the Department of Labor. Sometimes they let things slip right by them. They are not highly trained judges or lawyers and occasionally you will have something unfair and illegal in the way of a job description be used in the advertisement. But that's not the norm by any means.

The other factor to consider here, regarding any job advertisement that might seem beyond the scope of the Dictionary of Occupational Titles, we don't know the ultimate disposition of that case. It may very well have not passed muster before the U.S. Department of Labor. Many cases get denied and the gauntlet a case must run is very difficult. If any job duties appear to be outside the normal scope of such a job, and also beyond the scope of the official job duties of the DOT which must be adhered to, the case will be very critically examined and a letter will be sent to the employer and their attorney (a "Notice Of Intent" to deny letter) regarding this issue, proposing to deny the case unless a clear explanation is given, for example, based upon an urgent business necessity. Even then, 9 chances out of 10, the case will be denied. The Certifying Officers at the Department of Labor are very critical and nitpicking for the most part. Therefore, just the fact that an ad appears in the newspaper involving a Labor Certification doesn't mean that the alien will be successful in his/her Labor Certification and be allowed to take the job and get a green card.

To restate what I said before, the advertising of the same job being offered to the alien is not a perfect process. It's inconvenient and downright unfair that Americans would respond to an ad and go to a job interview for a job that will never be offered to them. But that's the best solution our United States Congress has been able to come up with to insure the fact that the alien is not taking a job away from an American worker. Remember, if just one American worker responds to that job ad (including the one you posted above), and if that American worker is even minimally qualified in terms of experience and academics, then the entire Labor Certification falls through and the alien doesn't get certified. If you have a better solution to test the job market to allow that alien worker to get a green card through employment, but to prevent him from taking away an American's job, then you should write a letter to your Congressman or Congresswoman, fully describing the new process. I don't like the system myself but that's all we have and it's been around for years.

[crispini]

56. Well, I'm telling you as an experienced technology worker...

that no normal human could have that skill set in that job. I'm referring specifically to the list of technologies that person is expected to know, which is incredibly long and contains at least two different types of technologies that people don't normally combine, but rather, they specialize in one or the other.

I agree that we don't know about what ultimately happened to that job, so the system may or may not have worked.

However, I continue to maintain that if employers are posting job descriptions which do NOT match the ACTUAL job that the employee will be doing, in order to prevent Americans from applying for the job or to show that no Americans are qualified, that this is fraudulent and illegal.

Do you disagree with that statement?

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

58. It does match the exact job the employer offers the employee

It has to by law. Item #13 on the ETA 750 indicating what job is being offered to the alien must be identical in wording to the job advertisement. And the alien must document his experience in each and every ability and skill through either his university course transcript or letters from previous employers. And he cannot have gained any of the experience or abilities while working for the employer filing the ETA.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

There are over three hundred million Americans

Out of those three hundred million there are none that are "extraordinary" or "outstanding"?

Sorry, but I find that just a trifle difficult to believe.

The major differences between an H1b holder and a citizen is the pay and the level of fear in the employee.

The H1b employee knows he is going back to wherever if he gets fired.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

41. That has nothing to do with what I wrote

I said there are categories of aliens where they do not have to go through the Labor Certification process. These are the first and (part of) the second preference categories.

If you can prove that you have risen to the summit of your field of endeavor, then no testing of the job market is required because you are considered to be "extraordinary". YOU DO NOT EVEN NEED TO HAVE A JOB LINED UP IN THE UNITED STATES. A particular laundry list of things you must submit is stated in the law and the USCIS adjudicating officer makes a decision based upon that evidence (high level professional membership, major awards, materials published about the alien, importance of the alien's own published work, etc.). Even though the U.S. has citizens with extraordinary ability in the sciences, arts, etc., the law considers the addition of alien individuals who are extraordinary to be a great benefit to the country. Here, the alien doesn't even need a job in the United States and does not have to have an employer filing the petition. For example, a great opera star or a Nobel Prize winning writer does not need a job; he/she gets automatic approval of the case. There is no Labor Certification or job advertisement process.

Another first preference category is that of outstanding researcher. Here, no Labor Certification or job advertisement are required either. It's another laundry list, with an emphasis on international publications and is usually a category used by scientists or engineers.

Then there's the second category petition of "exceptional ability" (with another corresponding laundry list of evidence that must be submitted to prove this. Here, however, only if the alien can prove that he or she is "contributing to the NATIONAL INTEREST to a substantially more significant extent than the majority of his/her peers", they can by-pass the Labor Certification, not even have to have a job lined up, do not have to go through advertising the job to the American public, and do not need an employer sponsor.

Again, this doesn't have to do with an H-1b. There is no job advertisement going on for an H-1b (except a internal posting by the employer at the place of work). This involves permanent residence (i.e. immigration), not temporary status.

[ProudDad]

32. Ah, Prince Mishkin,

You should check out this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbFEgFajGU

[lumberjack_jeff]

16. Here's the training that lawfirms offer their clients to conduct this "not scam"

http://thewhirlpool.blogspot.com/2007/06/how-to-not-hire-american.html

They're very explicit in their advice to potential clients, do it our way and you'll never have to hire another american.

It's not a scam; it's the law. The law seeks to enable every american company to hire exclusively foreigners if they wish.

Once you realize that the law isn't there to protect you, the world is easier to understand.

[TahitiNut]

19. Exactly. We must always remember that "legal" does NOT mean "ethical" or "right."

When those who have a private interest in contravening the 'public interest' gain influence in composing the laws, it is certain that the 'public interest' will suffer.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

42. Of course any lawyer is going to give his client advice in order to win

Lawyers do the same in personal injury cases. You don't think John Edwards pushed the envelope to the very limits of the law in telling his clients how to prepare for the witness stand or a deposition in any case he handled? You think he ignored questionable but nonetheless legal tactics to win his cases? He wouldn't be a good lawyer unless he did. That's what lawyering is all about. A lawyer is not a judge. You don't think a good criminal lawyer will try to use every possible maneuver to get a client off? If there's a problem with the law (and believe me, I think there are plenty of problems in immigration law and with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service) it's up to the legislature to change it. But don't blame the way the LAW is being carried out on the lawyers, the aliens, or the public in general. Blame the legislators who created it and who oversee its implementation.

I just can't believe the people on this thread who seem to think that a major component of our immigration laws, the Labor Certification process, is a shady scam. It is the law. It was enacted into law with clear knowledge of its provisions and with intent by our lawmakers.

People do not realize that there are VERY FEW ways under the law to get permanent residence in the United States. Very few, and they are hard. Basically, there is Diversity immigration (an annual lottery), family-based immigration (if you have a family member who is a U.S. citizen or green card holder), an asylee or refugee (categores coming under more and more scrutiny by the USCIS and hard to get), and finally employment-based, of which by far the biggest number are those who file Labor Certifications. THERE ARE NO OTHERS. Our country does not want other aliens.

I hear people talk about playing by the rules and waiting your turn. But there are no turns for unskilled laborers, for example. Average skilled workers, with Masters or even Ph.D.s can file a labor certification if they can find an employer.

I just do not see what is so shady about a protection in our laws for the American worker. By advertising the job to the public at large and forcing the employer to prove that there were no available and qualified American workers for the position they are offering the alien, the American worker is being protected. These are no perfect solutions. Believe me, the law itself is down-dirty and ugly in almost every single field. But that's the system we have.

[lumberjack_jeff]

46. But it's not "protection", it's a head-fake.

As the video illustrates, the law doesn't provide any meaningful barrier to companies who wish to hire foreign workers - even if there's a surplus of skilled US workers in that field.

[brentspeak]

26. It's also "the law" for our tax dollars to go into the pockets of oil execs as "subsidies"

This is just another case of crime being made legal.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

51. The intention may be to protect the American worker, but the employer

can word the job so specifically that only the one foreigner they have in mind fills the bill.

When I was in grad school, I (and several of my fellow graduate students) applied for a job in the Yale Library system as an assistant for East Asian languages. I met all the job requirements except one, "advanced calligraphic training in an East Asian country," which didn't really seem pertinent.

One of the older graduate students clued me in to what was happening. The head of the East Asian collection had a friend in Japan who wanted to come over to America. He therefore wrote the job description so that only his friend was likely to fit the description. After the job remained vacant for several months, his friend was granted a working visa.

The same type of thing is done for internal hires. At one university where I taught, a former fixed-term instructorship in Russian was turned into a tenure-track assistant professorship. Everyone wanted to keep the existing instructor, so they wrote the job ad to fit her and her alone. It was terribly unfair to other applicants, but it was the only way they could keep this excellent instructor.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

59. It's not a perfect system but the job ad process is the only viable way

Labor Certifications are THE major way in which aliens get green cards through employment. Of course we could remove all immigration through employment, leaving mainly family based immigration as the solution to immigrate legally to the United States. But the United States wants to attract skilled professionals and offer them permanent residence. That's a national policy and it's one of very long standing. There might be many situations of bad faith, where the job seems tailored to just one alien. Are you sure that advanced calligraphic training in an East Asian country had no use whatsoever in the Library System Assistant position? Chances are, that any arcane and irrelevant seeming job duties were heavily challenged by the Certifying Officer. I've been doing this for 14 years now and I can tell you the Department of Labor gives the employer, the alien, and the attorney a very hard time and virtually everything is subject to challenge and is challenged. Again, it's not a perfect system, but on the whole, the testing of the job market through the advertising process is the only viable means we have when an alien seeks a green card through employment and through a Labor Certification. If there are other, better means to screen immigration of professionals to ensure they don't take American jobs, I'd welcome knowing of them and I think the Congress would need to consider them.

[Dogmudgeon]

8. I've written about this scam dozens of times

I used to be a programmer. Every programmer I know has had hours of time wasted chasing jobs that didn't exist. In some cases, you get an interview appointment, and get called the night before to tell you it's been canceled. Job recruiters have gone out of business from being used as unpaid resume collectors.

I've met aeronautical engineers who went through this in the 1970s, in slightly different ways, since the laws were different.

But it's completely legal.

--p!

[loudsue]

10. If it's completely legal, then we need to DEMAND that it is made illegal.

This is an atrocity against our own citizens. And if it's being done legally, someone needs to re-write the law, or face the guillotine.

:kick:

[Dogmudgeon]

12. It's the whole system

It exploits Americans and guest workers alike.

These systems are all-pandering, total exploitation scams. Stoke a little hatred of foreigners here, dangle some goodies in front of small tech businesses there, and a whole industry of wheeler-dealers can be sustained across the world. We don't even know how the entire web works, but there have been a few busts of foreign underworld figures (Tong, Yakuza, Maffiya, etc.) in the last few years with employment scams going. And they are in bed with the state departments and bureaus of labor.

People figure that foreign mobsters getting their countrymen jobs aren't making much trouble, and that's probably true on the surface. But to me, it illustrates how deeply entrenched employment scams have become. We are evolving into a society where just having a job will be a privilege, and nobody has given much thought to the consequences. Europe is having a lot of problems with guest workers who have been unable to return home; America will have its own particular brand of trouble. And all for cheap labor!

--p!

[BearSquirrel2]

24. Amen Brother ...

I used to be a programmer too. We were H1-Bd out of our jobs. I've replied to too many of these resumes. And I've gone on too many forays to the recruiters office to fill out the candidate pool.

At a certain time, I just stopped trying as I realized I was being used as cannon fodder.

[TahitiNut]

25. I dealt with that for over two decades.

Between off-shoring and importing, American IT/EDP types were fucked over big time. Big time. And Gates wants hundreds of thousands MORE 'imports'!

[ProudDad]

33. No SHIT!

Last time I got a programming job it was 150 resumes for 1 interview (I got the job which was "outsourced" to Redmond WA within a year and a half)...

But, hell, I only had 39 years' experience at the time...

[thunder rising]

13. You win, just remember

when we go to war, it's our engineers and scientist against theirs. But we are hollowing out the profession. So, Americans can fight the invasion the old fashioned way, throwing their bodies into machine gun fire to run the enemy out of bullets.

And Chimpee himself cannot convince a kid that is smart enough to be a rocket scientist that there is actually a future in spending the time, money and effort to get a degree in a field that is being sold off wholesale.

When Americans accept living in a box a cat won't shit in ... we can have our jobs back.

[BearSquirrel2]

21. DUHHHH!!!

This is an old story. I discovered this after doing some research after receiving no reply from several ads on ComputerJobs.com.

The upswing for potential employers is that they use these fake job listings to boast there claims that there are not enough IT people out there to fill the demand for jobs.

[EnricoFermi]

28. I want a fake job

We should all apply

[rudy23]

29. They also use "wrong" phone numbers a lot. My old number was one of those numbers

They would advertise several different jobs, and list my phone number instead of the correct one. I didn't figure out what was likely going on until much later.

[flyingfysh]

30. this is a well-known trick

I've known some of the people these ads were designed to protect. The idea is to claim that no one else could possibly do the exact job these people are already doing.

[ProudDad]

31. Old News...

Video here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCbFEgFajGU

PERM Fake Job Ads defraud Americans to secure green cards


How can you tell the corporate capitalist masters are lying -- their lips are moving...

[The_Casual_Observer]

34. Always wondered why a job that basically had the responsiblity

& knowledge it would take to run the business paid so poorly. Now I know.

[AzDar]

35. Won't you join me in bringing this to the attention of Lou Dobbs?

[crispini]

37. Looks like he already knows

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kh6OLUPSHyE

I can't believe this.

[orleans]

38. wtf? n/t

[Skidmore]

39. Send this to Lou Dobbs.

[NorthernSpy]

45. Chairman Chao strikes again...

Bush's Labor Secretary Elaine Chao will do anything to help superior, deserving foreigners displace some more smelly Americans!

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/07/17/labor-secretary-american-workers-stink/

[glowing]

47. There was a video posted a few weeks back on DU with a company

that was explaining to companies how to disqualify American workers so that they can get H1-B workers.

It is legal but unethical and takes the context of the law and ruins it... The video guy was explaining that the company is to list the job but use an HR firm that immediately disqualifies people for key words. Also, listing the job outside of the actual city helps too. The companies are going really far not to pay qualified Americans. The reason I laugh a bit maniacly whenever Bush said we need more techs and scientists and mathmeticians is because companies are doing their best not to hire and pay qualified professionals.

[girl gone mad]

48. Thanks for linking to this.

I know many, many people in the DFW who have lost their IT jobs paying 60K+ to outsourcing or H1-B's and now work harder and longer hours for half the pay, if they can find anything at all in the field.

I also hate to say it, but it has been my experience that many H1-B applicants lie openly about both their experience and education. Employers lack the ability or simply don't care to check.

[Joanne98]

49. HI ELAINE CHAO!!!!!!!!!

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

50. I got a great idea!

Why don't we fight the hell out of this? it might be legal, but it's just plain WRONG.

[crispini]

52. I agree

what do you think we should do? Are there groups already existing that are working on this issue?

[newportdadde]

53. I wonder about some of these job ads sometime.. they want experience is everything.

As someone in IT I'm amazed at some of these job postings. The laundry list of expert skills you need to have just doesn't seem realistic.

[sadiesworld]

57. Let's all write Hillary, maybe she'll help.

:rofl: