Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said she will introduce a bill to end H-1B visas, which allow companies to bring skilled foreign workers, days after President Donald Trump backed the program.
It is very close to slavery. Your employer gets absolute power over you and your immigration status. “You’re fired” means “you need to leave everything you built and everyone you love behind”.
Are you gonna risk leaving your family behind and being banned from the country to join a union? To protest bad work conditions.
It is a scourge of a system that legitimizes the exploitation of immigrants.
I think the systems employed in the middle east where passports are confiscated and more overt coercion is involved are closer to slavery.
The conditions you describe certainly exist but are the nature of employment based immigration everywhere. It’s hard to imagine any country forgoing that initial period of leverage in their corporation’s favor. What’s uniquely exploitative in the US is keeping people in visa limbo for a period of 10 to 15 years because each nation has a cap of 7% of total green cards regardless of size or level of immigration. That mean the number of greencards available to a nation of 1 billion is the same as the number available to a nation of 20 million.
In the end it’s not the population of an immigrants origin country that matters, it’s how many are coming to the US. If there are a larger number of immigrants admitted from one country via H1b then there should be a greater number of green cards alotted. This way that exploitative relationship doesn’t stretch for 10 to 15 years which is unacceptable in my opinion.
Immigrants have always had to come in, put their heads down and work. That’s the nature of moving to a new country. To a degree, anyone that joins a new place of employment has a probation period and has to try not to make waves for a period of time. Those circumstances are not easy to change.
Instead we should be focussed on immigrants getting fair pay and having a clear pathway to permanent residency to limit a employer’s ability leverage a visa over their employee.
If there is another “nation of immigrants” that does it better I’d be interested to hear about it but as far as I know Canada’s LMIA system faces similar criticisms.
I am curious since it appears you are Canadian, what reform would you propose? The LMIA system in Canada faces similar issues but for a shorter period since immigrants with a high enough score on their application can secure PR within around 2 years. During those two years Canadian employers have similar leverage over immigration employees. However under the American H1b system if you’re terminated, you have up 60 days to leave which is often not enough time to secure a new sponsor. Under the Canadian LMIA system you have 90 days and can potentially apply for a temporary visitors extension which allows immigrants and their families a better shot at staying.
There are several different aspects of policy that can be tweaked but employer leverage period is really a tough one to eliminate. Though it can certainly be cushioned by removing barriers to PR and offering a longer grace period in the event of termination from employment.
It is very close to slavery. Your employer gets absolute power over you and your immigration status. “You’re fired” means “you need to leave everything you built and everyone you love behind”.
Are you gonna risk leaving your family behind and being banned from the country to join a union? To protest bad work conditions.
It is a scourge of a system that legitimizes the exploitation of immigrants.
I think the systems employed in the middle east where passports are confiscated and more overt coercion is involved are closer to slavery.
The conditions you describe certainly exist but are the nature of employment based immigration everywhere. It’s hard to imagine any country forgoing that initial period of leverage in their corporation’s favor. What’s uniquely exploitative in the US is keeping people in visa limbo for a period of 10 to 15 years because each nation has a cap of 7% of total green cards regardless of size or level of immigration. That mean the number of greencards available to a nation of 1 billion is the same as the number available to a nation of 20 million.
In the end it’s not the population of an immigrants origin country that matters, it’s how many are coming to the US. If there are a larger number of immigrants admitted from one country via H1b then there should be a greater number of green cards alotted. This way that exploitative relationship doesn’t stretch for 10 to 15 years which is unacceptable in my opinion.
Immigrants have always had to come in, put their heads down and work. That’s the nature of moving to a new country. To a degree, anyone that joins a new place of employment has a probation period and has to try not to make waves for a period of time. Those circumstances are not easy to change.
Instead we should be focussed on immigrants getting fair pay and having a clear pathway to permanent residency to limit a employer’s ability leverage a visa over their employee.
If there is another “nation of immigrants” that does it better I’d be interested to hear about it but as far as I know Canada’s LMIA system faces similar criticisms.
Damn that crazy bro.
I am curious since it appears you are Canadian, what reform would you propose? The LMIA system in Canada faces similar issues but for a shorter period since immigrants with a high enough score on their application can secure PR within around 2 years. During those two years Canadian employers have similar leverage over immigration employees. However under the American H1b system if you’re terminated, you have up 60 days to leave which is often not enough time to secure a new sponsor. Under the Canadian LMIA system you have 90 days and can potentially apply for a temporary visitors extension which allows immigrants and their families a better shot at staying.
There are several different aspects of policy that can be tweaked but employer leverage period is really a tough one to eliminate. Though it can certainly be cushioned by removing barriers to PR and offering a longer grace period in the event of termination from employment.