The Sopranos Meet H-1B In New Jersey 324
theodp writes "We smack this IT geek around a little, take him for a nice car ride, threaten to 'take care of him' if he doesn't recant his story, give him 5 G's for his trouble, and badda boom, badda bing, case dismissed. Federal prosecutors allege that an H-1B visa-holding IT employee who was owed some $53,000 in back wages was threatened in meetings at restaurants and in his home if he didn't change his story. However, the victim captured some of what happened on tape, and two employees of an Illinois-based IT staffing company — not named in the indictment but identified by the NJ Star-Ledger as ComData Consulting Inc. of Rolling Meadows, IL — are now facing extortion-related charges and a possible 20 years in prison."
Unacceptable (Score:4, Insightful)
This behavior is unacceptable from companies that have offices in America. That might be how people do business in other places, but they need to leave that shit at the door. Perhaps someday we'll realize this has been going on in Chinese restaurants and massage parlors for 50 years and do something about those too?
Re:Unacceptable (Score:5, Insightful)
Absolutely. And really, this might be how things are done elsewhere, but it is never acceptable. I'm unfamiliar with the Chinese restaurant/massage parlor comment, but these practices need to be stamped out wherever they are. Cultural relativism is criminal when it is used to excuse crimes like this.
Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't. Do. Nothing.
From the ComData Web Site (Score:5, Insightful)
Our Talent Engagement and Management Teams strongly believe in
The capacity of recruiters for absolute BS is amazing. Mind you there are smart ethical headhunters out there, but they're few and far between.
Re:Let it begin (Score:4, Insightful)
The H1B program deserves to be bashed, mindless or not. It artificially depresses the IT job market by flooding it with workers who are easy for companies to bully or take advantage of. These workers allow themselves to be treated like crap because they cannot leave their jobs without risking getting sent back to India. Most of them are afraid to speak up when they are treated unfairly because #1, they feel like they have it better than they did in India and #2, they don't know their rights in our country.
Re:Let it begin (Score:3, Insightful)
Umm, they can.
and get paid real us wages for work in the us
The law already requires that. The abuses arise from the difficulty in defining the "real us wages for work in the us".
Re:Let Com Data hear from you (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone notice how "careers" is misspelled on their website? That alone would cause me to NEVER use their services, because if you can't proofread your own damn website, what guarantees are there that you pay attention to detail in whatever work you provide?
Re:Let it begin (Score:2, Insightful)
Here is an even better idea: Lets change the immigration laws so that if someone wants to work in the US, they can quickly and easily acquire citizenship. I assert that anyone who wants to be an American citizen enough to ask to be, deserves to be. All of this isolationist shit should have died along with the 20th century.
If we just grant these people citizenships, then we won't have to worry about the ethical ramifications of having multiple legal classes of workers in the country.
Re:How many years? (Score:4, Insightful)
> Judging by the content of recruiters e-mails that I get...
And, as we all know, there is no more reliable source of information than recruiters.
Re:Free Market (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Let it begin (Score:5, Insightful)
They should be able to quickly and easily get a citizen-track visa or green card, but if we just grant citizenship to everybody who wants it, people will just be citizens for as long as it is convenient - say, as long as it takes to acquire the knowledge to offshore a process or function. There is every reason to give green cards to hardworking people who want to live and die in America, but I can't fathom why we want guest workers - except to hold down domestic wages.
Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:5, Insightful)
When leaving only gets you dragged back and beaten twice as hard for escaping, it's not really an option.
Escape is a gutsy move, sure to piss off the captors and it may even cost you your life.
The lion's share of the burden rightly falls on outsiders who are not as easy to catch, and are in a much better position to summon the cavalry.
Re:Let it begin (Score:3, Insightful)
Sheesh, where did your entitlement come from? Unless you're a fucking Native American, you'd best STFO and be happy that your ancestors illegally immigrated here lest you be born into some "awful non-US country."
Re:Let it begin (Score:4, Insightful)
You can't say it's always "mindless" to "bash the whole H1B program, all Indian techies and Indian call centers"--there are a few who do it out of prejudice, but most Americans complain about these things for perfectly rational reasons.
"Buy American and Americans work." That was the well-advertised slogan of the 80s, and yet NAFTA and outsourcing empowered a transnational corporate world in opposition to the very values of localism and national pride which most Americans grew up embracing. Importing foreign workers and exporting American jobs are some of the most visible violations of these values.
The oft-repeated mantra is, "We don't have enough skilled workers, so we need H1B!" Then why does almost anyone in the tech sector know many skilled but unemployed Americans? And if there were a real shortage, introductory salaries and incentives would let the "free market" attract more Americans to become qualified for tech jobs in the near future--but instead, H1B keeps introductory salaries and incentives artificially low and _creates_ the very shortage tech employers complain about!
"Call center work (or 7-11 clerking, or construction, or industrial farm work, or any 'unskilled labor') is drudgery no Americans are willing to do!" Bullshit. Maybe they won't do it for minimum-wage-or-less like immigrants or outsourced labor, but if not unfairly undercut by immigrants or outsourcing there are millions of Americans who would gladly work any and every job. Just look at the damned unemployment rate, especially among minorities--it is patently unjust and unreasonable to support immigration and job outsourcing when so many Americans are left jobless. If a job is vital and needs to get done, employer and employee will find the right pay each is willing to live with--the market will set fair pay in a fair, largely closed system. But in an open system filled with endless hordes of immigrants and outsourced labor willing to work for wages no American can live on--unless he's willing to live in a closet and eat the cheapest processed foodcrap imaginable and never even dream of supporting a family and kids--employees become a disposable commodity and employers will exploit the unjust and unnatural imbalance.
So, while what happened to this H1B guy is inherently unfair, criminal, and wrong--it is the foreseeable result of the H1B program, which along with outsourcing and uncontrolled immigration is creating an imbalanced market where workers both skilled and unskilled are disposable commodities instead of people.
And that doesn't even begin to touch on the cultural issues. The Western world, and especially the U.S., is currently committing cultural suicide by not limiting immigration to rational levels. We are a nation built on immigration, that's true--but it has never neared this uncontrolled torrent before: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5871651411393887069# [google.com]
Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:5, Insightful)
Contrary to what you might think, she could leave if she wanted to.
VERY common misconception where domestic and foreign worker violence is involved. No, a lot of the time these people don't believe they have a choice. By the time things have progressed to this point, most of them have it pretty thoroughly engrained in their minds that offering any form of resistance, to say nothing of reporting the problem, will only lead to intensified beatings, to the point of severe injury or death. These people are controlled by fear. Fear of worse beatings. Fear of death.
Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:4, Insightful)
would you turn off Rush for a few minutes and do some actual reading? Try Googling "human trafficking". I think you'll find that many undocumented immigrants live under conditions little better than slavery.
Re:Let it begin (Score:3, Insightful)
Your numbers are at least 50 years out of date. The only reason our (US) population growth is even positive is due to immigration. (direct immigration and children of first time immigrants) If zero population growth isn't sustainable, we have bigger problems than immigration to worry about.
The fact that your facts are so off makes me doubt the rest of your argument.
T
Re:Excuse me? All criticism has been well earned. (Score:3, Insightful)
Really? Let's see, I'm a newly minted H1B. My wages here are $15k above the wages that the role was offering (so I'm nicely into six figures before bonuses and stock). I've been coding for 20+ years, I've been brought in to upskill the team and bring those 20 years of experience to bear, I'm leading the development of a small product, pushing code quality, dealing with other teams, users and the wider open source community.
But then I'm British. So why don't you just say what you mean? That you don't rate Indian developers. Don't try to hide behind the H1B programme - you have a problem with a sub-continent, and you're tarring everyone from there with the same brush.
Re:Unacceptable (Score:2, Insightful)
This behavior is unacceptable from companies that have offices in America. That might be how people do business in other places, but they need to leave that shit at the door.
How is the parent comment rated insightful? It was US company and at least one of the crime perpetrators was a US citizen from New Jersey. It was the victim that was foreign.
Seems to me the shit was in the US to begin with and was the people from outside US that were used to good business practices that stand up against it from the story !
Man, then you ask why we Europeans think that Americans are full of crap ! At least in such obvious cases at least give the trouble to actually read the article before coming to advertise your country is the greatest thing this planet ever saw in all recorded history.
Re:Let it begin (Score:4, Insightful)
Wow, another mindless rant full of misconceptions, Where should I start?
The H1B's (as opposed to "outsourced jobs") are paid the same as an American worker would. So, please learn the difference and understand to place your indignation in the right place. The H1-B Program is a legitimate way for companies to be competitive. You should be holding your representatives and senators accountable for updating the rules and enforcement to root out these types of fraud. But it is easier to "bash the whole H1B program, all Indian techies and Indian call centers". In this case, the angst is misplaced and done out of ignorance or malice. People who engage in this are, quite frankly, ignorant and will willfully throw the baby out with the bathwater. Call your senator and congressman and tell them to fix the H1 Visa program.
Anecdoatlly, I feel that the mantra "We don't have enough skilled workers, so we need H1B!" is actually accurate when taken in context - and for two completely different reasons. One is that you're lumping all "skills" together: a Web Developer is NOT a good systems administrator or a DBA. So, you do get spot shortages of specific skillsets in places. The second is that the Indian software industry focuses on developing niches more effectively than in the US. Our kids are well rounded - they're not as good at being specialists in a given field. So, I can locally find a guy who can figure out his way in a given system (makes for a great supervisor of contract resources, BTW). But if I need someone who understands the intricacies of the SAP-HR module, it is more efficient to get a contract specialist. This is where companies that staff using H1-B's excel because I (a) can't keep this specialist busy and productive 40/hr a week month-after-month and (b) he won't ever be remotely interested (even if he does have the skills) in taking on a more flexible role.
In short, the above has been my experience.in the past 15 years of being in IT and then in SW Development. I have found that many Americans workers detest working with Indian colleagues (regardless of whether they're H1-B or not). I find this racist and stupid in the extreme and this attitude really hurts them and gives American workers a bad name. I know that some managers will prefer to not mix US sourced folks with employees or contractors of Indian origin.
I actually had a US Citizen turn down a 6month contract at $105/hr because he felt that the working conditions were not appropriate. His complaint: no assigned cube with window view and he reported to an "unqualified" supervisor ... which was code for someone of Indian background.
So, I have a hard time finding sympathy with your post. Perhaps if it was a little more informed and researched, I might be willing to engage constructively.
Re:Unacceptable (Score:5, Insightful)
Here are some examples from today's headlines. And by today I mean this week!
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/04/17/alec-massey-mine/ [thinkprogress.org]
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-04-18/goldman-s-staged-explosion-deserves-apology-roger-lowenstein.html [businessweek.com]
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/yesterday-germany-today-uk-tomorrow-world-goldmans-response-lawsuits-everyone-q1-stub-bonuse [zerohedge.com]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetar_Capital [wikipedia.org]
Fear Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:5, Insightful)
And fear of the unknown. Even being beat or dying doesn't hold a candle to the fear of the unknown. When people are in an abusive relationsihp, they often stay because the abuse and beatings they get here are at least known. Comparatively, they don't know if they leave _what_ will happen.
Fear of the unknown stops people from many things: from leaving abusive relationships, to success in business and life. It's also a huge problem for guys wanting to ask a girl out.
Re:Unacceptable (Score:5, Insightful)
Just being competitive in the global marketplace (Score:3, Insightful)
It's fascinating that Americans (Score:3, Insightful)
Who supposedly support the free and lubricated market when it comes to the free movement of capital across the globe can be so protectionist when it comes to labour. By the tenets of capitalism, a Bangladeshi man should be able to move to New Jersey without let or hindrance and put X plumbers and handymen out of business. How come the proponents of capitalism can consider with glee another country's protected industries and financial markets falling to the inexorable march while at the same time, oddly, not sharing the glee of, say, a Sri Lankan chicken farmer at the thought of selling Americans chicken for 0.50$ / lb, retail?
Capitalist? Ha
Re:Let it begin (Score:5, Insightful)
Here is an even better idea: Lets change the immigration laws so that if someone wants to work in the US, they can quickly and easily acquire citizenship. I assert that anyone who wants to be an American citizen enough to ask to be, deserves to be. All of this isolationist shit should have died along with the 20th century.
Let me tell this to you as a foreigner.
You can't give citizenship out left and right. What makes your country is your culture (and I don't mean things like country music or apple pie here...), and if you just open your borders, you will be immediately swamped by third-worlders (like me) who want their piece of the quality-of-life pie. They don't care in the slightest how the pie came to be there in the first place, or what they have to do, long-term, to keep it - well, some will, but they are the minority. Most just want to have it.
Therefore, for immgiration to be productive, rather than detrimental, to your society, you need to make sure that, however many people you take in, they are assimilated into your culture - and that's your upper limit. And the relatively straightforward way to see how good the immigrant is assimilating is observing how they do when they're still on worker's visa. It also gives them time to learn the language, as well as basics of living in a new place (you'd be surprised to know how many things that are mundane to you are strange and alien to a newcomer), and see what the society there is really like, and decide whether they're really sure they can be a proper part of it.
To that extent, the process of acquiring permanent resident status (and eventually citizenship) from worker visa shouldn't be too simple - you need some gates there to control it. The biggest problem with your program as is is twofold. First, there are no established terms or guarantees. In most other countries that have similar programs in place, you are eligible to apply after working in the country for a certain specific period of time, and the process is straightforward in a sense that there are usually point-based systems with published evaluation criteria, so, for the most part, you know in advance whether you will be approved or not (unless you don't pass a security background check - but that isn't typical, though chances of a "false positive" are higher in today's terrorism-crazy world). The amount of time that processing of the application takes from the moment you submit it is also generally known fairly well.
In contrast, applying for a green card from H1-B is very much a gamble - you never know if they approve you or not, nor how long it takes - and it can take really, really long. I know of people waiting for 7+ years to get there; for comparison, in Canada, the whole process almost universally takes less than 3 years from the moment you first set foot in the country (including 1 year on worker visa so that you're eligible for fast-track permanent residence).
The second problem is just the one GP noted - that H1-Bs are severely disadvantaged, because they're tied to their employer, and, should he kick them out for any reason, they have to start packing right away - no chance to find another job (in practice, quite a few people actually break the law and overstay to do so - but this is also very much a gamble). Yeah, in theory, employers have to prove that the wage they offer to employee is above market average for this position - but there are many well-known tricks on how to legally do this for practically any number. And, once hired, the employer has both the carrot - raises - as well as the stick - termination of employment - at his full disposal.
If a citizen is denied a raise that he believes is rightly his, he can just quit and go look for a better job - and, if his assessment of his worth was correct, he'll find one. An H1-B just has to suck it up, because however bad he has it, it's usually still way better than what he'd get back home. Ditto for overtime.
And, of course, it screws both H1-Bs them
Re:Excuse me? All criticism has been well earned. (Score:4, Insightful)
As much as you have a point, I've been working in IT for years as well and I've only met one British worker in the US, and I think he's got at least a green card because he married an American girl. Just about everyone else I have ever seen working H1-B is Indian and boy do they fuck them over. As a white man who actually speaks a dialect of English that is considered civilized in the US, you are going to have a decent time of it. The only thing you need to worry about is idiots making too many Limey jokes and telling you that your spelling is funny.
The Indians generally have to worry about unscrupulous companies that bring them in, keep them in the dark and then make sure that they work under conditions that you could consider appalling. I can't tell you the number of H1-B colleagues that I know who have at one time or another had to worry about losing their job and then having to deal with being packed off back to India 5 days later because they are a guest worker.
The problem with H1-B is that it allows more bad than good. Clearly we want to have some guest workers like you over here to provide actual technical expertise, but most of these guest workers are doing jobs that Americans could definitely do and not even getting paid decently for it. That may be because we don't have enough IT people available to work over here, but I suspect that the supposed lack of IT workers is more of a situation where those said workers actually want to be paid US wages and treated like professionals.
Of course, the H1-B problem is one where many of us feel we are being unemployed in favor of cheap labor, but it doesn't change the fact that the program is allowing the guest workers to get screwed too, if they happen to be from somewhere sufficiently backward. That's just bad all around, and I see no reason that it should be allowed to continue as it has been.
Re:Let it begin (Score:3, Insightful)
"The H1B's (as opposed to "outsourced jobs") are paid the same as an American worker would." That's bullshit. The job market is just that, a market. Supply and demand. Restrict supply wages go up, increase supply wages go down. Any increase in the supply automatically reduces wages. If there really is a shortage of skilled IT workers, how about investing in education? If people see wages on the rise, you can guarantee more will seek education in the field. If we aren't turning out qualified candidates, look for the reason why. Our math and science education sucks. Importing the products of other, more successful education systems merely hides the fact and covers it up for a little while, until eventual wages between us and them normalize to the point they have no interest in coming here. I for one am not interested in turning America into a 3rd world shit hole so you can find the cheap programmers you want to make some extra profit right now. If there is a real lack of talent, we need a long term solution, and that means improving education, improving access to the education, and letting the market set wages that actually makes the time, effort, and money spent on that education a sound investment.
Furthermore, if we are going to allow immigration (and I think we definitely should) there are much, much better ways then the H1-B program. Ways that lead to citizenship, and a real investment in the future of our country. Ways that enable them to bring their families here, to be represented fairly in our government, and to quit their job if their boss is being abusive or paying them an unfair wage without fear of being deported. H1-B is and always has been a shortcut to cheap labor in the immigration system. If the regular system is to slow and corrupt, FIX THAT, don't make shortcuts.
Re:Let it begin (Score:4, Insightful)
Right. Just imagine what a mess we'd be in if 100 years ago anyone could become an American citizen just by showing up .. oh wait.
Re:How many years? (Score:3, Insightful)
"If you are really good you can get a job anywhere, visa or not."
Sure, as long as you have money to bribe people and you keep your head down in the boat.
Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:3, Insightful)
It works like bullying: eventually the victim's own fear means instant compliance with the bully's wishes.
Re:Excuse me? All criticism has been well earned. (Score:1, Insightful)
Well, as with most things, there is a hint of truth to all of the above. I work at an Indian owned company, so so I know these things first-hand.
However, outsourcing companies are often hired for tedious jobs that anyone with talent would quit. You have to realize that when judging the quality of those guys you have seen. The companies are getting what they want then.
Do the math: 60% the productivity at 30% of the price works out in the favor of the company paying. you can hire 3 less skilled people for the budget of one skilled local, and get almost two people worth of productivity. This only works on simple tasks that require more grunt and less management though. But.. this is exactly the type of task most places want to have someone else do.
There are genius programmers in India, but they don't usually get stuck working in random projects, but can have their pick of any project they want.
Also, as the IT profession is more common in India compared with the US and Europe, you have to realize that people with no actual interest in what they are doing end up in the field more often - that eventually affects quality.
Re:Let it begin (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, the "one nation under God" was added in the fifties by Americans. So apparently the current population of US citizens seems to have a severely different grasp of what a "better life" is than the renaissance men who founded the country in the first place.
I look at my own constitution and the state of my nation, and we're facing a very similar issue with Moroccan and Turkish immigrants who are Islamic. Some people want to put caps on immigration, some people want to outlaw Islam because they're clueless and scared.
In the mean time The Netherlands have, since the Unie van Utrecht was drafted and signed in 1579, a ~450 year old tradition of guaranteeing Freedom of Religion and Freedom of a man's Faculty which was continued in our constitutions until this day.
Culture is what you make of it. There's no such thing as a culture that is still alive *and* unchanging at the same time. In the mean time it is important we stay true to the Constitutional values that are the cornerstone of our respective nations.
Re:Free Market (Score:5, Insightful)
True, they just oppose a government powerful enough to do something about it.
Re:Abuse of Restaurant Workers (Score:5, Insightful)
And whose legal and cultural system they don't understand. There's a quote from movie, where a factory owner in London is trying to get one of his workers, a woman illegally immigrated from Turkey, for a sexual favor. He basically says, if you don't do it, I'll report you to the government, and they'll throw you in jail. "And British jail is not like your Turkish jail, where the men and women are kept separate. If you go to jail you will be raped every night, over and over again." 100% bullshit, but 100% effective.
Re:Let it begin (Score:3, Insightful)
Cultures change, absolutely. But such changes are evolutionary in nature, and generally happen at the pace with which most members can keep up, or at least tolerate. What I was talking about is a rapid change which discards most, if not all, of the fundamentals, all at once, in a very brief period of time.
And, yes, naturally, any protective measures have to be respectful of the culture they're trying to protect, otherwise what's the point? If part of it is freedom of speech and freedom of religion, then that's what you stick to. It's very unfortunate that some people in the West have recently started to subscribe to the concept that human rights and freedoms - the concept which their civilization is largely responsible for establishing, promoting, and spreading - are not for everyone, and especially not for "foreign-looking" (i.e. not white, Muslim, etc) immigrants.
Last I checked, however, even the most liberal countries still control immigration to some extent or another.
Abuser's mind (Score:1, Insightful)
In the abuser's mind, THEY OWN their victims. So if they have to hunt down the victim that has left them, it is the worst insolence and to be punished as harshly as possible. It is also their biggest fear, that they DON'T have absolute control, and that their life-lie can be found out. Though they are unaware of this, it is just the overwhelming and unrecognized emotions that dictate their inhumane actions.
A perpetrator might very well kill a victim that has fled from them, feeling justified in doing so, or just losing all control because of their own fears and shattering of their illusion that they have absolute control. It's predatory action, without awareness of consequences. Like an automaton. All this, while towards other people, such people may show signs of empathy and friendship, there is this black hole inside that yearns to live out their darkest wounds (a perpetrator has always been a victim at some point of time).
When you don't even speak the language, it's hard to escape, almost impossible. Like in Dubai, people are being held there in the millions as labour slaves. They can't just flee, because they don't speak the language, the slave-culture is ingrained in Dubai and they may risk death and injury even to think about fleeing. Often, they have been promised great wages, great work-conditions, left their families, borrowed money to travel and is now stuck in a quagmire of economic and social oppression inside Dubai while basically being held as slaves:
The Dark Side of Dubai
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/the-dark-side-of-dubai-1664368.html
Although this is more a socially-accepted slavery, the underlying problems are similar, just in a different flavour. It's not sustainable in the long run. Dubai is like a big fat lie, that eventually will fall back into the desert and the natural environment, sooner or later.
But there is a 'shortage' (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Given unemployment, cancel these programs. (Score:3, Insightful)
Funny thing too, at one time a "shortage" of qualified people was a reason for businesses to contribute back to society by providing training and scholarship programs to get the people they needed. This, in turn, encouraged loyalty in both directions and so, long term employment. IF the H1B program is permitted to continue at all, the constraints should be expanded so that not only must the employer show that there are no qualified citizens or green card employees available but that there are none who could be qualified within a year (or two) with a training/educational program.