Trump Plans To Dismantle Obama-Era 'Startup Visa' (arstechnica.com) 320
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A regulation from the Obama administration that would have allowed foreign-born entrepreneurs who raise investor cash to build their startups in the U.S. won't be allowed to go into effect. The Department of Homeland Security will file an official notice to delay the International Entrepreneur Rule for eight months. The intention is to eliminate the rule entirely, according to sources briefed on the matter who spoke to The Wall Street Journal. The decision isn't final, and a DHS spokesperson told the WSJ that the department "cannot speculate" on the outcome of the review. The International Entrepreneur Rule, signed by former President Obama days before he left office in January, doesn't offer a visa but rather a type of "parole" that would allow immigrants to stay in the U.S. temporarily as long as they meet certain requirements. In order to qualify, a foreign entrepreneur has to raise at least $250,000 from well-known U.S. investors. The rule grants a stay in the U.S. of 30 months, which can be extended for an additional 30 months. Founders can't apply for a green card during that time. DHS has estimated about 3,000 entrepreneurs would qualify under the rule.
Wondering what may replace this. (Score:5, Insightful)
If I were President I'd scrap this rule too--because it's just too confusing. But then, everything having to do with visiting and obtaining permission to work within the United States, as well as with immigrating to the United States, is just terribly confusing. And I say this as a U.S. citizen.
Personally I would rather we simplify all these regulations regarding immigration--and make it easier for people who qualify to immigrate here without all this weird mumbo-jumbo "parole, no green card, 30 months, can't visit overseas for longer than so many days, do not pass go, must recite ancient Aramaic to come back" nonsense. I swear; just talking to my friends who immigrated here from overseas about what they had to do to become U.S. citizens gives me a massive headache.
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It's like that because nobody wants to advocate for simple exclusions. And for every reasonable exclusion you can think of, there's a constituency who wants exceptions for their specific cases -- countries of origins, family ties, sponsors, assets, various flavors of civil and military conflict, etc.
Simplifying is a great idea, but you have to be willing to decide who you won't let in without creating any exceptions.
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Fact of life: any time you change regulations there are always losers. When you talk about regulations at the federal level, sadly, you need to approach the problem by recognizing you're trying to maximize overall "good", recognizing the fact that some folks will always fall between the cracks.
Even creating exceptions for every fiddly little fringe case doesn't solve the problem, since the folks who fall between the cracks are those of average intelligence who can't navigate the list of exceptions.
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The problem with immigration is there is no Pareto optimal state.
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visiting OR obtaining permission to work. You don't need to be doing work for something to be difficult.
I find it easier to go to China to visit. At least you know when your visa is rejected, but what is the purpose of an ESTA form? An Electronic System for Travel Authorisation that allows you to waive a visa but at the same time doesn't guarantee that you won't randomly be rejected and doesn't tell you if you're okay to travel? Like WTF! It's the only developed country I've ever been uncertain about.
No justification that is at all reasonable (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:No justification that is at all reasonable (Score:4, Informative)
Instead, this startup visa (would have) required someone to have an idea for a business that's good enough to attract investors. Maybe some of them fail, but maybe some of them are the next (insert cool/successful tech startup), and we'd rather they be in the US than in the other countries trying to attract them.
Of course, the startup visa was drawn from the number of visas otherwise available for EB-5 buyers. Gee, I wonder why Trump and Kushner would want to cut startup visas, but keep the EB-5 around.
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It's all in the enforcement and the loopholes. How many "investors" are required? Are they required to be actual American firms or citizens? How many employees is your "startup" required to actually have?
What's to prevent a H-1B farmer from simply creating sham startups and importing "entrepreneurs"?
Sure, if the enforcement is rigorous and there is some kind of auditing to insure that these are bonafide startups, entrepreneurs and investors then on the surface it doesn't seem like a bad idea at all. If
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Because sham startups won't get professional investors - definitely not well-known ones with some credibility.
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Enforcement is a completely different claim. Are you at all able to acknowledge that your initial claim about where the money would come from is wrong? You also appear to be completely missing the point that this system was set up to encourage more startups with more jobs. That helps the people who aren't rich.
"You have your talking point to spin on for keeping your two tiered system only for the rich, I have my points for explaining why you are being dishonest. "
It is unfortunate that you presume that
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No, it is 30 (+30) month visas for people with $250,000, nothing else. If you want a two tiered immigration system that only caters to the rich, win an election. I think the majority of the country is fed up with two sets of rules depending on how much money you have or how high up your contacts in the government are.
Strange. Isn't catering to the rich all the Republicans do these days? That's what "trickle down" is all about, right?
Divide and conquer! (Score:2)
Yep.
Good (Score:2)
This honestly sounds like a scam to get entrepreneurs stuck in a legal negative space so we can strip them of the business they built in the process of kicking them back out. The foreigners would have to be on crack to take this deal.
absolutely pointless program (Score:2)
That's a ridiculously pointless program. No sensible, skilled entrepreneur will want to come to the US on a temporary visa and start building a company without the security of permanent residen
I have a feeling... (Score:3)
Dismantle? Really? (Score:3)
The International Entrepreneur Rule, signed by former President Obama days before he left office in January
President Obama was able to completely architect, build, and implement an entire new category for immigration operations in just a few days? This is probably just President Trump stopping the first part of the process (architecting it), before anything else even started. But it does make great political grist for the mill!
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I don't understand what's good about this step. The argument against H1Bs is that companies like Infosys and Tata abuse them to bring in tons of unskilled workers at low wages and displace a bunch of US jobs in doing so.
That argument doesn't apply to this scheme. This scheme in fact involves creating US jobs, so why on earth would you want to shut it down?
Re:A good first step (Score:5, Insightful)
'Cause Obama did it.
That seems to be the guiding light behind a lot of stuff Trump is doing. If it was a policy pushed by Obama, Trump wants it off the books. It doesn't matter if it is something Trump would nominally support, if it was done by Obama, Trump is going to get it changed. Had Obama built a 30' wall all along the Mexican border and gotten Mexico to pay for it, Trump would be tearing it down. The guy's got a raging hard-on for destroying Obama's legacy.
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'Cause Obama did it.
That seems to be the guiding light behind a lot of stuff Trump is doing. If it was a policy pushed by Obama, Trump wants it off the books.
Way to stoke the fire of partisan politics. It has absolutely nothing to do with that. It has to do with American citizens being essentially forced to give opportunities in their own country away to foreigners because of corporate greed and in this case, it's venture capitalist greed. Americans are being thrown under the bus but this greed.
Look, I have empathy for the rest of the world but I have empathy for my homeland first. If you can't understand that, you should move out of this country because you
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Bingo. In the animal kingdom, el Presidentie Tweetie would be pissing in all the corners a rival visited once before. He's about as sophisticated as a 12 year old.
Re:A good first step (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: A good first step (Score:2)
Actually, it's the "I am a citizen here" deal. If you don't like that go live in an amorphous fantasy land, perhaps in a MMORPG where you can be a "world citizen." Quit trying to ruin the real world for the rest of us.
Re:A good first step (Score:4, Informative)
Why do you assume that?
He assumes that because, like many economic illiterates, he believes the job market is zero-sum. If there are N jobs, and an immigrant takes one of them, then there are N-1 jobs left for real Americans. Of course this is total nonsense [wikipedia.org]. Real economies don't work that way.
an immigrant decides to go to Canada instead and start a company there
Many other countries are far more enlightened about immigration. Immigration, especially of educated people, tends to create net jobs, and create better jobs. Instead of keeping them out, we should be trying to promote more immigration by marketing America as a destination for entrepreneurs, researchers, investors, etc.
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So a Syrian software engineer should stay in the ruins of Allepo and start his startup there?
When people migrate and start companies outside their native land, they create networks that benefit their home countries. An Irish software engineer goes to Silicon Valley, starts a successful startup, then eventually partners with people back in Ireland where he can sell his stuff and create more business opportunities for people there.
"If people were goods, the solution to different wage and employment levels would be obvious: encourage the transfer of ‘surplus' people from poorer to richer nation states, which should benefit individuals whose incomes rise, increase global GDP, and promote convergence in wages and opportunities between sending and receiving areas that eventually reduces migration pressures."
Migration and development [economist.com]
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Funny...I just read on another article, that McDonald's was going to be laying some people off due to automation and kiosks....perhaps they would like to pick some fruits and veggies?
At that level, a job is a job is a job....
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Don't blame people for the sins of their ancestors. I am my own person. I am not my father. I am not my mother. I am not my grandparent.
I presume this statement is in reference to DACA kids, right?
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Don't blame people for the sins of their ancestors. I am my own person. I am not my father. I am not my mother. I am not my grandparent.
I'm not. I'm saying that if the reason you are here is because of illegal immigration (and most of us are to one degree or another) then it is a dick move by YOU to hold it against someone else. America is a nation of immigrants. To pretend otherwise is ridiculous.
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So you're saying we should just let everybody that wants to come here in right? Until the whole world lives here right? We already have too many people. We need to drastically limit that for a while.
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Re:Trump on illegal immigrants (Score:4, Insightful)
Anyone living in America bitching about people coming to this country "illegally" is a huge hypocrite. Just ask the next Cherokee you run across.
Pretty sure there is no one in the country that was born prior to 1776. US law states that if you are born on US soil, you are a US citizen regardless of your parents status.
So while our ancestors did some shit things to the native population, no US citizen can be considered to be here illegally at this point in time and is therefore not a hypocrite when they say they want people to immigrate here by legal means.
in case you forgot he lost the vote.
And there we have it folks, proof of a clueless moron that just toes the party line.
First of all, the POTUS is not elected by the popular vote and never has been. You can argue all day long if the electoral college is right or not, but it is the long standing law on how the election happens. Hillary knew this, but chose to go for the pointless popular vote.
Secondly, the only cases of electors going against the will of the people they were representing were ones that tried (I believe all were overturned?) to vote against Trump even though that's how their state voted.
Finally, for all the crying about how Hillary won the popular vote but lost the election, where is the complaining about how the DNC did the exact same thing (though through back door dealings and flouting their own rules rather than following long standing law) to nominate Hillary to begin with? Until it was clear that the fix was in, Bernie won primary after primary, yet some how the delegates kept going to Hillary??? Talk about being a hypocrite!
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Actually in looking up the faithless electors it appears that more abandoned Hillary than Trump [wikipedia.org].
Thanks for the link. Not as I recall it at the time, but that could easily be a signal/noise ratio issue. They mention a couple that had their faithless votes overturned, but I thought there were a few more (about a dozen spread across the states)?
I'll study up. Thanks again.
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Trump isn't owned by corporations; rather it is their allegiance he craves for two reasons: (1) he is needy and has never been accepted by other corporations and so he figures being prez will win him their respect, (2) he has a brain-dead idea of unemployment and figures the big corporations do all the hiring, so he figures giving them and their owners more money will make them hire more and thus he can claim that.
With Trump, there are two rules: (1) everything he does he does for himself, (2) he destroys e
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Rule #2 seems unlikely.
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I am so native that Canada has to let me in.
It doesn't work that way. Not only did we not have immigration laws, the reality is that was hundreds of years ago. It was tragic, horrible, and vile. But, not one person is alive who is responsible for it.
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"..would allow immigrants to stay in the U.S. temporarily as long as they meet certain requirements. In order to qualify, a foreign entrepreneur has to raise at least $250,000 from well-known U.S. investors."
It's about raising capital NOT creating jobs. When it finally comes time to creating a business that eventual hires people, those hires can easily be H1B visa holders.
Think before posting.
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What on earth do you think that raised capitol was going to be spent on?
Hint - when people raise capitol for a startup, it's because they need to employ people to do work to get the company moving.
Re: A good first step (Score:4, Insightful)
Exactly how many full-time salaries do you think $250k will cover?
Real tech start-ups need millions in funding. This looks more like a way for people to buy immigrant entry to the US.
Re: A good first step (Score:5, Insightful)
$250k is going to cover two full time people for a year if you don't run your startup in Silicon Valley. In that year, you can then start you know... bringing in some money, so you can pay them more, or you can prove that your product is worthwhile and get hold of more funding.
I don't deny that $250k is a small number, but arguing that you can't start a company with quarter of a million dollars is ridiculous. Not all startups have to be unicorns.
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
Sure. It will cover salaries for two people for a year, if the founder who gets this visa doesn't draw any salary, and the startup doesn't need any goods or services on that year. How often is that going to happen? How often will a startup with that scope be doing anything economically or technically interesting? Does that really justify issuing a five-year visa for the founder?
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You may not realize it, but wages in many areas of the US are around the $30,000 mark. 3 times $30,000 plus overheads is of the order of $150,000. That leaves $100,000 for other expenses.
In that time, you can start actually making money.
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
Wages for what? Convenience store clerks? Are you saying this is a way to procure visas for people to start up corner stores?
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Wages for what? Convenience store clerks? Are you saying this is a way to procure visas for people to start up corner stores?
And this will be bad because??????
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Wages for what? Convenience store clerks? Are you saying this is a way to procure visas for people to start up corner stores?
Let's not forget that two dudes started what looked like a company on a garage in the 80s and... we'll the rest is history.
America has plenty of examples of successful companies that started with one or two people with nothing but their clothes on. Somewhere along the line that drive was replaced with nihilism. The rest is history.
Nuking this program is just a sign of that.
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$250k is going to cover two full time people for a year if you don't run your startup in Silicon Valley. In that year, you can then start you know... bringing in some money, so you can pay them more, or you can prove that your product is worthwhile and get hold of more funding.
I don't deny that $250k is a small number, but arguing that you can't start a company with quarter of a million dollars is ridiculous. Not all startups have to be unicorns.
Let's go back in history to the 1980's, do you think anyone would have ever thought that they could run a company with two employees and somehow within 5 years be making millions in profit margin? If someone said that in the 1980's they would looked at as if they were out of their freaking minds. You want to talk about a sense of entitlement. This one is astonishing.
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I don't deny that $250k is a small number, but arguing that you can't start a company with quarter of a million dollars is ridiculous. Not all startups have to be unicorns.
I don't think people are saying you can't, rather that it is unlikely the visa is being used for this purpose.
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I don't deny that $250k is a small number, but arguing that you can't start a company with quarter of a million dollars is ridiculous. Not all startups have to be unicorns.
I don't think people are saying you can't, rather that it is unlikely the visa is being used for this purpose.
To make that claim, them motherfuckers should be providing with evidence that shows that. Without this, such claims amount to nothing more than hand waving.
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It can also cover the purchase of a convenience store, not outright, but nice down payment. SBA will give you a loan for the rest.
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Exactly how many full-time salaries do you think $250k will cover?
Quite a few. The idea is not that this ends up being the sole source of funding for this company going forward.
Real tech start-ups need millions in funding.
By "real" do you mean those companies which create nothing, produce little, have no idea on how to make it profitable and yet are somehow valued at $1.9bn with 3800 employees? Then sure if your idea of a startup is SMS limitations on a global social platform and never making money then you will most definitely need millions in funding.
Oh wait... No sorry I was wrong. The likes of Twitter and Faceb
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Real tech start-ups need millions in funding. This looks more like a way for people to buy immigrant entry to the US.
And attempting to fast-track startups by not having to pay fair market value for the labor. Corporations are completely selfish. That's why they won't repatriate their taxes. That would theoretically support the actual country that afforded them the ability to even have a corporation but no, they'll find clever ways to not give back.
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Exactly how many full-time salaries do you think $250k will cover?
Real tech start-ups need millions in funding. This looks more like a way for people to buy immigrant entry to the US.
Outside of SV, you can start a company or a franchise with (much) less than that. Sorry dude, the argument that this program does not create jobs is bullshit.
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
Open a franchise? Which franchise has fees and other start-up costs of less than $250k?
As I pointed out elsewhere in the thread, offering visas for people who get US seed money for what amounts to a convenience store seems like the kind of program that should be shut down.
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Exactly how many full-time salaries do you think $250k will cover?
Real tech start-ups need millions in funding. This looks more like a way for people to buy immigrant entry to the US.
Are you expecting a "startup" company to be a corporation??? What is the minimum number of employees in order to be a U.S. company? If you can answer that, you will understand that $250k is more than enough to establish and run a company in the U.S. for at least a year.
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
If the person getting a visa is getting $250k in VC, the startup will probably be structured as a corporation so that the investors can record their ownership.
You seem to be forgetting the premises and purposes of this visa program. In context, $250k does not seem like a sufficiently high threshold for how much the founder and his/her idea is perceived to be worth.
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Exactly how many full-time salaries do you think $250k will cover?
Real tech start-ups need millions in funding. This looks more like a way for people to buy immigrant entry to the US.
When in Start-up mode, that $250k won't cover salaries - it'll cover office space, equipment, securing loans, etc getting things going.
Startups are not expected to make a profit for the first 5-7 years. Yes, they will start paying out salaries before then - but the people at the top are typically expected to go without until the business starts to have a positive balance sheet.
So of that $250k, you might get a secretary/office admin (to look after the basics), and a couple junior type people that will
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
So, you're hiring two or three cheap people, and expecting at least two more to work for a promise, all using maybe $250k of money from investors who were already in the US.
Why is this worth bending or breaking immigration law?
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I'm not sure you've ever started a business or taken business classes, or understand the difference between equity, debt, revenue, and profit. Hopefully no startup is running at -100% profit margins. Most businesses operate in the -20% to +20% range. That means on $1mm in revenue, there companies that are bleeding $200k a year. By raising $250k in equity, such companies continue to survive, and grow. Companies typically have long-term debt that is 4 times revenue, or $4mm. By raising $250k, such companies continue to be able to make interest payments on their $4mm debt and meet all other payment obligations for the year. That is, due to leverage, a $250k equity investment allows a business with $1mm revenue to run a $4mm "credit card", which is used to pay employees or other purchases. There is significant economic activity achieved by that $4mm in expenditure and repayment. Defaulting on such expenses a zero-sum, whatever temporary gains were made through expenditure on credit will be zapped later on economic contraction due to non-payment of debt. It's well worth it (to society at large) to keep that $4mm in economic activity alive with $250k cash infusion.
TL;DR: capital raised isn't going toward full-time salaries, it's going toward interest on much larger debt that goes toward full-time salaries and other purchases. (Quick side note: that's how your taxes work as well.. your taxes don't build roads or hospitals, those were all built on debt through muni bonds, your taxes just pay the interest payments and other obligations. We have a good 30yr history of never paying down the debt but just making minimum interest payments.)
Thank you. Finally someone who gets how a business actually runs.
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
So, your theory is that we need to provide visas for people who get seed money for their startup, so that they can immediately use that money to borrow more money to fund their brand new startup that had no income stream, but they'll be approved for a loan because their brand new startup has $1m annual burn rate on $800k annual revenue?
Maybe you missed the part where this was meant for start-ups, which by definition don't have a history showing their revenue.
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You do realize that there have been people who started off with ten bucks in their pocket and landing in this country and doing something right? Jeezus..
Indeed. Hell, I know of this person (true story) that came here as a student with literally nothing other than his clothes (his family could only get enough for a one-way trip.) He was accepted into a graduate engineering program in the US, but he (and his family literally) had nothing left when he finally came.
No cash. No car. No place to stay. Just the admissions letter. Imagine that. That person went to become a senior engineering manager at a blue chip company.
That's drive. That's something people i
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
Cool story, bro. To bad it's clearly irrelevant to the topic of buying a visa with a $250k loan from US investors -- unless you think those investors will be inspiring that kind of drive, like by threatening kneecaps.
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What on earth do you think that raised capitol was going to be spent on?
Hint - when people raise capitol for a startup
Your sentences don't parse. Why would raising the Capitol building in DC accomplish anything, and how can you "spend" a raised building?
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Then put a lid on those H1-Bs and only let the ones that create the jobs and not the ones that take the jobs in.
It's your country, make your rules as they benefit YOU. There's no reason to keep the job creators out. An Indian creating jobs for people in your country? Hell, if you don't want him, send him over here!
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Re:A good first step (Score:4, Insightful)
Your entire post has left me shaking my head. I have a hard time figuring out where to even begin. Since I can't possibly address everything, I will pick on this:
This is not about jobs. This is about scapegoating immigrants for America's problems, and then "dealing" with immigrants as a substitute for dealing with the actual problems America has.
The problem with your logic is that you don't see people violating our laws and the government not enforcing the laws as a problem. We are going on 20 years of presidents picking and choosing which laws they like/dislike (Obama failing to enforce and vigorously defend the Defense of Marriage Act, Bush deciding that pesky things like the Fourth Amendment were more advisory in nature, and others). In fact it is the only thing the current generation has even seen presidents do.
People have become so accustomed to cheering when their guy ignores the laws they don't like and screaming when the other side's guy ignores the laws they do like, that when somebody comes along and says he wants actually enforce the laws (motivation aside) everybody loses their minds.
Personally, I think our immigration system is a train wreck. However, I believe that the rule of law is more important, so the proper sequence of events is enforce the laws on the books as they stand now so that the executive branch gets to what its like to actually do their jobs. Once that is in order people can start writing their representatives to get the mess fixed. People can even start writing their representatives now and get some work started on fixing that in parallel. What Trump is doing is an attempt to fix the problem. You probably disagree with his approach, but he is still trying to do something.
The crazy thing is that Obama twice campaigned successfully by wooing the immigrant community with his promises of fixing immigration. He had the ability and opportunity to fix this. Both times he didn't lift a finger. Check that, he lifted one finger: his middle finger right in their faces.
Like it or not, lots of people immigrate legally to the US, as much of a pain as it is. The way we have handled illegal immigration for the past few decades is just a slap in the face to people who have come here in a way that respects our laws.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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The problem with your logic is that you think this is about illegal immigrants. Your entire rest of your post rests on the presumption that this is all Trump cares about. If that were the case, Slashdotters wouldn't be so excited by the notion he's going to "do something" about H1-Bs. Do you think H1-Bs are illegal? For the matter, look at what Trump is actually doing, to thunderous applause from his supporters: Do you think being a refugee and turning up at an American airport is illegal? Do you think that having a visa issued by an American embassy in a country that's suffering war or terrorism is illega?
I never said or implied any of those things. H-1B is an economic/jobs issue hiding in the immigration debate. Personally, I think H-1B is badly broken, but for economic reasons, not because I dislike immigrants or immigration. In fact, I come from a family of immigrants and I know many immigrants who have come here (legally) and done great things for their families, communities, and for the country. I think that we should help refugees, but I think throwing the doors open without acknowledging that we m
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Why not? Because they're not going to get punished. Su
Re:A good first step (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem with your logic is that you don't see people violating our laws and the government not enforcing the laws as a problem
The problem with your logic is you are putting words in his mouth and then arguing against statements he never made. He never said illegal immigration wasn't a problem. He was I believe inferring it wasn't as big of a problem as it is being made out to be, which is a fair point. Illegal immigration is arguably just an appropriate byproduct of failing immigration policies. Our country needs more workers willing to do jobs US citizens tend to find undesirable but that produce goods US citizens do find desirable at a low cost (like food). Unless we create a legal way to let millions of workers into this country to fill these jobs, we need illegal immigrants. The tragedy is how poorly these immigrants are treated, not that they are here in the first place. The thing to fix is to thank them for the risks they take to improve our country even as our country marginalizes them.
Thankfully we have people willing to break our laws when they are unjust and harm our country, just like we had people willing to fight against slavery while that was still legal. The thought that the rule of law is more important than human decency is a horrible source of evil in this world. It is a shameful belief to hold.
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The problem with your logic is you are putting words in his mouth and then arguing against statements he never made. He never said illegal immigration wasn't a problem. He was I believe inferring it wasn't as big of a problem as it is being made out to be, which is a fair point. Illegal immigration is arguably just an appropriate byproduct of failing immigration policies. Our country needs more workers willing to do jobs US citizens tend to find undesirable but that produce goods US citizens do find desirable at a low cost (like food). Unless we create a legal way to let millions of workers into this country to fill these jobs, we need illegal immigrants. The tragedy is how poorly these immigrants are treated, not that they are here in the first place. The thing to fix is to thank them for the risks they take to improve our country even as our country marginalizes them.
If I put worse in his mount, then that was not my intention. However, I would no more thank someone for violating our immigration laws than I would thank someone for breaking into home and stealing. Also, you have created a false dichotomy the choice is not let in millions of immigrants willing to do undesirable jobs so we can have products or don't let them in and go without. We could let the marketplace figure out how to fill the gaps. Of course, that doesn't appeal to statists (not saying that you ar
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Also, you have created a false dichotomy the choice is not let in millions of immigrants willing to do undesirable jobs so we can have products or don't let them in and go without. We could let the marketplace figure out how to fill the gaps.
I'm just curious on this statement. Letting marketplace figure out by itself? So who do you think will be affected the most? I understand that the solution to this type of workers isn't available at the moment, but I am curious how severe the impact would be to the people you think. Entitlement is not something people would let go easily (and most never let it go no matter what). You may not feel or see the severity of your suggestion because either you are well off for yourself or the impact isn't here yet
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I understand what you mean. What we have now is essentially a marketplace approach. People are willing to pay so much and in order to keep prices at the right point, producers have an incentive to pay lower wages, which is probably a driver of the current situation with immigration, at least in areas like agriculture.
The marketplace adapts pretty well to even significant changes. For example, there was a story here on Slashdot recently where I think the CEO of McDonald's (I am not certain about that, it
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Obama failing to enforce and vigorously defend the Defense of Marriage Act
You lost all non-partisan credibility right there. The Defense of Marriage Act was a special interest proposition by Christians. There is supposed to be a separation of Church and State. Just because you have your beliefs doesn't mean you get to use the government as a vehicle to force your beliefs on everybody. If you think that's the definition of marriage and your community thinks that, great. Support that in your community. Not everyone agrees with you or thinks your belief system is true. Get ov
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You lost all non-partisan credibility right there. The Defense of Marriage Act was a special interest proposition by Christians. There is supposed to be a separation of Church and State. Just because you have your beliefs doesn't mean you get to use the government as a vehicle to force your beliefs on everybody. If you think that's the definition of marriage and your community thinks that, great. Support that in your community. Not everyone agrees with you or thinks your belief system is true. Get over it.
I am curious how you inferred my position on the Defense of Marriage Act from what I wrote. I assume you inferred something about my beliefs because you chose to see partisanship where there was none.
What I stated was an objective fact: the Defense of Marriage Act was passed by both houses of Congress and signed by President Bush. It therefore became the law of the land. If you carefully read the US Constitution it is the legislature's job to make the laws (with the President's signature or overriding a
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However, I believe that the rule of law is more important, so the proper sequence of events is enforce the laws on the books as they stand now so that the executive branch gets to what its like to actually do their jobs
I saw a lot of people speeding on the highway - maybe we should spend $20b to solve that problem because the rule of law is important.
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I saw a lot of people speeding on the highway - maybe we should spend $20b to solve that problem because the rule of law is important.
It is important. You should take that matter up with the authorities in the jurisdiction that establishes and enforces the specific speed limit to which you are referring.
Immigrants are not evil people (Score:2)
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It's not about protecting jobs. It's about keeping out foreigners.
You are making a wild ass claim here. Your claim is: because it keeps out foreigners, it can't be about protecting American interests, specifically jobs. That is a HUUUUUUGE logical fallacy. It's about BOTH. It's simple economics, it's the same problem with free trade agreements. Corporations have an interest in the cheapest possible labor. All they care about is the balance sheet. In this particular case, it has a detrimental ripple effect to the ACTUAL American citizens. We get screwed just so a b
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It's just a loophole to smuggle in temp workers. (Score:4, Interesting)
This scheme in fact involves creating US jobs
No, this is just another avenue to smuggle foreigners into the country. The plan that this will be used for creating jobs is really far fetched. Anyone who can show $250K (do they even need to show it?) is allowed to to invite anyone they please for 5 years. The cover that the money will be used to start a business is really hard to prove or verify. Also, who is going to invest into a business of a foreign tourist with a temp visa?
Re: It's just a loophole to smuggle in temp worker (Score:2)
One might put money into a business started by someone on a short-term visa if they expect to take over the business after the visa expires.
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This scheme in fact involves creating US jobs
No, this is just another avenue to smuggle foreigners into the country. The plan that this will be used for creating jobs is really far fetched. Anyone who can show $250K (do they even need to show it?) is allowed to to invite anyone they please for 5 years. The cover that the money will be used to start a business is really hard to prove or verify. Also, who is going to invest into a business of a foreign tourist with a temp visa?
Ohhh ooooh smuggling foreigners, ooooh oooooh chupacabra!!!!
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H-1Bs are one thing. The startup visa means that people take their hard-earned currency and go to a more friendly country, be it France, China, or even Russia.
Turning away the idea-generators is the first step to becoming a footnote in history. History shows what happened to Portugal when they turned away Christopher Columbus.
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If they create too many jobs there won't be enough workers to keep the coalmines running!
Re: A good first step (Score:2)
This scam involves allowing cover for foreigners who are granted US investment dollars. How does this create more jobs vs if the money was given to US citizens and legal residents who would start businesses and create jobs?
If you think about it logically, the net initial jobs created should be the same, but the net wealth that remains in the US will be greater with the removal of this policy.
Anything pushed through last minute by an administration should be suspect. If this was such an awesome idea, why d
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The argument against H1Bs is that companies like Infosys and Tata abuse them to bring in tons of unskilled workers ....
Stop right there. "Unskilled"?
Re:American tech workers are incredibly racist (Score:5, Interesting)
Setting aside your complaints of racism, one reason why some of us would like to eliminate H-1B and replace it with something else is because the rules behind H-1B creates some onerous requirements that resemble indentured servitude.
When you receive an H-1B visa, you must be sponsored by a company, and that creates a situation where if you lose your job, you may also lose your apartment, your friends, and everything you own that you can't carry on the airplane as you are shipped back "home." This puts H-1B holders at a significant disadvantage during salary negotiations, since their status (including the path towards citizenship or green card status) can effectively be held hostage by the sponsoring corporation.
Further, there is a cap on how long someone on an H-1B can stay in the United States. After that period, it's not uncommon for people (usually computer programmers and systems analysts) to return back to the country where they originally came from--but retain their jobs via telecommuting, but at a lower salary (on the theory the cost of living is cheaper). This contributes to off-shoring of jobs.
Personally I would rather see this system replaced with one which greatly simplifies the process of gaining a green card (permanent residency). This would prevent many of the abuses of the H-1B program, as a permanent resident doesn't have to rely on a corporate sponsor to stay. Just as I'd like to see the path to citizenship greatly simplified as well.
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Right. I've felt if the program actually was designed to meet its ostensible goals, it'd be a good thing. In fact, the program is designed to depress tech wages and transfer technological expertise overseas.
A program which was focused in bringing in talent would focus on top talent rather than people with commodity skills, and it would give them an almost automatic path to permanent residency. That would actually increase wages for domestic engineers. A top engineer creates jobs for his colleagues.
Free flow of labor and culture (Score:2)
I suspect this will be an unpopular opinion, but I can't see any particularly good reason for any kind of restrictions on the flow of labor. The tech centers are going to be talent magnets no matter what, but I personally wouldn't mind setting up shop someplace tropical and isolated. It's not like there's some finite amount of labor [wikipedia.org] to be done in the world. America as a nation of immigrants has done pretty well for itself so far, and it's not like lazy stupid people are the ones who decide to go live in oth
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Personally I'm in complete agreement.
Generally I find arguments against the free flow of labor to be protectionist in nature--and while in the short term protectionism provides short-term gains to whomever is being protected, in the long term they tend to create drags on the economy. And that's true regardless of what you import: cars, soap or workers.
Besides, one reaso
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You think investors, their attorneys, their accountants, wouldn't be able to tell if the property is "obviously inflated?"
You pretend you're insightful but don't realize you just insulted 1000s of Chinese investors (who are not necessarily stupid), their attorneys and their accountants.
Hmmm. If I was a prog this would the time I would yell: RACIST
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That's what I thought of immediately as well.
But well, the obvious answer is -- this one's only for rich people, and it helps to make his family rich.
The other one's for smart people, and they're probably 'elitist', and realize the emperor has no clothes. (but not like they'd be allowed to vote, as this has no direct path to that ... whereas I'm pretty sure the EB-5 does)
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Hey, not everyone knows what a footnote is! But seriously, I think you should focus your resentment on your ex-employer. The ones that came up with the idea of replacing local manpower with cheaper peers overseas are the companies. If you offer them a good salary (for their standards) why would they refuse it?
Underrated (Score:2)
I thought this was witty for about thirty seconds, but now it feels like more of a sad commentary on the American people's lack of autonomy.
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