Many comments here claiming immigrant tech workers undercut native workers, yet somehow in the software industry, where H1B has been the most widely used, unemployment rate has historically consistently been much lower than the overall unemployment rate, and the wages have been higher (and growing faster) than average wages.
Like 25% - 40% lower unemployment and 60% - 100% higher wages. Even during the dot-com bust software was much better off! It's right there in the BLS data (though a bit hairy to slice and dice due to how they categorize jobs.)
The "immigrants displace native worker" narrative is too simplistic. Consider maybe that without those workers the work simply does not get done.
I mean, we've all lived through this. How many people here, for most of their careers, did NOT have mountains of backlog they would like to clear out if only they had more headcount? How many have NOT spent days on quarterly planning because of the need to be extremely judicious about what you put on your roadmap? And how many have not bemoaned, oftern right here on HN, how hard it is to find people who can actually code?
It's not just you, this dynamic plays out all over the place, and puts real constraints on the expansion potential of companies, which reduces future hiring all around. There are studies on this. Yes, there is naturally some downward wage pressure on local employees due to a larger pool, but on the whole the expansion and faster growth of companies, and hence the overall economy, more than compensates for this.
Feel free to ask your favorite AI for more... You know, the thing actually taking our jerbs! ;-)
Like 25% - 40% lower unemployment and 60% - 100% higher wages. Even during the dot-com bust software was much better off! It's right there in the BLS data (though a bit hairy to slice and dice due to how they categorize jobs.)
The "immigrants displace native worker" narrative is too simplistic. Consider maybe that without those workers the work simply does not get done.
I mean, we've all lived through this. How many people here, for most of their careers, did NOT have mountains of backlog they would like to clear out if only they had more headcount? How many have NOT spent days on quarterly planning because of the need to be extremely judicious about what you put on your roadmap? And how many have not bemoaned, oftern right here on HN, how hard it is to find people who can actually code?
It's not just you, this dynamic plays out all over the place, and puts real constraints on the expansion potential of companies, which reduces future hiring all around. There are studies on this. Yes, there is naturally some downward wage pressure on local employees due to a larger pool, but on the whole the expansion and faster growth of companies, and hence the overall economy, more than compensates for this.
Feel free to ask your favorite AI for more... You know, the thing actually taking our jerbs! ;-)