rssImmigration, Labor Laws a Catch-22 for Foreign Workers
Wednesday, February 24, 2010 at 3:22 pm
- 6 Comments
Patrick Thibodeau of ComputerWorld reports that one result of the administration’s crackdown on employers using H-1B (non-immigrant skilled worker) visas is that one company, Peri Software Solutions, may be required to pay $1.45 million in back wages to 163 employees. Peri reportedly failed to pay workers prevailing wages — one requirement of the H-1B program is that employers pay foreign workers more or less what they would American workers, if they could find any — as well as forcing them to sign employment contracts that they were sued for violating.
Unlike American workers, however, the foreign workers at Peri might get their back wages, right after they’re sent home.
The Labor Department is also seeking to hit Peri with a $439,000 civil penalty and a two-year debarment from the H-1B program.
Unless Peri’s workers are able to find other H-1B jobs before being asked to leave the United States, punishing Peri for paying its workers less-than-prevailing wages will mean that their workers will lose their jobs and be sent back to their countries of origin.
The Catch-22 of immigration law — report the person who got you into the country, and get sent home for the privilege — is something many immigrants and foreign workers face on a regular basis. Without significant reform, for which Congress likely doesn’t have the stomach this year, the administration’s crackdown on employer violations of labor law will necessarily result in job losses for the people already hurt by the labor law violations.
(h/t @Elana_Brooklyn for the link)
Follow Megan Carpentier on Twitter
6 Comments
Pingback posted February 24, 2010 @ 6:08 pm
[...] SOURCE [...]
Comment posted February 25, 2010 @ 6:04 pm
Ms Carpentier has the facts wrong. The civil penalty, back wages, and the two year debarment will not cause Peri’s workers to lose their jobs with Peri. The workers will get a pay raise and continue working. These 163 jobs will not be available to unemployed Americans. Going forward Peri will be less profitable but they will still have 163 employees bring in income. The disbarment only means they can not add additional workers using the H-1B visa. They can hire Americans. What most of the firms do when caught violating the rules in start another firm and continue violating the law.
The “prevailing wage” that Peri failed to pay is not the wage that an American would have been paid. When the rules to determine the so called “prevailing wage” are applied the resulting wage is well below what an American would make for the job. Peri foolishly decided to pay even less than that.
The H-1B is not a skilled immigrant visa. It is not even an immigrant visa. It is a non-immigrant visa (NIV) that allows employers to temporarily employ foreign workers. Loopholes in the regulations allow H-1Bs to be employed at wages well below that paid to an American. The reason so many of them are from third world countries like India and so few from Western Europe or other developed countries is that the wages paid to H-1B are below what citizens of developed countries can earn in their own country.
According to the Department of Labor:
“H-1B workers may be hired even when a qualified U.S. worker wants the job, and a U.S. worker can be displaced from the job in favor of the foreign worker.”
Leftist Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) put it this way:
“What many of us have come to understand is that these H-1B visas are not being used to supplement the American workforce where we have shortages but, rather, H1-B visas are being used to REPLACE American workers with lower cost foreign workers.”
Conservative Nobel laureate Milton Freidman said:
“There is no doubt, that the [H-1B] program is a benefit to their employers, enabling them to get workers at a lower wage, and to that extent, it is a subsidy.”
Comment posted February 25, 2010 @ 11:04 pm
Ms Carpentier has the facts wrong. The civil penalty, back wages, and the two year debarment will not cause Peri’s workers to lose their jobs with Peri. The workers will get a pay raise and continue working. These 163 jobs will not be available to unemployed Americans. Going forward Peri will be less profitable but they will still have 163 employees bring in income. The disbarment only means they can not add additional workers using the H-1B visa. They can hire Americans. What most of the firms do when caught violating the rules in start another firm and continue violating the law.
The “prevailing wage” that Peri failed to pay is not the wage that an American would have been paid. When the rules to determine the so called “prevailing wage” are applied the resulting wage is well below what an American would make for the job. Peri foolishly decided to pay even less than that.
The H-1B is not a skilled immigrant visa. It is not even an immigrant visa. It is a non-immigrant visa (NIV) that allows employers to temporarily employ foreign workers. Loopholes in the regulations allow H-1Bs to be employed at wages well below that paid to an American. The reason so many of them are from third world countries like India and so few from Western Europe or other developed countries is that the wages paid to H-1B are below what citizens of developed countries can earn in their own country.
According to the Department of Labor:
“H-1B workers may be hired even when a qualified U.S. worker wants the job, and a U.S. worker can be displaced from the job in favor of the foreign worker.”
Leftist Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) put it this way:
“What many of us have come to understand is that these H-1B visas are not being used to supplement the American workforce where we have shortages but, rather, H1-B visas are being used to REPLACE American workers with lower cost foreign workers.”
Conservative Nobel laureate Milton Freidman said:
“There is no doubt, that the [H-1B] program is a benefit to their employers, enabling them to get workers at a lower wage, and to that extent, it is a subsidy.”
Comment posted July 6, 2010 @ 6:41 am
“What many of us have come to understand is that these H-1B visas are not being used to supplement the American workforce where we have shortages but, rather, H1-B visas are being used to REPLACE American workers with lower cost foreign workers.”
Comment posted July 25, 2010 @ 7:53 am
The “prevailing wage” that Peri failed to pay is not the wage that an American would have been paid. When the rules to determine the so called “prevailing wage” are applied the resulting wage is well below what an American would make for the job. Peri foolishly decided to pay even less than that.
Comment posted August 3, 2010 @ 9:28 am
We need some rules. The law is the rule.
RSS feed for comments on this post.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
