High-Tech Workers With H-1B Visas

* “High Tech’s Passport to Nowhere” (Sept. 21) is really the story of how corporate America exploits imported labor in order to drive down the wages of high-tech workers at home. Intel, Oracle Corp., Microsoft, et al., do not “prefer to hire U.S. workers.” In fact, there is an increasing unwillingness to pay U.S. professionals prevailing wages for their training and skills, acquired often at their own expense. These companies advertise, and then complain when there is little or no response to job offers that pay less than the market demands. They make imported workers sign contracts that resemble indentured servitude: The worker soon figures out what he is really worth and leaves.

The bottom line is that most companies publicly spout the merits of free enterprise but are doing everything they can to prevent the “market” from working freely when it comes to labor costs.

MONIQUE BRYHER

Tarzana

*

The motivation of foreign workers coming to the U.S. is every bit as mercenary as that of their employers: profit. Virtually all of these skilled workers are drawn to jobs in America because of the dismal wages, employment opportunities and quality of life in their homelands. It is no surprise that your average H-1B visa holder wishes to remain in the U. S. permanently, nor do I blame him or her.

To suggest that these foreign workers are being exploited is a little off the mark. So an Indian consultant at Oracle makes $70 an hour while his American counterpart makes $150. Seventy dollars an hour is an impressive wage in the U.S. Seventy American dollars an hour is a staggering fortune in India. The H-1B program should not be confused with our immigration policy. A temporary work visa is not a promise of permanent residency in this country, nor should it be advertised as one. It is also misleading to suggest that people in the Philippines and India are ignorant of our immigration policies and are somehow being “duped” by the American high-tech companies. There are literally millions of representatives from both those countries here in the U.S., and they do phone home.

MATTHEW P. MACKENZIE

Temple City