IEEE-USA: Building Careers & Shaping Public Policy — So all the BS about “can’t find Americans who want these jobs” and the other crapola delivered by the CEO’s of America was pure BS and they knew it. I wouldn’t mind all this if those same CEO’s were not lining their pockets in the process.

WASHINGTON (6 September 2006) — U.S. industry spokespeople say repeatedly that H-1B visa holders are paid the same wages as similarly qualified American citizens. Numerous studies and reports, however, have found this to be untrue.

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) Vice President Phiroz Vandrevala even admitted that his company enjoys a competitive advantage because of its extensive use of foreign workers in the United States on H-1B and L-1 visas.

“Our wage per employee is 20-25 percent lesser than US wage for a similar employee,” Vandrevala said. “Typically, for a TCS employee with five years experience, the annual cost to the company is $60,000-70,000, while a local American employee might cost $80,000-100,000. This (labour arbitrage) is a fact of doing work onsite. It’s a fact that Indian IT companies have an advantage here and there’s nothing wrong in that. … The issue is that of getting workers in the U.S. on wages far lower than local wage rate.” (“U.S. visas are not a TCS-specific issue,” Businessworld (India) magazine, June 2003)

IEEE-USA President Ralph W. Wyndrum, Jr. said proposals now before Congress to raise the H-1B visa cap should be scrapped until significant workforce protections for U.S. and H-1B employees are instituted.