| |
Indian IT professionals targeted in
US
By Seema Sirohi
WASHINGTON
- With unemployment rising and the US economy refusing
to perk up, American labor unions are engaged in a
sophisticated and coordinated effort to close doors to
foreign workers who they say use generous visa schemes
to enter the United States and take away jobs.
A
lobbying campaign in the US Congress by the unions is
increasing the pressure, which could affect thousands of
information-technology (IT) professionals from countries
such as India, China, Russia and Ireland who supplement
the workforce. Sentiment against foreign workers has
been bubbling around various states over the past six
months, but now it is threatening to erupt at the
national level. The problem is acute in the software
sector, where hundreds of American workers have been
laid off in recent months, giving way either to
temporary foreign workers or outsourcing - an
increasingly dirty word in the lexicon of US workers.
Unions seized the issue this year, flooding the
Internet with information about how foreign workers were
displacing America's own skilled workforce. Articles
appeared in union-affiliated magazines, websites and the
traditionally anti-immigrant right-wing press, but
lately the mainstream media have been highlighting the
issue as well. Stories about displaced workers and
highly skilled computer professionals driving taxis and
waiting tables have made it an emotional red button.
With the presidential elections approaching next year,
unemployment and the economy are likely to become
campaign issues, especially for the Democratic Party,
which currently seems as lifeless as the economy.
Last week two bills aimed at eliminating and
curbing H1-B and L-1 visa programs were introduced in
the US House of Representatives, sparking fears that
protectionist sentiment might grow as politicians come
under pressure to do something about the problem of
unemployment, which rose to 6.4 percent last month
according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Congressman
Tom Tancredo, a Republican from Colorado, introduced a
bill to abolish the H1-B visa, which allows
professionals to come to the United States and stay up
to six years, although companies can hire them only
after they prove there is a shortage of skilled workers
in their sector.
During the booming 1990s and
the dot-com euphoria, US corporations successfully
lobbied Congress to raise the cap on H1-B visas issued
worldwide from 65,000 to 195,000. The visa cap is
supposed to come down to its original number this
October 1, but Tancredo, a frequently anti-immigrant
advocate, says he wants the program to end because it
has outlived its usefulness. "There are American
corporations that worry a great deal more about their
bottom line than they do about the American worker. No
one can convince me that there are jobs in the computer
industry which can't be done by American workers,"
Tancredo said in an interview.
A day later, on
July 10, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut led
eight others in introducing the L-1 Non-Immigration
Reform Act, aimed at tightening the requirements.
DeLauro claimed that the bill would close the loopholes
in the law that allow large corporations to bring in
foreign workers, pay them less, and replace good-paying
US jobs held by US citizens. The bill puts an arbitrary
cap of 35,000 on the number of L-1 visas to be issued
worldwide where there was previously none. It also bans
the practice of filing blanket petitions to hire L-1
workers; prohibits the visa to any firm that has laid
off an American worker within the preceding six months
and for six months after the application is filed;
demands that the prevailing wage be paid to L-1 workers;
and requires the L-1 guest worker to have been employed
by the petitioning firm full-time, continuously for
three years. In addition, it authorizes the Department
of Labor to investigate companies through random
surveys.
"Our economy has been in a downturn for
three years," DeLauro said in a statement. "More than 3
million people have lost their jobs since President
[George W] Bush took office. Now, more than ever, we
need to ensure that all Americans have access to
good-paying jobs."
The two most recent bills
join another introduced in May by Congressman John Mica
of Florida, whose district saw displacement of many
workers by L-1 visa holders. All three bills are
awaiting consideration by the House Judiciary Committee
and public hearings are expected in September. It is
unclear whether any or all of these bills will become
law, as big business houses get organized to counter the
union demands. A US Chamber of Commerce official
described the phenomenon as "serious" and said
mainstream businesses were charting out a strategy to
fight back.
Since Indian IT companies have
aggressively used the H1-B and L-1 visas to bring
thousands of Indian professionals into the United States
on the one hand and enjoyed the fruits of outsourcing of
jobs to India on the other, the problem has acquired an
"Indian face" even though China, Russia and Ireland too
have benefited greatly. "This is not an India issue but
it has been portrayed as such because India has such a
large pool of talented professionals," said Michael
Clark, director of the US-India Business Council, an
industry group formed to promote investment and business
between two countries. Labor unions have made the issue
more tangible by giving it an identifiable Indian face,
using a variety of figures on the number of workers,
which often do not tally.
Websites abound with
names that are self-explanatory - nomoreh1b.com,
stopimmigration.com, hireamericancitizens.com and
fairUS.com. One website claims that "special interests
have imported more than 17 million non-citizens to glut
the labor market between the years 1985-2002". It goes
on to claim that in 2001, nine out of every 10 new job
openings in the computer/IT sector were taken by H1-Bs
and that despite record unemployment, the US government
issued 312,000 visas in 2002.
But the official
US government figure for H1-Bs for 2002 is much lower,
at 79,100. And the figure has been coming down steadily
because of a combination of factors. There have been
delays in visa processing because of additional security
checks after September 11, 2001, and US corporations
have not made as many H1-B requests because of the
dot-com bust.
But the rage continues to grow
against foreign workers, with e-mail campaigns in full
swing. One website asked visitors to check whether their
congressman was a member of the India Caucus, a group of
India-friendly congressmen, and then to target him
accordingly for sending jobs out of the United States.
Figures show that the use of the L-1 visa has
been growing steadily, as its requirements are less
stringent, since it is an inter-company transfer of
employees. But unlike H1-B workers, who can apply for
permanent residency in the United States or a green card
(work permit), those on L-1 can stay for a maximum of
seven years. Multinational corporations have used the
L-1 visa to transfer executives and workers to the US,
but critics say it is now being misused by large Indian
high-tech companies with offices here. The names that
keep coming up are Tata Consultancy Services (TCS),
Infosys and Wipro - all three companies at the forefront
of India's high-tech revolution. Company spokesmen
stress that they are not only in full compliance with US
laws in bringing workers here, their companies are also
creating employment in the United States.
TCS
has 50 offices around the US and Canada with 5,000
employees, combining the work of US and Indian software
developers. Nearly half of the 5,000 are on the L-1
visa. The opening of its latest office in Buffalo, New
York, was facilitated by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Business for TCS grew 29 percent last year to US$500
million as more and more blue-chip clients used its
services. From Apple Computer to Boeing, they find
outsourcing IT services to TCS efficient, cost-cutting
and useful.
The number of workers getting the
L-1 in the early 1990s ranged around 60,000 a year, but
the use has nearly tripled over the past two years,
according to a study conducted by the Congressional
Research Service, a part of the Library of Congress. In
2001, 12,538 such visas were issued. The number for 2002
was 112,624 and for the current year 69,105 visas had
been stamped by the beginning of May. According to the
CRS, India accounted for 24.4 percent of the total
number last year, with Japan and the United Kingdom
coming in next with about 12 percent. But the study
pointed out that L-1 visas comprised only 0.02 percent
of 5.8 million visas issued last year by the State
Department.
Adding to the fiery debate are
groups such as Federation for American Immigration
Reform (FAIR), which claims in its position papers being
distributed in Congress that the entire "high-tech
worker shortage is a sham". The frenzy is driving many
politicians to jump on the anti-foreigner bandwagon as
elections draw near. The group claims that the H-1B
program, while intended to allow companies to hire the
"best and the brightest" from around the world for
periods of up to six years, in practice is just an
alternative path for outsiders to gain employment and
permanent residence. The system, often abused by
unscrupulous employers, does nothing to protect US
workers, FAIR says.
But a ban on visas or
restrictions on movement of labor could bring the US
high-tech industry to a standstill, according to an
industry analyst in Washington. An official of the US
Chamber of Commerce said the movement against foreign
workers is "another species of the anti-globalization
animal that we have been fighting since NAFTA [North
American Free Trade Agreement] and China's accession to
the World Trade Organization". But in the past, there
was a focus on some treaty or group. "What is happening
now is more diverse both at the state and the national
levels," the official added.
"The trade unions'
tendency to define the issue in terms of job losses is
far from the truth because for every job that is
outsourced, there are others created elsewhere. More
jobs in India or China means they will buy more US
exports, analysts say. For every auto-manufacturing
plant that went offshore, Japan and European countries
set up factories here.
"This is a periodic
crisis and there is some turmoil. It will all balance
out as the stage is set for the next economic boom.
There is a restructuring of business going on and we are
on the cusp of entirely new industries such as life
sciences. Occasionally globalization bites back," the
official said.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times Online
Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication policies.)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
