John Law (9:39)
All right, first up, let's start with what the left is saying. The left is mixed on the new policy, with some saying it will be detrimental to the tech industry. Others argue Trump is taking necessary action to address abuses of the H1B system. In no opinion, Noah Smith said the Trump administration goes after Asian immigrants. The tech industry is very international. Often the people who bring key ideas to a startup are at first only able to come to work in America via H1B. A lot of universities initially depend on H1B visas to bring over faculty and researchers. In general, critical knowledge workers will eventually get employment based green cards, but this takes a lot of time and effort. Usually they have to come on an H1B first and apply for green cards while working in America, smith wrote. As a result, a lot of very successful and famous Americans needed the H1B to get their start in the country. If the $100,000 fee holds up in court, it'll still place a significant burden on H1B employers and workers, but not an insurmountable one. And it looks like foreign students may be exempted from the fee, which would bias the visa program toward people who study at US Universities and away from people who are hired directly from overseas, Smith said. That would actually be good, since the former are especially desirable. But in any case, the order in whatever form is still a significant attack on skilled immigration. In Bloomberg, Patricia Lopez suggested the $100,000 H1B visa is a gamble that could protect US jobs. President Donald Trump is taking yet another gamble on immigration, betting that he can force companies to compete for skilled American engineers and tech workers rather than hire foreign workers through the popular H1B visa program. Employers won't like it, but reform of the program is long overdue, lopez wrote. Trump is correct the H1BS had been deliberately exploited and that systemic abuses have created large scale replacement of skilled American labor with lower paid workers. American STEM graduates led to believe that their degrees would result in plentiful opportunities and well paid jobs are instead scrounging for work. Loopholes abound. Middlemen flood the program with applications and scoop up as many visas as possible, then contract out those workers to a handful of large companies. In 2023, there were 446,000 applications in a program limited to 85,000 private sector slots, Lopez said. Trump's policy carries risk. The H1B overhaul dramatically escalates costs at a time when companies are struggling to find the skilled labor they need. If companies can't find competitive labor sources, expansion plans may slow, resulting in fewer jobs overall. Frustrated companies could move such jobs overseas. Alright, that is it for what the left is saying, which brings us to what the rate is saying. The right is also mixed on the policy, but many praise Trump for prioritizing U.S. workers. Others say the fee will disproportionately hurt small businesses. In the American Thinker, Brian C. Jundef said that the new H1B fee puts America first. The H1B program was initially created to help US companies fill rare, high skilled roles when American expertise was unavailable. However, in practice it has become a pathway for cheap foreign labor. According to the Economic Policy Institute, in 2022, the top 30 H1B employers brought in 34,000 new visa workers even as they laid off at least 85,000Americans, June def wrote. The new fee is meant to give employers pause. Is the skill so scarce that it justifies paying $100,000 annually to Washington, D.C. in addition to salary and benefits? Allowing tens of thousands of foreign nationals, many from strategic competitors like China, to work in sensitive sectors such as semiconductors, defense and telecommun poses serious national security risks. Intellectual theft, espionage and divided loyalties are real threats, not just theories. They have been repeatedly documented by US intelligence agencies. June deff said. By tightening the H1B pipeline, Trump's executive action reduces this exposure. America cannot afford to have its cutting edge military and technology sectors mainly staffed by non citizens. In the American Spectator, David Herbert called the new rule an exercise in crony capitalism. The president is once again showing that he is not afraid to shake things up when it comes to protecting domestic workers. If we look beyond the surface level details, we can plainly see that this is a policy that will alarm anyone who believes in free markets and fair competition, herbert wrote. Rather than promote domestic employment, this new fee will only do more of the same. Protect large, established and politically connected firms at the expense of smaller, newer and less connected firms and increase the cost of presently done with H1B visas. For tech companies like Amazon, Google and Microsoft who collectively employ thousands of workers on H1B status, an additional $100,000 per worker is annoying but not devastating, herbert said. But what about a small tech startup in, say, Austin trying to hire a new programmer from India to help them get off the ground? Or a family owned engineering company in Ohio that found a perfect candidate in Germany for these smaller operations, which are the backbone of America's workforce and the creators of our world leading dynamism. And an extra $100,000 fee is a crushing barrier that effectively prices them out of the global talent market. Alright, that is it for what the left and the right are saying. Which brings us to what industry experts are saying. Some experts note the outsized effect this policy will have on India. Others say the rule can help U.S. workers and industries if properly executed. In Bloomberg, Andy Mukherjee suggested Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will pay a price for H1B visa curbs it's hard to say what President Donald Trump's extraordinary attack on immigration will mean for the future of US Tech dominance. What's clearer, however, is the immediate challenge he has created for his friend Narendra Modi. Days after wishing him a happy 75th birthday, Mukherjee said Indians account for more than 70% of all H1B visas. A steep $100,000 entry fee paid by employers for every worker entering the US under the program will effectively gut it, forcing large outsourcing companies such as Bengaluru based Infosys Ltd to rethink their business strategy. To immigrant families, an already arduous path to permanent residency in America will look like an impossible dream. Now, naturally, even many employees currently in the US would ask companies to move them elsewhere. But where? Canada? Australia? Singapore? Somewhere within India, mukherjee wrote. The US tech and finance industries have at least a couple of options besides mass relocation of foreign born talent. They could challenge the legality of the entry fee for India. The problem is much bigger in the free press. Josh Code interviewed Min Kim, an immigration startup founder, about the fallout in Silicon Valley from the new rule. I think this is probably a long time coming. It's an important incremental step for a visa program that has existed for decades but has faced a tremendous amount of scrutiny and frankly some amounts of abuse. And so I think this is directionally a great step in curbing some of the concerns that people on both sides of the political aisle have with the program at large. What do we deem to be in the national interest? Kim said. There are occupations that truly are absolutely necessary and important in order for us to win the AI race and continue the revitalization of the energy and manufacturing industries. A proposed suggestion on how to improve it broadly is if we're really looking to revise this program to select for the ultra elite talent and then prioritizing by compensation is a good proxy for that, and so raising the salary floor has been a long suggested improvement to the overall program, kim said. The rollout may have been confusing and still there are lots of open questions, but it seems the administration is getting at an important element, which is we, America, want to be attracting the absolute best talent in the world, but not at the expense of those who are already here. Alright, let's head over to Isaac for his take.
