https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2017/06/28/trump-threats-on-h-1b-visas-scaring-india-outsources/#41dec4e17b20 https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2017/06/28/trump-threats-on-h-1b-visas-scaring-india-outsources/#41dec4e17b20
JUN 28, 2017 @ 08:35 AM 15,884 2 FREE Issues of Forbes http://bit.ly/17QKNDv Trump Threats On H-1B Visas Scaring India Outsources mailto:?subject=Trump%20Threats%20On%20H-1B%20Visas%20Scaring%20India%20Outsources%20-%20Forbes&body=Hi%2C%0A%0AI%20thought%20you%27d%20like%20this%3A%0Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.forbes.com%2Fsites%2Fkenrapoza%2F2017%2F06%2F28%2Ftrump-threats-on-h-1b-visas-scaring-india-outsources%2F%2341dec4e17b20%0A%0ATrump%20Threats%20On%20H-1B%20Visas%20Scaring%20India%20Outsources%20-%20Forbes http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/ Kenneth Rapoza http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/, CONTRIBUTOR I cover business and investing in emerging markets. Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. Pause Mute Current Time0:58 / Duration Time3:22 Loaded: 0% Progress: 0% ShareFullscreen Rajesh Gopinathan, chief executive officer of Tata Consultancy Services, looks on during a news conference in Mumbai, India, on Tuesday, April 18, 2017. The POTUS is promising a clampdown on the H-1B work visa that overwhelmingly go to Indian outsourcers. The uncertainty is causing many to announce they're hiring U.S. citizens instead. (Photographer: Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg) India's IT outsourcers have discovered Americans. On Thursday, Wipro announced that U.S. citizens now account for more than half of its U.S. workforce. They've hired over 1,600 employees by attracting and nurturing local talent instead of resorting to the now infamous H-1B. All of a sudden, the biggest Indian outsourcing firms have found U.S. citizen software engineers able to do the same job that the roughly 40,000 Indians they bring in annually on H-1B visas can do. The threat of legal and immigration authorities pressuring the likes of Infosys and other outsourcing powerhouses is enough to force them to find talent coming out of American colleges and universities instead of importing engineers that do not necessarily have the niche specialty for which the visa was intended. In the race to import the "best and the brightest", Infosys has hit Trump's virtual wall. No other Indian company takes its lumps like these guys on the H-1B. In May, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman announced a $1 million settlement with Infy for failing to properly compensate hundreds of workers, pay applicable taxes and for abusing immigrant visa rules for their foreign hires in New York State. They found that Infy was using a different type of visa, the B-1, to bring in temporary workers. The B-1 does not have the same salary requirements as the H1-B, allowing Infy to pay below market rate, the Attorney General office ruled. “We will not permit companies to violate our laws in order to undercut New York workers” Schneiderman said in a press release. Infosys is a top five user of the visa, along with national India rivals Tata Consultancy, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra and Wipro. U.S. specialty tech outsourcers like Deloitte, Accenture and IBM round out the list for American firms that hire 80,000 H-1B visa workers each year. Some 65% of those visas have gone to the Indian firms, based on 2015 data from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS). See: Trump Has Already Beat India On The H-1B Visa Issue https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2017/06/26/trump-has-already-beat-india-on-h1-b-visa-issue/#154a01fa1f62 -- Forbes Vishal Sikka, CEO of Infosys. When it comes to the H-1B visa, Infy has become public enemy no. 1. Here, Sikka announces plans to expand U.S. operations, establishing four new technology and innovation hubs. They will hire more American citizens, thus helping to "make America great again." (AP Photo/Michael Conroy) Numerous American citizen tech workers have complained that companies were abusing the H1-B visa program in order to put a cap on wages, and force out older employees. India is the biggest user of the visa, so it has been in the cross-hairs and takes the brunt of the criticism. A March 60 Minutes special on the visa program http://www.cbsnews.com/videos/youre-fired/, however, showed mostly middle aged software engineers working for companies like Disney. The polemic visa became a front and center issue for Indian leader Narendra Modi when Trump was elected president. The IT sector accounts for roughly 10% of his country's GDP. India tech companies are going on the charm offensive. They have no support in Washington, and are reaching out to the media and local government officials wherever they can to highlight they're hiring spreed. Infy is hiring 10,000 over the next three years, and building four new technology research and development centers. Tata Consultancy has hired over 12,000 U.S. citizens over the last three years. They're local headcount is 57% higher than the average Indian IT firm operating here. Like Infy, they too have been known to pay below market rate and have a high foreign head count. “TCS is proud to be a significant employment and talent development force in the U.S.,” says Surya Kant, president of TCS in the U.S. That comment came from a press release. Tata wants everyone to know that they are also "preparing the current and upcoming workforce with foundational skills needed for 21st century careers.” TCS expects to hire Americans in 2017 -- whether they're Mayflower Americans or first generation Indian-Americans with a green card or U.S. passport. They said they will keep hiring locals on par with 2016 levels, or increase their local headcount. Tata regularly has between 800 to 900 open positions – quarter to quarter – in locations from Texas, California and Ohio, to North Carolina, Pennsylvania and New York. Examples of specialized roles focused on digital business transformation include digital DevOps and agile software development engineers, digital user experience (UX) designers, cloud architects, and autonomous drone operators. Jeff Bezos wrote in an internal email to Amazon employees, including those at The Washington Post which he owns, that his lawyers prepared a “declaration of support” for a lawsuit against Trump’s executive order on immigration and refugees. It was a shot across the bow to Trump, meant to scare him from crushing the H-1B immigrant visa program. Amazon is a top user of that specialty worker permit. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File) H-1B visa users say it is harder to find niche talent, including from prestige colleges, who are willing to live in Ohio, or the Carolinas. Most want to work in Boston, Mass.; New York or California. That makes it harder for companies to hire in other states, and forces mid- to small-sized tech firms to pay New York City-like rates. That hinders their bottom line. So bringing in foreigners increases the labor pool, a labor pool that is increasingly concentrated in those three states. By concentrating all the tech talent in those high rent states, other states are unable to develop the tech talent, which often require years of experience in specialty fields. Indian companies have been scapegoated by Silicon Valley and their American outsourcing competitors. That is because have taken the lion share of the 80,000 H-1Bs each year. With Indians getting the whits scared out of them by Trump, hiring locals shows they are on the same page with America's new fearless leader. Yes, they too want to make American great again! Abidali Z. Neemuchwala, CEO of Wipro, said the company is building its science and technology outreach programs in the U.S., which includes working with secondary school teachers in New Jersey, Dallas and Boston. “We are committed to local communities where we are present and will continue to build a strong local talent pool." Meanwhile, any reduction in India IT visas should not to be taken to mean there will be a reduction in H-1B visas overall. There is no plan to reduce the number of foreigners coming to the U.S. next year on that visa. Decisions on who gets what comes in the fall. India companies will likely be granted less visas. Amazon and Accenture will take them instead.
