The public sentiment on H-1B visa policy changes is mixed. While many Indian commenters view the changes positively, seeing them as an opportunity for India's job market and talent retention, there are significant concerns in the U.S. about job offshoring and the potential negative impact on local employment. Some critiques focus on the motives behind the policy, suggesting it might primarily benefit corporations at the expense of American workers. There is a strong feeling of skepticism about how these changes will affect skilled labor dynamics in the U.S. and abroad.

U.S. Government

Indian Government

American Companies

I work for a large company who didn't buy Trump a gold statue. I have recently been assigned to 2 new projects. 1) Knowledge transfer to Bangalore 2) Knowledge transfer to Singapore. All US contractors were let go. Many but not all were Indian. I don't know their visa statuses. Our focus is to move the work ASAP. Singapore will pick up whatever Bangalore can't handle. Bangalore is the preferred site due to lower costs. It's already happening.

PetiteSyFy

What job market? Anyone lookin for a job can tell you that’s barely a thing already in the US.

adamlh

H1B's were usually less than $5000 before this order, and already many employers refused to sponsor those visas.

Now it's multiplied by 20x? It's going to kill any international labor.

This almost fixes our white collar issue in the US except that outsourced labor isn't actually the taxed part, imported labor is. Offshore labor isn’t any more expensive, but bringing that labor (and productivity) to the US is now massively more expensive.

Brilliant move /s

Orion_437

This is going to fuck over healthcare like you have no idea. 


So medical students from other countries often train here. They either get J1 or H1B visas, typically sponsored by their training program. Fewer programs sponsor H1B since it was more expensive and time consuming. J1 allows you to train, but you have to go back home, whereas H1B let's you stay here and work as a physician. I think there is a pathway that allows J1 residents to stay, but not sure how likely that is. I once knew a fellow who tried and failed to do that.


Hospitals (Medicare) who pay the residents $50-70K/yr aren't going to sponsor $100,000 residents, so we'll probably see more J1 than before. Meaning that a lot of residency spots are going to people who are just going to peace out after the fact. We're going to lose a lot of foreign and potential doctors. And while I can't find great statistics, the AMA estimates that 25% of doctors are foreign grads.


Here's the kicker. They have to be incredibly smart and motivated to take spots from American grads. And they work/train at places most Americans wouldn't want to train at. Not just inner city hospitals, but a lot of rural (Trump voting) places too. So I see this hitting healthcare for Red voters harder.


Edit: Apparently J1 visa holders have to go back to their country for two years before they can apply to stay. They can apply for waivers, but no idea how hard that is. I think one way is to already have a job offer to work in a designated underserved area in an underserved medical field, though I feel like it would be hard to get that done fast enough.

rgnysp0333

Big companies will start building overseas offices, taking growth away from the US

True Trump 4D chess 🙃

derpydore

You see, they are going to take that money and use it to fund programs that allow companies to subsidize the hiring and on-the-job training of Americans to do those jobs, thus reducing unemployment and making it easier to succeed as a domestic company.

Oh, sorry, just kidding, that money is going directly into the Orange Kleptocrat's pocket.

davevr

Trump just greenlit every large company to outsource those jobs... not to hire locally...

Instead of bringing H1-B workers over to america wherethey prop up the country's economy by living here, buying groceries here, have their family go to school here, pay taxes here, etc... now companies are going to hire outsourcing companies in Brazil, China, India, etc pay 1/10th to 1/4 what they were paying for those positions before, none of the money is going to come to the U.S. and entire sectors are going to dry up...

In the same way that manufacturing is dead in the U.S. no one goes to the U.S. for things like Tool and Die because the experts are all in eurpoe or Asia, now in a decade Silicone Valley will be a page on a history textbook, there will be new tech centers in Canada, Germany, and Ireland.  Mark my words if this isn't reversed quickly within two decades the U.S. won't even be a global power.

TheElusiveFox

What about our hospitals, I haven't seen anyone talk about that. Residency programs and doctor shortages rely on international visas, our medical industry will be completely fucked.

GonnaLoveMyNutz

The US employment rate dropped six figures in three months, the next report could exceed that number.  Long term the uncertainty and loss of faith will hurt far far more.

SidratFlush

Question to all. 

With H1B now axed for the most part, do you think the administration will now go after outsourcing to India in the form of higher taxes for outsourcing to specific countries?

Hot-Wave-8059

Not that much, because the same executive order says that they can waive at any time they want without explanation.

So in reality all the company has to do is bribe Donald Trump and this goes away.  It is just him getting his beak wet again at the expense of everyone else.

Thylacine_Hotness

I support this in theory but the Trump admin will just use it to grift people out of more money. "Give us a million and we'll waive your h1b fees".

The h1b system was not being used as intended; Eg: To get workers for jobs americans didn't have the skills to do. Instead it was a way to get cheaper labor.

Also the incoming workers' visa was tied to their employer: no job, no visa. In other words if you're laid off you're also deported. I witnessed a lot of H1B's working far more hours than they should have because if they didn't, it was back to India for them.

TheHappyPie

Don't forget the caveat they built in so the administration can waive the fee completely if they choose, so you can bribe him for anything less than $99,999 and be better off or flatter him enough to pay nothing.

BaronVonNom

Too late to matter.  An entire decade of American I.T. graduates got screwed out of a career.   Chase bank in Ohio has so many their department doesn"t even speak English anymore.  Exploited scared kids put Billiions in the pockets of bank leasership, and Indian consulting firm owners.  Companies use the visa as total leverage to get 100+ hours a week of work with 24/7/365 OnCall for free.  It is basically slave labor.

hyteck9

With the added $100K / person, companies will use that as a justification to accelerate more office centers being created in India, which has been happening for years anyway.  More capitals will be allocated to those.  So most of these jobs will still be done in India.

I don't necessarily think these will create a lot of new jobs in the U.S, especially in the engineering space that is lower / junior.  however, temporarily, this will probably boost demand for mid-level talent.

pcurve

Companies will just move jobs overseas instead of hiring locally

New_Discipline1529

It's going to let more smart people stay in, and help, China/India/etc.

More work will be outsourced.

Big companies will be able to afford the fee at least to an extent (offset by lowering wages...)

It may marginally create new opportunities for Americans.  

Suspect it is more likely those positions get eliminated.

And we don't know what the exemptions are yet.

negative-nelly

They need to go after offshoring - H1Bs aren't as big problem. 

Is the H1B program abused? Big time. Companies use them to depress Tech salaries, pretending there is a shortage when there is not. They just don't want to pay American PhDs what they are worth. Fake shortages. And they train up Indians on a H1B and then send them back to India to assist with offshoring. H1Bs are treated like indentured servants. 

I have known many H1B Visa holders that I know and like. While abused, the real issue is sending jobs overseas and this change is more likely to accelerate that.

CelebritySaltLick

I feel like many H1-B will move back to their home country and work from there. The net net is that their home countries will benefit from their income

[deleted]

I'm anti h1b visa but I don't trust trump to do this properly.

He will grant exceptions to people/companies who bribe him.

The_Frostweaver

Reddit blames foreigners when it comes to housing prices and calls to ban foreign home ownership. Why is it the opposite when it comes to jobs? Why are foreigners entitled to work our jobs but not buy our houses?

igomhn3

Afaik many doctors are on H-1B visas so expect a collapse of our healthcare industry as hospitals who are already struggling either pay out the ass to keep their amazing doctors around or have a bunch of vacancies making it even harder to get visits from a doctor and make ER waiting even longer.

AthearCaex

DikTaterSalad

Meh, companies have plans for this many many years ago already. Now the push to add visa fee will only accelerate the jobs being offshore. Maybe American can work in sales or finance not tech anymore.

ryanchrisgow

Healthcare? Shitty.

Science? Shitty.

Tech? If they were hiring because they really couldn't find someone in the area, then they'll pay the fee. Otherwise, they'll look at the tens of thousands tech workers laid off in recent years and the tens of thousands of new grads and go, "hmm maybe a little on the job training isn't so bad."

Keganator

I work in engineering, we have a serious shortage of engineers as it is now. It will only get worse.

statistician88

I'm a manager in a multi-national company.  People who think this will be better for American applicants are wrong.  If the cost goes up by $100k, companies just hire in other countries.

CcntMnky

100k for an H-1B basically means small companies are out. Startups just won’t bother, they’ll hire remote in Canada or India. Big Tech can pay but they’ll just spin up more teams in Toronto, Dublin, Singapore, etc.

The pipeline of grad students dries up too. If you’re a smart kid from abroad, why gamble 100k just to maybe work here? You’d just go somewhere friendlier.

Long term that means less talent here, slower innovation, and yeah… eventually weaker growth + weaker dollar. US kinda shoots itself in the foot while the rest of the world scoops up the brains.

amydauer

All the unemployed lazy idiots will now finally be able to get a 6-figure job at Meta and Google, for sure. No more unemployment in the Rust belt and economy will finally boom like never before. 

/s

john_san

Also fucks hiring on exchange students who came here for undergrad, masters or PhD. We'd hate to be able to hire additional intelligent people and maybe keep them around for their lifetime. This dictator needs a nursing home.

Stonewool_Jackson

H1B visa holders are truly Schrödingers immigrants.

They're simultaneously the smartest people in the world, and cheap exploited labour paid pennies on the dollar...

___

Raising the cost of H1B puts pressure corporate giants and gives Americans bargaining power...

If Gen Z and Gen Alpha play this right, they'll be able to demand livable wages again...    
Don't fuck this up...

FunnyMustacheMan45

Maybe they’ll start hiring people in the country instead of outsourcing everything

AnimalCrossingTax

It won’t. Just means tech companies (who are the largest sponsor of H1B visas) won’t be able to exploit cheap Indian labor (who are the largest national cohort of visas issued). They’ll have to pay US workers market rates.

The H1B visas are a tiny segment of the overall labor force. So tiny, like the size of an atom in comparison to total labor force.

Difficult-Practice12

Suck up to trump, no fees. Dont suck up, $100k.

army2693

If you think the doctor shortage is bad now, just wait.

Excellent-Case570

When will Trump start paying the US  for those 140+ foreign workers at Mar a Lago?

offroadadv

It’s really unclear yet how big of an impact this will have. There is conflicting information on whether this will affect the F1 to H-1B pipeline. If that is left as is, this is largely going to do affect nothing. If it does, it will be a significant change for a small group of people. 

It will mainly be beneficial for new graduates in tech just joining the work force next year as they won’t have to compete with H1-B applicants. Yes some jobs will move oversees, but there’s a reason everyone returned to work, a lot of people believe working in office is more effective. However it’s important to understand that the effect will be limited to the more junior level job market as existing H-1Bs have been confirmed to not be affected by the changes.

commander_bugo

H-1Bs are already exploited labor. They get paid much less than US citizens in similar roles because the money they are making is still more than they would make in India and the company that is sponsoring has control over those employees. Making them more expensive won’t stop H1Bs

BrewedAwakenin22

Didn't Melania apparently come in on an H1b visa, and then brought her parents over?

RudeAudio

It could actually give American workers a fairer shot. If fewer companies rely on H-1B, they might invest more in training and hiring locally.

Mvdcu1980

rleondk

In a long line of shit trump moves, this one is good. 

This one existed to fuck over US domestic labor. We don't actually have a shortage on talented labor here lol.  This system exists to just get primarily indian workers here for far cheaper than the prevailing wage

loggerhead632

I want to know if he is actually allowed to raise the price of anything just because he wants to without Congress signing off on it.

Notmykl

Trump did [insert thing here] how will it affect the US economy?

The answer is always it will hurt people that are not in the 0.1%.

CarpoLarpo

I think it’s great!  More citizens will have an opportunity

gmanose

I think it's just another attempt to isolate us from the world. The "intention" is to only bring in the best and brightest. The only thing it does is make us even less attractive to outside talent.

cannonballfun69

It's just him trying to find a legal way to reduce immigration for work. I don't think it's really going to make that big of a difference in the grand scheme of things.

KoolKuhliLoach

I think we dont have much to worry about. I want to see how much of this money goes into the Republicans pockets.

AcrobaticLadder4959

I think it’s ironic payback for all the Silicon Valley billionaires who helped get Trump elected. With him you FAFO. Deep down I’m happy because it has no affect on me and hurts the people who helped him. Long term however, I think it’s terrible for the U.S.

lmb123454321

It's just another one of his money making schemes. A business can pay him a million bucks and he'll give them an exception. Everything Trump does is to financially benefit Trump. And a vendor of chaos makes their business thrive by creating the chaos around them. 

Basically he's going to offer the 10 pack for the 20 pack for a million and unlimited attendance for you know 20 million. 

Same way he started selling American citizenships for a million bucks a pop. 

It's just another Griff from the grifter in Chief. 

The department of State accidentally leaked a memo talking about how the entire tariff thing was just to force companies to making deals with him personally. So I don't know why everybody's acting on surprised about ; deliberately set out to fill their life with grift in the person of Donald Trump. 
 
This is the same guy who sent out flyers and emails asking his followers to donate $15 to help him get in the heaven. Like literally that was one of his recent emails right after he came out and said that his doctors told him he was at the bottom of the totem pole and now he wants to get into heaven.

BitOBear

I think it will just encourage US companies to grow their India offices and hire tech for those offices vs US offices. The problem is that the Indian engineers are cheaper and hard-working for the most part. From what I have heard from my teams, they tend to be more qualified in engineering and tech roles. Face it…the US education system is lacking which is why companies want to bring in tech talent from Asia.

Fantastic-Explorer62

Immigration has never been a paid scheme. Trump cheapens everything he touches.

silent_chair5286

My company outsources a decent amount. It’s hard to say how many because it changes constantly, but we have maybe 1,800 IT contractors. Damn few are H1B. The overwhelming majority are people in India, and to a lesser extent, Costa Rica. None of our junior-level jobs are H1B. I don’t see this impacting us much at all. 

On my team, there is only one H1B, but now that we’re almost 100% remote, he could return to India and keep his job. We actually opened a branch in India last year, so he could transfer there and stay an employee.

che-che-chester

H1B is a smaller problem, mass outsourcing from big US corporations are bigger problem.

Rich-Quote-8591

It will probably help, but we're still dealing with the fact that huge numbers of people are graduating with tech degrees during a time of basically no job growth.

napleonblwnaprt

hopefully americans get jobs now but what we really need to do is tax the F$&amp;$ out of offshoring jobs and  force companies in AMERICA to hire AMERICANS and not pay 10 cents in the dollar to others

HoeForITS

Honestly we don’t need anymore h1b1 employees  making our pay go down.  They need to stay hiring in house US employees and students from our colleges.  Not outsourcing a bunch of h1b1 and making our salaries drive down

WestCovinaNaybors

IF it happens we'll likely start seeing juniors hired again.

Possibly_Naked_Now

This is actually the best policy he has ever put forth. 
H1Bs drive wages down for otherwise good mid career positions that should be able to support families. 

This effectively ends that.  100k is too high a burden to make sponsorship worth it for anything but very high level positions.  

Some jobs will be lost to off shoring,  but those jobs were probably not long for stateside anyways. 

This is a win.  You have to be ultra cynical to not admit it.

jcole4lsu

It’s a good step. The next one should target out-of-country workers. A 100k fee for each worker outside of the United States.

ShadowTurtle88

Probably means small businesses can't afford to sponsor, only large corporations can

Lemonbear63

Non-paywalled article link: https://archive.ph/2025.09.19-220836/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-09-19/trump-to-add-new-100-000-fee-for-h-1b-visas-in-latest-crackdown

coffeequeen0523

Not for nothing. Many of the H1B1 Visa Holders have the best jobs in Tech...and ita happening for years and heard about the complains of they hiring their buddies when they take over for many many years... I can see it working well if we push for technical trade training in the USA It will help many here.

hvcool123

How does this affect things when these companies can just offshore the work? I'm not the smartest in this subject so would love some input. The way I see it, they keep the person working, then offshore them. Still not hiring americans.

Effective-Access4948

I recently managed to get into a salary job close to home that hires directly and has banned ai tools on the company network, I got extremely lucky.

TehGuard

Does anyone know if the fee is per year per h1b visa? Or is it per year per company? Or just per visa on every application/renewal.

I heard its per visa per year. If true, this is going to open the market up bigly.

Foreign_Addition2844

This is GREAT FOR IT/Engineering. I have seen so many teams let go for h1b1.

masteroffeels

I'll probably be hated but I think this is a great thing. Means that we will actually be skilled workers again and needed. Companies can't cheap out no more now they gotta pay for quality.

DrunkNonDrugz

"Pay $100,000 to have a worker that cannot change jobs" is a deal every CEO will take without blinking.

Tx_Drewdad

I’m not sure much if anything will change. 1st I’m bad at politics but I do believe this still needs to be voted in by congress or w/e. 2nd tech billionaires have been making buddy buddy with trump so I doubt they will just cut one of their labor sources. If it is passed I’d expect said billionaires to have a work around to not pay it.

Just my 2 cents, but I wouldn’t get my hopes up on this improving the market If that is what you were expecting.

Demonify

Hopefully it will make more companies hire Americans.

100k is light work lol. Are you guys even serious?

nestersan

jdptechnc

Where I worked, we had 1 H1B on a team of 50 domestic employees. We had 500 Indians in the same business unit, in India. Someone explain to me how "fixing" H1B will solve the problem.

I understand the economics of this arrangement, I really do. What I don't understand is how it works out when 10 overseas employees cannot do the work of one American, or worse, undo good work that has to be repaired during business hours by the US staff. I'm not saying that the overseas workers cannot do the work competently, there's just no expectation of competence when the cost is so damn low.

MonkeyDog911

Unpopular opinion, but from what I have seen with the H1B problem in the US and the FWP in Canada with regards to "tech" is that most of these workers I have come across in IT are extremely useless (1 good one out of 200). 

It's a way for *most* organizations to exploit workers, pay crap wages, and scrape the bottom of the barrel. This is the common notion in my group of fellow IT guys I keep in contact with.

J-VV-R

American IT employees need to unionize.


I know something needs to be done, because they're definitely abusing the system to suppress wages. 


This is an interesting topic. Trump's donors are the biggest abusers, but most of his voters are racist. 


Is $100k enough to dissuade corps from using h1bs? How long can they stay here? Is it a 1 time fee per h1b? Do they have to renew yearly, etc?


Can you use 1 application for a group of people? 


Im just thinking, if an American specialist makes 170k a year, and an h1b brings in lets say 90k a year, and 1 approved application is good for 5 years, it'll take just over a year to see cost savings, which doesnt seem like a big deterrent.



And probably the biggest/most obvious question, is he gonna nake an exception for his donors?


Edit: I read elsewhere that it's yearly fee.

nazerall

shawn1969

It will just speed up the offshoring of tech jobs. However, this  is actually a policy I'm okay with in principle.

Myrddin_Dundragon

It won't matter to the big companies (i.e. the ones gobbling up the most H-1B1 visas). It will hurt the smaller players. Why? Because the bigger players can simply open up small offices in tech hubs in India and China and hire out of there. Most already do. The smaller players can't afford to do this. The problem isn't H-1B1; it's offshoring, and unless we have turned against capitalism, then it's going to happen regardless. Companies will find a way. Our laws and tax code greatly favor big corporations over workers' rights.

dr_z0idberg_md

What all the people talking about out off shoring fail to realize is the drop off is real and it comes back because like everything it's a pendulum and it swings both ways. For all you know it could boost co managed MSP set ups. It's a complex issue with a lot of unknowns and instead of good conversations it's frustrating everyone is assuming it's just going to be a giant negative. Long story short it's a good start if it happens.

PalmettoZ71

[https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/companies/banking-finance/anz-to-cut-jobs-outsource-work-to-india/5FMU2LEOOHLG4SDIYT4WVHDDMY/#:\~:text=ANZ%20plans%20to%20cut%2023,business%20more%20efficient%20while%20not](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/companies/banking-finance/anz-to-cut-jobs-outsource-work-to-india/5FMU2LEOOHLG4SDIYT4WVHDDMY/#:~:text=ANZ%20plans%20to%20cut%2023,business%20more%20efficient%20while%20not)

Disastrous_Grass_376

For smaller companies, maybe a change. But they left a loophole

[ (c)  The restriction imposed pursuant to subsections (a) and (b) of this section shall not apply to any individual alien, all aliens working for a company, or all aliens working in an industry, if the Secretary of Homeland Security determines, in the Secretary’s discretion, that the hiring of such aliens to be employed as H-1B specialty occupation workers is in the national interest and does not pose a threat to the security or welfare of the United States. ]

I mean, if you get in nice with the administration, you could suddenly find yourself excempt.

Mysterious_Anxiety15

Small Start Ups gonna have a difficult time. Well funded start ups are okay. The big guys already outsourcing.
Great for the big guys, bad for the really small ones…

s_sayhello

For this policy to actually have truly beneficial effects for Americans, a serious conversation has to happen about offshoring. Otherwise, jobs would just be removed from US soil and reappear somewhere else. As it stands, I can only see this as a short term, beneficial solution until infrastructure is built up in other countries. Long term, this policy will only hurt if nothing else is done.

Now….from a geopolitical standpoint, this is just bad. That’s man power that’s been diverted to other countries who are competing with/against the US. This is mainly bad when looking at technology/ IT/ AI jobs. This only accelerates the brain drain.

McLaren03

AdSuspicious7110

Maybe ITT Tech will come back.  For those who don't know, ITT tech had smaller buildings, similar to the testing and bootcamp course sites of today.  But they charged a lot of money and basically said you were guaranteed a job.  In their defense, that was pretty close to true, until the rapid rise in H1B and outsourcing took those jobs away.  And somehow ITT Tech became the scapegoat.

QuinoaJones1

Companies will just off shore more work.  You can't legislate your way out of cheap labor

A_Curious_Cockroach

Probably not as much as you think. My company outsources 50% of our labor to India. The best of the best people on my team get sponsored and relocate. In Our case This would only really hurt the people who are doing well and want to get a better life for themselves while working at our company long term. It won’t stop companies laying off entire teams to hire people in Ireland etc.

DerfQT

jramz10

The Australian media is predicting that they will try to hire more people on E-3 visas instead of H1B.

busyship1514

It will accelerate the offshoring of the jobs. At least under H1B they’re paying US taxes.

cyberentomology

dankp3ngu1n69

I don’t believe there will be an effect

dontping

Zero impact. There are 1 million of unemployed tech workers

Fun-Conversation-634

Negatively. Studies have shown that H1B1 visas support a ton of jobs in the US, specifically in industries that are highly supported by the visas themselves. An average of 6 high paying jobs are directly created and maintained for every one H1B1 visa, plus tons of economic activity that supports economies in those areas. These are jobs that do not exist without those Visas. 

I am all for a "Visa Tax" but it needs to be the right amount to ensure business can bring in talent to fill roles that support existing US workers, and  to make American workers competitive for those roles. This is the wrong amount and will take money out of communities where it lifts people out of poverty and supports small businesses and entrepreneurs and into the federal government to be returned to businesses and the rich through tax breaks. 

It's just bad politics.

mrbiggbrain

That fee could push talent away faster than ever

tldrpdp

Wow, saw a lot of comments here that seem off to me. Everything that happens in business is a decision made at the margin. Companies who hire a foreign worker through an H1B visa end up paying tens of thousands of dollars in fees to the government and charges from their outside attorneys. They face huge uncertainty, have to hire people with a different cultural perspective, have to relocate the employee, etc. It is bloody expensive to get an H1B employee on board. So why do they do it? Even if wages for the foreign worker now in America are lower, any savings are frittered away through the transaction cost. So think about it, why do they do it? It’s because they need staff they can’t otherwise find, because turnover is lower (the visa holder is chained to the company), there might be work ethic differences, etc. I haven’t hired workers like this so I am not certain of the rationale. However, these companies wouldn’t be spending BILLIONS to do it if it didn’t make economic sense.

The new H1B policy — if it survives the inevitable court challenge — increases costs for the employer. So, will that mean less foreign hiring and more domestic hiring? Maybe. But no company is forced to be an American company. At the margin, some companies will conclude that it is too hard and/or too expensive to run their business in America. And if they choose to return the 80 H1B employees back to whetever their homeland is, those same companies may conclude that the 20 American developers don’t need to be in America — or Americans — either. The $100,000 H1B plan makes it more expensive to do business here. Doing that, again at the margin, will make some employers pack up their toys and choose to do their business elsewhere.

Some posters suggested elaborate schemes to make companies pay to outsource or offshore their operations. Forgetting for a moment the impossible political odds against this, or the Constitutional issues this raises, just try it and watch a mass exodus of companies before it becomes effective. Do you seriously think that a company like, say, Dell, or Microsoft, or Amazon with thousands or even tens of thousands of foreign workers will just take on billions of dollars in extra tax burden without maybe some unforeseen negative consequences resulting? These posters need a dose of reality.

Finally, everyone hates offshoring of their own jobs. But few people complain about the cost of their jeans that are being produced by someone in Bangladesh. If offshoring is so bad, then to be intellectually honest you need to be against everything that could be made in America being made overseas. If you are reading this post on an iPhone, drive to work in (some models of) a Mercedes, or used an umbrella this year, then you’re being hypocritical to decry the horrors of outsourcing. (N.B. The umbrella was included in my list because about 96% of the umbrellas sold in the U.S. are imported). We hate to admit it but offshoring of manufacturing and, yes, tech work reduces costs. Companies capture some of that savings. But a lot is passed to the consumer. If all the things made and done overseas were done here, and were paid American wages, then many, many goods and services would be a lot more expensive. That’s why, when tariffs on steel were raised during Trump 43, the average cost per job saved in the steel industry was like $400,000. Yes, some worker kept a high paying job. But to make that happen EVERYONE paid more for steel (which is everywhere). The net effect was that we became a poorer country (and some steelworkers did better). It was a bad trade off and doing this in tech will be, too. At least, as they say, at the margin.

It’s 2025 and we live in a globalized economy. You can’t set economic policy that is predicated on forcing companies to do things not in their best interest. If you try, you will simply increase the incentives for those businesses to do that business elsewhere. Instead of focusing on punitive solutions that force behaviors on unwilling participants, consider policies that make it make more sense to do business here. Not through tropes like “lower taxes”. Instead do things like make getting a building permit faster and more predictable. Speed up lawsuit resolution. Or create mechanisms that create smarter and a more capable workforce of Americans. Face it: you want your six figure IT salary; who wouldn’t? But there is someone in China right now as smart and capable as you that will do it for $20k. Or $10k. You won’t keep your job by making it cost your employer $100k to hire that foreign worker. But you might do it if you help make it clear that the benefits of doing it here make it economically a smart move for the company to do so.

WhamboMPS

I'm going to say the same thing as I said in the other sub about this with the added point that this affects CS way more than it does IT.

Companies will go where the talent is, which will mean that more companies will leave the US and in turn there will be fewer jobs available. It's going to have the opposite effect that everyone is hoping for.

Creative-Package6213

Changes to the H-1B visa process, including a new fee, are prompting U.S. companies to hire more American workers and could exacerbate the tech skills gap.

H-1B Visa Policy Changes and Impact on US Job Market

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