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How do H1B consultancies have abundance of jobs when new grads struggle?

7 points by lance_klusener ↗ HN
Question

1] How do H1B consulting companies that take money from candidates to apply for H1B, have abundance of jobs; But on the other hand, new grads are struggling for jobs?

2] What's the catch for a candidate applying thru these H1B consulting companies? Seems like a win-win situation for candidate and the consulting company

Background

1] There are H1B consulting/contracting companies that can apply for H1B visa for south Asia based candidates

2] Candidates apply for multiple H1B visas thru multiple companies. Submission fee is merely 10$

3] Companies benefit - Once visa is selected, they take anywhere from 5K to 10K USD from the candidate + a percentage of future earnings

4] Candidate benefit - Thru relatively low uplift, candidate gets a chance to work for USD earnings

9 comments

[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 31.7 ms ] thread
Overtonwindow
On the first question, I think it's economics. H1B's are cheaper, which IMO explains why so many older American tech workers get laid off and replaced by them; see Disney, Matel, and others.

"The H1B level 1 salary is the lowest wage a foreign worker can pay while working in the United States under the H1B visa program. The salary of this level is valued at between $38,000 and $51,000 per year.."

Americans cost more. Plus benefits, and possibly greater job security, etc. Whereas H1B are totally captive to the company.

lance_klusener
Thank you for your response.

Min wage is indeed low - $60,000 is the min

Link found from Google - https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/WHD/legacy/files/whdf...

manojkumarsmks
This is not true, the H1B salary like everywhere depends on the position, the salary range is decided by LCA (Labour Condition Application) it is approved by Labour Department.
bobosha
This is the standard bogeyman used by h1b haters (for lack of a better word). The median h1b wage for 2022 was ~95K [?] IIRC and h1b holders are usually at the top of salary tiers.

[?] Unfortunately don't have the source handy.

While it's true there are many unscrupulous actors in this space and fraud happens, need I mention the level of fraud in SS/Medicare/Medicaid, VA, DoD. I will save you the research it's orders of magnitude more.

Also a lot of good came out of the h1b. Just see the number of Indian-born CEOs, founders etc I'll bet most of them came on an h1b. There is universal agreement that h1b needs reform and needs a better filter, perhaps using a points system, so you are arguing a straw-man.

This knee-jerk "greedy company! cheap labor!" sloganeering is, in large part driven by the (almost entirely) WM techies' wage-gouging entitlement compounded by racism. Pure & simple.

uberman
Is your beef that unscrupulous consulting companies might try to back charge the $10K is actually costs to sponsor an H1B candidate or is your complaint that you feel American employers are willing to pay a premium for H1B consultants rather than higher a full time employee?

I don't believe a company in the US could directly sponsor an H1B employee if there were qualified permanent residents who could fill the position. I'm sure some less ethical lawyering might make that possible but I believe it would be in violation of the rules.

lance_klusener
No beef with anything. I am trying to understand the win-win situation here.

The proliferation of H1B consulting companies tells me that this business model is widely being used. The legal structure to prevent misuse seems to have inbuilt backdoors.

Some light googling and i found this consulting company that has applied 20+ roles - https://h1bgrader.com/h1b-sponsors/ana-data-consulting-inc-5...