ToysRus, NY Life, etc - Temporary Visas to Import Copycats Take Jobs to India

[HamburgerBoy]

That doesn't factor in women entering the workforce, individual wages going down but household incomes remaining relatively steady. Not to mention the massive wage increases in many developing countries.

EDIT: And the Google thing is another case of overpopulation. There are plenty of engineers not in the Silicon Valley that can afford a house just fine.

 

[Sonikku]

That doesn't factor in women entering the workforce, individual wages going down but household incomes remaining relatively steady. Not to mention the massive wage increases in many developing countries.

In other words you have to coax mom to get a job in her own right just to break even with the level of buying power a one breadwinner household could have had years ago.

 

[NaughtyGeek]

So, am I getting this right, s0me0nesMind1, nS1 and HamburgerBoy basically believe that we should all accept that eventually all employment will be sweatshop labor and that's ok?

 

[Ns1]

So, am I getting this right, s0me0nesMind1, nS1 and HamburgerBoy basically believe that we should all accept that eventually all employment will be sweatshop labor and that's ok?

nope.

Because India has so many more opportunities than nearly anywhere in America, amirite?

Indians have this thing called "the internet" that allows them to compete at a global level. Perhaps "OMG I'm being outsourced" Americans can also use this "internet" to their advantage.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

So, am I getting this right, s0me0nesMind1, nS1 and HamburgerBoy basically believe that we should all accept that eventually all employment will be sweatshop labor and that's ok?

No, you're just simply an idiot that has no idea what they are saying.

As someone that has been DIRECTLY affected by outsourcing, everyone here saying this is an outrage is simply too stupid to understand how the world truly works. You all want to live in your fantasy land of magic and social justice protection and expect to thwart away any and all threats to your cushy lifestyle. It's getting downright pathetic.

My first job out of college - I worked at for only ~2 years from one of the biggest global IT companies until they announced ~28k layoffs. It wasn't hard to take a hint. All of a sudden we found team leads and managers taking random trips to Guadalajara and not long after I was being forced to make documentation on my workflow process. Now I'll admit, nothing is more degrading than helping your company get rid of you. I was already looking for my next job and pumping out applications like crazy. Thankfully my manager was pretty cool at the time and said if you have an interview, just let me know and go to it.

I was notified February 1st I was getting the layoff slip that the ~15th was my last day with a 2-month severance pay. By Mid-march I had started my next job for a 50% hike in pay and a sign-on bonus. I just considered the severance pay a "leaving bonus" and a nice vacation

Point being: Quit sucking in life. Quit acting like I don't know what it's like. If anything, YOU probably have never experienced such events. It's not a travesty, it's a fact of life. Deal with it instead of crying and you might just get somewhere better in life.

 

[NaughtyGeek]

No, you're just simply an idiot that has no idea what they are saying.

As someone that has been DIRECTLY affected by outsourcing, everyone here saying this is an outrage is simply too stupid to understand how the world truly works. You all want to live in your fantasy land of magic and social justice protection and expect to thwart away any and all threats to your cushy lifestyle. It's getting downright pathetic.

My first job out of college - I worked at for only ~2 years from one of the biggest global IT companies until they announced ~28k layoffs. It wasn't hard to take a hint. All of a sudden we found team leads and managers taking random trips to Guadalajara and not long after I was being forced to make documentation on my workflow process. Now I'll admit, nothing is more degrading than helping your company get rid of you. I was already looking for my next job and pumping out applications like crazy. Thankfully my manager was pretty cool at the time and said if you have an interview, just let me know and go to it.

I was notified February 1st I was getting the layoff slip that the ~15th was my last day with a 2-month severance pay. By Mid-march I had started my next job for a 50% hike in pay and a sign-on bonus. I just considered the severance pay a "leaving bonus" and a nice vacation

Point being: Quit sucking in life. Quit acting like I don't know what it's like. If anything, YOU probably have never experienced such events. It's not a travesty, it's a fact of life. Deal with it instead of crying and you might just get somewhere better in life.

In true internet warrior fashion you've lashed out and made broad assumptions while puffing out your chest to show us all how great you are because things worked out for you. Bravo. If your expectation is that everyone caught in that scenario who's as "great as you" is going to luck into the same outcome, you sir are the one without firsthand experience.

Not everyone discussing this issue in a negative light is whining, crying, sucking etc.. Some folks are pointing out that this could have long term negative consequences that our economy, government and general way of life can't cope with. Offshoring has been going on for decades now and the more time that goes by the deeper it's going to cut. At some point simple math is going to catch up with us as many people just are not trainable beyond a certain level yet still need a way to provide for themselves.

 

[Ns1]

At some point simple math is going to catch up with us as many people just are not trainable beyond a certain level yet still need a way to provide for themselves.

Then they should probably look for fields that cannot be outsourced - and in some cases, they'll be replaced by robots instead of outsourced. So all those warehouse workers and fast food workers better be preparing for the inevitable.

 

[NaughtyGeek]

Then they should probably look for fields that cannot be outsourced - and in some cases, they'll be replaced by robots instead of outsourced. So all those warehouse workers and fast food workers better be preparing for the inevitable.

There are only so many fields/jobs available and as you pointed out that field is only going to narrow further. This is why I'm in automation because I recognized that fact long ago. However, not everyone is capable of installing precision robots, programming machine safety systems etc.. Therein lies the problem, several folks in here want to shout out that it's the problem of the individuals. At what point does it become the problem of society that we're getting to a point that we can replace such a significant portion of the workforce with machines and the portion we can't replace with machines can be outsourced to places with extremely low standards of living coupled with no human/environmental protections to compensate for?

The language of the H1B program clearly saw the outsourcing issue as a danger and that's why there are so many stipulations trying to prevent it. The program wasn't created for offshoring, it was created to bring talent in.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

In other words you have to coax mom to get a job in her own right just to break even with the level of buying power a one breadwinner household could have had years ago.

What's the alternative? Ban women from the workplace and bring back the 50s? The average white American male never had it better than the first half of the 20th century. Ethnic minorities were relegated to the worst work, women were relegated to the kitchen, Europe and Asia were killing themselves with one war or revolution after the next, and we sat around, relatively safe from harm, exporting our shit to everyone. Both the USA's and the world's population have roughly tripled since then, we've shifted from a more agrarian economy which means even more people crowding the cities meaning even higher property values, a worldwide wealth inequality means people south of the border want a slice of the pie (and I don't blame them), etcetc. H1B visa workers are just a drop in the bucket compared to the overall problem, if you call people trying to find better work and opportunities a problem.

 

[Ns1]

There are only so many fields/jobs available and as you pointed out that field is only going to narrow further. This is why I'm in automation because I recognized that fact long ago. However, not everyone is capable of installing precision robots, programming machine safety systems etc.. Therein lies the problem, several folks in here want to shout out that it's the problem of the individuals. At what point does it become the problem of society that we're getting to a point that we can replace such a significant portion of the workforce with machines and the portion we can't replace with machines can be outsourced to places with extremely low standards of living coupled with no human/environmental protections to compensate for?

The answer is to diversify into fields that cannot be outsourced, e.g. corporate masseuse for robot technicians. Got no hands/arms? Become a thai masseuse.

 

[NaughtyGeek]

The answer is to diversify into fields that cannot be outsourced, e.g. corporate masseuse for robot technicians. Got no hands/arms? Become a thai masseuse.

Now that's an idea I can get behind, lol.

 

[brycejones]

The temporary work visa programs were designed with the intent of destroying jobs to get people on welfare and push this country one inch more into the abyss of global governance where the only bill of rights is the corporate bill of rights.

Many valid issues to be discussed around H1Bs and their impact on employment. You however come across as a freaking loon.

Did you eat lead paint chips every day as a snack after school?

 

[BoberFett]

Sad and ironic that a corporation like Starbucks not wishing us a Merry Christmas on their cups is a bigger deal to Americans than the job offshoring of their labor.

Kinda explains a lot actually.

It's sad that you're an easily led buffoon.

http://thefederalist.com/2015/11/10...bout-the-starbucks-cup-stop-saying-otherwise/

Seems like the whole Starbucks controversy may have been media hype more than anything.

 

[BoberFett]

It's hilarious that Democrats call everyone else racists, but as soon as some non-white non-American gets a job, they lose their shit.

 

[DrDoug]

It's sad that you're an easily led buffoon.

http://thefederalist.com/2015/11/10...bout-the-starbucks-cup-stop-saying-otherwise/

Seems like the whole Starbucks controversy may have been media hype more than anything.

But who started the whole thing? A conservative shyster.

 

[Blanky]

It's okay, the big businesses are doing better with this and everything will trickle down. The god of capitalism has foretold it and as long as you pray to him you'll be okay, he is never wrong and the stats make it clear that the middle class is doing super awesome.

The people claiming it's so easy to pull yourself out of this rapid decline of the middle class are either delusional, leeching off mommy and daddy or are the 1%. Even white collar workers like physicians, dentists, lawyers are feeling the pinch. Those that deny what's happening are living in a fantasy world. You can't plan for something which is no longer there. There are Google engineers living out of vans on their campus just to scrape by and save enough money to buy a house--that speaks volumes about how shit is so fucked up in this country.

I'm doing very well now but I know that with the change in the economy what is good now could disappear in a few years. And what can I do? Basically hope it doesn't happen and try and stay ahead of the curve. Hopefully that works out, it might not. And I'm educated with a good job and skills. It must be fucking scary for a lot of people out there. I think corporations have been screwing people for way too long with outsourcing.

I'm profoundly worried about the sport fucking that automation is going to do to the labor market. I think it is going to be an absolute gang bang on jobs, robots are going to invalidate the usefulness of so many people who cannot possibly retrain as quickly as some fresh firmware can be deployed. Technology is going to eviscerate jobs from the cashier up to the $300k/year radiologist.

 

[werepossum]

Last I checked Americans belong to a UNION called the United States of America that is supposed to protect its members from things like scabs whether it's illegals or outsourcing to other countries,

I expect this from Republicans, but you pretend to care for America Democrats, where have you been for the last 30 years ?

Instead of protecting that greatest Union in America you have been calling for higher minimum wage, $15 dollar an hour burger flippers, as a solution to the loss of upward mobility in the job markets, and calling those that are against illegal immigration racists or xenophobes.

It has become more of a scandal if someone speaks out against a Gay friendly policy of a Democrat/Liberal company than it's hiring practices

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-disney-technology-h1b-20150617-story.html

Rinse repeat all across America for over 30 years, in one form or another whether it's illegals taking the lower paying jobs for less or outsourcing and H1-B's being used to not pay an American, while phony politicians promise to bring back prosperity,


and you regular partisan hacks are in dis-belief and left scratching your heads when an unqualified blowhard like Trump is becoming so popular over your status quo politicians.

Exactly. Trump's (and Carson's) only real qualification is not being a member of our political class. With Republicans, that has become the hottest skill. With Democrats . . . not so much.

I for one want to assure Kathleen Waugh that I intend to assist Toys “R” Us attain its "streamlined, more efficient global organization to make it fit for growth” by not spending a freakin' penny with them. Can't get any more streamlined than no sales.

 

[sao123]

I've come to the conclusion that the USA can no longer be saved.
Anything that speeds up the demise of this corrupt empire, the better.

...Of the People Corporation, By the People Corporation, For the People Corporation...

 

[werepossum]

What's the alternative? Ban women from the workplace and bring back the 50s? The average white American male never had it better than the first half of the 20th century. Ethnic minorities were relegated to the worst work, women were relegated to the kitchen, Europe and Asia were killing themselves with one war or revolution after the next, and we sat around, relatively safe from harm, exporting our shit to everyone. Both the USA's and the world's population have roughly tripled since then, we've shifted from a more agrarian economy which means even more people crowding the cities meaning even higher property values, a worldwide wealth inequality means people south of the border want a slice of the pie (and I don't blame them), etcetc. H1B visa workers are just a drop in the bucket compared to the overall problem, if you call people trying to find better work and opportunities a problem.

Dude, you seriously need to study history. For a good portion of the first half of the 20th century most "average white American males" worked on farms - long, hard, back-breaking labor for poor wages before mechanization. Then there were a handful of prosperous years doing factory work leading up to a war where over a hundred thousand of those "average white American males" died. Then there was a reasonably prosperous decade followed by a long depression where many of those "average white American males" had to hit the road looking for work - literally ANY work - and living on hand-outs while their wives tried to keep body and soul together on what little their husbands could send home and their kids were often parceled out one by one to whomever could feed them. Then there were another handful of prosperous years leading up to a war where four hundred thousand of those "average white American males" died and many more sustained life-altering physical and mental wounds.

Young people today really need to spend some time talking with people who lived through the Depression as adults to understand what things used to be like before the "safety net". Unfortunately that opportunity has pretty much passed, but there are still some lucid old folks who lived through the thirties. Men on both sides of my family and my wife's family roamed the nation in search of work - roamed the nation of foot in search of work. Children on both sides of my family were fostered for a time with relatives because their parents literally could not afford to feed them. Same with my wife's family - they settled in Michigan and Ohio and California because that's where they could find work. Men often traveled hundreds of miles on foot or by box car just for the rumor of work. I've heard tales from the women in my wife's family in Fondee and Morgan Hollow and Clear Fork Kentucky and Pruden Tennessee - mountain land where there are barely roads even today - of the steady stream of men traveling the rails and logging roads and looking for any work, no matter how menial, just to eat. And just like from my own family, no one got turned away if there was food to be had. It might be no better than a biscuit or a pone with a little lard, but if the family had food, strangers didn't leave empty handed. Charity was a requirement of Christ.

In this "never had it better" time, thousands of banks failed in less than three years - and there were no federal guarantees, so if your bank failed, you typically lost everything you had. Far from making up losses, the federal government couldn't even pay all its employees their wages. The United States was at that time a creditor nation, but many of its European debtors were unable to repay their loans. Our very brief rosy manufacturing period (roughly 1915 to 1930) spurred by the European nations' rampant inflation ended with European nations unable to pay for goods and enacting trade barriers to protect domestic industry. Farmers were unable to harvest crops because the required labor was more expensive than the crops would bring. Farms were lost businesses were lost, rich men became poor and poor men became desperate. Almost a quarter of the nation was unemployed - and as I said, many of those were on the road looking for work - and bread lines and soup kitchens were operating in every town and city to try to avoid mass starvation. The United States did not have enough gold to meet its obligations, leading us to drop off the gold standard and devalue our currency 40%. FDR largely kept the wolves at bay by force of personality. It could have been us raising the next Hitler or Mussolini or Franco without that.

I don't say all this to pick on you; your perceptions are probably fairly typical. I say it because we tend to believe things have never been as bad as they are today, and in fact things are almost uniformly better today then in our imagined golden years. The Great Recession of 2007-2008 was a walk in the park in every way compared to the Great Recession of 1929-1938. I certainly agree that there are things today (as noted in this thread) that need to be fixed. But if we look back at the past as some rosy, idyllic period, we stand a real chance of making things worse.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

OK, I can't disagree with any of that. My paternal grandfather busted his ass to get off the farm and be the first on that side of the family to get a college education. I meant more from a perspective relative to the rest of the world, particularly during the golden age of the 50s/60s that many seem to think we are capable of returning to, but my wording was very shitty admittedly. However, even during the worst times America had it better than most other places in the world. No mass starvation on a Wiemar Republic scale, no threat of a fascist takeover of the government, no neighboring enemies, etc. Coming out of World War 2, yes my grandparents'/great-grandparents' generation lost a lot of men and sacrificed a lot of time to supporting the war, but compared to most of Europe in ruins we were on top of the world, and I'm pretty sure our strong economy of the early post-war period is largely attributable to being able to sell the world what it needed to rebuild. Sorry for the ambiguity because you're exactly right on your point, I'm just saying that when you look at charts of super cheap homes and food relative to a single-earner's income in the 50s, that was an anomaly and not something that can be fixed by raising tariffs and blocking immigration.

I actually don't think the present time is bad at all, and certainly not for me personally. If you look at household income, not individual income, and include increased spending on various workplace benefits over time, the average American household has actually been pretty steady over the last few decades. There are certainly things that have become inordinately more expensive (higher education and healthcare especially) but people using immigrants/illegals as a scapegoat are blame-shifting and missing the bigger picture.

 

[Blanky]

Dude, you seriously need to study history. For a good portion of the first half of the 20th century most "average white American males" worked on farms - long, hard, back-breaking labor for poor wages before mechanization. Then there were a handful of prosperous years doing factory work leading up to a war where over a hundred thousand of those "average white American males" died. Then there was a reasonably prosperous decade followed by a long depression where many of those "average white American males" had to hit the road looking for work - literally ANY work - and living on hand-outs while their wives tried to keep body and soul together on what little their husbands could send home and their kids were often parceled out one by one to whomever could feed them. Then there were another handful of prosperous years leading up to a war where four hundred thousand of those "average white American males" died and many more sustained life-altering physical and mental wounds.

Young people today really need to spend some time talking with people who lived through the Depression as adults to understand what things used to be like before the "safety net". Unfortunately that opportunity has pretty much passed, but there are still some lucid old folks who lived through the thirties. Men on both sides of my family and my wife's family roamed the nation in search of work - roamed the nation of foot in search of work. Children on both sides of my family were fostered for a time with relatives because their parents literally could not afford to feed them. Same with my wife's family - they settled in Michigan and Ohio and California because that's where they could find work. Men often traveled hundreds of miles on foot or by box car just for the rumor of work. I've heard tales from the women in my wife's family in Fondee and Morgan Hollow and Clear Fork Kentucky and Pruden Tennessee - mountain land where there are barely roads even today - of the steady stream of men traveling the rails and logging roads and looking for any work, no matter how menial, just to eat. And just like from my own family, no one got turned away if there was food to be had. It might be no better than a biscuit or a pone with a little lard, but if the family had food, strangers didn't leave empty handed. Charity was a requirement of Christ.

In this "never had it better" time, thousands of banks failed in less than three years - and there were no federal guarantees, so if your bank failed, you typically lost everything you had. Far from making up losses, the federal government couldn't even pay all its employees their wages. The United States was at that time a creditor nation, but many of its European debtors were unable to repay their loans. Our very brief rosy manufacturing period (roughly 1915 to 1930) spurred by the European nations' rampant inflation ended with European nations unable to pay for goods and enacting trade barriers to protect domestic industry. Farmers were unable to harvest crops because the required labor was more expensive than the crops would bring. Farms were lost businesses were lost, rich men became poor and poor men became desperate. Almost a quarter of the nation was unemployed - and as I said, many of those were on the road looking for work - and bread lines and soup kitchens were operating in every town and city to try to avoid mass starvation. The United States did not have enough gold to meet its obligations, leading us to drop off the gold standard and devalue our currency 40%. FDR largely kept the wolves at bay by force of personality. It could have been us raising the next Hitler or Mussolini or Franco without that.

I don't say all this to pick on you; your perceptions are probably fairly typical. I say it because we tend to believe things have never been as bad as they are today, and in fact things are almost uniformly better today then in our imagined golden years. The Great Recession of 2007-2008 was a walk in the park in every way compared to the Great Recession of 1929-1938. I certainly agree that there are things today (as noted in this thread) that need to be fixed. But if we look back at the past as some rosy, idyllic period, we stand a real chance of making things worse.

Overall quite right. Basically none of us have had it better today, whether we are white men or black single moms. Nonetheless, it's worth worrying about where things are heading, because the only people who are getting richer now are the already rich and I think the disparity is going to keep increasing as it has.

Economic surplus is likely to ensure long term that even the destitute can have some degree of housing and food (as they do now), but the middle class is under threat.

There are certainly things that have become inordinately more expensive (higher education and healthcare especially) but people using immigrants/illegals as a scapegoat are blame-shifting and missing the bigger picture.

They are not the main problem, but they definitely are one. I think that illegal immigration and/or immigration from lower class third world countries is a massive danger to the strength of the American economy. The only saving grace is that Europe is going to help show us just how bad immigration from a shit load of damaged immigrants (defined as no education, barbaric religious views) can be.

 

[werepossum]

OK, I can't disagree with any of that. My paternal grandfather busted his ass to get off the farm and be the first on that side of the family to get a college education. I meant more from a perspective relative to the rest of the world, particularly during the golden age of the 50s/60s that many seem to think we are capable of returning to, but my wording was very shitty admittedly. However, even during the worst times America had it better than most other places in the world. No mass starvation on a Wiemar Republic scale, no threat of a fascist takeover of the government, no neighboring enemies, etc. Coming out of World War 2, yes my grandparents'/great-grandparents' generation lost a lot of men and sacrificed a lot of time to supporting the war, but compared to most of Europe in ruins we were on top of the world, and I'm pretty sure our strong economy of the early post-war period is largely attributable to being able to sell the world what it needed to rebuild. Sorry for the ambiguity because you're exactly right on your point, I'm just saying that when you look at charts of super cheap homes and food relative to a single-earner's income in the 50s, that was an anomaly and not something that can be fixed by raising tariffs and blocking immigration.

I actually don't think the present time is bad at all, and certainly not for me personally. If you look at household income, not individual income, and include increased spending on various workplace benefits over time, the average American household has actually been pretty steady over the last few decades. There are certainly things that have become inordinately more expensive (higher education and healthcare especially) but people using immigrants/illegals as a scapegoat are blame-shifting and missing the bigger picture.

With that I can mostly agree. I would not claim that illegals are THE biggest problem; as Blanky says, they are one of many factors. If we could control our immigration and stop our loss of jobs (without crippling productivity) then I think they would be a net positive, as most first generation immigrants work harder than most of us entitled old timers. But right now we have a large number of powerful forces devaluing labor and the only solution we seem to find is artificially propping it up. As with lifting oneself up by the seat of the pants, success tends to be fleeting, mostly illusionary, and followed by intense pain.

Overall quite right. Basically none of us have had it better today, whether we are white men or black single moms. Nonetheless, it's worth worrying about where things are heading, because the only people who are getting richer now are the already rich and I think the disparity is going to keep increasing as it has.

Economic surplus is likely to ensure long term that even the destitute can have some degree of housing and food (as they do now), but the middle class is under threat.They are not the main problem, but they definitely are one. I think that illegal immigration and/or immigration from lower class third world countries is a massive danger to the strength of the American economy. The only saving grace is that Europe is going to help show us just how bad immigration from a shit load of damaged immigrants (defined as no education, barbaric religious views) can be.

Agreed, and well said. And thank G-d for Mexicans et al; I'm not big on illegal immigration for a variety of reasons but as illegal immigrants go, we definitely get the pick of the crop.

 

[Brainonska511]

http://nyti.ms/1RJ574l

The lawsuits by Mr. Perrero and Ms. Moore, who each filed a separate but similar class-action complaint on Monday, represent the first time Americans have gone to federal court to sue both outsourcing companies that imported immigrants and the American company that contracted with those businesses, claiming that they collaborated intentionally to supplant Americans with H-1B workers.

I don't have a problem with H-1B visa workers, if there is a legitimate need, but it's about time people start fighting back against companies conspiring to abuse the system and displace US workers with cheaper, foreign labor.

 

[senseamp]

American workers should be replaced with American AI, not foreign workers!

 

[master_shake_]

http://nyti.ms/1RJ574l



I don't have a problem with H-1B visa workers, if there is a legitimate need, but it's about time people start fighting back against companies conspiring to abuse the system and displace US workers with cheaper, foreign labor.

is there any cases where it was a legitimate need?