The Great Tech Worker Divide

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While the differences among tech workers are growing as jobs become more specialized, public policy hasn't kept up. For one popular visa, known as an H-1B, any worker from overseas with an undergraduate degree qualifies. There's no need to try to hire an American first or demonstrate that such workers are in short supply. In addition, the visas are doled out to the first companies that ask for them, not those most important to the U.S. economy.

Questionable Searches

The loose criteria have opened the door to potential problems. Earlier this year, senators Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) launched an investigation (BusinessWeek.com, 5/15/07) into how companies have been using the H-1B program for temporary visas. They disclosed that the most active users of the visas are Indian outsourcing companies, led by Infosys Technologies (INFY) and Wipro (WIT). The senators said the visas were being used not to make the U.S. more competitive but to save money by hiring cheaper workers from abroad and to facilitate the outsourcing of jobs to other countries. Grassley cited the "high amount of fraud and abuse" in launching the investigation. Wipro and Infosys say they are simply helping their clients become more competitive and have done nothing wrong.

In June, a startling video leaked out. It showed a corporate law firm coaching employers (BusinessWeek.com, 6/22/07) on how to get around the requirement of trying to hire an American before bringing in a worker from abroad for a green card. "[O]ur goal is clearly not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker," said the firm's director of marketing in the clip.

Such cases are taken by American tech workers as confirmation of their worst fears. In Seattle, Sawade thinks many employers he talks to don't really want American workers; they just want cheaper labor from abroad. "It seems companies are going through the motions so they can be free to hire guest workers," he says.

Where Are the Jobs?

From the outside, it would seem tech workers should have little trouble finding jobs. The unemployment rate for computer and mathematics-related work occupations has dropped steadily, from 5.4% in second quarter of 2002 to the 1.8% in the second quarter, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The total number of such jobs is higher than at any point in the last seven years.

The type of jobs being created, however, is shifting dramatically. As more technical jobs like programming are outsourced, new opportunities in the U.S. require additional or more specialized skills. The biggest job gains in information technology in the past year have been for software engineers, IT managers, and network systems analysts. IT management jobs are up more than 50% since 2001. Meanwhile, programmers and support specialists—the easiest categories to outsource—continue to shed positions. Computer programmer employment tumbled to 396,020 last year, from 530,730 in 2000.