Wipro's Premji on the Visa Controversy

Premji said: "You will not be able to substitute the absence of this talent with local hires, because it’s not easily available"

This is a boldface lie.

Right now the US graduate 70,000 IT engineers and import 85000 H1B visa a year. When the US import 185000 H1B visa, their engineering school will perhaps graduate 0 IT engineer per year.

Premji’s statements are self-serving propaganda.

The purpose of the H-1b visa, L-1 visa and outsourcing was to break the American I.T. labor market. Now salaries have been slashed for U.S. tech workers and most can’t even find a job. Every IT department is now 80% Indians, not because Indians are good (the opposite is true), but because they are cheap.

If inshoring / offshoring / outsourcing of IT work to Indians is good, why restrict this winning labor strategy to IT? Let's import Indians by the tens of millions to replace all American workers in all trades - blue collar, white collar, government workers, judges, doctors, nurses, lawyers, accountants, finance, home health care, skilled trades, everybody. We need 80% Indians in every U.S. labor market. We'll figure out what to do with the wrecked lives of all unemployed Americans later. We know one place they can't go to find a job: India.
India doesn’t let foreigners take Indian jobs.

Just another greedy shameless self-serving Indian businessman. What do you expect him to say?

"Nearly 55% of the economy of China is government" -- Indian CEOs, stop these non-sense, no basis accessment about China, more importantly, stop using "India and China" to gain weight when you talk about India, China ain't India, India ain't China, two different animals. China belongs to the real Asia (east Asia, that is)

I did not expect this from Mr Premji. Instead of creating oppurtunities in India for Indians and Indian consumers, why our engineers have to work for the US and other western or developed nations? It is nothing but a form of slavery forced on India by MNCs like Wipro. I would expect Mr Premji to screw the Indian FM to reduce taxes on goods and services and start infrastructure development for India, instead of grabbing and stealing jobs and bread crumbs from the US people. It is stupid of him to tell Americans how run their economy, instead of telling our own people how to run our own economy.

I've yet to hear a company say, let's improve quality by moving development to India.

"Premji: They like the labor rates, the quality of the people, the willingness to work hard. They’re not getting the people they need in the United States. That’s the bottom line."

It's all about reducing costs, whether it's moving development to India or moving Indians here.

Nobel Prize economist and free-market advocate Milton Friedman hit the nail on the head when he was quoted in the 22 July 2002 Computerworld article, "H-1B Is Just Another Gov't. Subsidy." (Google the title to find it.) A "Government Subsidy" that distorts the wage structure for technology professionals by bringing in planeloads of "fresh (imported, indentured, and inexpensive) young blood."

You can learn how Bill Gates, III became the world's wealthiest man by hiring the "best and brightest" lobbyist Jack Abramoff - and his team. Please read "The Greedy Gates Immigration Gambit" - google the title and choose the second link, which is the more engaging PDF version of the article.

Then, use the powerful no-cost citizen activism tools at NumbersUSA.com to demand that this corrupt program be terminated.

He is upset because he will lose his cheap labor. The regulation is clear H1B is to be used by American companies and not Indian companies trying to profit from cheap labor.

Azim Premji: "...the people who come here on H1B visa... They’re here to do a specific job for which their presence is required. If the job can be done by an American, we’ll hire an American. It doesn’t cost us more to hire an American." This is laughably wrong, folks. I wonder if he was able to keep a straight face when he was saying this. Just look at the facts being laid out in the comment posts attached to the recent ComputerWorld article at the following link....

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=legislation/regulation&articleId=9133529

I heard from some Wipro employees that Wipro treats them very badly. They make them work some 16 hours, 7 days a week. Premji, What are you doing to stop this and treat your employees like a human being - 8 hours a day, 5 days a week and reasonable lunch breaks. And, more importantly, stop bothering them after work hours. You can't call someone at home at 9:00 PM and talk about some project. This is only a little better than slave trade

Thats a fact, we have a internet, fiber optics and the software to do work from home. The home can be anywhere India, Tibet, chila, anywhere.
Don't every one drink Coco-cola every where in the world, don't every one smoke the cigarates made by british- american tobacoo.What about the IBM, and ofcourse AIG, GE never forget Boeng and lock-heed martin. What about the oil company, all americans few year back?
The world is changing, it is becomming smaller and smaller with disappering boundries because of Trade Practise created by American ( GATT later WTO), tecnologhy created by american ( computer- networking- internet), language spoken by american called English, and travel time because of Boieng and etc.
It is you who were taking all the benefit from all these, now others wanna take a tiny Pie, you are complaning.
BUT don't worry you and your company will be the real winner in the long run.Trade is all about Markating and Finance which you are master of.

Stopping IT professionals when business are more global than local, will not improve the situation for non-qualified labor. Populist moves like these will only harm businesses in the long run. Premji is right. after only 30% or so of the possible outsourcing business goes to India. Why do American brands try and sell in global markets, why not sell only in local markets. What if other markets also stop inflow of non-local goods ?

The issue discussed above doesn't simply reflect the unemployment dealing strategies of a specific nation.One really need to understand the free-trade notation used. U.S is the nation which encouraged the free-trade concept than any other on the planet earth.It ruined the intra-development of poor nations in the name of free trade.It is the major cause of exploitation in the African nations.

India is no exception from being exploited.The strategies that U.S implement doesn't in real terms yield any long term benefits to the nation internally and externally as well.As said in the above comments,the employment it generates in the home U.S market is just a sour grape.Such Short term approaches make no sense in the globalization scenario.

Remember what the CEO of MS said " If they cannot hire H-1B people, then MS will hire these people somewhere else.

This step will be more serious for the US.

Premji is threatening us and as an American I don't take kindly to foreign companies and their CEOs lobbing threats at the American people.

His rhetoric is discusting. He is anti-American and should not be allowed to step on the precious soil that our fathers (and now brothers) fought with life and limb to defend.

Wipro is a case study of "what went wrong" with the H-1b visa program. The program wasn't intended to be used by offshoring companies to shepard jobs to India. Yet, like Premji said they need a 25-75 ratio of workers onshore and off. So for every H-1b worker here there are at least 3 more offshore doing what would have been an American job.

The H-1b program ENABLES offshoring. He is bluffing - using scare tactics to prevent you from calling his bluff. If you prevent offshoring companies from using the H-1b visa, it will drive up the cost of offshoring. Cost is the only reason we do it. So Premji's ability to exploit foreign workers on our soil makes it easier for them to offshore jobs.

This is a good bill. Having worked in the tech consulting for the past 10 years, I can vouch that there is rampant fraud and abuse of these programs. Most big US corporations abuse the system by indirectly getting cheap labor by contracting with Indian body shops. Most of the work done in very routine and does not require specialized skills. Lot of these body shops don't pay the advertised rates and don't pay the worker when they are on the bench.

I have a problem with this article from the beginning... "I think he gave the most lucid statement of the Indian position on America’s guest worker visa controversy that I have heard." - Steve Hamm
My comments:
- Premji is a shrewd businessman just like any American businessman. Their motive is always profits for themselves.
- The IT industry exploits most workers not only in the US but in India as well with long work hours and low pay
- I have not met anyone (American/Indian/Chinese etc.) in any industry who thinks they are paid satisfactorily.
- The issue is how do we collaborate as people and create a healthy interaction to share knowledge and not let politics between governments spoil the good in people.
- US has given me the opportunity to study here at a very esteemed university and pursue dreams that may or may not have been fulfilled in India. Can an American say the same thing about India or any other country in the future? I sure hope so...
- In summary this article is just another page for politics and business but does not represent the sentiments of the Indian IT worker or millions of other Indians.

Oh please... "choked of talent" or not, somehow the US will do just fine without the low wage Indian labor.

India's first response to economic difficulties - fire all possible foreign pilots in India.

Too many H1B visas are being abused and the original goals and intentions of the H1B visa system is not being met due to the exploitation of the holes in the system. I have talked to H1B visa holders who work for Indian companies who have admitted that they are not being paid what was promised or sometimes not paid at all when they are on the "bench", and there are companies who hold them hostage by hanging on to their passports and these are just a couple examples of the abuse. There are also companies that follow the law and use the H1B visa for the right reasons and not for some quick profit. There is definitely a need for the temporary skilled worker visa program, when used lawfully, however the system needs to be overhauled and loopholes need to be closed to stop all the abuse.

Premji and other con-men have pulled off a scam against the whole Western world. They should walk away humble.

Instead, they insult the very people they are screwing - American IT workers. He says Indians "work hard".

I work in IT. I see the Indians arrive for work at 10:30am and leave at 5:00pm. The Americans arrive at 8:00am and leave at 5:30pm. I see the Indians take nice long lunches while the Americans work through lunch. I see Indians take a break at 2:00pm to stroll around the office park, or maybe just to go to Starbucks while the Americans take no breaks.

What if the likes of Premji were calling the (carpenters / fitters / Ironworkers / police officers / firefighters / nurses / teachers ) lazy and unskilled and saying they needed to be replaced by Indians?

Don't make the mistake American IT workers made by thinking it couldn't happen to your profession.

Get on the right side of this issue before it's too late. Revoke all H-1b and L-1 visas and send all Indians back to India so Americans can get back to work and start paying taxes again.

To all I agree with you. Not to mention that so many of these 'techies' have terrible analytical skills. I'll say one thing they have & that is nerve.

Premji is a slave-driver.

Indians need that "talent" to build their own country!

The first workers who should be replaced by Indians are the American corporate officers. It is the corporate leaders who told us we needed to replace American IT professionals with Indians to cut costs.

Board members, CEOs, CIOs, CTOs, CFOs, VPs, and HR Generalists all make obscene amounts of money. These are the people who can be most effectively replaced by less expensive corporate officers from India. This is a rich target of unchecked corporate waste.

Then watch the stock market soar from the tremendous cost savings. That's the way to deliver value to the shareholders.

I understand the pain of American employees...but they also should not forget that how the company's(american) are making profit..are not using the indian market..i think every indian is using almost 60% american product in their daily life...so what's about that???...and about china...socalled east asian...evry product you will buy in america is "made in china"..why? why america is outsourcing that work???...dont america has the capability of producing a single thing for the daily life? america...you will take everything but not ready to give..china..dont treat yourself as real or super real..in your country government will not allow you to speak out..are you really free??..but yes you are real asian..at last i respect all the countries...

http://www.expressindia.com/news/fullstory.php?newsid=62949

This shows how Indian IT companies become profitable and competitive: They are making money from "selling" Visas. As pointed out by some readers after that news, that's a common practice among Indian IT companies.

I agree that if there are restrictions placed on Indian corporations and citizens to work in US, a bigger backlash is expected from Indian government in terms of taxes and US businesses doing business and making huge money in India. IBM, Cisco, Intel, Coca Cola, Pepsico, GE, Boing and many others are doing Billions of dollars worth of business and profiting from Indian companies and consumers. They can also prepare to downsize their business in India.

He said "20,000 to India. What will you achieve? The 20,000 will come down to 12,000. You’ll create 8,000 more jobs,..." , if just 8,000 jobs, why he is so worried???, the true is it's not just 8,000 jobs, it's many more, the entier project have to be done onshore if they can't send people onshore,

We Indians don't need any weight of China.Every country knows how every country using good because you people are cheap labor in manufacturing and also copy cats.Not like you can develop their own.

I'm an immigrant too. H1B is a loophole.
I own 6 gas stations in NJ, all of my $8/hr employees are H1B holders from INDIA, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. All of my gas station employees were dumped by Wipro, Infosys, Satyam .... etc.
Why these companies are brink talented IT workers from their home countries and dumping here in US ?
Then they end up in gas station.
I feel sorry for them.

Am an indian. When I was in school than I had to compete with 100 people...in high school with 1000...in college with 10000...now I am in IT...they are asking me to compete with the WORLD !! America\China\India what should I do?

When I was looking for engineers in Bangalore in 2004, I had the feeling that modern day slave traders like, Wipro and Infosys, had hoarderd all "talent" to make Captive outsourcing non-viable for small companies and difficult for big companies.

Premji is a liar. I'm an Indian and will hopefully never work for someone like him. Its people like him that have a strong hold on the Indian labor that abuse most of his workers with cheap pay and then flood them in foreign markets. If not, they bring them to the US and put multiple folks in cramped quarters and dont pay them on par with their counterparts. What they do well if find models to pay themselves good money and get richer.

I think the bill needs to be introspected to ensure companies like Wipro, TCS, Infosys and more are not abusing work rights in India - and abroad!

@Ron,
Everyone pays taxes, whether they like it or not.

To everyone, the bottom line is that there is abuse of the system in certain industries. There are legitimate uses of the visa that will be affected in a knee-jerk backlash, but it appears that it cannot be avoided. So be it. In the long term, equilibrium will be reached. It just might get a bit ugly in the interim.

USA did not put man on the moon with oustourced "talent". Same thing with Nuclear, Oil indstry, car industry...everything worthwhile in the world.

US govenrment allows outsourcing to increase US wealth from selling to 'colonies' If it creates some jobs thats a bonus, enjoy.

I like the answer for "Why are IBM and Accenture employing so many people in India?" YES Indian's work hard and smart. Indian's are not cheap they are better paid than average American IT worker, how many Americans IT professionals works on weekends and nights on production support basis in summer?

He is worried about 8000 jobs because they impact his company, but to the US labor force, what would be the impact of saving 8000 jobs? Nothing.

The retaliation would probably end up costing more than 8000 jobs.

Also, you’ll generate a trade war with countries such as India. It’s a freedom-of-trade issue.

Interesting and hypocritical comment when India has slapped most imports with exorbitant import duties to preserve their economy from competition.

Freedom of trade is a two way street, developing countries still have to learn that and stop expecting free trade for their products and services while virtually closing their markets to competition.

While I am personally not very impressed by Premji's answers to Steve's questions, I do not agree with the above mentioned regulation to dictate on how companies should conducting their businesses.

Unforntunately, the topic of foreign labor, which over many many years has added tremendous value to the US economy, is under limelight due to the current economic conditions.

It is a part of human nature. When things go well, no one questions the principles that have led to the growth. When things go bad, finger pointing starts. Same is true for our capitalist societies. We all have lived and relished capitalist societies, allowing banks / consumers to take risks. Now that things have gone south, instead of blaming ourselves for the poor decisions we made, we turn to banks.

Outsourcing, is too small, (as a part of US GDP) to fret about. In fact, it is in the best advantage of US to adopt the law of "Comparative Advantages" and let countries do what they are the best in doing. US has always been top notch in higher education, innovation, business models, science / technology. That is our comparative advantage.

Again, when people are loosing jobs, what can one do? But to create politically based policies like the above. The bill will not solve the problem of unemployment apart from scoring some political points to the Senators passing it. It however will create a bigger long term issue, which right now not many people are capable of seeing it. And the senators have to worry about their near term elections. So why not take the opportunity.

It is a shame in the face of US which has been propagating capitalism & globalization and benefiting from it and built its economy to backtrack on the same philosophy of free trade that built the nation.

It for US to worry about the consequences of the bill. Rest of the world wont take it lying down. The way US treasuries is being shunned by China. you will soon see similar restrictions & boycott of US companies & services abroad. US cannot afford this to bail out its recession rid economy.

I am an Indian and quite honestly I can't take the politics from the likes of Premji and the TATAs. This guy talks utter non-sense. Premji, you are better off making your vegetable products in India and looking for IT projects in India. Don't ruin the life of every other American and Indian that is here in US soil to make a honest living. Wonder why Premji and the TATAs wouldn't comment about all the L1, H1 and B1 fraud they commit.

Editor,

All your comments are one sided. If business week belongs to free press please post the comment I posted earlier a few minutes ago under the same name and e-mail ID. if you don't you obviously prove what you are what US is and what this bill is all about - INSECURE

We need to take the tribal barriers down, American, Canadian, Mexican, etc. We need to be capitalists, best products at the lowest cost. Duties, and Tariffs did not save GM, Chrysler, Circuit City, Aig or Lehman Bros.
PS we have lost 100 Million jobs we no longer have draftsmen in a large hall drawing schematics or Secretaries taking messages,(to name a few) lost to Voice Mail. We have to lead in Biotech (undo the village view of Stem Cell research and other scientific advancement.
Dammed those Indians though they have interpreted our pure Religion Christianity by teaching us Mediation and Yoga. Boy next we will stop buying gun's and knives. I also believe Indian are responsible for the high level of Crime higher than Europe and higher level prison population. Not sure but it has to be them

Premji is correct.
How many americans have the knowledge of programming?

Most of the comments on this article remind me of outdated Indian politicians arguing that automation and use of computers in India is creating unemployment. Tasks that created 100 jobs earlier can be done with 1 using computers today. So should we ban computer use?

The big US corporations now have operations worldwide and revenues greater than most countries GDP. They cant compete unless they have the best and cheapest talent available. If this law is passed how will the Indian politicians explain to then unemployed IT engineers why the power plants are being made by GE on government subsidy or GM is being given land at almost no cost in Gujrat state by the government when US wont let him work for an Indian company that has operations in the US?

Premji is highly regarding as a leader and visionary. He is on the richest but doesnt have a reserved parking lot in his own office building and still travels economy class. Labeling him a slave trader and liar is ridiculous at best.

On India Vs China, they are totally different. China is manufacturing super house that cant be replaced, has huge dollar reserves and US owes them a lot of money. India on the other hand doesnt have such a strong bargaining position. But India does have a democratic government with almost absolute transparency. This is attractive for US corporations to do business. After all we still live in a society ruled by money and not a Utopian society of Star Trek!

Cheers and good luck to Premji.

Sam
May 27, 2009 12:51 PM
India's first response to economic difficulties - fire all possible foreign pilots in India.

Sam,
This was not enforced by the government but private airline operator (Jet Airways) did this because foreign pilots were drawing 3-5x salaries of Indian counterparts. Its basic capitalism, remember who taught this is to the Indian companies?

H1B program is used by US government to steal qualified workers from across the world and people like Premji (who incidently has done a great job) abet in the trade.
How about J1 to attract doctors and au pairs; temporary farm & hospitality workers - surprising US has enough High school grade labor why get young females to serve the Americans. It is sheer cunningness on the part of European Americans. US wants to buy sportspersons and experts in various fields.
WHY not use home grown stuff and save the american pride; rather than expoiting the whole world.

America has enough programmers. It's just that companies are greedy and end up hiring cheaper/less expensive labor from India.

CADiver
May 27, 2009 03:49 PM
Also, you’ll generate a trade war with countries such as India. It’s a freedom-of-trade issue.

Interesting and hypocritical comment when India has slapped most imports with exorbitant import duties to preserve their economy from competition.
-----

CADriver,
India traditionally had very high import duties (>100% during 60's and 70's) which have now been brought down in accordance with WTO guidelines. The only issue with elimination is definition of free trade. India has argued at WTO that if a foreign government is giving subsidy for production of certain goods then the Indian government has the right to levy duties on it. A case in point is farm subsidies in Europe. If European farmer produces wheat @ 20 cents/Kg but due to subsidy can sell it for 10 cents how can Indian farmers compete if there is no duty on imported wheat?

If this bill passes through then Silicon Valley will go down the path of Detroit. Guys, you gotta understand that innovation fuels growth and let's accept it US will lose it leadership in innovation if it goes down the path of protectionism. I work in a global environment and every day I see why US is still the leader, because it has allowed talent to come in and also cultivated the business model for them to thrive. I do know the H1B program is abused at some places but it's so small that it has no impact on employment for US citizens. Simply put, US companies will not be competitive and will fall behind without using global talent pool.

"We need to take the tribal barriers down, American, Canadian, Mexican, etc. We need to be capitalists, best products at the lowest cost. "

First world countries cannot compete on price with third world countries unless we completely illiminate major factors of production (materials, shipping, labor, environmental protections, etc).

The only way for us to compete on cost with third world countries WHO NOW HAVE MODERN MANUFACTURING CAPABILITIES is to lower our own standards. A race to the bottom. Third world nations ignore employment law, environmental law, they subsidize companies with raw materials, the manipulate their currencies. Get the drift?

Free trade doesn't work. Short of having a single global government where everyone operates under the same rules and has the same currency, it won't work. Unfortuately, a single global government would be a nightmare for every human on the planet. So the cure to unfair trade is also a disease.

The best we can hope for is FAIR and SMART trade agreements.

Also, humans are not cattle and temporary worker visa programs intended to ship humans around like cattle should NEVER be part of a trade program. We aren't for sale.

What would you call every person who posts using the alias "Economist" and supporting the companies who are offshoring American jobs to India?

A good start. Hah. Lawyers everywhere are cheering that offshoring executives are now the brundt of this joke.

Premji should find the deepest body of water in India and jump in. It would be a good start.

I completely agree with 'Economist'-comments on this article remind me of Soviet era socialist politicians who were so prevalent and popular in India till 2 decades back. Apart from H1B, looks like this mindset is being imported to the land of the free from India !

I am involved in recruiting US computer science undergrads and grads for a Fortune 50o IT company and can say first hand that the average American comp science or college undergrad cannot compete in any way with his counterpart from India or China. The focus is too narrow, knowledge is too superficial and often cloaked in self serving righteousness of "knowing less and being proud ot it". Wake up and smell the coffee folks - China and India are basically keping the dollar afloat these days. And one more thing, all the H1s and L1s who come here - well they pay for Social Security and Fed and State Taxes out of their own salary - which finances a lot of unemployment and SS checks. And when these H1s lose their jobs - they never get any unemployment benefits or social security themselves.

Mr. Premji is a wonderful man. It is about time someone said the truth about these very bad Senators and the even worse plan they hatched. Mr. Premji is saying what the fabulous Mr. Bill Gates has already said that there is major shortage of high skilled, high tech workers in US. Most tech workers in US are out of date with their skills and unwilling or unable to improve them. Why deny the free trade imperative espoused by such figureheads as Mr. Alan Greenspan.

It is utter nonsense to try and play this H1B/L1 card as a free trade issue. It is nothing of the sort. US companies have and will continue offshoring jobs to lower wage countries. Importing labor into the US as indentured servants, on the other hand, is NOT free trade.

One US citizen looking for an IT job with pertinent skills that cannot obtain employment blows away the whole 'not enough talented workers' BS so often repeated by the US executives. Hundreds of thousands of unemployed citizens in the IT field unable to find jobs, while still importing these slaves, is disgusting, and those corporations that use the practice should be punished and shamed immediately.

There is nothing 'free' about being an unemployed software developer competing against slave labor in my own country, while also having to pay full price from every other service industry that doesn't have compete with imported labor. Either allow all US workers to be easily replaced by imported labor or none of them. We IT workers need to start having our voices heard!

Premji said, "I think the United States must realize that today 60 to 70% of the growth of the revenues of large American companies comes from India and China." Really? Even if that outrageous figure is actually true, how many % of that actually is from India vs. China? Per CNBC, of the top 5 countries receiving H1-Bs in '07, 70% went to India, just 7% went to China. India also has the largest number of L1 visas, China is not even in the top 10. Meanwhile, as of 2008, India imported a paltry $18B worth of goods from the US. China imported $71B from the US.

These Indian con artists love to ride on China's coat tail when it's to their advantage, but never hesitate to then turn around and sh*t all over China for Tibet/Communism and exerting their racial superiority over the Chinese at every turn, even when they have no reason to be. At least the Chinese take the jobs (and the pollution) and stay in their country, they don't demand our government to give them hundreds of thousands of visas each year so they can take over the remaining manufacturing jobs in the US as well.

I will like point one thing that when it comes to money no one does any favors to anyone. If Microsoft, Google are pushing for more H1B visas then its not because Mr. Gates or Google has some problems with Americans. Or not because they want to do some charity to India, they are doing it because they get some value out of it.

Now second issue is both Microsoft and Google are not in commodity business (i.e. Services companies such as Wipro, IBM, Accenture) . If only they were recruiting Indians to save few dollars at the cost of quality then that would have resulted in these companies doing really bad. But both these companies are still in the business of innovation.

Looking at opposite side from this issue, nobody likes leaving his home land and that applies to Indians too. The reason Indians use to travel here was because of lack of opportunities in India and higher wages in US. But India is changing a lot in last 10-15 years. Now a days there are lots of opportunities in India, Standard of leaving is also going up. So the craze of coming to US is going down. In fact if you go to Indian metros like Bangalore or Bombay you would find few foreigners working there.

The way things are improving in developing world things would be very different in 10-20 years time and it wont be because of US visa policies but because the economic realities would have been changed by that time and that would be a long lasting change, no H1B policy would be able to stop that change.

Please note that all this logic is for reasonable person but if you believe that your country or place of birth makes you better than others then i will say may god bless and help you, because you will need lot of help from him in the ever more integrated world going forward.

Partial list of American companies affected if there is trade embargo on both sides for products and services.

Coca Cola, Pepsico, Kellog, Bose, GE, GM, Ford, United Technologies, Boeing, Gilette, GSK, Pfizer, New York Life, HP, Dell, IBM, Cadbury, Samsonite......

India has population size of 1 billion with current consumer size of 300 million and growing at the rate of say 5%. If India too imposes similar embargo how will it impact these companies and thus americans. For each of the above companies there are indian alternatives as well as other non-american companies

"Also, you’ll generate a trade war with countries such as India. It’s a freedom-of-trade issue. It’s precisely what President Obama said in the G20 meeting: The United States will not get into a spate of protectionism."

why was H1B created in the first place? to import labor from outside for US benefit. who created H1B and is allowing H1B to continue? US govt. so why pretend as if it is the visa policy of the Indian govt. why complain so much but do nothing to discontinue it?

Wealth like water will always level out, you can put a temporary barrier, but will not work in long run. So be competitive, dont complain, we always knew what is coming, dont we?

I really would like US to learn the hard way. Please - please bring em on those protectionist measures. Let's see how employment in India increases dramatically when companies start offshoring. And as one of the comments say - US won't be the biggest consumer anymore. INDIAN engineers will work in INDIA for INDIAN companies catering to INDIAN consumers.

Its nothing about cheap labors, if that was the case then why not Americans hire employees from other countries which is more cheaper than Indians, A country like Zimbabwe where even 1$ will make their whole life, why don't Americans company ask for them......
Accept the truth, Indians are more brilliant then Americans and so they hire them, they get more brilliant employees in cheap rate why should they go for the Americans who ask more money and work done is less.

"Premji: They like the labor rates, the quality of the people, the willingness to work hard. They’re not getting the people they need in the United States. That’s the bottom line."

Cheers Premji

Even without all the Indian software engineers, U.S. and the world will be just fine. The fact is Indian SW eng are over-rated, the majority of these engineers become enginners after a 3 months training, way below average U.S. SW eng.

Today things are Global, before commenting anything someone should think about the Global effect, need to think from both sides - consumer and employer. US companies do more business in India than Indian companies do in US.

Mate:

Visited Gujerat, Bombay and Calcutta last Christmas for four weeks - after about a twenty-year break.

I'm ashamed to note that people still live like dogs - even after 60 years of Independance.

Worse still, the rich show off and brag about their wealth, instead of rolling up their sleeves and doing something about it; having lived overseas since I was 21, I can't see any light at the end of the tunnel for India; makes little difference what the rich fulminate about.

I felt so sick that next year I'll be publishing a fiction titled as THE REVOLT. Watch out.

Love you all. Melbourne, Australia

Subtly Premji has challenged America. Intersting are the reactions here to his statements (I am sure a lot of them are from Americans). Isn't it evident that Americans are actually scared and insecure?

If you make a product for the global consumers you will end up using resources from across the globe. If you make products which are only used in your country then use your own people.

Forget about the profit minded private corporations. Do you know how many Indians are their in NASA? Do you think NASA cant afford to pay to similar skills in the US?

And finally, do you know almost all of you are actually immigrants? And that you have displaced the native people and claiming that you have "fought a great freedom struggle" to achieve what is it now? Its a shame that now you find all those immigrants as untouchables.

@ unemployed middle-aged IT Neanderthals of Programmer's Guild and Washtech:

Get a life, even if it involves flipping pizzas, instead of hanging on to the coat tails of your senators and bringing everything down

@likes of Wipros & Premjis:
Vacate USA and come back to India and bring all the Indian and Chinese H1-B workers from USA. Build software product companies that will compete with the world's best. If it requires, hire competent US citizen IT workers at double pay benefits.

@ Paranoids on this board:
In the age of Internet and satellites you cant halt march of globalization and outsourcing through retrograde legislation. You may succeed in stopping outsourcing to India. There will be dozen other countries that can still do the outsourcing, such as China, Ireland, etc.

H1B visa is an excuse for angry unemployed people to have an enemy - and the comments posted here prove it. Efficiency is the reason jobs are lost in Europe and the US to the East - bang for the buck as they say. In the US and to some extent we have become lazy, shorter days filled with breaks slacking
- only when jobs are firmly on the line might our workforces improve - as a owner of a SME i can say that the working ethic of the western word has dropped significantly over the past 10 years - our graduates should know their competition from the east is just as bright but importantly they are hungry for success and will work hard to get it.

So stop sulking, firms will hire American/ European if there is a reason too. Governments should stop interfering with the market. By doing so they are making it difficult for my firm and as such will endanger the jobs that are here in the US.

I say,
pass the bill American senators!!
But then please don't throw the 'Free market bullshit' in our face :)

I am surprised why Americans are worried of loss of jobs, when US is forcing itself into all other countries' markets through WTO, to dump goods, which keep American jobs alive. Many local cos are not allowed to operate, millions remain unemployed. So lets us all be on equal terms and not just see IT alone ! I fully support Mr. Premji

To Vijay : Can't you figure out..Name one Programming language that came out of India...Nothing...Name on OS that came out of India...Nothing....So, lets not get into a slanging match here...

Programmers are cheap there. So capitalistic system in US chooses the cheapest cost. Thats the bottom line. Tomorrow if Africa is cheaper, you guys will lose your jobs ...American Corporations will move it to Africa...So does that mean Africans are better than Indians ? May be or May be not. What matters is they are CHEAPER...Thats how it works...So stop deluding yourself

The Social Security that all the H1 and L1 people pay is also helping the govt. pay for the recent bailouts. They do not get any Social Security benefits.

To Roger: Hiring a Software Engineer in India is cheaper. Hiring a H1-B in US is not. It is more expensive than hiring somebody who doesn't require visa sponsorship. Salaries paid are the same and the company incurs additional costs of lawyer fees, H1-B fees, costs of permanent residency sponsorship for those who decide to stay back.

Do you think employers hiring H1-B's will think twice to stop hiring them if they have a reason? Most of the companies put restrictions on hiring H1-B's when they are going through a recession or missing their numbers because they want to cut costs.

Current Indians are the better lot when it comes to programming, analysis and grasping ideas faster. No programming language or major OS came out of India, because the cash rich lot were not ready in spending money in Investments rather make money by shipping them to the US or have them work for US companies which spend so much money on such initiatives. If the H1-B program is stopped, you will start to see atleast some of these innovations atart coming out of India as there is lot of money flow in India now.. This might not have been true in those days as India was not even a developing country, they had very minimal exposure and people did not have money.. many of the early scientists and mathematicians were from India but their Ideas and discoveries were never published or utilized in a big way.. I am not trying to praise Indians knowledge and skill because I am an Indan but presently Indians are the best programmers, Analysts and thinkers. This situation may change though in the distant future. But for that the American education system should be revamped and the students should be willing to work harder. This applies to the Indian kids being brought up here. Americans are great managers though!!

I can understand anger of unemployed Americans. But it's not an Indian techies making uneployment in US. Simply they are delivering best in cheap. If Americans can manage to work for what Indians are, MNCs will hire them on priority. Question is are they americans ready? It's simply business - what they'll prefer to hire is cheaper for the same outcome. Doesn't matter if it is an Indian MNC or US.

http://www.numbersusa.com/content/news/may-27-2009/us-report-show-h-1b-holders-outnumber-unemployed-tech-workers.html
The United States government is pursuing a visa-fraud case against a New Jersey IT company and will submit as evidence a report that will show the number of foreign tech workers using H-1B visas outnumbers the number of unemployed American tech workers.

According to an article on ComputerWorld.com, the government says that "in January of 2009, the total number of workers employed in the information technology occupation under the H-1B program substantially exceeded the 241,000 unemployed U.S. citizen workers within the same occupation."

The U.S. issues 85,000 H-1B visas per year. The visas are awarded to highly-skilled foreign workers usually in the fields of technology or health care. Companies must show that there is not an adequate number of American workers to fill open jobs before requesting H-1B visas.

The H-1B program continually comes under allegations of fraud, and Sens. Charles Grassley (R-IA) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) have proposed legislation to revamp the program. They successfully added an amendment to the economic stimulus bill that was passed in February restricts banks that utilize TARP money from hiring H-1B workers.

RE: Con Artists
Dude, who ever you are take some steps to correct your myopic view. Do you think all these companies GE, Walmart, Mc Donalds, Coke, Pepsi, GM, Chrysler, Ford(and many others), Caterpillar, Dell, HP, Microsoft, Google are hurtling towards India for a meager 18 Billion dollar pot. It is very easy hurtling insults(con artists???) when you don't know what you are talking about...

Make salaries in US 1/3rd of the current levels and increase the working hrs to 8.75 and throw in a weekend working day here and there (and be ready to pick up a support call 24*7..ha..don't forget service with a smile). And employ only those who have spent atleast 18 years in school and never dropped out. Now US is on par with the Indian work force (and of course there is a probation of atleast 6 months on job). Do it.. and All IT jobs from even Indian, Philippines, Vietnam, Jap Govts will be outsourced to US (provided you deliver quality ontime with no overruns). US will come out of recession in no time. Good suggestion..?..:)

The irony is the same h1-b workers will face the same fate, fast work 20 plus years from now, if things continue be like this.i know friends who came from India couple of decades back, and now have mortgages and college tuitions for kids, but have to lose jobs or compete with the new arrivals i.e h1bs

The fault doesn't lie in Indians either, because it is an innate human nature to better your conditions if you can. I will lay the fault with high level CXO people who approve such hiring policies, based on bottom lines only.

US has become a nation of whiners...blame everyone but themselves for everything...
I concur that it would be a blessing in disguise when all the immigrants stop coming to US and are forced to work in their home country, when the rest of the world boycotts American Products and companies.There is absolutely nothing that we need these American companies in India for just as the Americans do not need H1b holders.

According to the latest data shared by the US treasury department, India’s outstanding exposure to US government bonds rose from $18.3 billion in October ‘08 to $38.2 billion in March ‘09. The latest tranche of investment into treasuries has made India the fourth-largest creditor to the US after China, Japan and Russia during this period.

so... what.? everyone stop buying US treasure bonds.. and lets see how the bailout happens..!!! all you guys are bunch of ostriches burying ur heads in sand ..

Its just money guys. Asians work in US because they get more here than india\china. US corporates setup companies in india\china because its economical. VISA policies are not created by Asians but US. Don't fight with the world! Change the rules.

Also, would like to add how we(Indians) have been exporting the best and brightest minds who are educated by Indian taxpayers(IIT's)to US who reaps the benefits.With all the H1b and anti immigrant bashing off late, US visa is losing a lot of its sheen...so hopefully, this is a good thing and we shall prosper in the long run by retaining the best and brightest.

After reading all the comments, i have two points to bring it out.

1) H1 B and 2) Outsourcing.

1) H1B - I can defineltly say that half the people who speaking trash about H1B here do not know what it stands for orelse they would not link the H1 B worker visa with all other jobs like plumber, craftsman etc. H1 B is specifically utilised for people with skills in Science and techonolgy....for gods sake it wont be for any Tom Dick and harry. Yes i m on H1 B and i have been legally paying taxes from day one when i cam to USA five years back on F1 visa. I respect both the nations USA & India. In that context i respect all the nations for what they stand for.Lets not fight over that.For all the people who think H1 B workers gets paid less than a AMERICAN WORKER i beg your pardon sir, you are WRONG. As someone said earlier in their post that - H1 B workers actually end up putting some extra cost on companys pocket for their sponsorship. All this because YES they do have the skill set, and every company does need skills embedded employee's. There is absolutly some damage done to the H1 B visa by some people and i am in total accordance for the investigation that is being launched. Its not about Indians, chinese, americans etc fighting over each other if they are better race than other in programmingh, managing or anything else...but its all about an INDIVIDUAL if he is better skilled than other individual and can he/she bring in the necesassary value add in to the company (irrespective of their race).

2) Outsourcing - There is no magic or surprises to this section here. In this globalization world companies and people alike will try to get their job done in less cost. Be it manufacturing where USA turned to China or be it IT where it turned to India. Yes i agree as some one mentioned USA might go to Africa tomorrow if they get it at a better cost, no wrong in it and it will happen...as i have seen some companies already started doing this. One should also realize its not USA throwing Jobs to India for lower cost....it could be any country in world offshoring jobs to any country with lower cost. Lets not play the blame game...

Finally this is a global world.....everybody is looking for best talent for lower cost, and if they cannot get it for less, face it they will even be ready to spend.

Let there be peace in the world

"If Americans can manage to work for what Indians are, MNCs will hire them on priority. Question is are they americans ready?"

I could live quite comfortably on what Indians work for, if I could also treat my neighbors the way upper-class Indians treat theirs: no electricity, no running water, no high-school educations for the great bulk of the population. Question is are Americans ready to do that? Are you, Steve Hamm?

The Indian innovation is nothing more nor less than simply the rolling back of three hundred years of social progress. If we allow them into the game on their terms, we will have no choice but to play by their rules, or be crushed by the enormous cost advantage that de facto slavery confers.

Eswar

The $18B imports from US came from US government census website: http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/. You can look it up by year. If you are so sure that US multinationals sold many more billion dollars worth of goods and services to India go ahead, find the data for us. What's the total profit of US multinationals in India in '08? And how much of that is not already included in the $18B?

Go ahead. Provide the numbers with links. I'm curious.

Most of the software tech outfits in Silicion Valley are run by Indians and usually when a Indian join, he lay off old timers and bring in his/her Indian troops. I have seen it time and time again in SV. There is an absolute discrimation going on (if you don't have the skin color or accent, you don't belong here mentality).

NASSCOM shills redirect to the H1B issue to the trade issue mechanically. NO EXCEPTION. Here are the reasons why your argument are fallacious:

1. We trade goods, not human.
2. If you think the trade is not fair, don't participate.
3. The US have many trading partners, how come only India abuses the H1/L1 like mafia.
4. India/US trade surplus is 16B at 2008. It is a job loss to the US. It is double is last four years.
http://commerce.nic.in/eidb/iecnt.asp

Lets get real about this issue of protectionism. I hear all these Indians talking about how if they stop buying coca-cola and McDonalds the US economy will collapse completely. Give me a break. We are sending hundreds of thousands of high paying jobs offshore and importing millions of slave Indian laborers - so that we can sell some soda and hamburgers? There will never be enough Indians able to drink enough coca-cola to balance the billions of dollars in wages that are offshored or sent home by H1B visa holders stealing jobs from Americans. Lets put some actual numbers behind these arguments - then we will see who the real loser is here. The United States and it's citizens. Especially in IT. When is this the US going to wake up and finally admit that this whole free trade fiasco has been tremendously detrimental to this country. Now, we have to listen to some CEO of some Indian company threatening that any measure to ensure Americans are provided for first by their government is going to be very bad for the United States. I have had enough of this already - lets have America worry about its own citizens first.

@ H1B/L1 lobby;

Many of you fail to appreciate the fact that the economic crisis is a game changer. Its true the cause is mostly credit derivatives and such. However, it's also true that the 315,000 L1 + 85,000 H1B "temporary NON-IMMIGRANT" visas (not counting exemptions as universities, "research institutions", "non-profits" others are exempt from H1B quotas) doled out annually in
recent years is no longer sustainable.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/12/28/52FE-underreported-visas_1.html

This is especially true when professions such as engineering have experienced a 10% decline in jobs between August 2008 to April 2009, check out the graphs here;

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2009/05/a_bad_time_to_b.html

The "National Foundation of American Policy" (NFAP), a the ONE-PERSON "foundation" run by H1B shill Stuart Anderson, claims that;

"For each H-1b visa position requested, U.S. technology companies increase their employment by an average of five workers."

http://www.nfap.com/pdf/080311h1b.pdf

However, this "study" has been debunked by University of California Computer Science professor, former statistics professor, Norm Matloff. He does so by exposing the errors (fraud?) in Stuart Anderson's (NFAP) statistical regression analysis.

http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/Archive/NFAP2.txt

The Wall Street Journals Carl Bialik has also debunked the NFAP (Stuart Anderson) claim. He did so by sending the NFAP
"study" to several statisticians, and most questioned the findings.

http://blogs.wsj.com/numbersguy/the-debate-over-h-1b-visa-numbers-652/

India is 16% of the worlds population and gets 71% of annual H1/L1 "temporary NON-IMMIGRANT" visas (said CNBC). How is this "GLOBALization"?

Vivek Wadwa claimed last week in a BW column that there are now 1 million H1Bs on US soil. Given the state of economic affairs, what is so unreasonable about asking these people to live up to the terms of their TEMPORARY NON IMMIGRANT visas and go home? This alone would instantly open up 1 million+ jobs for Americans!

http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2009/tc20090511_939248.htm (Paragraph 6)

Cries of protectionism from India because of the Senate bill 887 (Durbin-Grassley H1B/L1 visa reform) conflate trade and immigration--two separate things.

ONLY "persons of Indian origin" are allowed to immigrate to India with very few exceptions. No "birthright citizenship" in
India either. Does this mean India is "racist"?

Its rather outrageous for India to give lectures about "protectionism" as Wal Marts recent experience shows;

"India's restrictive commercial laws prohibit most foreign companies from setting up shop to compete with domestic retailers. So Wal-Mart's debut outlet, which will open in the city of Amritsar in northern India later this month, is a wholesale-only operation that will sell mainly to vegetable vendors, hospitals, hotels, restaurants and other companies. The Amritsar outlet won't even carry the familiar Wal-Mart brand. To deflect the attention of politicians and activists who
oppose the entry of foreign multi-brand retailers, the Bentonville, Ark., company has named its Indian outlets BestPrice Modern Wholesale."

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1898823,00.html

Where are Indian cries of "protectionism" in the Indian state of Maharashtra where a political party called "Shiv Sena" (army of Shiva) wants to make sure that ALL the jobs should go to locals of that state/City? Yet, shameless Indian H1Bs DEMAND that Americans hand over their jobs.

"The Income Tax department has agreed to give priority to "sons of soil" ... have been accepted by the IT Chief Commissioner (Mumbai region)"

http://business.rediff.com/slide-show/2009/may/27/slide-show-1-income-tax-dept-okays-jobs-for-locals-sena.htm

Azim Premji lets the cat out of the bag;

"The software and BPO industries for India represents 24% of our exports. It represents 44% of our labor force coming onto
urban markets....The mix of technical people has traditionally been 25 people on site for 75 offshore. We can bring it down to 10 to 12%. It will happen."

Essentially, India DEMANDS the right to be a parasite upon US working people via H1B/L1/Outsourcing and is crying foul now that US Senators seek to rectify this outrageous state of affairs.

Implicit in Azim Premji statement, quoted above, is a refutation of claims that curbing H1B/L1 "temporary non immigrant" visas would lead to more outsourcing.

Rochester Institute of Technology professor Ron Hira on H1B/L1 "temporary non immigrant" visas;

"First, it facilitates their knowledge transfer operations, where they rotate foreign workers in to learn U.S. workers' jobs: U.S. workers are "transferring knowledge" often under duress. Second, H-1B and L-1 programs provide them an
inexpensive onsite presence that enables them to coordinate offshore functions. Third, the H-1B and L-1 programs allows the
U.S. operations to serve as a training ground for foreign workers who then rotate back to their home country to do the work more effectively than they could have without such training in the U.S."

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=how_guestworkers_promote_outsourcing

Azim Premji threats of a "trade war" ring hollow when one considers that India is not even among top Americas 15 foreign customers. India buys less from the USA than Switzerland (who buys 1.9% of USA exports), a country of less than 9 million people.

http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/statistics/highlights/toppartners.html#exports

China/Brazil/Canada/etc will launch a trade war with the USA because India is upset over USA immigration policies?

When Japanese/German car makers open a plant in America, they don't expect to staff it with workers from the home country via H1B/L1 visas almost exclusively. The same is true of UK/Swiss banks operating in the USA. Australian mining companies in the USA don't expect to staff their operations with Australians on H1B/L1 visas exclusively.

However, I can envision Tata Motors opening a plant in the USA to produce its Nano car--and then whining and crying "racism" and "protectionism" when demands to have 90%+ of the workers of said plant come from India, on H1B/L1 visas, are rebuffed.

Why can't Wipro, Tata, InfoSys, etc use American workers on their US projects?

Tata Consultancy Services Vice President Vice President Phiroz Vandrevala explains;

"Our wage per employee is 20-25 per cent less than US wages for a similar employee...Typically, for a TCS employee with five years experience, the annual cost to the company is 60,000-70,000, while a local American employee might cost $80,000-100,000. This (labour arbitrage) is a fact of doing work onsite. It's a fact that Indian IT companies have an advantage here and there's nothing wrong in that. The issue is that of getting workers in the US on wages far lower than the local wage
rate."

http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?id=cda81c51-7247-4c2a-8e36-2414c5f9686c&ParentID=ea3188ae-1933-4afd-81e1-a89d979dbeee&&Headline=H-1B+visa+holders+paid+less+in+US

H1B/L1 "temporary non immigrant" visas never meant for the "best and brightest" anyway. H1B is supposed to relieve "skills shortages" on a "temporary basis". However, there are no shortages in this economy.

O-1 visas are designed to allow persons of "extraordinary ability" to take up residence in the USA as immigrants. O-1 visas have no quota. Hence, abolition of H1B/L1 "temporary non immigrant" visas would have no effect on persons of "extraordinary ability" entering the USA.

The Durbin-Grassley H1B/L1 (S. 887) reform bill would NOT terminate these visa programs anyway. Legitimate "skills shortages" would surely be able to get past the core provisions of the Durbin-Grassley H1B/L1 reform bill. As such, the H1B/L1 guest workers would benefit because their claims of racism and xenophobia would have merit;

1) Require all employers who want to hire an H1B/L1 guest-worker to first make a good-faith attempt to recruit a qualified American worker. Employers would be prohibited from using H1B/L1 visa holders to displace qualified American workers.

2) Prohibit the blatantly discriminatory practice of "H-1B only" ads and prohibit employers from hiring additional H1B/L1 guest-workers if more than 50 percent of their employees are H1B/L1 visa holders.

ALAN GREENSPAN, former chairman of the Federal Reserve; "Our skilled wages are higher than anywhere in the world," he said. "If we open up a significant window for skilled workers, that would suppress the skilled-wage level and end the concentration of income."

http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/03/14/greenspan_let_more_skilled_immigrants_in/

Common guys, don't be so naive! I bet most of the people who are complaining against foreign workers (taking their job) are the ones who have not being affected by immigration cause probably they just living off state support. I don't want to even start on how US is benefiting from free trade. Is there a single American (BW reader) who sees things rationally or maybe he doest think its even worth explaining things to his fellow (dumb) citizens.

The H-1b program is ripe with fraud and abuse

You don't believe me???
Then go to www.guestworkerfraud.com

and for more see
www.noslaves.com
www.brightfuturejobs.com

It is all about.... "How NOT to hire an American worker!"

www.youtube.com/programmersguild

Wake-up! It is American Job Destruction! deleting the American worker.
www.eiass.com/Articles.htm

Stop associating H1bs with low wages or slavery, most of the H1b holders are well compensated , just like the rare educated Americans.H1b visa holders by law have to be paid on par with the Americans, but you would see most of them get much more than the minimum defined by law.Tech jobs are need high skilled labor and are highly paid.If a American is available with the skills needed for the job, why wouldn't he be hired?(After all, he has that GREAT communication skills and is "hardworking")
I understand Americans losing jobs to outsourcing, but don't blame your incompetency or lack of skills on H1b visa holders in US.

GM is almost bankrupt. Lets talk about H1B

A lot of people in the US have their head in the sand.
The world has changed and they just do not want to recognise that. They want to return to the 1950s and they thik that Eisenhower is still President !
US labor force is only 140 million, Indian labor force is about half a billion.
Why don't you understand that the raising of the living standards of the
workforce in the emerging world will lead to the betterment of the western world.
You acn either build a wall or a bridge.

Offshoring is not about trade. It is about global labor arbitrage. Those who see it as a trade issue are wrong.

I have a very simple suggestion to the skilled(jobless) Americans.Can anyone of you post what your I.T skills are, how much experience you have in that field/domain and we all can compare them with the jobs out there(on dice,monster etc) to see if you still cant find a job.
ANYONE....?????

"Why don't you understand that the raising of the living standards of the
workforce in the emerging world will lead to the betterment of the western world."

I agree. I want to see India invest its windfall from the IT boom into raising the living standards of its workforce. I want to see the Indian IT industry taxed fairly to help build social infrastructure for the benefit of all India's people, not just the tiny élite. If India is a nascent superpower as is claimed, then there should be clean water supplies, sewers, power lines and high schools (especially high schools!) burgeoning like flowers in the spring all over (really -- all over) the country.

Is this happening? Show us.

Seriously, Steve, here's a story I would love to see you do next time you're in India. Go to the high schools that the children of the people who clean the bathrooms in the IT companies go to. Take lots of pictures and show us what they look like. Go to the homes of the people who clean the bathrooms and take pictures there too. Do they have toilets and refrigerators?

If I thought that the outsourcing craze was actually contributing toward a better and more just society in India, I would feel entirely different about it.

There are different types of people coming in on H1B. IT support people at one end, and chip designers and nanotechnologists at the other. Most of the people complaining here are talking about IT support, which is where people like Premji make money. However, the effect of the cut would be that it would also restrict companies that hire chip designers and biochemists, and that would hurt innovation. Making Ph.D. an essential qualification or H1B would be a good way to sort the wheat and the chaff.

Came to US on L-1 and shifted to H-1, learned Americanese, arcana and supported Clinton, enjoyed Hollywood fare. Read...and observed. And the one thing I realized was that this is not really a country as much as it is a casino. A casino controlled by rich fat cats smoking cigars in backrooms with names out of Sopranos. Peddling influence, pedigree and creating backslapping networks with elements from the old country club-style admission rules is what this country is really about. As a naive Indian it was an education to me like no other. I didnt have to go to US university for my Masters and toil like penniless grad students, thanks to the unique set of forces that were set in motion in early 90's.

The fat cats aka capitalists had decided that the new game in town was wage arbitrage. What if that dude from Vijayawada had B.O. and wore plaid shirts with tie for his first day at work! We can train him, they said and they lobbied hard. H-1B was born.

Fast forward...those same Indian guys now can spout Friedman and Nilekani and do the monday morning quarterbacking and are now well entrenched with their green cards and shiny two car garages. They pay their mortgages on time and drive up property values after making impossible demands on their children in terms of their academics.

Now, two things are happening:

1. Fat cats still want their pet labor cost arbitrage to work. But they have almost killed the golden goose.
2. The entrenched green card holding Indians are demanding the same wages as their American counterparts resulting in the axe falling on them as well.

The rest of the American masses fed on an exotic diet from the likes of Nader have finally woken up to this monstrous nexus between the fat cats and the political lobbyists.

The real question is Corporatization and the impact of unbridled capitalism without thoughtful regulation. Will US find a nice balance or continue to subject itself to these wrenching cycles?

And oh yeah as an Indian that enjoyed the benefits and now a US citizen, I support the bill!

Hi,

I have heard a lot about this computer world article. Let me throw light on the actual H1 worker's life.
We are always treated as sub-contractors or "purchase services". No human firstly likes to be a purchased service but the fact is that the terminology is like that and one has to live with it :)
Firstly there is always a balance of permanent employess, H1 subcontractors and contractors. At least I have always heard from the Senior Managers here in my company that "We have hired purchase services so that whenever we have to reduce workforce, we will start by reducing purchase services". This does not give confidence to me as an employee but this is how it is. Somehow the impression is that H1 ppl are preferred, but that is not the case. Apart from that one Vision Systems example, most other American companies infact DO like to retain the permanent job employees as compared to contractors.
Whenever layoffs happen, first to go are contractors, then H1 sub contractors and then permanent job employees (bcoz contractors get the highest salary per hour, H1 employees already get less salary but have to be laid off before permanent job employees).
Also the fact is that it is easier for a company to hire and fire h1 employees as compared to permanent employees. To acquire permanent employees a company invests too much in training, HR etc and hence does not make business sense to fire them first. H1 workers are subcontractors who come and work and are not actual flag-bearers of the company.
So all in all, I would say that no one is devouring the other. This is the way market behaves during slump and all are affected as humans!
So I would like to say to my American friends that your companies ofcourse prefer you over us, and they will take a decision keeping you in mind first!

As of this year I have lived more in US than India and I am very proud US citizen. I have few simple comments after reading this article and opinions expressed by readers.
Up till now I thought only Indian H1-B dummies were making such comments “only India has talent”. But I am very surprised to see the comment from rich and therefore respected Mr. Premji. There is some kind of thick illusion in the minds of Indians that US economy cannot function without them. In order to remove that illusion, I must say.
1) India is not helping USA, in fact US is helping India by developing them Just in 1992, India had to mortgage 40 ton of gold to prevent bankruptcy. If US would not have allowed to flow back billions of dollars back to India, India would not have been able to financially exist. Remember, India restricts foreign currency outflow. If you think otherwise, please do not beg for H1-B or L1 visas, stay in your own third world.
2) No Indian educational institution is among top 50 in the world. It is still dominated by US. So do not think US does not have talent. Nobel laureates are still from US and not from India.
3) Do not compare you (H1B dummies from Andhra and Tamilnadu) with Indians in US who came here for education on scholarships. In 80’s Indians came here on credentials and not with fraudulent 6 month diploma.

Now it terms of what Indians can do –

1) Yes, it is true Indians work harder than Americans. Because Indians take double time to understand what is being asked to do and take triple time to actually complete it.
2) Before making any tall claims about yourself, I Challenge you to develop one software which everyone in the world will use. Needless to say, US only outsourced jobs which were low skilled and grunt work (password resets, first level of customer support). If you think that is talent, then I really wonder about your IQ!
3) Develop one car program ground up without technology collaboration. Majority of recent development in India is not because of local talent but because of expats who are educated and experienced in US. Suzuki started production in 1984, but Maruti could not develop a single car on their own even 20 year later.
4) Develop one plane or fighter-jet or an aircraft carrier on your own. It will take at least 2 more decades before India can achieve this.
5) Develop one nuclear reactor without western nations help.
6) Learn to defend your land rather than making tall claims about tolerance or resilience. How powerful you are, everyone has seen this recently.
7) Before talking about USA, create a unified country where one person does not look down upon other because of its cast or religion or region. You guys even do not know the definition of discrimination. Show me one Tamil or Telgu hiring non-Tamil or Telgu employee. Find out the % of Tamils in TCS (I guess stands for Tamil consultancy services), Infosys vs. % of Tamils in India. I hope US lawyers start investigating Indian companies for their compliance to equal employment law in US.
8) Indians and corruption cannot be separated. Corruption in H1-B visa program has reached monumental proportion. Dumping rickshawals as IT professionals. One person giving interview for other and then taking a commission. In Andhra, Karnataka and Tamilnadu, engineers are being produced on conveyor belts in every corner of the town. Based on the news published in Indian newspaper itself, 45% of the US visas issued at Chennai consulate were to fake degree holders.
Finally I hope Obama administration takes a tough stand against fraudulent visa holders and kick them out. India is still a very insignificant country when it comes to global trade. India does not have power to demand, it should be happy what is being given.

The truth is the visa requires sponsorship. I have seen most of these companies forces employees work from 9am to 8 pm per day and then talk to India team from home till work related issues are resolved. They promise to the customer also for that many hours of work. I have seen at many places. Why will than a company hire an American. If Wipro really wants to compete, it should develop few products that can compete with US products.

In 2001-2002 most big corporations in USA signed deals with these companies to outsource "projects". I worked in a one of the largest corporations. They terminated contract of almost every one in the company. Most of those affected were experts. They were replaced by novices from India on H-1Bwere L-1 visa. My America born co-worker was expert with two degrees from top-US universities, solid passion for software and had more then 10 years of experience. He was replaced by below average Indian with degree from a teaching shop (can not be compared with any regular university) and with total 2-years of experience. He and I approached to the company that got the project and other companies that had other projects. We were willing to work for any salary as market was slow. Your boss was also very keen on joining the project as we were trained and fully integrated. We would have worked for even 25K to 30K at least for a year but turned down. My coworker then worked at retail store for minimum wages, as he had to make his mortgage payment. I was wandering how the economy can grow if purchasing power of people is being compromised. I was anticipating this severe recession. In my opinion current unfortunate recession in consequence of severe fraud in H-1B or L-1 visa and discrimination against US workers.

to proud american of indian origin

why do u mention ur indian origin if u have so much to complain about ... india is still very yound 60 years of independence compared to the US...

we did send chandrayan to the moon... everyyear there are millions lifited out of poverty ....

yeah we do have a million problems to solve for our own people but its only a matter of time...

why dont u look into innovations indians have done in american companies..to know about our talent...

i agree with many of the negatives u pointed about the country u originate from supposedly ....but there are positives and negatives in every country ..

so u telling me americans are not racist , is it ?

i believe 50 % of the entire world ..including every country is racist ....

stop counting ur indian origin if u cant stand up for any of its goods...ok?

just be american entirely and put these comments...

No sense in fighting over this issue. It is common sense to understand that we are in a competitive age and heading towards more and more of it. The open trade was brought in to benefit US, and it did to a very very large extent. now US corporations have their offices and products through out the world. If others get some benefit on that, why should it trouble so much? what shoudl the indegenous companies, cottage industries closed in India, unable to withstand the might of US MNCs say?? Then everyone says it is the collateral for the open trade.

Mr.Premji,
I am an Indian living and working in USA. I have seen several Americans born in USA, studied in USA and working in Tech industry in USA. They are equally competitive as Indians coming to USA from Wipro or other companies. Infact they are more effective in certain scenarios. The reason why they do not join Wipro is:
1- You pay less
2-You make them work 14 hours a day and do not pay overtime
3-You rob their personal time and destroy their personal life.
4-You harass them with bonds and do not let them join other companies
Wake up Mr.Premji, you cannot ride on the same old set of lies and mispractices. Be more truthful, you have made enough money for 10 generations, be truthful.

To Premji and all of the other folks that love replacing US workers with H1-B visitors -

The following fits in with the whole scheme of "cheap labor" and the other "short-cut" tactics that companies pursue these days...

See the following article (Link below)...
Wipro now plans to off-shore work to Egypt. I guess the indians just don't have enough "talent" in their country - so, now they are seeking "talent" from Egypt. Premji says, "They’re not getting the people they need in the United States", when referring to US companies - I guess they (indians) just aren't getting the people they need in india (I hear the Egyptians are more talented and work harder).

Article - Wipro to offshore to Egypt:
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Infotech/ITeS/Wipro-may-outsource-work-to-Egypt/articleshow/4574130.cms

Oh, hey - why is that the supporters of off-shoring, both from the US and india, always say "Talent" and "best and brightest" when talking about the H1-B visa situation and offshoring- but, why is it that the words "lower cost" always show up (even coming from the person that used the term "talent"/"Best and brightest")....
So, when the indians get all worked up because some of their jobs/work are getting off-shored to other countries, they can use their protectionism argument and their other invalid points on themselves.

To Srini, regarding your idiotic post, from May 27, 2009 04:18 PM - If you can read, then read the notice that comes up after each post, it says that your post WILL NOT APPEAR immediately - as it will be reviewed (for appropriate content - or something to that extent)... Your previous post DID show up, uncensored.
You need to learn how to read carefully and understand the words.... I certainly don't want you on the other end of the phone, when I call my bank regarding problems with my account (where do you work ? - I will avoid that company)...

Your post (Srini's post) "Editor,.....All your comments are one sided. If business week belongs to free press please post the comment I posted earlier a few minutes ago under the same name and e-mail ID. if you don't you obviously prove what you are what US is and what this bill is all about - INSECURE"

Excellent Post "Proud US citizen of Indian Origin" on May 31, 2009 10:17 AM

You stated the plain truth.

This guy premji is a leader of indian labour misusing company...
He does all his best to exploit indians in cheap labour ..to extent his hr manager will team up with the other indian companies..He has created a dirty mafia and i am soon going to leak what he does..in some blog ..which shall have a nice effect..He has managed even to hold the guys of american companies in india like moles in these companies..i know these companies and soon we will be bringing this nexus in some website..
Imagine even all the american top companies their top people are underhis payrol.