I'm not American, but with how many software engineers having gotten laid off over the last 4 years, reducing foreign workers competing for the same positions should be a given from the perspective of governing a nation.
I'm surprised how divisive such a decision seems to be considering our current reality of a contracting industry (employment wise)
This is anecdote, but majority of the folks that Microsoft has on H1B from India are people who were hired in India in the first place and were allowed to move over because it was “worth it”. Microsoft specifically will be fine with Indian H1Bs even if they don’t want to pay $100k.
Let's be real here, the metric the foreign workers are mainly competing on is price.
The average tech immigrant is not particularly more bright then the average native dev, and the truly outstanding ones can still be given entrance just my paying 100k - which should be entirely neglectable for world class talent.
The H1 system requires the sponsoring company to prove there are no available US citizen candidates. Perhaps the appropriate move would be to look at eliminating fraud in that area. If there are large numbers of available qualified candidates then under the existing system H1-B applications should drop to zero.
Indians would rather import more Indians than hire anybody else (including Indian Americans) domestically. This is well understood by looking at lawsuits against WITCH companies, and by speaking with anyone who has seen what happens when an Indian attains a leadership role in a tech company. That’s why you get downvoted and suspect it’s controversial. It’s not controversial to anyone but Indians.
I'm surprised how divisive such a decision seems to be considering our current reality of a contracting industry (employment wise)