"Over the holiday break, a MAGA civil war erupted ..."
Respectfully, I think we need to stop using the term "civil war" to describe the H1B Visa debate. This terminology highlights one of the reasonss why the left lost, and will continue to lose. Healthy debate over complex issues is seen as terminal. Nothing but total conformity and compliance is seen as viable, hence the decent into madness we see with Democrats.
In my opinion, this was necessary, and we should hope to see more of it. This is what debate looks like and it’s expected and needed to keep a wide tent together and to solidify what is important and what isn’t. Note that Vivek and Elon now are understanding the problems with H1B and addressing them. They realized what a hot button issue this is and are moderating their stances. Yes, there was some ugly discourse, but the majority were not and this was a welcome advancement of the MAGA movement maturity.
Great take, Jen. 100% agree. I can see pros/cons of H1B clearly now due to the recent discourse. As it should be. Now, clean up the excesses, keep it going where needed - and get back to also more hiring of qualified native-born Americans.
OK, so "debate" in this complex, hard for you to understand environment means that one side says there is a need for high skilled workers from abroad (that means other countries) and the other side says there are enough here but we have to train them (that means school, something you obviously dropped out of, so do please try to keep up.) "Debate" is a grown up word that means two sides having a difference of opinion and attempting to resolve (that means make good, not boo boo) those differences by talking to each other like intelligent, mentally sound adults. You'll understand once you're old enough to move out of Mom's basement.
I get your point but that was not what happened overall.
People ended up going into their corners and basically had a shouting match.
Were facts and issues brought out? Yes.
But it got ugly, emotional, and potentially damaging.
In my opinion, we all have to learn, or re-learn, how to talk to one another again, to actually have a real debate, especially when it comes to hot button issues, without it turning into a “my way or the highway” free for all.
H1B seems ripe for reform/disruption. Probably lessons to be learned from other countries (e.g., AUS/NZ points system). High skilled immigration = good.
Much ado about what always turns out to be simply government standard operating procedure: a good program gets corrupted by waste, fraud and abuse. That was the whole shameful H-1B brouhaha that transpired on X.
Elon and Vivek dug in on their positions toward the program, that it was essential to achieving American excellence via legal immigration, and therefore untouchable, appearing to blind themselves to those rightly complaining of the flagrant and egregious abuse rampantly occurring throughout that system.
Not a good look.
Hopefully, when they begin to delve into their DOGE project, they will show themselves to be a lot less purist and a bit more circumspect.
I understand what the author was trying - and Rabbi Ephraim ben Shimshon too - but I'm not sure this is the time to formulate Jews to werewolves. Good grief.
I'm going to comment on the cancer rates graph. This is observational data. The big problem with observational data is that to make sense of it you have to control for all the confounding variables, which can be very difficult. Another thing that is potentially misleading about that graph is that it isn't the actual rates/100k cohort population, it's "cumulative change in rate".
First of all, I'm not even sure what that means. Lets try some numbers. Suppose the cancer rate in new cases/100k for successive years were: 10,11,12,13,14. Then, the rate of change starting with the second year would be roughly 10%,9%,8%,7%. But the "cumulative change" would then be what? Accumulating case rates in successive years? That might make sense if people are living longer with cancer. If in the seventies cancer was a death sentence but in the nineties people live for years with it, then it would be natural to see the "cumulative change in cancer rate" to rise rapidly. But it would reflect not more initial cancer, just living with it longer.
Another confounder is that people who die from other causes aren't around to develop cancer. So if the youngest age cohort is less often dying from other means (say, violence, accidents), some percentage of these will show up as cancer cases that wouldn't have before. Heart attacks and strokes are still the number one killers of old people. That takes out lots of potential cancer cases in those groups.
Then there's the leverage effect. I bet the actual rate per 100k in the youngest cohort is orders of magnitude smaller than the older ones. Changes in that rate are going to be noisy compared to the others, because smaller numbers are going to have greater rate changes.
I don't have any idea if cancer is increasing in general in any age group or not. The kind of data one needs to determine this is longitudinal data. What would be meaningful is knowing what the odds were that in the course of their lifetime a member of each cohort would develop cancer. Looking at the age of people who do develop cancer doesn't tell you that, unfortunately. Looking at the "cumulative change" in these already problematic rates is probably very misleading.
Here's a short Op-Ed from about 23 years ago regarding the controversial H-1b Visa program. The ironic factor is that it is written by a Washington, DC lobbyist advocating for a liberalization of permanent residency for visa beneficiaries.....
Despite big layoffs among IT workers and post-Sept. 11 concerns over the immigration system, advocates of H-1B visas aren’t going away. Indeed, IT employers are lying low, hoping to quietly persuade Congress next year to permanently raise the annual H-1B visa limit above 65,000. And why not? Like most politically connected industries, IT employers have friends in Washington who are arguing to expand what is in truth a government subsidy.
Take the Cato Institute, supposedly a small-government, antiregulation, free-market advocate, which for 10 years has opposed deregulating employment-based immigration. Buying green cards for new hires is a “tax,” it argues, so Cato wants a permanent, massive, overregulated subsidy instead.
Meanwhile, IT employers explain that H-1B holders are a “minor league,” in ITAA President Harris Miller’s words – a try-before-you-buy approach, like Major League Baseball’s farm teams. But Nobel economist Milton Friedman scoffs at the idea of the government stocking a farm system for the likes of Microsoft and Intel. “There is no doubt,” he says, “that the [H-1B] program is a benefit to their employers, enabling them to get workers at a lower wage, and to that extent, it is a subsidy.”
From free-market thinker Friedman, those are devastating words. The H-1B program is a subsidy that distorts the job market for IT talent. (But watch for hilarious letters from libertarians explaining how Friedman, a contributor to Free Minds and Free Markets, doesn’t know a free lunch when he sees one.)
Two years ago, I participated in a National Academy of Sciences hearing about IT workforce needs. After the ostensible libertarian in the room, former Cato economist Steve Moore, laid out his case for permanently recruiting foreign talent, the panel’s economist called his bluff: “So, there is no argument for a temporary visa, then?” Moore did a double take before stammering, “Well, this is one of those wink-and-a-nod programs. Everybody expects most of these workers to stay.”
When the government supplies non-U.S. workers to an industry, that’s a subsidy. When those workers accept minor-league wages, that’s a big subsidy. When those outsiders want a benefit that can be supplied only by the government, like a green card, even regulations intended to protect U.S. workers can skew the labor market against citizens. American workers won’t support a minor league that runs against their interests, and winks and nods don’t fool them.
Meanwhile, unions and IT professionals risk getting suckered (again) into supporting irrelevant training programs as a trade-off for H-1Bs. But the more that’s loaded onto the H-1B approach, the bigger the subsidy gets.
Let’s face it: IT lobbyists ill serve the industry by perpetuating the failed regulations of the H-1B and green-card programs, which could be replaced with a market system that would deliver green cards as fast as they’re paid for. But laying off thousands of U.S. citizens and green-card holders while retaining “temporary” foreign workers adds fuel to a growing anger. So call the H-1B visa what it is: a subsidy that runs counter to the real interests of both IT workers and free-market thinkers.
Paul Donnelly writes about immigration and citizenship. Contact him at pauldonnelly [at] mindspring dot com.
Do you include temporary farm workers, foreign cars, French wine, German chocolates, in other words, anything not produced, but could be produced in America, as subsidies?
"Over the holiday break, a MAGA civil war erupted ..."
Respectfully, I think we need to stop using the term "civil war" to describe the H1B Visa debate. This terminology highlights one of the reasonss why the left lost, and will continue to lose. Healthy debate over complex issues is seen as terminal. Nothing but total conformity and compliance is seen as viable, hence the decent into madness we see with Democrats.
In my opinion, this was necessary, and we should hope to see more of it. This is what debate looks like and it’s expected and needed to keep a wide tent together and to solidify what is important and what isn’t. Note that Vivek and Elon now are understanding the problems with H1B and addressing them. They realized what a hot button issue this is and are moderating their stances. Yes, there was some ugly discourse, but the majority were not and this was a welcome advancement of the MAGA movement maturity.
Great take, Jen. 100% agree. I can see pros/cons of H1B clearly now due to the recent discourse. As it should be. Now, clean up the excesses, keep it going where needed - and get back to also more hiring of qualified native-born Americans.
What exactly is your idea of healthy debate? Where was the healthy debate? I missed it. Can give me some good examples? I missed it.
Here you go. Try to be nicer online, please.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2024/12/30/the-heated-debate-over-h-1b-visas-understanding-both-sides/
Regarding Half(wit)…
To engage the benighted is to make them belighted. Arguing gives them credence. Ignoring makes their heads explode.
You're an idiot.
OK, so "debate" in this complex, hard for you to understand environment means that one side says there is a need for high skilled workers from abroad (that means other countries) and the other side says there are enough here but we have to train them (that means school, something you obviously dropped out of, so do please try to keep up.) "Debate" is a grown up word that means two sides having a difference of opinion and attempting to resolve (that means make good, not boo boo) those differences by talking to each other like intelligent, mentally sound adults. You'll understand once you're old enough to move out of Mom's basement.
I get your point but that was not what happened overall.
People ended up going into their corners and basically had a shouting match.
Were facts and issues brought out? Yes.
But it got ugly, emotional, and potentially damaging.
In my opinion, we all have to learn, or re-learn, how to talk to one another again, to actually have a real debate, especially when it comes to hot button issues, without it turning into a “my way or the highway” free for all.
And "decent is NOT "descent"
See Matt L re the benighted
H1B seems ripe for reform/disruption. Probably lessons to be learned from other countries (e.g., AUS/NZ points system). High skilled immigration = good.
Much ado about what always turns out to be simply government standard operating procedure: a good program gets corrupted by waste, fraud and abuse. That was the whole shameful H-1B brouhaha that transpired on X.
Elon and Vivek dug in on their positions toward the program, that it was essential to achieving American excellence via legal immigration, and therefore untouchable, appearing to blind themselves to those rightly complaining of the flagrant and egregious abuse rampantly occurring throughout that system.
Not a good look.
Hopefully, when they begin to delve into their DOGE project, they will show themselves to be a lot less purist and a bit more circumspect.
"Hungry Like the Wolf"?
I understand what the author was trying - and Rabbi Ephraim ben Shimshon too - but I'm not sure this is the time to formulate Jews to werewolves. Good grief.
Better a wolf than a lamb these times. Erez Yisrael is the vanguard. The rest of us should take notice.
I'm going to comment on the cancer rates graph. This is observational data. The big problem with observational data is that to make sense of it you have to control for all the confounding variables, which can be very difficult. Another thing that is potentially misleading about that graph is that it isn't the actual rates/100k cohort population, it's "cumulative change in rate".
First of all, I'm not even sure what that means. Lets try some numbers. Suppose the cancer rate in new cases/100k for successive years were: 10,11,12,13,14. Then, the rate of change starting with the second year would be roughly 10%,9%,8%,7%. But the "cumulative change" would then be what? Accumulating case rates in successive years? That might make sense if people are living longer with cancer. If in the seventies cancer was a death sentence but in the nineties people live for years with it, then it would be natural to see the "cumulative change in cancer rate" to rise rapidly. But it would reflect not more initial cancer, just living with it longer.
Another confounder is that people who die from other causes aren't around to develop cancer. So if the youngest age cohort is less often dying from other means (say, violence, accidents), some percentage of these will show up as cancer cases that wouldn't have before. Heart attacks and strokes are still the number one killers of old people. That takes out lots of potential cancer cases in those groups.
Then there's the leverage effect. I bet the actual rate per 100k in the youngest cohort is orders of magnitude smaller than the older ones. Changes in that rate are going to be noisy compared to the others, because smaller numbers are going to have greater rate changes.
I don't have any idea if cancer is increasing in general in any age group or not. The kind of data one needs to determine this is longitudinal data. What would be meaningful is knowing what the odds were that in the course of their lifetime a member of each cohort would develop cancer. Looking at the age of people who do develop cancer doesn't tell you that, unfortunately. Looking at the "cumulative change" in these already problematic rates is probably very misleading.
What do you make of Livelsberger's musings about the NJ drones being anti-grav vehicles ? And are you certain the body is his?
Here's a short Op-Ed from about 23 years ago regarding the controversial H-1b Visa program. The ironic factor is that it is written by a Washington, DC lobbyist advocating for a liberalization of permanent residency for visa beneficiaries.....
H-1B Is Just Another Gov’t. Subsidy
Computerworld Opinion
Jul 22, 2002 Paul Donnelly
https://www.computerworld.com/article/1329178/h-1b-is-just-another-gov-t-subsidy.html
Despite big layoffs among IT workers and post-Sept. 11 concerns over the immigration system, advocates of H-1B visas aren’t going away. Indeed, IT employers are lying low, hoping to quietly persuade Congress next year to permanently raise the annual H-1B visa limit above 65,000. And why not? Like most politically connected industries, IT employers have friends in Washington who are arguing to expand what is in truth a government subsidy.
Take the Cato Institute, supposedly a small-government, antiregulation, free-market advocate, which for 10 years has opposed deregulating employment-based immigration. Buying green cards for new hires is a “tax,” it argues, so Cato wants a permanent, massive, overregulated subsidy instead.
Meanwhile, IT employers explain that H-1B holders are a “minor league,” in ITAA President Harris Miller’s words – a try-before-you-buy approach, like Major League Baseball’s farm teams. But Nobel economist Milton Friedman scoffs at the idea of the government stocking a farm system for the likes of Microsoft and Intel. “There is no doubt,” he says, “that the [H-1B] program is a benefit to their employers, enabling them to get workers at a lower wage, and to that extent, it is a subsidy.”
From free-market thinker Friedman, those are devastating words. The H-1B program is a subsidy that distorts the job market for IT talent. (But watch for hilarious letters from libertarians explaining how Friedman, a contributor to Free Minds and Free Markets, doesn’t know a free lunch when he sees one.)
Two years ago, I participated in a National Academy of Sciences hearing about IT workforce needs. After the ostensible libertarian in the room, former Cato economist Steve Moore, laid out his case for permanently recruiting foreign talent, the panel’s economist called his bluff: “So, there is no argument for a temporary visa, then?” Moore did a double take before stammering, “Well, this is one of those wink-and-a-nod programs. Everybody expects most of these workers to stay.”
When the government supplies non-U.S. workers to an industry, that’s a subsidy. When those workers accept minor-league wages, that’s a big subsidy. When those outsiders want a benefit that can be supplied only by the government, like a green card, even regulations intended to protect U.S. workers can skew the labor market against citizens. American workers won’t support a minor league that runs against their interests, and winks and nods don’t fool them.
Meanwhile, unions and IT professionals risk getting suckered (again) into supporting irrelevant training programs as a trade-off for H-1Bs. But the more that’s loaded onto the H-1B approach, the bigger the subsidy gets.
Let’s face it: IT lobbyists ill serve the industry by perpetuating the failed regulations of the H-1B and green-card programs, which could be replaced with a market system that would deliver green cards as fast as they’re paid for. But laying off thousands of U.S. citizens and green-card holders while retaining “temporary” foreign workers adds fuel to a growing anger. So call the H-1B visa what it is: a subsidy that runs counter to the real interests of both IT workers and free-market thinkers.
Paul Donnelly writes about immigration and citizenship. Contact him at pauldonnelly [at] mindspring dot com.
Do you include temporary farm workers, foreign cars, French wine, German chocolates, in other words, anything not produced, but could be produced in America, as subsidies?
Not having a go at you. Genuinely curious…
Thanks for sharing this.