By Kollengode S Venkataraman, written in 2001
The darker side of economic boom times in the US — the 18th century California Gold Rush, and the growth of the steel industry in Western Pennsylvania, for example — is well documented in US history. If we do not know about similar stories in countries like India, it is not because it was all milk and honey. It is only because either it was not recorded at all; or if it was documented, we don’t have the stomach to know about the unsettling details. Living in ignorance is blissful.
The IT boom is no different, and the darker side of the Silicon Rush is as vicious. We hear anecdotally from friends about Indian software workers willingly falling victim to unscrupulous recruiters in India and employers in the US, many of them Desis themselves. Recently, Georgetown University Institute for the Study of International Migration’s Lindsay Lowell studied the problems with the H-1B visas, using which nearly 300,000 IT workers have entered the US since 1992.
Taking it further, San Jose Mercury, the daily from the software boom town, focused on India and published investigative pieces [New legislation eases worker shortage, but does not fix underlying problems by Pete Carey*; and Middlemen thriving in lucrative industry while foreign workers complain of abuse by Sarah Lubman, Nov 19, 2000] on the many darker sides of the IT boom. Highlights from their articles:
* The H1-B visa boom hit the IT industry in the 1990s, with US companies driving towards outsourcing parts of their operations to reduce costs. Software pros from China, Russia, South Africa, and India started pouring in.
* Proud of their contribution to the Hi-Tech boom and to the strength of the US economy, H-1B workers are a fixture in many Silicon Valley companies. Many have gone on to found IT-based companies. A Congressional study finds that nearly 75% of the systems analysts holding H1-B visas are Indians.
* Nearly 100,000 IT workers are in the Bay Area, putting in long hours in the hectic working environment. Nearly 420,000 H-1B workers are in the US now, of which nearly 50% are in IT.
* Some middlemen who hire these H1-B visa holders and lend them as temps to larger companies withhold up to half of the workers’ promised prevailing wages. H1-B visa holders derisively call these companies “body shops,” and “blacklist” them among themselves.
* The contractors say they are defending themselves against the HI-B visa holders, who otherwise jump ship for better opportunities. Many workers have signed contracts that force them to pay $10,000 to $30,000 for leaving before a stipulated time.
* Many US companies now rely on H1-B as a way to assure a pool of available, flexible, and often cheaper IT workforce.
* Outright fraud with H-1 B visas is not uncommon, ranging from academic degrees faked overseas to phony job offers in the US.
* IT professionals from India in the Bay Area have formed their own organization Immigration Support Network (founder: Murali Krishna Devarakonda), to highlight their plight.
* Recent changes in issuing H1-B visas enacted by Congress, while doubling their number from 115,000/year to 190,000/year, did nothing to address the fraud and abuse that plague the program and often leave the workers in limbo.
* Some US labor contractors (many of them Indians themselves) intimidate and underpay H1-B workers, yet the Department of Labor lacks the teeth to go after them.
* With US companies’ drive to outsource important parts of their business activities, several intermediary companies have formed a chain, each outsourcing the work to smaller companies down the line.
* According to the US State Department, in 1999 nearly 20% of the H1-B visa applications received in India contained fraudulent information. This year, this has reduced to 11%.
* Many companies charge the H1-B visa holders exorbitant fees to bring them to the US and leave them stranded. With no jobs.
* US labor leaders say some companies use H1-B, a Specialty Worker Visa, to bring run-of-the-mill programmers who will work for less than fair wages. Peggy Taylor of AFL-CIO’s Washington DC office says, “Most of them have less than a master’s degree.
* In a field in which today’s techno wonder is tomorrow’s garbage heap – “half of what you know becomes obsolete in 36 months!” _ many companies prefer to hire up-to-date temps from overseas rather than having an ongoing retraining program in-house.
* INS estimates that half of HIB visa holders — 160,000, would apply for permanent residence. The annual limit of green cards available for ALL temporary workers — MBAs, MDs, engineers and scientists, PhDs of other disciplines – is only 140,000.
Understandably, in the San Jose Mercury stories, none of the H1-B visa holders who candidly spoke to San Jose Mercy News’ Carey and Lubman wanted to be quoted by name.
In this wired world, sharp business practices draw closer media scrutiny when the stakes are high. Reflexively, we can say these are sophisticated ethnic bashing and choose to live in denial. But investigative journalism does not discriminate: Ask any US executive or politician who has come under media scrutiny. Mature businesses will react nondefensively to fix the underlying problems. The question is: Do the Indian IT business and the Indian media see the problem?