H-1b/L-1 Expansion Destroys American Science Education
Print Friendly and PDF
H-1b/L-1 expansion was posed by some congressman as a "stopgap" measure until the US could train more software engineers. Let's check a little about one measure of the "progress" that has been made: In 1997, 14 of the top 27 teams in the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest were from the US. By 2006, only one of the top 27 teams was from the US.

Now, we are also seeing similar decline in science knowledge among high school students.

The rise of temporary worker visas in the US has been accompanied by significant educational decline by a variety of measures.

The reason is really quite simple: scientific and technical professions are more subject to direct competition from foreigners via immigration compared to other occupations. Real Estate Salesmen, CPA's, Lawyers, stockbrokers all have some very well paid practitioners - but none of these occupations have a special visa classification aimed at enabling foreigners able to get jobs in the US to do so.

The US's leading competitors in technical areas include countries like Japan and South Korea with virtually no immigration, high education levels, large trade surpluses - and which lack the natural resource base the US has.

The US needs to cease this failed strategy and look elsewhere for a solution.

Print Friendly and PDF