If the cost benefit analysis for employers still shows that H1-Bs are cheaper, how will this offset H1-B exploitation? My guess is that this will suppress STEM wages artificially to account for paying a one-time fee for an H1-B, but hiring someone for 1+ years at that suppressed rate will be cheaper. Employers will blame AI for decrease in STEM wages, of course. A complementary solution is to add the $100k fee, and to restrict H1-B per employer per year, or something like that.

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alephnerd 10 hours ago | parent [-]

In 2025, the decision isn't hiring someone on an H1B versus a citizen - the cost is mostly a wash.

The decision is hiring in the US (visa or citizen) versus hiring abroad.

Given that a large number of EMs, PMs, Directors, and even VPs are on some sort of immigration or work visa, this makes it easier to incentivize you as an employer to move some of them back to India or Czechia to open a GCC. This is what has been happening for the past 5 years now.

On top of that, vast swathes of STEM academia are dependent on H1B. You simply aren't going to find enough American citizens with a background in (say) battery chemistry to become a tenure track professor versus from Korea, Japan, or China.

Now you basically created an incentive for large swathes of junior faculty in STEM subfields to return to Asia, leading to a massive reverse brain drain.

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nis0s 9 hours ago | parent [-]

> The decision is hiring in the US (visa or citizen) versus hiring abroad.

True, but there’s a balance that employers have to maintain to get some in-state advantages from local or state governments for job creation.

That said, it makes more sense for America to get trainers or professors for niche subfields than actual workers so you can create homegrown talent, not sure why that isn’t done more.

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alephnerd 5 hours ago | parent [-]

> but there’s a balance that employers have to maintain to get some in-state advantages from local or state governments for job creation

True! The issue is local, state, and federal governments gives limited benefits compared to CEE countries, Israel, India, and others who roll the red carpet with multi-year tax holidays, subsidizes, and targeted hiring pipelines.

> makes more sense for America to get trainers or professors for niche subfields than actual workers so you can create homegrown talent

How? They overwhelmingly came on H1Bs as well, not O-1s.

This is why this is such a stupid approach, and is absolutely showing the hallmarks of a Stephen Miller policy. Interestingly, this seems to have overshadowed the Trump Gold Card and Platinum Card announcements (which part of me thinks was part of the reason this announcement happened).

	▲	porridgeraisin 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> such a stupid approach What do you think of this alternate one? Don't make H1-B employer-specific. That way, they automatically have to pay market rates to the guy since otherwise you would sponsor his entry and he'd switch to a market rate employer immediately. This removes the "unfair" aspect of h1bs being cheaper to hire.