Mica's (L)oophole Bill

Mica's (L)oophole Bill - Part 3

Date: Wednesday, May 21, 2003 4:54 PM

JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER

www.ZaZona.com

Some extra commentary by Dr. Norman Matloff is followed by a late
breaking article. Norm probably didn't see the article when he wrote
this but it's very relevant to the issue.

Thibodeau's article is accurate but it lacks an analysis of why Mica's
bill is one big (L)oophole. People that read the article could be
seriously mislead into thinking that Mica cares about American workers.
Mica is actually just trying to throw a bone to Florida voters that
want the corporate treason against citizens to stop. Nobody should be
fooled by this feeble attempt at reform.

The Orlando TV news show that Matloff mentions can be downloaded at:
http://www.hannatroup.com:81/wkmg/

Or better yet get a DVD of all the news shows plus an intro to H-1B and
L-1 at:
http://www.hireamericancitizens.org/announce1.html

The DVD is very convenient because you can loan it to people. I just
gave the DVD to a neighbor across the street that works for Siemens. At
least he will now know what is going on if he is asked to train a
foreign worker.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Norm Matloff [mailto:matloff@laura.cs.ucdavis.edu]
> Sent: Wednesday, May 21, 2003 3:56 PM
> To: Norm Matloff
> Subject: more on the Mica proposal

> To: age discrimination/H-1B/L-1 e-newsletter

Rep. Mica's "interest" in the L-1 program arose earlier this year when
Mike Emmons contacted Mica with an urgent complaint: Emmons, an
engineer with Siemens in Mica's Florida district, was being replaced by
a foreign national subcontracted by Tata, an Indian/American firm.
Adding insult to injury, Siemens was also forcing Emmons to train his
foreign replacement (as a condition for Emmons to get his severance
package). Siemens admitted that these events were taking place, not
just in Emmons' case, but for many American workers at Siemens. (Keep
this latter point in mind when I refer to Emmons below. I actually am
referring to large numbers of American workers.)

A local TV news program did an excellent four-part investigatory piece
on what was happening at Siemens. Greatly embarrassed, Rep. Mica, who
has supported the related H-1B program, said he would work on
legislation to address the problems with L-1.

Mica has now announced his bill. He agrees that the L-1s are being
brought in for the purpose of cheap labor, that it is outrageous that
the American workers are forced to train their foreign replacements,
etc., but claims that it is all related to one single loophole in the
L-1 law, as follows:

Tata had brought the foreign national who replaced Emmons to the U.S.
under the L-1 visa for intracompany transfers, making use of the fact
that Tata is a multinational firm (India, U.S., etc.). Tata then
basically "rented" the foreign national to Siemens, replacing Emmons.
According to Mica, Tata should be bringing L-1s to the U.S. only for
its "own" use, not for "renting" to other firms.

So, Rep. Mica is proposing legislation under which Siemens could not
"rent" L-1s from Tata. As I said yesterday, that is really no
restriction at all. To get around the new L-1 policy as proposed by
Mica, Siemens would simply say it was subcontracting the PROJECT to
Tata. Then Tata could say that the L-1s are working solely for Tata,
not for Siemens, even though the L-1s might make frequent visits to the
Siemens site. As I said, this is the way Tata and others handle
H-1B already.

But EVEN MORE IMPORTANTLY, the fact is that under Mica's bill, Siemens
could simply do its OWN intracompany L-1 transfer. Siemens has its own
IT shop in India--see www.siemens.co.in--Siemens Information Systems
Ltd.

So Siemens could and would continue to bring in cheap labor from its
Indian subsidiaries to replace American workers like Mike Emmons,
forcing the Americans to train their replacements--all with Rep. Mica's
blessing.

In other words, Mica's bill is just "vaporware," folks. It's just a
ruse being used to make the public think that Congress is really going
to address the issue of tech guest workers as cheap labor, when in fact
they want to PRESERVE U.S. firms' access to cheap labor.

Another important note: The fact that the American workers at Siemens
and so many other U.S. firms are being forced to train their foreign
replacements put the lie to the employers' claim that the foreign
workers are being brought to the U.S. because they have skills which
the Americans lack.

Norm

http://www.computerworld.com/careertopics/careers/labor/story/0,10801,81401,00.html?nas=PM-81401

Bill in Congress would curb L-1 visa use for foreign workers

By PATRICK THIBODEAU
MAY 21, 2003

WASHINGTON -- Legislation was introduced in Congress this week that

would set curbs on the use of the L-1 visa, a controversial visa
program that, like the H-1B visa, allows U.S. companies to bring in
foreign workers.
The L-1 visa enables companies with subsidiaries abroad to transfer to
the U.S. from other companies executives or workers with specialized
skills. But critics contend that foreign outsourcing firms use it to
import lower-paid workers who then replace higher-paid U.S. employees.

U.S. Rep. John Mica, (R-Fla.) called the L-1 visa a "back door to cheap
labor" in his legislation. His bill would require that employees be
transferred from their own subsidiaries and not from third-party
outsourcers.

The bill's intent is to block foreign outsourcing firms, so-called
"body shops," from using the visa to move foreign workers into U.S.
positions. But the legislation may face opposition from all sides.

Mike Emmons, an Orlando-based activist who said he lost his consulting
job because of L-1 visa, lobbied Mica heavily for action on the visa
and said he's disappointed with Mica's legislative fix. Emmons said the
legislation includes a large loophole that would allow a U.S. company
to set up shop in India or some other country, hire workers there and
then move those employees here.

"This is a pretty minuscule bill," said Emmons.

However, Vic Goel, a Greenbelt, Md.-based immigration attorney who
represents high-tech companies, said the legislation could prevent a
multinational firm from bringing in foreign workers to help clients.
For instance, the foreign workers may have played a key role in
software development and are needed to implement, service and maintain
the software.

"The idea is to find a solution that promotes business and closes the
door on the abusers," said Goel, explaining that such a solution could
involve finding a way to differentiate between "project-based [work]
vs. simple provisioning of warm bodies to fill seats."

According to Mica, there are currently more than 325,000 L-1 visa
holders in the U.S.

H-1B visas allows foreign workers to take jobs in the U.S. for as long
as six years. Someone with an L-1 visa can work in the U.S. for up to
seven years.

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