- [English] 90th percentile (108 or more on TOEFL [0]): +11
This amounts to 24 points, needing 6 more to achieve 30. A job offer of 150% the median household income of the state is only +5 points, so the candidate would need a 200% offer. This means, using 2015 data [1]:
- California: $64.5k -> $129k
- Washington: $64k -> $128k
- New York: $61k -> $122k
- Massachussets: $70k -> $140k
The numbers above are, obviously, higher than average, but certainly reachable for excellent software engineers at big companies. (It is unclear to me if other compensation components such as stocks/equity count toward the 200%.)
However, if such candidate reaches the age of 26, earns a foreign MS in a STEM field, or obtains a perfect TOEFL score, thus earning an additional point or two, then she would need a job offer equivalent to only 150% the median household income.
"Anyone with less than a 60th percentile proficiency gets no points. Between 60th and 80th percentile is worth six points, someone in the 80th to 90th percentile range earns 10 points, someone with a 90th percentile proficiency or above earns 11 points, and someone in the 100th percentile range earns 12 points"
I can't understand if it means, on a test with 1000 points, for the 90th percentile:
1.) you scored at least 900 points.
Or
2.) you did better than 90% of the persons that took the test (That's what I understand by percentile. But it doesn't make sense since mathematically you can't have a 100th percentile. Except if you approximate 99.995 -> 100)
For all you non-Nobel-Price holders that aren't uneducated and want to live somewhere else: Germany welcomes you.
Actually, having a bachelor's degree in the STEM field almost automatically gets you a visa for "searching work" for 6-12 months. If in that time you find a job that pays at least ca. 40.000 Euro, you get the "BlueCard" which leads to permanent residency after 2-4 years (depending on your German skills). If you are well qualified, but not in the STEM fields, about 60.000€ yearly salary paves the way. There is no point system, there is no maximum number of BlueCards, you don't have to be the best of the best (just "regular" well educated people) and you get your shot. We are just going through the process with a family member of my wife and it is surprisingly painless compared to most other German bureaucracy. In contrast to the USA, Germany is actively searching for more talent abroad and has reasonable acceptance criteria (never thought I would say this about my country...).
When I was backpacking, I entered Germany without a definite exit date and with no onward travel booked. Upon hearing this, the immigration official gave me a hard stare, and let me sweat for what felt like ages. He then cracked a smile and told me to visit the Foreigners Office if I wanted to stay for longer, or look for work. While I doubt that's the normal experience, including finding an immigration official with a sense of humour, I found Germany to be pretty flexible in this regard.
Come to India. The demographic dividend of having a captive and growing billion strong market coupled with a vibrant media and democratic institutions make this a no brainer.
Plus, once you make a name for yourself in India, the rest of the third world is yours for the taking.
FD - See other comment about H1B holder fucking off back home to India to grow my company.
(Not an economist. Current h1b visa holder about to leave the US to grow my company in India.)
A country whose indigenous population growth is stagnating, whose indigenous population does currently not pick up all available jobs, whose economy is 6x as big as Canada and Australia combined is choosing to turn away immigrants.
From a purely numerical standpoint, an 18T dollar economy built by 330M individuals will start to become unstable if the population starts falling and aging. This is a distinct possibility when you only invite highly educated, skilled immigrants since education negatively correlates to family sizes. Falling population will be another reason to push for more automation (see Japan) leading to wage stagnation.
America, be careful what you wish for. Read this demographic report. It's eye opening. Childbirth rates are 1.82. If you bring in Nobel prize winners, you'll get brainy people who will not beget brainy kids.
America isn't turning away Nobel Prize winners. This system is open to those who are educated and/or skilled. It's difficult for those who aren't.
Many countries have similar immigration standards. It's only when America does it that people get angry. It's quite difficult for skilled workers to get visas to the EU. Far harder than it is for Europeans to move to America.
> ...whose indigenous population does currently not pick up all available jobs
Aren't U.S. companies responsible for retraining workers to meet their needs? Are U.S. companies entitled to business models that aren't supported by U.S. demographics?
The idea that employers should just import workers doesn't help underemployed citizens. And it doesn't improve wages of employed citizens.
Hey, it's a decent MVP! If you sort by points and pick the top k, that's already better than H1B by a long shot. Getting to the threshold of 30 is hard but doable, and using standardized tests is a big plus to level the playing field.
It's probably best to replace the "foreign degree" points with a standardized test as well. There's too much variance in quality when it comes to foreign degrees - depending on which univ you go to, the foreign degree may be better than Harvard or worse than the proverbial toilet paper. With such a wide variance, especially in vital fields like medicine, US currently relies on standardized medical tests like Step2, Step3 to admit FMGs - this cuts down on all the "fake doctors" since these tests are hard to game. You could do the exact same thing for STEM - wide variety of good standardized tests to choose from. In fact, this is a good startup opportunity to design and administer a standard battery of tests for any foreign BS discipline - there are "monopolies" like Prometrix who do such a shoddy job, startups can surely do one better.
Now, like any good MVP, there will be a bunch of iterations where congress and lobbyists will tweak these points to ensure their pet cadres make the cut. Hopefully they don't fuck it up too much. Not a fan of this administration, but honestly, this is a competent first draft.
I'm a US citizen, born an raised in this country, and a working software engineer in the Bay Area. I'm not sure I would score 30 points on this system.
The main difference I see, is that unless you are a Nobel Prize or Olympic Medal winner, or a 26-30 yo with a PhD perfectly fluent in English, the only way to qualify is to have an existing job offer.
If I'm not wrong, both in Canada and Australia you can apply and look for a job there, if you can prove you have enough funds and past work experience, in addition to similar age/education/language fluency requirements.
Isn't this basically ageism, the kind that is outlawed federally?
Perhaps the concern is about the economics of importing people who are harder to provide insurance or pensions for. But for that I could see a requirement for a certain level of insurance. Or a disqualification from entitlement programs for a while.
Hiring laws do tend to outlaw discrimination based on age except in a few circumstances - there are laws specifying the minimum age to be able to sell alcohol, and there's an age at which commercial pilots have to stop flying.
If congress didn't specifically include a provision to note that age discrimination laws didn't apply to this, it would likely end up being challenged in court, but I certainly couldn't say what the outcome would be.
Other countries do this as well - it's not right, but the people developing this policy don't have an original bone in their body, so of course they're going to copy what other countries already have!
Five points are awarded if an applicant has a job offer
that will pay at least 150% of median household income
in the state where he or she will be employed. [...]
13 points if it's 300% the median.
I wonder why the median income is tied to the state rather than the nation? It means an oil worker paid $120,000 is worth 8 points in Texas, but only 5 points in Alaska.
It's probably good for the locals if wealthy people living outside the country don't buy up housing stock for use just in case their country goes to pieces.
[+] [-] gberger|8 years ago|reply
- [Age] 22-25: +8
- [Education] Foreign BS: +5
- [English] 90th percentile (108 or more on TOEFL [0]): +11
This amounts to 24 points, needing 6 more to achieve 30. A job offer of 150% the median household income of the state is only +5 points, so the candidate would need a 200% offer. This means, using 2015 data [1]:
- California: $64.5k -> $129k
- Washington: $64k -> $128k
- New York: $61k -> $122k
- Massachussets: $70k -> $140k
The numbers above are, obviously, higher than average, but certainly reachable for excellent software engineers at big companies. (It is unclear to me if other compensation components such as stocks/equity count toward the 200%.)
However, if such candidate reaches the age of 26, earns a foreign MS in a STEM field, or obtains a perfect TOEFL score, thus earning an additional point or two, then she would need a job offer equivalent to only 150% the median household income.
--
[0]: https://magoosh.com/toefl/2015/whats-your-toefl-percentile/
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_income
[+] [-] AStrangeMorrow|8 years ago|reply
1.) you scored at least 900 points.
Or
2.) you did better than 90% of the persons that took the test (That's what I understand by percentile. But it doesn't make sense since mathematically you can't have a 100th percentile. Except if you approximate 99.995 -> 100)
[+] [-] geff82|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] DarqWebster|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] saimiam|8 years ago|reply
Plus, once you make a name for yourself in India, the rest of the third world is yours for the taking.
FD - See other comment about H1B holder fucking off back home to India to grow my company.
[+] [-] saimiam|8 years ago|reply
A country whose indigenous population growth is stagnating, whose indigenous population does currently not pick up all available jobs, whose economy is 6x as big as Canada and Australia combined is choosing to turn away immigrants.
From a purely numerical standpoint, an 18T dollar economy built by 330M individuals will start to become unstable if the population starts falling and aging. This is a distinct possibility when you only invite highly educated, skilled immigrants since education negatively correlates to family sizes. Falling population will be another reason to push for more automation (see Japan) leading to wage stagnation.
America, be careful what you wish for. Read this demographic report. It's eye opening. Childbirth rates are 1.82. If you bring in Nobel prize winners, you'll get brainy people who will not beget brainy kids.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demography_of_the_United_Sta...
[+] [-] fiblye|8 years ago|reply
Many countries have similar immigration standards. It's only when America does it that people get angry. It's quite difficult for skilled workers to get visas to the EU. Far harder than it is for Europeans to move to America.
[+] [-] humanrebar|8 years ago|reply
Aren't U.S. companies responsible for retraining workers to meet their needs? Are U.S. companies entitled to business models that aren't supported by U.S. demographics?
The idea that employers should just import workers doesn't help underemployed citizens. And it doesn't improve wages of employed citizens.
[+] [-] cmahler7|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] dxbydt|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pmiller2|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dingo_bat|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lnreddy|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] vim_wannabe|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] k-mcgrady|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] docdeek|8 years ago|reply
http://www.border.gov.au/visas/supporting/Pages/190/points-t...
[+] [-] Kurtz79|8 years ago|reply
If I'm not wrong, both in Canada and Australia you can apply and look for a job there, if you can prove you have enough funds and past work experience, in addition to similar age/education/language fluency requirements.
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] humanrebar|8 years ago|reply
Isn't this basically ageism, the kind that is outlawed federally?
Perhaps the concern is about the economics of importing people who are harder to provide insurance or pensions for. But for that I could see a requirement for a certain level of insurance. Or a disqualification from entitlement programs for a while.
To go straight to age ranking is disappointing.
[+] [-] tallanvor|8 years ago|reply
If congress didn't specifically include a provision to note that age discrimination laws didn't apply to this, it would likely end up being challenged in court, but I certainly couldn't say what the outcome would be.
Other countries do this as well - it's not right, but the people developing this policy don't have an original bone in their body, so of course they're going to copy what other countries already have!
[+] [-] moomin|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] akhilcacharya|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] j7ake|8 years ago|reply
Excuse my ignorance but what is comparable to a Noble prize ? I can think of the fields medal, anything else?
[+] [-] docdeek|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pmiller2|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] microtherion|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] michaelt|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] akhilcacharya|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eb0la|8 years ago|reply
There is a market for middle-high income people that buys housing out of their home country just in case the political situation becomes unfavorable.
In fact some countries give you residence if you spend a high amount of money on real estate.
[+] [-] imron|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nopinsight|8 years ago|reply
If not then this would shut out the vast majority of non-PhD startup founders who do not already have a green card.
[+] [-] chvid|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ausvisaissues|8 years ago|reply
H1b lottery is a broken system which is gamed by outsourcing companies.
[+] [-] Klockan|8 years ago|reply