[vajorie]

> The H1Bs aren't being hired by A-list companies.

H1B is a type of visa, it cannot be hired.

> They're getting hired by old, slow, cheap, mostly non-tech corporations who won't compete on either quality of work or wages.

Foreigner = Evil. On the other hand, you get an H1B if you are shown to be more qualified than u.s. citizens who applied to the job. If anything, it's a great way to bring in skilled laborers and keep them in check (since, if you get fired, you get deported too).

[beat]

Qualified isn't the problem. Willing isn't the problem. When some old non-tech company needs a network engineer to work in some crusty old industrial town in the middle of nowhere for 2/3 what a qualified person would make in actual civilization, they cannot get one. Even if they paid market rates, which they find appalling, they couldn't get anyone to move into the boonies in an environment with little opportunity for professional advancement.

So they import someone on an H1B visa, work them for a few years, and send them home. They've solved the kind of labor shortage that causes immigration, without actually giving them the chance to become Americans.