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Why is H-1B Use Skyrocketing among Bay Area Tech Giants?

On August 13, 2018, the San Jose Mercury published a story titled H-1B use skyrocketed among Bay Area tech giants . The story begins: Even as the White House began cracking down on U.S. work visas, major Silicon Valley technology firms last year dramatically ramped up hiring of workers under the controversial H-1B visa program, according to newly released data. The data show the importance of H-1B workers to the tech industry, which has long lobbied to increase the number of highly skilled foreign workers. Menlo Park-based Facebook in 2017 received 720 H-1B approvals, a 53 percent increase over 2016, according to the National Foundation for American Policy, which obtained federal government data. Mountain View's Google received 1,213 H-1B approvals, a 31 percent increase. The number of H-1B approvals at Intel in Santa Clara rose 19 percent and Cupertino-based Apple received 673, a 7 percent increase. The NFAP (National Foundation of American Policy) has posted a study which con...
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How Much Ageism Exists in High Tech?

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On August 4, 2017, an article appeared in USA Today titled Ageism is forcing many to look outside Silicon Valley, but tech hubs offer little respite . It begins: For years, job hunting over the age of 40 in the youth-obsessed Silicon Valley could prove hazardous to your career. But judging from the experiences of technology workers roaming the country in search of job opportunities elsewhere, ageism is a universal problem in the industry. READ FULL REPORT
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Unemployment Rate versus the Labor Force Participation Rate

On June 1, 2018, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the May Employment Report . It begins: Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 223,000 in May, and the unemployment rate edged down to 3.8 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment continued to trend up in several industries, including retail trade, health care, and construction. READ FULL REPORT
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A Look at Labor Condition Application (LCA) Data from 2015 through 2018

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The Wikipedia page for Labor Condition Application states the following: The Labor Condition Application (LCA) is an application filed by prospective employers on behalf of workers applying for work authorization for the non-immigrant statuses H-1B, H-1B1 (a variant of H-1B for people from Singapore and Chile) and E-3 (a variant of H-1B for workers from Australia). READ FULL REPORT
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Pew Research Center on the Surge of Foreign College Students Working in the U.S.

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Today, the Pew Research Center released a study titled Number of Foreign College Students Staying and Working in U.S. After Graduation Surges . A PDF version of the study can be found at this link . The subtitle of the study is "Federal training program sees 400% increase in foreign students graduating and working in STEM fields from 2008 to 2016". The study expands on this in the second paragraph, stating: Many foreign STEM graduates enrolled with OPT after executive actions in 2008 and 2016 initially doubled (29 months), then later tripled (36 months), the maximum length of employment for foreign students with STEM degrees. The number of foreign STEM graduates participating in OPT grew by 400% since the first employment extension was introduced in 2008. This 400% increase can be seen in the first of the following charts which shows the number of STEM OPT approvals increasing from 34 in 2008 to 172 in 2016. The study continues: OPT is one mechanism by which the U.S. c...
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Pew Research Center Study on Which Cities had the Most H-1B Visas (Part 2)

Output from a prior Jupyter notebook checked the validity of a March 29, 2018 study from the Pew Research Center by looking at Labor Condition Application (LCA) data from 2017. The analysis concludes: READ FULL REPORT
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Pew Research Center Study on Which Cities had the Most H-1B Visas

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On March 29, 2018, the San Jose Mercury News published a story titled "H-1B: Silicon Valley doesn’t get majority of controversial visas, report says" . It begins: The controversial H-1B work visa used heavily by Silicon Valley tech firms to acquire talent is much more widely used by companies based in New York and Texas, according to new research. From 2010 to 2016, almost a third of the visas, which are intended for workers in jobs requiring specialized knowledge and a bachelor’s degree or higher, went to businesses in the New York City area, the Pew Research Center reported Thursday . The referenced Pew Research Center Study is titled "East Coast and Texas metros had the most H-1B visas for skilled workers from 2010 to 2016" and begins as follows: The employment of high-skilled foreign workers with H-1B visas centered in large East Coast metropolitan areas from fiscal years 2010 to 2016. These foreign workers...
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