If you were planning on changing your name to something a bit more… traditional, now is the time because, if you hadn’t noticed, one provision of the stimulus bill orders changes to the famous Emma Lazarus lines: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free… provided they don’t have any form of H1-B visa stamped in a foreign passport, in which case send them right the hell back.” A Dealbreaker operative spotted work crews hacking away at the plaque at Liberty’s feet last weekend.
Bank of America has become the first US bank to withdraw job offers made to MBA students graduating from US business schools this summer, citing conditions laid out in its bail-out deal as the reason.
The recently passed $787bn stimulus bill in effect prevents financial institutions that have received money from the government’s troubled asset relief programme from applying for H1-B visas for highly skilled immigrants if they have recently made US workers redundant.
All we can say is… America! Fuck yeah!
(We are entirely certain that the connection to North Carolina has absolutely nothing to do with BoA being the first to implement the ban. We did hear that a butcher knife wielding Daniel Day Lewis will play Ken Lewis in the motion picture. No word on Leo yet).
BofA withdraws job offers to foreign MBAs [The Financial Times]
Foriegners specialize in areas like math & science that Americans don’t want to and we are denying them jobs now?
Who knows how far this will go…
Fucking ridiculous.
Great way to guarantee that global talent will flow to other countries. Pretty nice subsidy for Canadian, European, and Asian banks.
Does that affect Merrill? Their Stat Arb Prop desk is full of H1b’s who made decent money last year. I guess they will join their ex boss at Citdal capital markets!
I wonder if anybody will comment on how this affects ML? I think — and somebody correct me on this if I’m wrong– I think their Stat Arb Prop desk is full of H1b’s…
Does anybody have any info?
@3, @4, @5 – Please, this is an American website. It is not the place for multiple comment submissions. If you want to practice Monte Carlo simulation, please move back to India/China/Taiwan and do it there. Also, it would not hurt to check your (English) spelling while you are at it. Thank you.
Ken Lewis
Doh! After I posted my comment, those sneaky Americans at DB deleted @3′s multiple posts, so now mine looks foolish.
I still can’t figure out this interweb thingy. Can’t I hire one foreigner to teach it to me?
Ken Lewis/@5
So illiterate mexican fruit-pickers who jump fences to get here, pay not taxes and are a drag on the system are welcome and furiously defended against any move to deport them.
But legal, educated tax paying folks are being driven out. Speaks volumes about the future path this country is charting out I guess.
Change(c).
Incidentally 90%+ of Indians/Chinese tend to be dems so the irony is quite strong, he he.
Explain to me why Bank of America needs new MBAs at this time, foreign or domestic.
Erin B. needs to lay off the pancake. She looks like she bathed her face in it this am.
@7
Strangely, Republicans are more open to increasing H1b’s. But they (Republicans) require people like Nelson Rockefeller types as thier leaders, not Palin, Rush or Hickeybee.
As Silicon Valley and other associated industries always need new H1B hires to keep driving salaries down, this is good for them. Since the number of H1B visas is capped every year, not having Banks consume visas from that quota frees up more visas for industries like technology that actually add value to the economy. Bankers just subtract value, plus, nobody needs more bankers right now.
This country is so screwed. Every H1B worker probably supports 10 other jobs. This is so short sighted its blind.
Most fat American’s couldn’t figure out how to multiple double digit numbers, let alone divide. Many struggle even with simple subtraction problems while working behind registers.
Its not clear that the talent isn’t already here with domestic workers.
The banks do the same thing that other businesses do – bring in foreigners to dilute the bargaining power of domestic workers and lower wages overall. Furthermore – foreigners are easier to tool – because they tend not to be aware of their rights or afraid of the system.
There are plenty of qualified people here.
While i believe that free trade implies the free movement of labor – I’m not so sure pressuring banks to look at qualified Americans for jobs first affects the “talent” level and competitive balance.
Chase Dream?
12 Nothing like promoting stereotypes. See 11: Most techs do work that requires a decent but not rocket scientist skill level. The real purpose behind H1B is to keep a cap on tech wages.
EP=Asian
Actually, the sponsor of an H1B is required by law to pay the prevailing wage to an H1B. They would be breaking the law if they didn’t.
@13 – it has bigger implications and not just for banks. As a first step, protectionism like this will encourage the best in other coutries to pursue education in more open countries. US has held on to the #1 spot because it has always attracted the best. I don’t doubt that domestic talent is up to the task, but it’ll be a chance for other countries to catch up.
Throughout history civilizations have progressed:
From bondage to spiritual faith;
from spiritual faith to great courage;
from courage to liberty;
from liberty to abundance;
from abundance to selfishness;
from selfishness to complacency;
from complaceny to apathy;
from apathy to dependence;
from dependency back again into bondage.
Hell yea.. American bankers can lose trillions of dollars just as well as imported bankers.
@19 I think we’re probably somewhere in between selfishness and apathy.
Someone needs to get their logic in line here.
These MBAs would be placed along with their American brethen on trading desks or banking groups and paid the same base/bonus.
Now if the argument is that presence of H1Bs is lowering the prevailing wages of bankers? So bankers are not paid enough?
If so, then the outrage over banker pay is misplaced, right?
Americans need to be paid more because they fill more space.
Big deal.
~The Guy Who Dismisses Things with, “Big Deal.”
The lower wages argument amounts to support of protectionism.
That is a slippery slope to start down and I can’t think of any respectable economist thinks protectionism is a good thing.
I can say that my personal experience with H1b holders is that they work harder and have a better attitude than their American counterparts.
Don’t you need one of those H1b3asagda visas if you’re from NY and you want to work in North Carolina?
Watch out 20 somethings, the baby boomers are pissed and they aren’t gonna take it anymore!
22 Lowering the wages of analysts, not bankers. Its similar to outsourcing. No judgements here about it being good or bad: just saying that removing barriers between between work and workers will causes wages to be lowered.
doesn’t vikram pandit have an h1b visa?
“Posted by guest, Mar 09, 2009 10:33AM
Foriegners specialize in areas like math & science that Americans don’t want to and we are denying them jobs now?
Who knows how far this will go…”
BS, the engineering schools have been taken over by foreign deans who favor admission to their own kids. It is very difficult for Americans to even get in and more difficult for them to stay. Try learning complex math or physics from someone who can’t even speak English and competing with kids whose contries are paying for everything concerning their education. right down to spending money, when you have t have a part time job just to eat.
Notice also, the one business other than government that has been growing exponentially is education. It is a business make no mistake about it.
@3, @25
This is absolutely the right thing to do. The Merrill Stat Arb desk is nothing compared to the entire CDO structuring department at Citi (I will not name names), the entire research team at Lehman, etc. I can not tell you how many arguments I have had with H1B employees yelling that the 98 handle on the CDO was justified by “the muddle”. Just because you went to grad school doesn’t mean you can think.
25 Actually my exp with H1B is that they work harder and have a better attitude on the 80% of the work that is direct and straightforward. On the remaining 20% that requires subtlety, creativity and teamwork they always fail.
Tell those MBAs who got walked on by Banco Americo to come work in the natural gas trading and marketing industry. In our industry you can walk on a deal any time (mostly for “price majeure”) and get away with it. Oh, your counterparty might have a little snit, but you stay calm on the phone and after he/she gets off the line , you and the whole midcontinent desk just fall down laughing!
~Jimmy Crack Korn
East Texas Gas Trader
18 is right, I doubt it’ll stop with the banks.
Although it probably wouldn’t affect something like GM, because who the hell would come to America to build a toaster oven on wheels?
I find it extremely amusing when Yahoo finance types accuse H1b visa’s suppressing wages.
How can 65,000 H1b’s per year suppress wages of a country with population in excess of 300 million?
@32 that business is likely over. Why get educated in a country with no exit opportunities. And plenty of US students get lots of govt & private assistance. If you compare, may be x top students from a foreign country gets some kind of foreign govt assistance. They are certainly qualified. And if they/their govt didn’t pay the full tution, you think american students will pay:
(A) More
(B) Less
(C) Don’t know, can’t decide – these numbers are too big.
With so many experienced AMERICAN MBA’S what the hell are they doing hiring even a single foreigner? A lot of countries do not hire any foreigners, by law.
@17
In most cases the sponsor is a contracting agency and they do their “magic” regarding the prevailing wage issue. One such thing is to claim their visa employee is based in a low wage state, even though is assigned to a place like NYC. Plus they can also include as compensation the costs of dealing with the INS, all the way to getting a green card. And many of these agencies are now foreign-owned.
So the smart thing for a US corporation is not to bring these folks in as employees, but bring them in as contractors. The bottom line is that it does cut costs. But in the case of banking right now, really, they don’t need to hire replacements for the ones that are getting fired. That will take time.
So when does Barclays and UBS fire all Americans working in Europe?
I’m going to agree with The Banker Of The Year on this one. You can’t create complex structured products when you’re staffed with people who can neither add nor subtract.
@31, Complicated structured products are the root of the worldwide economic collapse. Keep knocking American education, and the business of education will get pissed.
19, 21- Great posts. Think that relying on the Chinese to fund the deficit so we can buy many basic necessities from them would count as dependence?
EP – Is Ghent or Bruges better to visit?
Merrill once gave me an H1B visa. It was very nice of them to get me into the country. Working in that hell hole though, any wage would have felt suppressed.
@38
The US in some professions, doesn’t like to be protectionist. This is specially true in the technology sector. So we bring a lot of people from China or India by providing H1B visas for certain professions. Those countries don’t have reciprocal treatment so if US workers want to emigrate there, they would have very little chance of getting their permits.
Second point is that some professions in the US have a strong set of protectionist laws and regulations that make it very difficult to import individuals with those skills. See, for example, physicians and lawyers.
I find Belgium boring. Luxembourg on Wednesday night is the place to be if you are stuck in Benelux and can’t get to Amsterdam quickly.
@42 spot on.
the fundamental model behind CDOs was called the Binomial Estimation Technique. Any American would have told you not to use that name for a model, because of its initials. The modellers were mostly H1B hires who were so smart, they turned out to be stupid. Send them home, now.
If these kids were so ‘skilled’ how come they ended up at Bank of America.
@49
compared to Infosys, B of A is Nirvana (what a surprise that the word is Indian)
“So we bring a lot of people from China or India by providing H1B visas for certain professions. Those countries don’t have reciprocal treatment so if US workers want to emigrate there, they would have very little chance of getting their permits.”
Ever here of Hong Kong, funny how they let Americans bankers work there and relatively easy entry into the Chinese SAR gets forgotten.
Screw you Ken
-Vikram
@43 Definitely.
@49
good point!
If the HB1s “work harder” and have “better attitutdes”, it is because they are immigrants and hence are abnormally reverential toward the company and the boss. They tend to not know their rights and hence fear their employers – they are guests and know it.
Bringing in more workers creates greater competition for jobs and hence lowers salary and worsens overall job conditions for those in the jobs. – Management/ ownership gets the edge. Crabs in the barrel. There are plenty of qualified people here who can do these jobs. Immigrants have been used this way in this country for a long long time.
The H1-B visa works to suppress wages because foreign workers have to find another job before they can leave the sponsoring firm, otherwise they have to go home. Thus foreign workers will be less aggressive in getting wage increases and more worried about getting fired.
If we truly want the best brains in our companies, we need to raise immigration quotas for those with skill into the U.S. Right now most immigration is based on family status, not skills. H1-B is an inefficient way of bringing in folks with skills.
@48 Brilliant! It’s these damned H1-B’s with their models who ruined everything. Us American bankers are blameless. We just did what the models told us.
The visa process is also a quick/cheap way for Corporations to get the labor they want under the conditions they want – lower wages/more control). Through this process, they also avoid having to contribute more to public education through taxes.
If there aren’t enough qualified people here (which I don’t believe), then there are certainly enough potentially qualified people who can become so with the right training and investment. This would require the appropriate investment in education – which can only be paid for by a greater tax burden on said corporations – whose tax burden – currently is extremely low.
What can’t we all just get along?
@7 is correct. And I’d like us to consider the following…
1 – BoA, until recently (read: a couple of years ago), began sponsoring H1 visas for MBAs. Prior to that, when most of the banking business was run out of Charlotte, they would only hire US Citizens or Permanent Residents. They’re reverting to their previous policy.
2 – 65,000 H1 Visas / year: and most of it is taken up by IT. MBAs requiring H1 Visas are a a speck in the drop in the H1 bucket, so why are you crying? They get paid competitive wages, not lower wages. Why? It’s the law.
3 – H1 Visa holders help America by doing the following:
a)Pay taxes, at the city, state and federal level, just like Americans and permanent residents.
b)Pay Medicare and Social Security allocations: consider this our gift to you, granted the fact that we’re probably never going to see one cent of that money, yet it get’s withheld from our paychecks. Would it not be fair to get it back?
c)Love America. Land of the free. Home of the brave. We cherish the liberties this country affords. We cherish democracy. Some of us have enlisted in your army to help fight your wars, while the likes of Bill Ayers and Ward Churchill continue bashing your way of life. Why do they get to stay?
No one here is bashing immigrants – I bet many of us here are 1st, 2nd. or 3rd generation immigrant. I’m a 2nd myself. But that doesn’t mean I can’t or shouldn’t look at and understand the big picture.
dear @57
the Americans in the picture were the mortgage originators, the scum at New Century and ilk. No one said Americans were blameless. However, investment bank research departments which validated the erroneous rating agency models were largely H1B hires as were the ratings agencies. Of course, like likes like, and they kept on pressing for more. I was not hired by Lehman research because I was American.
@61 Aah, that last line explains
everything. Thank you for playing and better luck next time.
Hey lets get this discussion back on topic.
Why weren’t Obama’s Harvard transcripts released?
@62 and look what happened to Lehman. case closed
@7
90% are dems? are you nuts? maybe 90% of americanized, indians and chinese living in manhattan’s upper west side are, but generally speaking those 2 groups are HUGE conservatives, shake out the data on IPUMS or something brah (thats right i just called you “brah”)…
I am not your ‘brah’, pal.
Okay, this is just ridiculous. Among other things, getting rid of foreign MBA’s is obviously an easy way to reduce the ’09 associate class without alienating recruiting ties at B-Schools. With the combined BofA/Merrill class, the bank overhired and is finding the obvious way to hull it down. Foreign-born incoming analysts are probably going to be the next announced item.
Here’s what the future holds for some in Charlotte:
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/business/story/586265.html
Any debate involving H-1B tends to be heated. Leaving aside the unfairness to those whose offers were taken back at the end of recruiting season…
Bottom-line = Any protectionism will hurt U.S. in the long run, if the changes that are being done create a vicious cycle. Job uncertainties for foreign workers will impact the quality of education and students at U.S. universities, which in turn will impact innovation and the edge America has. Further the double standards for dealing with illegal and legal immigration will change the mix of American population. Anyone who is #1, eventually looses its place due to complacency.
Welcome to the new America.
@61, you were not hired by lehman because you weren’t as good as the other candidates. or possibly because you let slip in the interview that you hate foreigners.
H1-b has nothing to do with wages- it’s an analyst or associate class they all make the same. Also TARP firms are only limited on hiring new h1-b’s…. the ones that are already there are fine
65, you clearly do not understand the difference between being culturally conservative wrt some social customs and political affiliation of immigrant groups. Its like saying Hispanics are all conservative christians hence they must all be republicans.
Why dont you yourself look up the population databases. Might be an eye opener for you.
@71 … you are an idiot. I don’t hate foreigners; I am an American and like all of us came from foreign stock. However, I am glad I didn’t get hired by Lehman because I now have a job and they don’t. The reason they don’t is because, amongst other things, their commercial mortgage loss model was on drugs. That model was written by the largely H1B foreign employees who went to grad school here but had no clue about real estate or markets. The proof is in the pudding.
Btw,
To respond #7 comment below,
Posted by guest, Mar 09, 2009 10:49AM
So illiterate mexican fruit-pickers who jump fences to get here, pay not taxes and are a drag on the system are welcome and furiously defended against any move to deport them.
But legal, educated tax paying folks are being driven out. Speaks volumes about the future path this country is charting out I guess.
Change(c).
Incidentally 90%+ of Indians/Chinese tend to be dems so the irony is quite strong, he he.
@61 and @74:
It was not because that you are American that you were not hired, it was because you are one of the lazy/stupid Americans, even though there are plenty of smart/hardworking Americans out there.
BofA did this 2 weeks ago. There will likely be more cuts. Between BAC and MER, they have ~ 110 incoming Associates; they only need 50 or so…
Everyone needs to stop overhyping this. It’s not because they “wanted a smaller class”, though they probably don’t mind it. They were just the first of the TARP banks to do it – therein probably doing a favor in comparison to other TARP banks that will need to pull H1B visa’s in the coming months yet give their candidates less time to find other positions.
Maybe there could have been some uproar a month ago when this condition in the stimulus bill passed, but at this point it is expected news, not a huge story.
What would happen if China and India fire those Americans,too?
Consider that fact that people of both countries are closer to Europeans than Americans.
79 – pretty much this:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/43/Yankee-go-home.jpg
I support the new rule 100%. But why just stop there?
Fellow nations – Stop Globalization!
Stop sending your money to US of A by drinking Pepsi and Coke. Buy local drinks.
Stop exporting items produced with your hardwork at ridiculously low prices.
Screw Boeing go Airbus.
Demand that oil be available for tarde in a basket of currencies not just US dollars.
This can go on and on. It’s easy to whine & b*tch but America rode the Globalization gravy train all the way to the top – right up to selling toxic waste subprime CDOs and all to the rest of the world.
Now amidst global economic calamity, the leadership is busy with political stunts without working on real solutions.
@73 already did FOB, go back to your own country
@76 I was a VP at GS for 10 yes so I don’t think that I was lazy. you are so typical of the arrogant attitude I encounter time and time again amongst the supposed smart guys. Go to where you can pull a plow.
@83
- It’s not “10 yes” but “10 years”.
- Capitalize ‘you’ in the 2nd line.
- It’s not “supposed smart guys” but “‘supposedly’ smart guys”
Are you sure you are not lazy? I can see why you were VP for 10 years and not moved up.