7mo ago

Tesla replaced laid off US workers with foreign workers using H-1B visas that Musk wants to increase

Tesla replaced laid off US workers with foreign workers using H-1B visas that Musk want to increase

Tesla has replaced some of its US employees who were let go as part of a big wave of layoffs earlier this year with foreign workers using H-1B visas, which CEO Elon Musk is now campaigning to increase.

Over the last week, Elon Musk has been promoting the increase of H-1B visas, which are used to bring foreign workers into the US for “specialty occupations.”

Qualified foreign workers need to be sponsored by a company to get the visa, which lasts three years, extendable to six years, after which the holder needs to reapply.

The visa holder must maintain employment at the visa sponsor to retain the work visa. The worker would have to leave the country if the employment ends for whatever reason. This has led to some criticism as it gives tremendous power to the employer and can lead to a modern version of indentured servitude.

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[Edit typo.]

30 comments

Imagine if you lost your job to an H-1B visa holder and you voted Trump to make America great again. Boy would you feel dumb...
- I don't follow. Wouldn't that person be happy that Trump is trying to deport the person you were replaced by in this situation?
  
  Nah. Trump loves H-1Bs. He used to hate H-1Bs but his new corporate masters gave him new convictions.
  Anyway, he promised to deport the ten billion illegal immigrants that commit rape, murders and eat pets up and down the country on day one of his presidency. He said nothing about legal indentured workers that make his billionnaire buddies money.
Bruh imagine being a person who voted for Trump because you were against immigrants than Trump's Daddy takes away your job and gives it to an immigrant
- If you’ve been MAGA all this time, you’ll somehow find a way to shift the blame from Trump to $ENEMY.
A friendly reminder to everybody here that the problem with this is not that "H-1B immigrants have the job instead," but that "H-1B immigrants can be easily abused via deportation threats."
It's an easy thing to forget when you've got headlines like this one that subtly phrase this scenario (intentionally or not) as though it's the "immigrants work here now" part that's the problem. Were it that H-1B workers were properly protected, and citizens were given sufficient social safety nets and welfare programs to thrive despite this, there'd be no issue whatsoever.
- Yeah, I didn't want to edit the title, but I post again an important paragraph:
  The visa holder must maintain employment at the visa sponsor to retain the work visa. The worker would have to leave the country if the employment ends for whatever reason. This has led to some criticism as it gives tremendous power to the employer and can lead to a modern version of indentured servitude.
- I remember at an old job that I noticed everyone leaving was a citizen and the only people sticking it out were on visas.
- Both can be problems, if the goal of hiring H1B is to depress wages.
  
  That's the fault of the employer, not immigrants. Immigrants having jobs is never the issue.
It does fit the President Musk narrative. You play around with H1B you can skirt some pesky American labor laws, pay less, etc. I’d be curious to know what the benefits package, if any, looks like for H1B workers. We need a contract to post.
Musk is not a friend to the American working class, as defined by his behaviors. Quite the opposite.
Great system btw. Jack up the price of education making it inaccessible to Americans. Screw around with the loan system such that student debt never really gets paid down. (Someone in Musks tier is cashing in there). Contest student loan forgiveness on people who’d been paying for 10yrs (condition to get the forgiveness), win.
Give education spots to people from other countries instead.
But you have your degree and debt and have a job now too. Then, as an American, get fired only to be replaced with an H1B worker.
Outsourcing American education and jobs inside the United States.
American Dream level, that.
Look at all those cute Leopards!
So they were right about that replacement theory after all. /s
So there were Americans who had the right skills and qualifications otherwise how would you be able to lay off anyone?

30 comments