H-1B, Offshoring Supporters Get Key White House Posts
President Barack Obama has filled some of his top White House posts with people who not only support expanding the H-1B visa program, but see offshore outsourcing as a plus for the U.S. economy. That group includes the president's new pick to run the Commerce Department, Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) .
Tue, February 03, 2009
Computerworld — President Barack Obama has filled some of his top White House posts with people who not only support expanding the H-1B visa program, but see offshore outsourcing as a plus for the U.S. economy. That group includes the president's new pick to run the Commerce Department, Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) .
But another choice by Obama may be just as important in shaping White House policy: Diana Farrell . She is the former director of the McKinsey Global Institute, McKinsey & Co.'s economics research arm, and has been tapped to serve on the National Economic Council and as deputy economic advisor to the president.
McKinsey, a management consulting firm, has published research that argues offshore outsourcing to low-wage countries brings "substantial benefits" to the U.S. Its studies and reports have been cited by the tech industry in support of the H-1B visa program.
Farrell may have the president's ear, but it's Gregg, as Commerce Secretary, who may well become the White House lead for expanding the H-1B cap, a position Gregg strongly supported in the Senate. Obama voiced support early in his campaign for increasing the 85,000-visa cap, which includes 20,000 visas set aside for advanced-degree graduates from U.S. universities. But he has not addressed the issue in recent months.
In a talk last April at the Cato Institute, a libertarian policy research group, Gregg pointed to comments by then- Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates that for every H-1B worker that comes to the U.S., five jobs are created. Gates had made the comments the month before during an appearance before a U.S. House committee.
"It's not like ... we are taking jobs from Americans, which is what you hear from labor unions. We're actually creating jobs by bringing bright people into this country," Gregg said in a video on the Cato Institute's Web site.
Many in Congress are divided on the H-1B issue, Senate Republicans especially. Had Obama picked, for instance, Sen. Chuck Grassley, (R-Ia.), for the Commerce job instead of Gregg, he would have appointed someone who believes H-1B workers are being used to displace Americans.
Gregg acknowledged that there has been some abuse in the H-1B program, "especially involving Indian-related companies and their basic flooding of the market in this area and then having people return to India with knowledge that they gained here." But, he argued, that's an issue "that can be corrected fairly easily with minor adjustments in the program."
Indian offshore firms are the largest users of H-1B visas and consider it critical to their delivery model for moving IT functions offshore. It's a point they have made repeatedly in U.S. Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings.
