The H-1B Visa Problem

I despise almost all of what Trump has initiated in his nine months in office, but the H-1B Visa fees are not something I worry about.  In fact, wouldn’t the world be better off if we couldn’t rob other countries of their top talent?

There are three arguments against pillaging the best and brightest from other countries.  The first is that we should be focused on improving our own educational system.  We have three hundred and some million people in this country.  There is no conceivable reason why we should have to go far afield to find talent.  If the reason is better preparation in specific areas, then the tech companies should work with universities and secondary schools to improve the pedagogy in those areas. 

 

Within our population there is enough brain power to do anything.  There is no legitimate argument that we must tap other nations for the most intelligent or capable workers.  It is a simply a matter of developing the wonderful intellects that are already here.

 

The second argument is that H-1B visas are in essence a continuation of the western exploitation of the resources of other lands.  How can we expect these countries to become more stable politically with better developed economies and opportunities if we are taking the raw human resources that they so desperately need to make progress in a competitive world that is already stacked against them?  

 

The same is true for our visa system for studying in the USA.  It is a wonderful thing for our universities to train citizens from across the world if there are limited educational opportunities in their own country.  But we should not allow them to stay, for if they do not return, we are essentially stealing them from those other countries.

 

The world is a competitive place and I fully understand that there is a strong motive for recruiting talent, whether through university education or H-1B visas.  But the world is also a profoundly troubled place with grotesque inequalities among nations.  And those troubles and inequalities are no longer remote and meaningless to us.  They are increasingly causing strife within our land through immigration issues, climate change, wars, drugs and criminality.  There is no question that the loss of valuable intellectual talent contributes heavily to these woes.

Brain drain is a catch-22 for developing nations.  The more troubled or unstable a nation is, the more the best and brightest flee for better opportunities, which in turn creates more instability.  Developed nations are exacerbating the problem by aggressively recruiting people from struggling lands.

 

The third argument is that the H-1Bs are predominantly used to fuel the AI furnace, and the last thing this world needs is a furious, no holds barred arms race in AI.  We would all be better off if AI development were less frenetic and more measured, with essential ethical and safety analyses guiding the technology.  It would also be good for many countries to share in the development of this technology to motivate them to use it for the common good.

 

The AI arms race is similar to the nuclear arms race in the cold war.  But the mutual assured destruction scenario at least kept those arms in a dormant state.  I highly doubt there will be any such hesitancy or precautions in the application of AI technology.

 

Of course, all of my arguments are idealistic in the extreme and unlikely to ever be considered in public policy.  No doubt my concern for other countries and use of the term ‘exploitation’ would be ridiculed as hopelessly bleeding heart by more conservative readers.  But it is in my nature to ponder problems and look at an idealized scenario.  It is a naivete of sorts, but it is satisfying to me to imagine a more perfect world.