Sunday, July 13, 2014

Rand Paul Met Privately with Mark Zuckerberg

Rand Paul reportedly had a private meeting with Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg in Sun Valley, Idaho, according to Breitbart.

The connection might be amnesty for immigrants.

Zuckerberg has spent millions trying to get Congress to pass comprehensive amnesty legislation that would include an increase in the number of high-tech visas that he and the high-tech industry covet.

Rand has participated in Grover Norquist's monthly conference call, which is designed to push Congress on amnesty legislation, reports Breitbart. Rand has previously said all of the country's illegal immigrants should receive work permits and mentioned that he did not vote for the Senate's comprehensive amnesty bill because it did not award enough high-tech visas.

For a different take on immigration, see Hans-Hermann Hoppe's Current "Free" Immigration Policy is Really a Forced Integration Policy.

9 comments:

  1. Let's face facts, they want H1B visas to drive down wages.Those on visas are often paid less anyway.

    Engineering wages continue their backwards slide in this country due to things like this. In one product a good engineer can make 20 years of his salary for the company. Then after a few years he'll be downsized and replaced by H1B visa holder. All the talk of minimum wages and being paid what one is worth and what does government do? Give companies engineers that under the law are more like indentured servants.

    Then people wonder... why won't american kids go into engineering?

    Yes, I know the open borders principle of libertarianism, but as I always state, libertarianism is a complete package and doing it piecemeal can amplify the effects of government interventions. If we are to allow a flood of people in, even in fields where they won't be on welfare, the corporatist system has to go away so those displaced from their jobs have more options.

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    1. The facts are, it's hard to hire a decent programmer and American education isn't good at teaching clear thinking and rigorous logic - but is very good at instilling sense of entitlement and teaching how to bullshit.

      And, yes, one would naively think that greater supply of talent decreases wages - the reality is, the competition is global. Companies either hire guys here in Silicon valley, or hire them in Moscow, Beijing, or Chennai. The reason why companies are willing to pay the same people quite a lot more in US is because productivity and quality is a lot less when there is no constant contact and free exhcange of ideas, helful hints, and word-of-mouth information which never got into documentation.

      "why won't american kids go into engineering?" - Because they're damaged by years of child abuse by leftists in what passes for the schools in US. Because they can't. Not because engineering doesn't pay well.

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    2. Being heavily involved in manufacturing myself, I think about the talent pool & overall economic dynamics(here in the US) quite a bit.

      A couple of "guesses" of mine include the notion that the money printing & resulting severe capital misallocation here has helped to make the environment here in the US much worse than it would otherwise be.(current manufacturing competitiveness requires a tremendous amount of capital investment in many(but not all) areas)

      Dollars flow to financial services, MIC whores, etc., but truly private oriented manufacturing gets hammered by both the misallocation and global markets(and the way to compete globally is through automation, which is capital intensive, so it's a circular hammer)

      Even further, you can understand why many parent don't want their kids to go into engineering here in the US due to turmoil, uncertainty(hasn't exactly been a growth industry as a whole), etc. These are the kids that end up in banking, attorney's, doctors, etc.

      I agree, the education system has been totally inadequate when it comes to both engineers and certain technical manufacturing positions.(there's always exceptions) I've hired kids straight out of our state technical system, after they've received a "Machine Technology" AA equivalent, and they've been totally worthless.(sometimes even worse than worthless, and I'm serious!)

      My biggest success has been cherry picking guys that have fallen through the cracks, usually have little traditional education but some hands on experience and sending them to private CAD/CAM schools on my dime while also mentoring them in my shop.

      It's old school in a way, similar to old style apprenticeships....and it's very expensive but worth it.

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    3. "And, yes, one would naively think that greater supply of talent decreases wages - the reality is, the competition is global. Companies either hire guys here in Silicon valley, or hire them in Moscow, Beijing, or Chennai. The reason why companies are willing to pay the same people quite a lot more in US is because productivity and quality is a lot less when there is no constant contact and free exhcange of ideas, helful hints, and word-of-mouth information which never got into documentation."

      This is flat out false, there is no way that Facebook, Google, et cetera are going to relocate their important programming jobs abroad without paying huge switching costs.

      Also, why would a 20 year old American learn programming when Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg are clamoring to bring a boatload of Indians over and drive down wages. Not to mention tech companies hold a sword of Damocles over these Indians because they can threaten to pull the visa at any time and send them back to the slums.

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    4. Ricky Vaughn for the win. Nailed it. The greediness of our billionaires is unsettling and perverse. Rand won in 2010 in part because he believed in enforcement of our nation's immigration laws putting our citizens first instead of the cheap labor lobby. As his need for more power has grown, his ability to put aside the wishes of the people who elected him makes me realize our host was correct about Rand the entire time. What a shame.

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    5. Ricky, I'm not sure you understand that Google and Facebook are NOT dominant players in many of the world markets. Yandex in Russia and Baidu in China are examples of how local talent under local management outperforms the best American companies in their core competency. (In a similar vein Facebook loses heavily to Vkonakte and Q Zone in Russia and China respectively).

      Outsourcing indeed works poorly - and that is precisely why it is very important to US companies to bring the talent in. Or to abandon the markets to the local companies employing the very same people they failed to bring to US.

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    6. averros,
      Engineering does not pay well compared to other areas requiring similar levels of effort and ability except for maybe a couple sub fields, not in general. Getting an engineering degree can be accomplished by being good at school with no real knack for the work, so the educational system doesn't stop it. It just creates engineers who are entirely useless for real world work.

      Global competition would mean no need for visas. No need to bring people physically into the US. It's to drive down wage costs because they'll work here for less than people already here and are captive to their sponsors.The Si valley especially need to keep wages down due to the cost of living there. So they pay marginally more than where I live, but the houses are four times as much.

      Nick, you got it, the opportunities are better elsewhere. If I could stomach it, I would have switched. I knew someone who did and know of others... they make big money compared to if they had stayed in engineering.

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  2. "Also, why would a 20 year old American learn programming when Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg are clamoring to bring a boatload of Indians over and drive down wages."

    Have the spoiled white kids considered that they might get the job if they offer to work for the same amount of money as an Indian? You really think the company would rather go through the hassle of importing someone, teaching them American business customs, hoping they fit in culturally, etc. if they could hire a native for the same price?

    Americans have every advantage possible over foreigners in the American job market. They then proceed to piss it all away because the only real concept they picked up in college was "demand a six figure starting salary and settle for nothing less, your degree from our awesome institute qualifies you for a lifetime of wealth with zero effort."

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    1. Your description has no basis in reality for my experience.

      The laziest co-worker I ever had was a Chinese woman on H1B Visa. (major corporation that needed female engineer numbers and she played for everything she could get and it was considerable) Other than such exceptions if a company has a culture of working engineers long hours everyone does regardless. It's considered 'part of the job'. At one company I worked at engineers were chided for not working enough overtime. That company at that time paid the overtime... a few months later they told us to cool it with the OT.

      And yes, it is the point to make americans work for the same money a foreigner they import will. That's why we have H1B visas, to drive wages down. Furthermore management people rarely have an understanding IME the millions of dollars a good engineer with a proven track record adds to the bottom line. They see people as fungible and simply don't understand what they do. Professional athletes are paid based on their bottom line contributions, if engineers were paid the same way the best performers would have seven digit salaries, maybe eight.

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