U.S. tech firms — Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Apple — were the top 10 employers of H-1B recipients in 2024.
- Amazon workers bagged the highest number of H-1B visas every year between 2020 and 2024.
- U.S. companies have grown exponentially and need more IT talent.
- Indian IT firms have scaled back H-1B filings amid increased scrutiny.
I’m sure there are many cases where tech companies just cannot find local talent, but it wouldn’t surprise me if the H-1B provision is also misused to get less expensive labor. This could ultimately make it less attractive for locals to get into the field at all, since they cannot compete on salary. It also contributes to brain drain from developing countries. Personally I’m not going to shed a tear for Amazon in this case.
Not just salary - H1B are also good at following orders, because if they lose their job, they will get deported.
A good way to stop companies from abusing H1B is to make the visa portable with the worker for a set number of years. If the company is underpaying/overworking them, the worker on H1B can just skip town to another company without fear or deportation. This makes it not worth while for corporations to hire H1B when it costs money and time.
It sort of is portable in the sense that if another company wants to hire you. They can initiate a visa transfer process so you can go work for them but that transfer process costs time and money, so it’s still designed to make it harder for people on visa to switch companies
It’s more about control than money.