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6 Reasons Why Cutting Back H1Bs is Bad for America and Bad for Our Workers
Yesterday, the President signed an order that froze visas for foreign workers until the end of the year. (NBC News, 6/22/20) Over 219,000 workers could be impacted as a result of the order. (CNBC, 6/23/20) With massive unemployment, currently at 13.3% (CNN, 6/5/20), it might seem logical to promote an America first approach to reviving jobs.
However, policies designed to curb immigration end up hurting American workers and also inhibit American dominance in the global economy. Here are 6 reasons that break down why curbing immigrant workers, especially in tech, is bad for America and our workers.
Reason #1: It Will Slow Down Innovation in the U.S.
44% of Silicon Valley tech and engineering companies had immigrant founders. (Bloomberg, February 2016)). If we focus purely on unicorns (tech companies with over $1 billion in valuation), that number jumps to 51%. We might not care about Silicon Valley if we live on other parts of the country such as the Rust Belt or say Appalachia.
After all, most of the high-tech jobs have been drained from the middle of the country to the coasts. (CBS, August 2018) However, with COVID19 and the surge in remote work, these jobs are now trending out of big cities and back into the American heartland. (The…
