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http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/us-indian-high-tech-firm
U.S., Indian high-tech firms lobby against restrictions in Senate bill
By David Nakamura, Thursday, July 11, 6:49 PM
U.S. and Indian information technology companies are protesting provisions
in a Senate immigration bill that would impose new restrictions on firms
that rely heavily on highly skilled foreign workers, prompting fears that
the issue could harm trade relations between the two countries.
The companies have hired high-priced lobbyists to air their objections on
Capitol Hill and to the Obama administration. On Friday, a high-level
government delegation from India plans to discuss the issue in a meeting
with U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman and Commerce Secretary Penny
Pritzker in Washington.
Industry officials said the regulations, if made law, would limit the
ability of American outsourcing companies to hire technology workers from
abroad and place them with clients for temporary assignments, such as
installing new computer software and updating e-mail systems. That could
drive up costs for businesses, which could be passed on to consumers, the
officials said.
Indian firms, too, fear the repercussions on that nation’s fast-growing
technology sector, which sends tens of thousands of workers to the United
States on H-1B temporary worker visas.
“What this does for American firms’ relationship with global IT firms in
India is it disrupts the business model,” said Ron Somers, president of the
U.S.-India Business Council, which represents 350 U.S. companies and has
hired the law firm Patton Boggs to lobby lawmakers. “This is bad for U.S.
businesses, it’s bad for the global IT industry, and it’s bad for the
larger India-U.S. partnership.”
The fight over the high-tech provisions in the Senate plan is a sub-drama in
the larger Capitol Hill battle over comprehensive immigration reform. The
Republican-controlled House is pursuing an alternative course focused on
passing smaller bills, casting doubt on the chances for a broad overhaul.
The roots of the dispute over high-tech visas date to long-
standing concerns among U.S. technology firms that there are not enough
skilled workers in the country and that they must be imported. Unions and
many Democrats counter that the system is used to avoid hiring American
workers because of cost concerns.
During months of negotiations over the Senate bill, Republicans pushed
successfully to sharply expand H-1B visas for highly skilled workers from
the current annual limit of 65,000 to as many as 180,000. In return,
Democrats secured provisions aimed at ensuring that American workers get the
first shot at high-paying technology jobs.
Under the plan, outsourcing firms with more than 15 percent of their skilled
employees on H-1B visas must wait a year before replacing an American
worker with a foreigner and pay that worker higher wages, and they are
forbidden from placing such workers with U.S. employers.
A Democratic aide said Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) led the fight for the
restrictions because he believes the visa program has been exploited for
years by some U.S. outsourcing firms. Although many Indian workers remain in
the United States to work at client sites, many others are sent back to
their home country after receiving training on temporary visas and open
satellite offices that handle operations from afar .
Durbin’s position is that “H-1B visas have been, and still are,
outsourcing visas,” said the aide, who spoke on the condition of anonymity
to discuss details of the legislation. “India officials have bragged that
these are outsourcing visas with limited oversight and limited transparency.”
The technology companies reject that characterization, emphasizing that
Indian workers are returning home because of changes in business structures
for large, multinational companies. Having workers offshore helps ensure
round-the-clock service and support for U.S. clients, they said.
“These provisions undermine the ability of U.S. companies to compete in the
global economy,” said John Procter, a spokesman for Cognizant, a leading
outsourcing firm with 157,000 employees, 1,000 clients worldwide and an
annual revenue of $7.4 billion.
Three Indian technology firms are among the top 10 recipients of H-1B visas,
and the Senate bill has received extensive coverage in the Indian news
media. In April, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram told reporters that he
raised the issue with Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew.
Chidambaram said the “temporary relocation of knowledge workers” was
fundamentally different from other immigration issues.
A recent study by J.P. Morgan predicted that the Senate rules could lower
India’s gross domestic product by up to 0.4 percent in 2015.
Sheela Murthy, an immigration lawyer in Maryland who emigrated from India,
said she has received calls from outsourcing companies concerned about the
future of their businesses.
“They’re telling me they will go out of business,” she said. “Thousands
in the United States will be laid off. Thousands more than that in India
will be impacted.”
U.S.-India trade has grown five-fold since 2000, reaching $100 billion
annually, said Karl Inderfurth, a U.S. assistant secretary of state in the
Clinton administration who is now at the Center for Strategic and
International Studies.
Some U.S. firms fear that the disagreements could prompt India to impose new
sanctions on American companies trying to do more business in that country.
In Friday’s meeting, U.S. officials are prepared to raise their concerns
with Indian Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma about property
rights violations by Indian companies and caps on foreign investment in
India’s insurance industry, according to analysts.
Technology firms are happy that a U.S. House committee last month approved a
separate bill that adds new high-tech visas without the restrictions
imposed in the Senate.
“If this controversy is solved at the bill level, it will be quick and easy
to handle,” said Sudin Apte, chief executive of Offshore Insights, a
global technology firm based in Pune, India. “If it becomes a geopolitical
negotiation, it would be open to a lot of other challenges.”
Peter Wallsten in Washington and Rama Lakshmi in New Delhi contributed to
this report. |
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