Tag: jobs

Oppose closure of OPT Compliance Unit

Ask Biden to reopen OPT compliance unit!

The Optional Practical Training (OPT) program gives businesses a financial incentive to hire foreign college graduates instead of American and legal immigrant graduates. Employers do not have to pay payroll taxes and the OPT employees do not have to pay FICA withholding, making these employees significantly less expensive to hire. The OPT program is responsible for the inability of most American STEM graduates to find jobs in STEM fields — fewer than 50% of STEM graduates are finding STEM jobs. Moreover, the FICA fund loses out on $2 billion each year due to OPT and CPT.

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Oppose H-2B Increase

Make sure the omnibus spending bill doesn’t increase H-2B visas!

I cannot understand why some of your colleagues are pushing for H-2B visa increases in the upcoming omnibus spending bill. American workers are still devastated by the pandemic and the situation will only get worse this winter. Increasing the number of H-2B foreign workers will only make it more difficult for Americans to get back to work.

Increasing H-2B visa numbers will only keep more Americans unemployed and outside the workforce. Because H-2B visa holders tend to take unskilled jobs, these visas harm less-educated and lower-skilled Americans the most. Worse still, these impacted Americans are disproportionately Black and Hispanic Americans.

Further unfairly impacted by the pandemic, Black Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Americans with a high school education or less have been hit the hardest, and increasing H-2B numbers will only escalate the burden. Please ensure the omnibus spending bill doesn’t raise the H-2B cap or authorize DHS to raise the cap.

Greg Raven, Apple Valley, CA

Labor Department statistics prove no ‘labor shortage’

According to recent statistics released by the Labor Department, there has been some improvement in the current jobs crisis facing American workers. Sadly, there is much work to be done in reversing the disastrous effects the COVID-19 panic has had on our economy and labor force.

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Thank you for holding federal agencies accountable

Thank you for your recent executive order holding federal agencies accountable for H-1B abuses in the contractor sector. I’m sure you were as shocked as I was to learn of the TVA’s plans to outsource crucial IT jobs in one of the nation’s critical infrastructure grids — especially during the dire jobs situation facing the nation.

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