the "no good Perl jobs"/"no good Perl programmers" myth

[Sue Spence]

Steve Peters wrote:
> On Sun, Aug 06, 2006 at 01:27:32AM +0100, Peter Corlett wrote:
>> On 5 Aug 2006, at 17:40, Uri Guttman wrote:
>>> [...] getting you brits to move
>>> over here is problematic (though i did get a german and a canadian to
>>> move to nyc!).
>> Oh, now that one's easy. H1B appears to be code for "fuck this  
>> employee over", so anybody who is not completely wet behind the ears  
>> will give it a wide berth unless the deal is astoundingly better than  
>> what's on offer locally.  
> 
> Yes, and even worse, is many green beans go to work for companies that
> "hold" your green card.  The result is that you can't change jobs
> without your current employer's kind consent, which is rarely ever given.
> 

Companies do not hold 'green cards'.  'Green card' is slang for 
permanent residency (ILR).  An H1-B visa OTOH ties a person to the 
sponsoring employer, but changing jobs is mostly just a matter of the 
new company filling out and sending off a form.

Unless things have changed radically, no US company can stop their H1-B 
employees from changing jobs, however much they might like to do so. In 
my case, I was quite happy for my friends to transfer their visas. Their 
new employers paid me a fee, in fact. Employers need to keep good 
relations amongst themselves, after all.

Moving from H1-B status to the green card is more complicated and 
involves jumping through hoops that not every person wants to jump. 
Becoming a citizen is even more weird, but useful if you want to be able 
to come and go at will. When my English spousal unit decided to get a US 
passport a few years ago (late '90s), a Chinese chap tested his English 
language skills. He was kinda unamused. ;)