this post was submitted on 26 Dec 2024
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Summary

Elon Musk faced backlash from his followers on X after advocating for importing “super talented engineers” to address a shortage in the U.S. tech industry.

Musk likened hiring top foreign talent to building a championship sports team and argues that there is a shortage of talented and motivated American engineers.

Critics argued there’s sufficient U.S. talent being overlooked or underpaid, with some pointing to widespread tech layoffs.

Musk dismissed claims of low wages or training gaps, maintaining a need for exceptional engineering talent to advance innovation.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 2 hours ago

Super talented = extremely desperate foreigners who'll work 90hr weeks for very low pay.

Just in case anyone needed a translation.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 2 hours ago

What I'm reading is that he wants Chinese or Indian engineers because they are as qualified as the next guy, they're already used to insane hours and no holidays AND he can just pay them their original wage, which is peanuts compared to what US engineers make. Also once he's done with them he can just deport them. What's not to like?!

[–] [email protected] 56 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

He didn't explain to them that holders of H1B visas have to stay with the corporation that hires them or else they get deported. It's semi-slavery. Conservatives would love it.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

That's the only way to keep salaries depressed, which is why they're brought in. If they could switch jobs, there'd be competition among potential employers and the salaries would increase. The whole H1B scheme is a filthy racket. It depresses the wages of non-H1B workers, it exploits those on an H1B visa, and there's a whole cottage industry of faking recruitment campaigns before showing that a company was "forced" to fill a critical skills shortage with an H1B holder. For example, the qualifications can be written so that only people on certain Indian of Chinese computer-science courses can have the required coursework. Not that the applicant necessarily took the course, though: there's another cottage industry in India and in China of people doing exams on someone else's behalf.

And then there's industrial espionage...

[–] [email protected] 47 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

"import" like it's livestock. Strategically avoiding the word "migration", too.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 hours ago

Human Commodities

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 hour ago

What is so incredible is that the education system in the US is so fucked that so so so so SO many high skill, high education jobs need to be brought in from overseas. Meanwhile Elon just wants to fuck over the education system in the US even more.

The reason why he wants to bring in foreign labor is, in all likelihood, to make his employees more easily controlled. Expats are less likely to raise a fuss about their living conditions and may not have much of a connection to the political movements around them to take part in protests. Also if those employees have their visa's dependent entirely on the whims of their employer, if they DO get uppity in any way, they can face almost immediate deportation upon being fired.

In short, he does not give a fuck about Americans. It is 100% about control and exploitation.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

Can we ask Musk to volunteer to become the world's first recorded instance of a Mellified Man? Then science can determine if it's truly a medical marvel or not. He'll be the only one to have done it! I think his ego might go for that.

Plus it'll be sweeter when we eat him. Candied CEO sounds kinda good.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 hours ago

Finally, you could sincerely call him a sweet man

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

It's crazy that these politicians can just make wild claims without providing a shred of evidence. The just get to "dismiss."

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 hours ago (3 children)

Stop that, please.

Musk is not a politician.

Do not normalize this by even referring to him as such. He has never held elected office.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 hours ago

He's an oligarch interfering in politics. That makes him a politician, as well as an asshole.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 hours ago

The guy is absolutely an unelected politician. He's Trump's puppeteer and will be using his money to get what he wants.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

He's more than qualified. All you need to be a politician in America is capital. The actual law is typically sidestepped in favor of monetary gain. How is this any different than our usual goings-on? This is the most American thing that's happened in years.

You're still pretending the law and constitution mean a damn thing in practice. They're gonna roll it up and smoke it next year.

[–] [email protected] 80 points 9 hours ago (2 children)

Ya'll are not reading between the lines here.

"The number of people who are super talented engineers AND super motivated in the USA is far too low,"

The "AND super-motivated [sic]" is key here. By "super-motivated" he means working 80-100 hours for shit pay.

Yeah, both American citizens and H1Bs area getting tired of this shit.

On another vein, his government "positions" listing

"We need super high-IQ small-government revolutionaries willing to work 80+ hours per week on unglamorous cost-cutting." for "zero pay".

Is code for, "I want corporate lackies for this job." Corporations will pay it's reps to "work" in these government positions and basically lobby. No one else will bother because normal people got mouths to feed.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

It's not really "between the lines" when he's been straight up shouting exactly that for years. He's been very vocal about it at least since he bought Twitter, "keeping only the most talented ones who really want to work" and it turned out that only the immigrants who can't AFFORD to leave stayed for shit pay.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 hours ago

Another fun thing about H1B holders is that, in their home countries, there are often kickbacks and indenture schemes that mean that they're spending the first year of their working life in the US paying back someone for "arranging" the work. So if they quit, they're in debt to the mob, and if they don't return, their families are at risk.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 hours ago
[–] [email protected] 37 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

Don't forget that (using his words) he himself was an illegal alien that overstayed his student visa and started to work in his first startup with invalid status. Kick him out and ban him from re entry, no exceptions!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago

Yeah, rule of law applies to everyone, regardless of what those mouthpieces on the Supreme Court might claim.

[–] [email protected] 62 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

Deport the foreigners taking our jobs except for the ones who directly benefit me.

What. A. Shitstain.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago

They don't have to lie any more. They only need 4 years.

[–] [email protected] 139 points 14 hours ago (4 children)

shortage of engineers? are you kidding me?

I know of two first degree of separation SWEs who can't land jobs. One worked at microsoft for like a decade.

FTFA:

Other followers accused Musk of simply not wanting to pay top talent what it's worth.

Bingo, got it in one. They don't want to pay american talent american wages, they want to pay all talent 3rd world country wages while they themselves pocket a 50 billion dollar contract.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 10 hours ago

It's a common trick used in American Hiring Practices, knowingly set an impossible standard for hiring. Turn around and say "We can't fill this position with candidates in the US, here's the list of people we rejected. Can we get approved for hiring visas?"

And The Government falls for that bullshit guaranteed... after some donations to the Super PAC of course.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 13 hours ago (2 children)

He's running out of inexperienced engineers to burn through. He statedv early on that he wanted to create a surplus of engineers to drive down the cost.

That cost being, paying the engineers' salaries.

I work pretty closely with a lot of young engineers. My work brings them in as interns, hires them, but doesn't pay them very well and after 2 years we have new engineers because they've all found better jobs. Saturating the market with talent really hasn't worked out the way he wanted it to, because as it turns out that's nothing new.

So now he's gotta find a new way to pay engineers less.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago) (5 children)

So now he's gotta find a new way to pay engineers less.

I imagine it would be something like this:

Position: Senior ML Software Developer
Join the XTesla420X family of goal-oriented, success-driven, rockstar AI/Machine Learning engineers who aren't afraid to move fast and break things in the name of automation and mankind's future.

With no middle management, you get to be your own boss* and set your own working hours**. The only thing holding to hold you back from greatness is your own potential, and we're ready to help you thrive in a fast-paced environment where the sky the limit and your own mortality is nothing but a temporary setback.

Requirements:

  • 10 years industry experience
  • No kids
  • A 210% work ethic
  • Intimacy with a Python

Compensation & Benefits:

  • Exposure in lieu of salary
  • Office vending machine
  • Office cocaine (unavailable for remote workers)
  • Optional unpaid vacation days on statuatory holidays

* reporting directly to Elon Mouske
** minimum 80 per week

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

No middle managers is pretty attractive ngl

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 hours ago

If the CEO is Musk, I'd take as many managers between him and me as I can.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 hours ago

Intimacy with a Python

I mean, it helps either way you read it

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago) (5 children)

I don't understand how anyone thinks immigrants steal jobs. You can't just show up to a workplace and collect a paycheque, you have to get hired first.

Employers are giving jobs to immigrants. And they know it because they are the ones getting the visas.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Immigrants are in a more precarious position and are harder to get on board with unionisation efforts. The H1B visa specifically is designed specifically to undermine worker solidarity. If you're on a H1B visa and you get fired, your visa is cancelled and you go back home, to be replaced by someone else. There's similar incentives at play for undocumented migrants.

Any immigration that doesn't include a full green card is bad for all workers.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago

It doesn't need to be a green card, it could be time-limited, as long as it's not locked to a single sponsor.

The big lie behind the H1B program is that the jobs cannot be filled by Americans. The way the jobs are advertised is carefully crafted to exclude Americans, requiring specific coursework and qualifications that are named differently from US equivalents.

I was in consulting and was a senior exec, I saw how the game was played. They should burn the whole shithouse down to the ground and start over. The way it works now benefits nobody but the billionaires, and billionaires should not exist until we are all rich.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

I don’t understand how anyone thinks immigrants steal jobs

Econ 101 Supply/Demand charts tell us that if the supply of laborers goes up, the price for each laborer must fall.

So it's less stealing jobs and more stealing bargaining power for pay.

Of course, this ignores the price fixing power of monopsony. Prices can also be low because there is only one buyer of labor (or one big cartel) in an industry that refuses to employ outside of a certain price range. If you pick up Peter Theil's book "Zero to One", you'll read all about how the end goal of a business owner is to corner the market and dictate price within the industry.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

Prices can also be low because there is only one buyer of labor (or one big cartel) in an industry that refuses to employ outside of a certain price range.

There's a lot of under-the-table wage-fixing within the industry. It's usually masked by the use of HR consultants for "benchmarking" of salaries (i.e., providing the desired answer for a reasonable fee). They then inevitably tell the employer that their salaries are higher than their competitors, and the employers use that as leverage to reduce salary increases or cut pay and benefits.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

Yuuuup. A lot of "illegal immigration"and often even the technically legal stuff is honestly closer to "human trafficking." They want people they can pay less and who will be too scared of ICE to speak up about labor violations and shady / dangerous business practices. A looot of nursing homes are staying in business while understaffing to the point of extreme neglect by hiring immigrant nurses then telling them they'll get deported or owe them $10k+ for breaking their contract or otherwise losing them as an employer. This is how you wind up hearing stories about a nursing home that had one nursing assistant responsible for 32+ patients, half or more total care who in addition to needing to be fed and cleaned also need to be turned side to side every two hours to not literally wear holes in the skin over their bones. In my clinical placement I saw a pressure injury from a nursing home so big the wound care nurse could fit her fist in and when she debrided the dead tissue you could see the sacrum underneath. The nurses at these places are too scared to speak up because even if what the employer is telling them is illegal they don't know for sure or it would take resources they don't have to fight it. And by the time the patient gets any help you've got those massive pressure ulcers. I'm very pro DNR just let me go ffs.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago) (1 children)

“Stealing” jobs is just Americans being willfully ignorant that these people are willing to work shit conditions, for less pay, so they can get that “American Dream” they’ve been sold so often.

Yes, you’re correct the corps are enabling it but the other aspect is our own citizens being ignorant fucks and not caring about adjusting their views because it would mean admitting they are wrong.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago

Enforcement of decent working conditions would be another way to rectify this situation, but guess which government agency enforcement budgets are always underfunded?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Read between the lines. More unions in USA means companies have less guys to be robbed for profits. So they - especially Leon - need more workers for less money. Leon needs slaves!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

All Conservatives(=Sadly the today's "alt" right) want is to revert back to whatever status they deem fit. For Germany it's the Third Reich, for the US it's the slave times.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago

Yeah. sic In such fast changing times the best idea is to go back decades to make again all the errors we did step by step! facepalm

[–] [email protected] 238 points 18 hours ago (11 children)

Musk doesn't want a championship sports team, he wants a cheap, desperate, obedient source of labour.

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