Norm Matloff on H-1B and America’s Internal Brain Drain

 

1. The H-1B program is causing an INTERNAL BRAIN DRAIN in the U.S. The H-1B program causes displacement (direct and indirect) of U.S. citizens and permanent residents–especially those over age 35–from the tech field, and it discourages young people from going into tech in the first place.

2. Our federal government, especially the National Science Foundation, has played an active role in facilitating this internal brain drain. Back in 1989 the NSF was in the vanguard of those pushing Congress to establish the H-1B program, and an internal NSF paper advocated bringing in large numbers of foreign scientists and engineers for the explicit goal of holding down PhD wages. Moreover, the NSF explicitly stated that this would CAUSE an internal brain drain, as the domestic students would be put off by the stagnant wages.

[“Dr. Norm Matloff on a Brookings Institute/GMU High Tech Immigration Conference.”]