H-1B visas

There is an interesting article in the New York Times about how the Bell Labs created modern American technology. You may want to grab a Chablis, put on your yoga clothes and read this New York Times article.

The H1B visa is directly related to this article. The H1B visa is the main visa that is used by businesses to bring in foreign professional workers. Without it there would be no Silicon Valley no Internet no Google.

Right now there is a campaign by many in politics to keep the H1B visa totally inadequate as it is today allowing in only a trickle of new vital workers.

The relevance to the New York Times article relates to my own experience. In the 1970s I was often called upon to advise the Japanese government. When Japan asked me how America generated such great innovation I pulled out a copy of the Bell Labs telephone book. Virtually every name in the book was unpronounceable. Nearly the entire staff came from outside the United States.

If Japan wanted American style innovation, it had to find a way to attract the greatest minds of the world. It had to rely on 2 billion adults not 70 million native Japanese.

The same is true of the United States today.

Don't expect self-serving narrow minded political people to understand this reality.

We need to expand the H1B visas to the level of hundreds of thousands per year. And let the creative forces of the world bring their families with them, so they will stay and help us. They are our future not the unemployed tech workers who vote for xenophobic politicians.