Resolved: The United States federal government should increase its quota of H-1B visas.

agsr

Resolved: The United States federal government should increase its quota of H-1B visas.

I will affirm this resolution as part of the DebateIsland Tournament.  Please note that I was randomly assigned affirmative side and therefore please judge this debate based on quality of my arguments, not your personal opinion on the topic.

Definitions and Rules:

"Should" - decision should be based on the overall benefit to the US companies and US taxpayers.

This debate isn't about weather better controls shouldn't be placed to ensure that H-1B visas aren't abused.

H-1B program is an important source of specialized talent, especially in the IT industry. Currently, The program is most often associated with the tech industry, where H-1B workers hold about 12%–13% of jobs, according to a Goldman Sachs report. (For comparison, they hold around 0.6%–0.7% of U.S. jobs overall.) 

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/05/business/h-1b-visa-tech-cheers-for-foreign-workers.html

US companies compete with Global enterprises.  If US-based companies are restricted to hire global talent, but European and APAC companies can get access to most of the talent pool then it puts US companies in an unfair disadvantage. It's not about just net costs, but access to the best talent available - that is especially important in STEM - now fields like Data Science and Artificial Intelligence have significant shortage and limiting the H-1B pool will limit many business opportunities.

Source: https://www.business.com/articles/big-data-big-problem-coping-with-shortage-of-talent-in-data-analysis/

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-07/just-how-shallow-is-the-artificial-intelligence-talent-pool

Seven in 10 employers said that having a global workforce was "very" or "extremely important" to their talent strategy (up from 63% last year). Some 77% cited the need to fill a skills gap for looking abroad.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2018/02/07/companies-say-they-want-more-h-1b-foreign-workers/#31d4dbf4df64

If US companies become less competitive then they will start losing market share and will result in less jobs for American workers and less taxes for the US government to collect.  

Also given such a shallow talent pool for specialty skills, US companies costs will be significantly higher by not hiring H1-B workers.  

In fact, Heritage Foundation calculations show that raising the cap to 195,000 visas would increase revenues by a total of nearly $69 billion over eight years. Unlike tax increases, this would be an economically beneficial source of revenue.

Source: https://www.heritage.org/immigration/report/more-h-1b-visas-more-american-jobs-better-economy

A crackdown on foreign work visas would devastate the US economy.  H1-B visas and immigrants are an important source of innovation and economic benefit we have seen in the United States.

• If the Trump administration and Congress crack down on H1-B visas, it won't just hurt immigrants, it will hurt all of us.
• Immigrants have had a profound effect on innovation in the U.S. Consider Russian-born Sergey Brin, who co-founded Google, and South African-born Elon Musk, who founded Tesla and SpaceX.
• Immigrants are twice as likely as U.S. born citizens to start a business and small business accounts for a whopping 99.7 percent of U.S. businesses.

Source: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/07/crackdown-on-foreign-work-visas-would-devastate-us-economy-commentary.html

I look forward to debating this resolution with my opponent @Eyes2See

Eyes2See

Hello DebateIsland!

I am so humbled to have won the last round of this tournament by only one point! I am excited to put my best foot forward on this debate, and hopefully entertain with an interesting argument that can persuade you to vote me onto the next round.

The United States federal government should increase its quota of H-1B visas.

Anytime there is a proposition that the U.S. Congress “should” make a change to law, there needs to be some reasoning, or explanation behind the proposition.

In debate terminology, FOR has taken on the role of debating the position that the U.S. Congress “should” change the current H-1B visa program from its regular cap of 65,000 visas (Dept. of Homeland Security, 2017), to some new proposed quota, and thus has the burden of proof (Hashmall, 2009), or the burden to explain why this cap needs to be increased.

Unfortunately, more than 75% of FOR’s argument is highly irrelevant to the debate as it either explained why the visa program is important to have in place, or the negative effects of ‘cracking down’ on immigration which I can only assume means to lower the current quota of H-1B visas. In the interest of staying on topic, and having a clean and easy debate for the readers to view, I will sum up all of those points made by FOR in one statement.

This debate is in no way suggesting that we should lower the quota of H-1B visas, or remove it completely. Both positions in this debate understand that the H-1B visa program is important to have in place, and both positions understand the importance of a ‘quota,’ or ‘cap’ to the visa program in order to control on some level the amount of immigration coming into this country.

With that being said, the only remaining relevant argument from FOR is the following:

If US companies become less competitive then they will start losing market share and will result in less jobs for American workers and less taxes for the US government to collect.  

Also given such a shallow talent pool for specialty skills, US companies costs will be significantly higher by not hiring H1-B workers.  

In fact, Heritage Foundation calculations show that raising the cap to 195,000 visas would increase revenues by a total of nearly $69 billion over eight years. Unlike tax increases, this would be an economically beneficial source of revenue.

Source: https://www.heritage.org/immigration/report/more-h-1b-visas-more-american-jobs-better-economy

 

I will now attempt to rebuttal FOR’s argument(s) for this debate.

When FOR stated, “Also given such a shallow talent pool for specialty skills, US companies costs will be significantly higher by not hiring H1-B workers.” It is implied that the US companies costs will be ‘significantly’ higher by hiring American workers.

FOR defined success in this debate as, “Decision should be based on the overall benefit to the US companies and US taxpayers.”

We are left then with an unsuccessful argument by FOR’s very definition and statement. You either have the overall benefit to the U.S. company, which according to FOR in this statement would be to pay less in salaries, or the overall benefit to the U.S. taxpayer which would be to receive a ‘significantly’ higher income by NOT increasing the H1-B visa cap. By this statement from FOR, it seems as if you can only benefit one or the other, and thus you do not have an overall benefit to U.S. companies AND U.S. taxpayers, and no justification to increase the visa limit.

The final portion of FOR’s argument is the following statement:

In fact, Heritage Foundation calculations show that raising the cap to 195,000 visas would increase revenues by a total of nearly $69 billion over eight years. Unlike tax increases, this would be an economically beneficial source of revenue.

Source: https://www.heritage.org/immigration/report/more-h-1b-visas-more-american-jobs-better-economy

To this argument I would say again that nobody is debating that workers from other countries, especially the brightest and most skilled, can benefit America greatly. It is obvious however that immigration has to be controlled in order to truly protect and preserve the interest of America, the interest of U.S. companies, and the interest of the U.S. taxpayer.

Closing Arguments

Neither position in this debate is advocating for a crack down on H-1B visa’s. Nobody in this debate is disagreeing that the Visa program is important, or that it brings major benefits to the U.S. economy and companies, however the FOR argument is responsible for explaining the problems with the current visa limit, and what the visa limit should be increased to. If the FOR argument is unable to do this, then the visa limit ‘should’ stay at the current quota, and I could hopefully can encourage you to vote for me.

 

References

 

Dept. of Homeland Security. (2017, October 03). Resolved: The United States federal government should increase its quota of H-1B visas. Retrieved February 25, 2018, from http://www.debateisland.com/discussion/1779/resolved-the-united-states-federal-government-should-increase-its-quota-of-h-1b-visas

 

Hashmall, M. J. (2009, September 23). Burden of Proof. Retrieved February 25, 2018, from https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/burden_of_proof