The H-1B’s spousal complement, the dreaded H-4 or “dependent” visa, means if he wants to stay and work in America, his brilliant, cheerful and pregnant wife Samvita Padukone, 27, would be chained at home by work restrictions. “The H-4 is out,” he says, sitting next to Padukone in their Toronto home. “Because there’s no way that I would be comfortable – I mean, I don’t have the right, to tell my wife `You have to sit at home and be barefoot and pregnant.’ No one has the right to tell anyone that, let alone someone who studied in Singapore on scholarship.” …
The couple’s situation isn’t unique. Mavinkurve, who works on digital mapping and was recently promoted to head a team at Google’s California headquarters, says he is one of several Google employees stationed in Canada because of American visa restrictions. Noting that Alberta has targeted H-1B holders, he says “Canada is already showing signs of capitalizing on America’s misguided `walls.’” …
“It’s hard for me to know what `from’ means. I was born in Bombay and I have a lot of family there. But I grew up in Saudi Arabia, because that’s where my dad was working for a long time. And then at the age of 14 I went to America,” he says. “The baby will just, kind of, be born whenever, wherever we are.” Living here and working for a company in California presents its own, uniquely modern challenges” …
This past Saturday we went to a party in Miami hosted by a young gay couple who are planning on having a family – one’s a Canadian with long experience in financing sustainable investments in emerging economies, the other an American with strong ties to Miami. They’re looking at houses in Toronto – because it’s a great place to raise a family and because of the economic crisis.
Crises are times when the relative positions of nations and cities can, and frequently do, change quickly. The closing of European economies during the late 20s and 30s causes a massive movement of top scientific, entrepreneurial, and creative talent to the United States. I’m not saying anything like that will happen to the U.S. But when it comes to top talent, the margin can really matter. If talented people or their spouses face obstacles to working and living in the U.S., they will go elsewhere: some will return home, some may go to Canada. Enterprising companies will open up facilities where needed to attract this talent. Over time, these sorts of places can develop a self-reinforcing cycle of growth, developing greater abilities to attract talent.
April 17th, 2009 at 9:27 am
American immigration policy is completely upside down. We have more than enough unskilled labor (both legal and illegal) flocking to the U.S. (although that has slowed), but not nearly enough skilled immigrants.
April 17th, 2009 at 9:37 am
Having moved several times myself I have spent some time thinking about what attracts certain people to certain locations. I had begun to think that Canada’s unique situation was that we were attracting lots of talented immigration, but not necessarily risk taking (who tended to go to the US because of the differences in the signals between the two regions).
This is where the US’s current immigration policies might really help. If those who are talented and risk taking just can’t make their way into the US then perhaps they will increasingly choose Canada. This could have major impacts for the Canadian economy if they look to start new businesses here and have anywhere near the success they have been having in places like Silicon Valley.
April 17th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Canadian cities such as Vancouver are today in a unique position to attract the most talented immigrants. Vancouver performs well relative to US peers when ranked on tolerance measures, such as the Boho, Gay and Mosiac indicies. Moreover less onerous immigration laws and the percieved failure of US economic policy has improved Canada’s relative attractiveness as a destination for talent.
Along with poaching existing US talent in the IT space, Vancouver should establish itself as the starting point for talented new immigrants from Asia.
April 17th, 2009 at 9:55 pm
Canada has it’s own immigrant worker problems. English speaking, highly educated, internationally experienced knowledge workers need not apply, the work culture and immigration process forbids it. Canadian experience required to work, save maybe cleaning toilets at Tim Horton’s. Oh, and we know you’re studying here so you can work here, but you have to apply for your visa out of country.
Maybe the US is tough for working Canadians and other immigrants, , but Canada is no bed of fresh cut flowers for skilled immigrants either.
- Adam Trent. (a Canadian working immigrant from central Europe)
April 18th, 2009 at 7:04 am
Following up on what David and Adam said, and since Richard IS a working immigrant in Canada, is it much easier to get a work permit in Canada than in the US?
On the low skill side, the US’s problem there is mostly ILLEGAL immigration. Let’s try to separate the problems of illegal immigration from the H1B visa issue. They really have nothing to do with each other.
April 19th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Buzzcut – the Canadian immigration system works on a points system. You get points for being relatively young, points for having a university degree — more for a graduate degree–, points for speaking English or French fluently, etc. The Google guy’s wife could probably qualify on her own to immigrate to Canada, based on the information offered.
The challenge for many immigrants is having their foreign credentials recognized at the provincial level (immigration is federal policy, but being certified as a Professional Engineer or medical doctor, for example, is the jurisdiction of the provinces). So, the result of this can be foreign-trained medical doctors or engineers driving cabs or washing dishes while they try to get recognized or complete the course work required.
For some people, this isn’t an issue — if you have a Master’s in computer science from India, many private companies will recognize this as a great credential. So as long as the federal government allows you to immigrate based on points, you’re fine.
But that aside, Canada needs to solve this federal-provincial credential recognition discrepancy.
April 20th, 2009 at 9:46 am
Buzzcut, I agree illegal immigration should be separate from the H-1B visa issue, but I’m not sure it looks that way to legitimate immigrants. Fingerprinting at border crossings, a requirement to report any change of address to the federal gov’t within 10 days (under penalty of deportation), popular resentment of the H-1B program, even the terminology of “alien” — they all contribute to sending the message that skilled workers are admitted grudgingly and warily into the U.S.
As for the Google engineer in the story, sounds to me like he’s pushing the limits of what he can do without a visa (if he’s flying down to Silicon Valley every week, that’s working in the US, even if he’s living in Canada). He may come to regret having told his story in the newspaper if a customs officer makes the connection at one of his future border crossings.
April 22nd, 2009 at 11:30 pm
Andrew’s comment about his impression that Canada attracts talent, but not risk-taking talent, and how that may change because of immigration policies, is an interesting one. This transformation of economies is a theme I have been thinking about lately, as the crisis has taken hold. I am just finishing up a business degree in a school known for its finance prowess but because of a couple reasons, folks are finding employment in alternate fields. This is either due to a lack of roles, or because they are coming to the realization that finance is not all it was previously cracked up to be. I for one, think that that is a positive transformation. In the last 10 years of good times in the finance world, too many of our most talented and brightest have defaulted into a banking role because of the lucrative compensation. With what we are seeing going on right now, other industries will get their fair share of this talent and this can only spur further entrepreneurship and innovation. Thus, while there are definite short term pains, I feel in the end we will only be stronger because of it.
April 23rd, 2009 at 6:58 pm
I agree that Canada definitely benefits from the U.S. limiting immigration policy and has been able to attract skilled immigrants which have contributed to the country’s growth. I related to the Google article posted on a personal level and totally agree with what the U.S. immigration policies signals to immigrants. Even though I have a U.S. green card, I decided to come to Canada because of its culture, the diversity and tolerance of its people. Today, I know I made the right choice. Wages might be a bit lower in Canada, but the quality of life and the culture more than make up for it. Most importantly, I don’t feel like an immigrant here; perhaps it’s the combination of Toronto’s openness and the fact that almost half its population is foreign born. Regardless, I feel that Canada does offer very attractive opportunities for immigrants relative to the U.S.
April 25th, 2009 at 12:03 am
New York Times published a similar story on April 11th, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/12/business/12immig.html One question comes to my mind is that what attracts top talents. With its size and depth in so many industries, US is among the very few that can source its talents from every corner of this planet, at any time it needs to. And US has the tradition, market, and companies to do that.
If we look at talent sourcing from the sourcing perspective, there is always a cost factor in this process. For those truly top talents at a global level, the cost structure and dynamics are perhaps very different from what most people can or are willing to comprehend. It is like Lamborghini commands very different drivers than Ford Focus.
April 28th, 2009 at 11:01 am
It will be interesting to see how this evolves as virtual communication technology improves. I think many forward looking companies, in a trend that mimics the outsourcing of the 80s/90s/00s, are starting to view geographical restrictions as an opportunity to get global talent working for them while they stay in their home countries. I can’t see a very good reason why the next generation of net kids who are extremely comfortable with communicating with people over profound distances would not feel more comfortable than today’s white hair execs. So basically I believe if this regressive US policy continues there could actually be more advances in these high definition or 3-D meeting spaces where you could have someone in Saudi Arabia, Victoria, and Sao Paolo all on the same “team” working towards traditional corporate goals.