DHS H-1B visa proposal: Wage Level system may benefit outsourcers over US-trained workers
By
johntfella
8mo ago· 14 min readenInsight
85/100
Golden Brown
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Summary
The article critiques the Department of Homeland Security's proposal to replace the H-1B visa lottery with a system based on Department of Labor "Wage Levels." It argues that DOL Wage Levels do not reflect actual market wages or skill levels, but rather measure relative seniority within job categories. The piece warns that this reform could inadvertently benefit outsourcing companies and harm US-trained talent, as the wage level framework was never designed for cross-occupation wage comparisons.
Key quotes
· 3 pulledOn the surface, this seems like a merit-based reform: higher wages should mean higher skills.
In reality, DOL's Wage Levels are very different from actual wages.
The Wage Level framework was never designed to compare wages across occupations because it measures relative seniority within a job category, not actual pay.
How DHS’s H-1B proposal could help outsourcers and hurt US-trained talent
