In the last days of the 2024 presidential campaign, American technological giants decided to join Elon Musk and support Donald Trump. Some, publicly; Others, with dozens of millions in donations. They expected the new president to be more related to his interests than in his first term. The result has been a Trump that keeps them close to him, but does not have too many objections when punishing his business.
First, with import tariffs from China or Vietnam with which the technology industry especially suffers. Now, with a new rate on a visa that has been key for Silicon Valley to attract the best workers internationally. This is the H-1B, the same as one day used Elon Musk himself, born in South Africa, to enter the US. SATYA NADELLA, CEO of Microsoft, or LASTAR PICHAI, executive director of Google, both of Indian origin.
Now, any worker who wants to get the H-1B will have to pay $ 100,000 (about 85,000 euros). This visa is not only for technological specialists, but it was created in 1990 for people with a degree or a higher title in areas where vacancies are considered difficult to cover, especially in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. However, the reality is that great technological ones are the ones that resort to these permits to attract international talent.
Tens of thousands of workers and their families depend on H-1B. The order that Trump signed on Friday to join it at that rate of $ 100,000 originated panic scenes. The White House did not explain whether the current concessionaires of that visa would have to pay the sum if they were outside the country, so the big technological ones asked all their employees to return before Sunday, when the payment entered into force. “Go home now, before the proclamation enters into force,” Google sent his workers.
Chaos unleashed both at the US airports and abroad. In the social networks, scenes such as those of the San Francisco Emirates were published to Dubai, who had to leave shortly after Trump's announcement and was delayed three hours after many of his passengers, whose final destination was India, prevented takeoff and left the plane for fear of not being able to return to US soil. Finally the White House clarified that those who already had the H-1B would not have to pay again.
70% of these visas go to citizens from India and 12% to Chinese workers. The Trump government ensures that the H-1B system has become a way to hire foreign workers with wages below what Americans specialized in technology would charge. It is true that Silicon Valley could not be understood without attending to the importance of the talent from these countries. However, it is not that the sector treats them as cheap labor.
The highest management positions of large technological ones are full of people born outside the US. In addition to the executive directors of Microsoft or Google, there are also those of Nvidia (Jensen Huang, Taiwan), IBM (Arvind Krishna, India), Intel (Lip-Bu Tan, Malaysia), Uber (Dara Khosrowshahi, Iran), Adobe (Shantanu Narayen, India), Qualcomm (Christian Amo, Brazil) HP (Enrique Lores, Madrid), among others.
Some analysts cover the rate not as a measure to protect US workers, but as a new tariff for large technological ones. Specifically “an talented tariff”: “The White House presents it as a patriotic filter, telling companies that must pay if they really need talent,” says Sanchit Vir Gogia, chief analyst and CEO of the consultant Greyhound Research.
“But it is not a gradual adjustment. It is a tariff on skills. It equates genius with financial balances and forces companies to ration critical talent,” Gogia continues.
Startups, the most affected
Trump has already tried to restrict the H-1B during his first stage in the White House. Then Silicon Valley, unlike now, was a constant focus of internal opposition to his policies, stirred against the measure. Manifestations were organized to stop it. “I hope this is one of the decisive moments in which people join this administration,” A young Sam Altman said in one of themtoday Executive Director of OpenAI. Altman has gone from leading protests against Trump to be part of his technological court.
On this occasion, most Silicon Valley leaders have chosen to remain silent. Even Elon Musk, who last December criticized the possibility of establishing limits to H-1B (“I will go to war in this issue of a magnitude that they cannot understand,” he said) has preferred to respect the non-aggression pact that in recent months governs its relationship with Trump.
Until now, H1-B were raffled among applicants in a lottery, with a maximum of 85,000 a year. Now, the sector expects the policy of large companies to finance the payment of that rate to workers as one more tariff. “Trump's 100,000 dollars tax is a great solution. It will mean that the H-1B visa will be used only for high value jobs, which means that a lottery will not be needed and there will be more security for those jobs,” he tweeted Reed Hastings, president of Netflix and traditional Democratic donor.
However, the speech changes in relation to startups, which cannot undertake that investment. “A rate of $ 100,000 for the H-1B visa will not bother the large technological ones, but it will leave both startups and bodyshops (Agencies that act as an intermediary to place specialized workers, generally foreigners, in other companies) and that is a mistake ”, has written on LinkedIn Garry Tan, and Combinator's executive director, the most prestigious startup accelerator of Silicon Valley.
In full arms race of AI, we are telling the creators to build somewhere else. What we need is to win the 'small American technology', not $ 100,000 tolls
Garry Tan
— Responsible for the main startup accelerator of Silicon Valley
“Incipient teams cannot swallow with that tax. bodyshops They abuse H-1B should be slowed. There are ways to do it without shoring large technological ones or suffocating startups, “he continues so:” Cities like Vancouver or Toronto will prosper instead of US cities. In full arms race of AI, we are telling the creators to build somewhere else. What we need is to win the small technology American, not $ 100,000 tolls. ”
European startups have presented their candidacy to take those positions. “H-1B visas are generating a lot of uncertainty right now,” He has written in the same social network Victor Riparebellidirected by Synthesia, a video startup with AI with a category of unicorn and headquarters in London. “Luckily, they are not needed to get a job like Silicon Valley,” he added. LinkedIn has arrived from publications in the style of startups throughout the continent.
Trump has assured that he will use the funds of the new rate to improve the technological training of US citizens. However, its open war against the country's universities makes it look unlikely an impulse in that regard. For Sanchit Vir Gogia, by Grayhound Research, the result will be greater relocation of work centers to countries such as India, as well as a greater automation of junior work in technological.