Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by Aurornis on Friday September 19, 2025 @07:37PM
(#45308097)
$100K per hire per year.
That's almost as much as the media H1B salary. It's a huge cost overhead. I don't understand how you can be dismissive of a number almost as high as hiring another engineer.
Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by throwawaylaptop on Saturday September 20, 2025 @02:18AM
(#45310922)
Id much prefer the companies pay $150k so that it entices someone to move from Nevada to California.
Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by tick_tock_tick on Saturday September 20, 2025 @04:12AM
(#45311445)
I think it's pretty reasonable line that it should cost the company at-least 2x normal to import someone.
Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by jonathanstrange on Saturday September 20, 2025 @10:49AM
(#45313877)
One more reason to replace the job with AI or outsource it.
> $100k per hire isn't much of a cost to pay for large companies.
Did you drop out of school before they taught multiplication?
1400 x $100,000 is $140 million, not $1.4 billion
Please don't comment like this on HN. The guidelines ask us all to be kind; they're the first words in the "In Comments" section:
Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by enraged_camel on Friday September 19, 2025 @06:37PM
(#45307585)
>> Is it? $100k per hire isn't much of a cost to pay for large companies.
It is $100k per hire per year.
https://apnews.com/article/h1b-visa-trump-immigration-8d3969...
Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by ZYbCRq22HbJ2y7 on Saturday September 20, 2025 @12:57AM
(#45310516)
> Smaller companies may -- may
Really? 100k on top of a salary per year? Why would anyone do that?
Re:$100K fee added to H1B applications
by huevosabio on Saturday September 20, 2025 @02:20AM
(#45310928)
$100k for a startup is a no-go from the onset. This makes foreigners basically unhireable for startups, and probably shuts down founding startups as well?
Is it? $100k per hire isn't much of a cost to pay for large companies. Smaller companies may -- may -- end up having some trouble with this, but consider that $100k often amounts to less than a yearly base salary (and will pretty much always be less than a year of total comp/total employee cost), not to mention the costs of legal staff that they're already paying to deal with this stuff.
What this may do is cause some of the "body shop" consultancies to drop some of their "low end" business, so they'll focus more on targeting positions with higher salaries. That's... probably a good thing.
And yeah, we may see some higher rates of offshoring, but I don't think that will be significant. And I'm not even really convinced: offshoring is already possible, and in strict dollar terms is already cheaper than going through the H-1B process to bring someone to the US. If companies preferred offshoring, they'd be doing it; clearly the already-higher-cost H-1B program is still their preference.
I agree that this isn't going to fix the H-1B visa system, and is not a reform or even a particularly positive step toward a reform, but I think you're overestimating the negative impact. I really don't think this will change things much at all.