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American engineers feel the sting of a stab in their backs from America's largest engineering society, IEEE (The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers).Last year IEEE-USA (the lobbying arm of IEEE) lobbyists called upon engineers from all around the country to fly in to Washington D.C. to ask their Senators and Congressmen not to raise the cap on H-1B visas.Once all the engineers sat down, the chief lobbyist began explaining that what engineers should ask their representatives for is EB-4 visas instead. Most engineers became upset and started to argue why they should ask for more green cards instead of asking for less H-1B guest workers. They argued that in both cases, American engineers are getting undercut by foreign labor. Then the IEEE-USA lobbyist explained that legal immigration is better because it takes "much longer" to process. So this would put the potential H-1B engineers on the slow track of legal immigration, which will give IEEE-USA time to lobby in favor of American engineers. He argued that it is better for the foreign nationals and it is better for Americans.Most of the engineers were confused but believed that IEEE-USA was looking out for their best interests. After all, nobody else seems to even care about American engineering careers. So off they went to speak with congressional representatives or their staffers about this new EB-4 agenda, hoping that it will bring some relief to their career problems. Some activists warned that IEEE was using the engineers as pawns to push legal immigration for engineers in addition to guest worker programs. At the time, it was hard for most to believe that such a conspiracy existed. Now, almost a year later it is revealed that the chief proponent of H-1B visas, the SIA (Semiconductor Industry Association) has joined with IEEE-USA to support more green cards for foreign nationals with the caveat that they are fast-tracked.
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