Tesla has replaced some of its US employees who were let go as part of a big wave of layoffs...

Summary

Tesla replaced many laid-off U.S. workers with foreign H-1B visa holders after a 2024 wave of layoffs affecting 15,000 employees.

These visas, tied to employer sponsorship, often lower compensation and give employers significant leverage over workers.

Critics argue this displaces U.S. employees, as senior engineers were replaced by lower-paid junior engineers.

CEO Elon Musk, while advocating for expanding H-1B visa caps, faces backlash, especially from conservatives, for “job-stealing” concerns.

Musk contends there’s a U.S. skill shortage, but critics highlight potential exploitation tied to Tesla’s demanding work culture and visa dependence.

  • @ChickenLadyLovesLifeEnglish
    8•5 days ago

    I deal with one of the big companies that supplies these workers and the vast majority of their personnel are “bodies.”

    InfoSys. My issue with these folks is that generally speaking they go into programming because it’s a lucrative career, not because they have even a mild interest in it as an activity. I’ve encountered a few exceptions to this in my career, but they’re extremely rare.

    • @CharlesDarwinEnglish
      6•5 days ago

      InfoSys. My issue with these folks is that generally speaking they go into programming because it’s a lucrative career, not because they have even a mild interest in it as an activity.

      My experience with H-1Bs has been very much like that. Although during the dot-com bubble and again more recently, I’ve experienced more than a few citizens in the same camp, too. The same type of person that learned to spell HTML in a bid to make it rich during the dot-com bubble is now the same type that you see trying to LARP as a “front-end developer” in React or what have you. That’s if they aren’t trying to flex on people by talking about something like Rust or have debates about htmx, SPAs, or whatever the fuck, but not really producing working, well-tested code that meets the business need or what have you, even if it’s not in the language/framework of the Youtube channel they happen to be following…

      I’ve noticed during a downturn/layoff session, they might not get rooted out right away, as some of the citizen programmers have priced themselves wayyyy under market probably because they know they are posing. But I think ultimately many of them do migrate to management, testing, documentation, or something else on the periphery of the actual work of programming. That, or leave the field entirely.