The Bank of America has pulled back job offers made to foreign students graduating from US business schools this summer, becoming the first American bank to do so.
The Bank of America has pulled back job offers made to foreign students graduating from US business schools this summer, becoming the first American bank to do so.
With Congress making it harder to hire foreigners during campus placements, the American dream has soured for some Indian students.
A bank spokesman told reporters that provisions of the ‘Employ American Workers Act’ in the stimulus bill prevent institutions like the Bank of America, which have received bailout funds from the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Programme (Tarp), from applying for H-1B visas for immigrants.
“As foreign students we don’t get any US grants. I took a $120,000 loan to get an MBA degree, which I planned to pay back by working here for a few years,” VK Mittal, who will graduate in May, told DNA. “But we are suddenly not employable. Firms just don’t want to sponsor H-1B visas.” Mittal said he had no offer letter.
The world’s best and brightest have always flocked to the US in pursuit of higher education and to seek their fortunes. But US immigration bureaucracy and economic protectionism are now pushing them away.
Academics say making it harder to hire foreigners is short-sighted xenophobia, as the US will need them again when the economy turns up.
“This is a stupid witch-hunt against foreigners…It is mean-spirited xenophobia,” Vivek Wadhwa, a senior research associate at Harvard Law School and executive in residence at Duke University, said during a heated debate telecast by CNBC.
“What if all immigrants were to pull their money from Bank of America and Citibank? There would be a run on the banks and the banks would collapse,” he said.
Wadhwa warned that when “smart young foreigners” leave US shores, they take with them the seeds of tomorrow’s innovation.
Immigrants founded a quarter of all US engineering and technology companies started between 1995 and 2005, including half of those in Silicon Valley. In 2005, immigrants’ businesses generated $52 billion in sales and employed 450,000 workers.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}