H1Bs are abused at the large companies as well. I work for eBay and the company regularly turns a blind eye to American candidates in favor of hiring an H1B. The company has had high attrition this past year. During one meeting where a consultant met with our team (80% H1Bs), I called out that many of the company culture problems people raise come up from the fact that managers know they can boss around H1Bs without consequence. Many of my co-workers finally chimed in and agreed. It was this unspoken reality that H1B employees will never tell a manager or director that this is a short-sighted technology decision. After the meeting a few came up to me and remarked they were bewildered I understood their predicament. They disagree with many of the things they are asked to do and want to do better for the company, but they are essentially wage slaves trying to stay in America until they can achieve citizenship. Moving to a new company within 5 years starts the whole citizenship cycle over again too, so they are a less mobile workforce.

Even on simple things like open floor plans, common working hours, scrum/agile methodologies, when an H1B employee is asked for feedback they will offer no real opinion. It has a large impact on the work culture.

Some of my co-workers are great friends. I would love for them to be citizens here, but I cannot help but resent the H1B program to the point where I will now scan companies for how many H1Bs are working there. I want to be a part of a work culture that does not treat its employees like hourly wage slaves. I would prefer they are granted full citizenship so that their lower bargaining rights do not affect mine. Not only do I have H1B friends who feel their d

Someone earlier mentioned that Indians get a bad wrap in Silicon Valley. I'll just throw in that even amongst my Indian friends it is a well-accepted fact that there is a pattern of strong in-group preferences among Indians in hiring practices, office politics, and inter-worker relations. Racial/cultural/religious groups that have strong in-group preferences in diverse settings such as large corporations will tend to get a bad rap.

Amongst Stanford, IVY, etc friends the common comeback to this conversation is that I should start my own company to avoid being an employee. All agree being an employee is a precarious position in America unless you are at one of the top 3 tech companies, but even for those companies, they only need to retain and keep happy their best workers during the high growth phases. The divide is that amongst my friends who have raised $10-30mm seed rounds, they all came from very wealthy backgrounds to begin with. Middle and lower class Americans friends are pursuing my path as well, building up savings and a personal safety net for first 5-10 years out of college because we see how greatly in debt our parents are. The wealthy love the H1B program because it is completely beneficial for them that America has a wage slave system, and they'll never have to be on the other end of the stick.

Outside of engineering, the other roles in companies like eBay that I see where cheap foreign replacement is less of a risk and native Americans are valued are product managers. An MBA is an unspoken prerequisite for that role, and again, I only know of wealthy friends obtaining MBAs. Even a friend who has Harvard MBA stated, "an MBA is worthless, it's basically an extended networking party for rich kids."