You hear an awful lot about how America is falling behind in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) education, that there’s a shortfall of graduates in those areas for now and the future. But labor statistics don’t back this claim.

Silicon Valley has been particularly loud about wanting foreign applicants fast-tracked for visas and citizenship. The situation is dire, they insist. Perhaps whether we’re talking about apple pickers or Apple engineers, this protest is more about want than need.

From Andrew Hacker’s NYRB piece “The Frenzy About High-Tech Talent“:

A variety of American industries have long held that their survival depends on being permitted to bring in foreign workers. Most familiar has been much of agriculture, which claims that resident citizens will not take the pay that employers can afford. Today the technology sector is making a similar plea, with the obvious difference that it needs more cerebral skills. Under H-1B, candidates must be sponsored by specified employers, with elaborate paperwork on both sides, including avowals that the domestic workforce has been thoroughly combed for qualified candidates. Apparently, the time spent on such applications is worth it.

As of the end of 2012, fully 262,569 H-1B visa-holders were working in the United States. By far the most were from India (168,367), with China a distant second (19,850). Indians are most wanted because they come knowing English and can start on assignments the day after they arrive. Topping the list are “computer-related occupations,” such as coding, followed by engineering. Microsoft leads the employers’ list, with Intel, IBM, and Oracle close behind. But a host of enterprises now have software systems in need of servicing. The H-1B roster also includes Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, and the Rite-Aid pharmacy chain.

A central question, of course, is why Americans weren’t available or applying for these 262,569 jobs. During the 2001–2011 decade, the most recent for which we have figures, our colleges turned out some 2.5 million graduates in computer science and engineering, which seems a fair-sized pool. On its face, it should contain enough people with the qualifications that Microsoft and Oracle and Rite-Aid expect. One explanation is that these and other firms in fact prefer people from abroad. Indeed, many are already in universities here, where they receive half the graduate degrees in computer science and engineering. Of students from India awarded Ph.D.s, 85 percent were still in the US five years after receiving their degrees.

James Bach and Robert Werner’s How to Secure Your H-1B Visa is written for both employers and the workers they hire. They are told that firms must “promise to pay any H-1B employee a competitive salary,” which in theory means what’s being offered “to others with similar experience and qualifications.” At least, this is what the law says. But then there are figures compiled by Zoe Lofgren, who represents much of Silicon Valley in Congress, showing that H-1B workers average 57 percent of the salaries paid to Americans with comparable credentials.

Norman Matloff, a computer scientist at the University of California’s Davis campus, provides some answers. The foreigners granted visas, he found, are typically single or unattached men, usually in their late twenties, who contract for six-year stints, knowing they will work long hours and live in cramped spaces. Being tied to their sponsoring firm, Matloff adds, they “dare not switch to another employer” and are thus “essentially immobile.” For their part, Bach and Warner warn, “it may be risky for you to give notice to your current employer.” Indeed, the perils include deportation if you can’t quickly find another guarantor.

Matloff also found that employers “tailor job requirements so that only the desired foreign applicants qualify” and they “have an arsenal of legal means to reject all US workers who apply.”•