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The overriding theme of the 2016 presidential primaries is about bringing jobs back to America and rebuilding the manufacturing sector, regardless of the hot-button, emotionally-charged rhetoric about xenophobia, race-baiting, misogyny, irresponsible State Department emails, Wall Street excesses, and the ultra-rich “One Percent,” emanating from candidates and their supporters across the ideological divide.
The campaign rhetoric about jobs is of concern to India and Indian-Americans as it relates to cutting outsourcing, immigration and, not least of all, changing visa rules in the middle of the game for tens of thousands of Indians waiting for green cards. And it could also hit Prime Minister Modi’s “Make in India” campaign that wants to diversify outsourcing to manufacturing to create jobs for the millions of youth expected to enter the job market every year.
Indian-American analysts and investors in Silicon Valley interviewed by News India Times, all agreed that a Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton presidency would not negatively impact India. They also cautioned against taking seriously the bombastic claims and statements from candidates in the primaries as opposed to what they say once nominated for the general elections. Some noted that while there appeared to be a basic shift in the American electorate on bringing jobs back to the U.S. etc., it was more that the “dark side” of America was showing its “ugly face” because a substantial section of the populace feels marginalized and has been marginalized.
Donald Trump
Front-runner Donald Trump’s economic plan takes aim at China not India. Coming down hard on China will have “huge” results for American businesses and workers.”Jobs and factories will stop moving offshore and instead stay here at home,” Trump contends.
On immigration, Trump says “decades of disastrous trade deals and immigration policies” have destroyed the middle class, and that that the influx of foreign workers holds down salaries, keeps unemployment high, and makes it difficult for poor and working class Americans to earn a middle class wage. “We need to control the admission of new low-earning workers in order to: help wages grow, get teenagers back to work, aid minorities’ rise into the middle class, help schools and communities falling behind, and to ensure our immigrant members of the national family become part of the American dream.”
On the other hand on the immigration issues that directly concern Indians, the H-1B professional visas, he has changed his position. He calls for raising the prevailing wage for H-1Bs, to “force companies to give these coveted entry-level jobs to the existing domestic pool of unemployed native and immigrant workers in the U.S., instead of flying in cheaper workers from overseas.” But he has also called for keeping back students who get STEM degrees. He also says before any new green cards are issued to foreign workers abroad, there should be a pause where employers will have to hire from the domestic pool of unemployed immigrant and native workers.
Hillary Clinton
Clinton declares manufacturing is critical for creating jobs. Her platform calls for strengthening investment in manufacturing; creating tax incentives in hardest-hit manufacturing communities to bring back jobs here; cracking down on trade violations to level the global playing field for American workers, and making the U.S. the “first choice” for manufacturing production worldwide.
The former Secretary of State is the only one among the candidates from both parties to take a favorable approach to the H-1B visa, even amenable to increasing the cap, according to a pro-H-1B visa site, prideimmigration.com. She has qualified her position over time, once saying in India that there is a need to balance the need to employ American workers with the need to grow trade between countries.
Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders makes no bones about keeping American jobs here and expanding manufacturing. He is credited with winning the Michigan Democratic primaries precisely because of his stand on manufacturing, trade and immigration.
“We must regulate the future flow of immigrants by modernizing the visa system and rewriting bad trade agreements,” Sanders says on his platform. But at the same time he wants a compassionate immigration policy and rejects militarized borders.
Sanders also takes a hard line of international trade pacts. “Let’s be clear: The TPP (Trans Pacific Partnership) is much more than a ‘free trade’ agreement. It is part of a global race to the bottom to boost the profits of large corporations and Wall Street by outsourcing jobs; undercutting worker rights; dismantling labor, environmental, health, food safety, and financial laws; and allowing corporations to challenge our laws in international tribunals rather than our own court system,” Sanders argues. India is not a part of TPP, but hopes to join the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).
Ted Cruz
Ted Cruz, the Republican candidate in the second place, believes his “Simple Flat Tax” is the answer to all ills, including boosting the economy and creating jobs, going by his agenda on the campaign website. Trump has held his feet to the fire on his support for trade deals, a position Cruz has squirmed under, but has been unable to brush aside.
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While raising a note of caution about a presidency of Clinton and Trump, the Indian-American analysts and Silicon Valley investors noted that they had changed their positions on various issues and would possibly further soften their stances come the general election. Those interviewed said the H-1B visa was not a matter of concern even though about 65 percent of these go to Indians, and 86 percent of the visas in the technology field are taken by Indians, according to South Asia Monitor quoting ComputerWorld.
“We have to separate the daily debates and what gets said in the primaries from positions after the party nominations,” Vinod Dham, a long-time entrepreneur and investor in Silicon Valley, told News India Times
“We’ve never seen a political (primary) season like this,” M. Rangaswami, founder of Indiaspora, a Silicon Valley-based advocacy organization, told News India Times. “Candidates on both left and right tend to go further on each side – which means protectionism and nationalism and trade will be accentuated and amplified to play to activist bases.” The rhetoric will be toned down for the general election, Rangaswami said.
Moving To Center
With the 65,000 H-1B visas, plus the 20,000 foreign STEM graduates “very critical” for Fortune 500 companies, there’s more rhetoric than policy coming out of the primaries, Rangaswami contended, and predicted candidates would come to the center on most issues relating to visas, immigration, trade and manufacturing.
“I am watching the races carefully. The biggest thing for India and Silicon Valley is H-1B, and I am not worried,” Dham said. While China has to be greatly concerned about who comes into the White House, India has little to worry, according to Dham and analyst Vivek Wadhwa.
As for trade, India poses no threat as there is no real overlapping of interests. As things stand, the U.S. is India’s fifth trading partner and New Delhi ranks 10th, and while India’s exports to the U.S. are higher than imports from it the products traded are in radically different sectors. India imports defense technology and aircraft whereas it exports gems and precious stones, and pharmaceuticals.
In the manufacturing sector, India is only now beginning a concerted “Make in India” initiative, and not taking away American jobs in contrast to China, Dham said.
Bad Visa
Wadhwa says the H-1B “is a bad visa,” and keeps workers from India and elsewhere in “forced servitude” working below market value. “Anti-immigration activists have a valid point when they say that employers take advantage of these H-1B workers,” Wadhwa says. “The focus should be on Green Cards where one million people are stuck in limbo and have applied 10 or 15 years ago,” he argues.
Regardless of who comes into the Oval Office, Wadhwa is upbeat about U.S-India trade and general bilateral relations. “The signs are very good for India. They (candidates) are going after China, where India is a natural ally. China steals from the U.S. on an unimaginable grand scale and is a security threat both to the U.S. and India,” Wadhwa said.
Rangaswami, meanwhile, along with other Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and activists, has formed an initiative named “India 2022” he said, “to be proactive in creating a strategic partnership that draws on common Democratic values and a strong diaspora, to make sure that the two sides are talking and working on issues regardless of who is on top in the White House.”
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