Why Johnny Gets Replaced By H1-B Guest Worker

The answer is very simple: the firm is controlled by foreign money power.

This subject was raised this morning by the Bloomberg article Microsoft, Intel Firings Stir Resentment Over Foreigner Visas.

Microsoft Corp.’s plan to eliminate U.S. workers after lobbying for more foreigner visas is stirring resentment among lawmakers and employees.

As many as 5,000 employees are being shown the door at Microsoft, which uses more H1-B guest-worker visas than any other U.S. company.
. . .
Microsoft is hiring 2,000 to 3,000 workers over the next 18 months, offsetting the job cuts. Some of those will certainly be on H1-B visas, said . . . a spokeswoman for the Redmond, Washington-based company. She declined to comment on how many workers laid off are on visas.

Why would not Microsoft's management choose American citizens, who had already proven their value, to stay employed and reduce the number of newly arrived foreign workers first? The answer may well be that management has its orders from its major shareholders, as shown in the table here.
NOTE: Take the links in the tables to see who controls those major holders.

But a bigger problem is that it is not just Microsoft. This is not an anti-Microsoft story.

Across the technology industry, some of the biggest users of H1-B visas are cutting jobs, including Intel Corp., International Business Machines Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. The firings at Microsoft, the world’s largest software maker, came less than a year after Chairman Bill Gates lobbied Congress for an expansion of the program.

Perhaps the foreign money powers should replace Bill Gates with a H1-B guest worker. Think of the money they could save. After all, Bill Gates hasn't controlled Microsoft since he accepted 49% when going public. He's simply another agent like William Buffett, as explained in a previous commentary. You could call them plantation managers, because they certainly don't own the plantation.

Update 02/24/2009:
At first, Microsoft claimed they overpaid severance to laid-off workers, according to this article in the Washington Post:

Microsoft has sent a letter to some of the 1,400 workers laid off last month telling them they were mistakenly paid too much severance.

And they have 14 days to give back the overpayment.

But then, a short time later, Microsoft recanted:

UPDATE: Late Monday night, Microsoft sent out the following statement, saying the overpaid employees will not have to give back the money, which proves the power of negative publicity:

Sometimes The Dragon Does Lose.

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Sometimes The Dragon Wins, but it's everyone else that suffers.

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Symbol Name Of Corporation MSFT Major Holders Microsoft Corporation (As of 30-Jun-2008) (As of 30-Jun-2007) Top 10 Institutional Holders Shares Pct. Value Barclays Global Investors UK Holdings Ltd 367,187,497 4.02 $10,101,328,042 State Street Corporation 268,337,481 2.94 $7,381,964,102 Capital Research Global Investors 259,066,798 2.84 $7,126,927,612 Vanguard Group, Inc. (The) 252,768,699 2.77 $6,953,666,909 Capital World Investors 230,847,800 2.53 $6,350,622,978 FMR LLC (Fidelity) 140,419,267 1.54 $3,862,934,035 Bank of New York Mellon Corporation 129,629,480 1.42 $3,566,106,994 Price (T.Rowe) Associates Inc 121,187,354 1.33 $3,333,864,108 Wellington Management Company, LLP 118,021,153 1.29 $3,246,761,919 Franklin Resources, Inc. 109,693,432 1.20 $3,017,666,314 % of Shares Held by All Insider and 5% Owners: 13% Top 10 [0.6%] of 1698 Institutional Holders Control 21.88% Percentage of Barclays and "Associates" Control 10.91%

NOTE: Capital Group manages four funds that control 5.66%.
Vanguard controls three funds that control 1.99%.
Therefore, the TOP 10 Major Holders control 29.53% of Microsoft.
Capital Group controls 11.03%.

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Symbol Name Of Corporation INTC Major Holders Intel Corporation (As of 30-Jun-2008) (As of 30-Jun-2007) Top 10 Institutional Holders Shares Pct. Value Barclays Global Investors UK Holdings Ltd 269,015,829 4.79 $5,778,460,006 State Street Corporation 192,379,309 3.42 $4,132,307,557 Vanguard Group, Inc. (The) 178,378,648 3.17 $3,831,573,359 Capital Research Global Investors 163,239,900 2.90 $3,506,393,052 Bank of New York Mellon Corporation 98,328,519 1.75 $2,112,096,588 UBS Global Asset Management (Americas) Inc 87,346,823 1.55 $1,876,209,758 FMR LLC (Fidelity) 83,702,490 1.49 $1,797,929,485 Northern Trust Corporation 69,231,180 1.23 $1,487,085,746 Franklin Resources, Inc. 62,649,681 1.11 $1,345,715,147 Morgan Stanley 61,166,555 1.09 $1,313,857,601 % of Shares Held by All Insider and 5% Owners: 0% Top 10 [0.7%] of 1429 Institutional Holders Control 22.50% Percentage of Barclays and "Associates" Control 13.39%

NOTE: Capital Group manages three funds that control 1.74%.
Vanguard manages three funds that control 2.32%.
Therefore, the TOP 10 Major Holders control 26.56% of Intel Corporation.

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Symbol Name Of Corporation IBM Major Holders International Business Machines Corp. (As of 30-Jun-2008) (As of 30-Jun-2007) Top 10 Institutional Holders Shares Pct. Value State Street Corporation 63,672,896 4.70 $7,547,148,362 Barclays Global Investors UK Holdings Ltd 54,400,543 4.02 $6,448,096,361 Capital World Investors 43,674,650 3.22 $5,176,756,264 Vanguard Group, Inc. (The) 42,958,004 3.17 $5,091,812,214 FMR LLC (Fidelity) 21,087,774 1.56 $2,499,533,852 AXA (Paris, France) 20,355,632 1.50 $2,412,753,060 Wellington Management Company, Llp 19,623,457 1.45 $2,325,968,358 Capital Research Global Investors 19,590,000 1.45 $2,322,002,700 JP Morgan Chase & Company 17,222,359 1.27 $2,041,366,212 Bank of New York Mellon Corporation 16,858,453 1.24 $1,998,232,434 % of Shares Held by All Insider and 5% Owners: 0% Top 10 [0.7%] of 1461 Institutional Holders Control 23.58% Percentage of Barclays and "Associates" Control 11.23%

NOTE: Vanguard manages four funds that control 2.95%.
Capital Group manages two funds that control 1.37%.
Washington Mutual manages a fund that controls 1.30%.
Therefore, the TOP 10 Major Holders control 29.20%, and
Barclays/Associates control 12.53% of IBM Corporation.
Capital Group controls 6.05%.

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Symbol Name Of Corporation HPQ Major Holders Hewlett-Packard Co. (As of 30-Jun-2008) (As of 30-Jun-2007) Top 10 Institutional Holders Shares Pct. Value State Street Corporation 114,036,175 4.62 $5,041,539,296 Barclays Global Investors UK Holdings Ltd 113,242,391 4.59 $5,006,446,106 FMR LLC (Fidelity) 100,667,747 4.08 $4,450,521,094 Dodge & Cox Inc 97,045,829 3.94 $4,290,396,100 Vanguard Group, Inc. (The) 77,594,773 3.15 $3,430,464,914 AXA (Paris, France) 58,744,678 2.38 $2,597,102,214 Capital Research Global Investors 46,670,000 1.89 $2,063,280,700 State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co 42,070,800 1.71 $1,859,950,068 Wellington Management Company, LLP 40,981,319 1.66 $1,811,784,112 Capital World Investors 31,728,000 1.29 $1,402,694,880 % of Shares Held by All Insider and 5% Owners: 0% Top 10 [0.8%] of 1215 Institutional Holders Control 29.31% Percentage of Barclays and "Associates" Control 9.21%

NOTE: Dodge & Cox manages two funds that control 2.78%.
Vanguard manages three funds that control 2.15%.
Fidelity manages a fund that controls 1.01%.
Capital Group manages a fund that control 0.96%.
Washington Mutual manages a fund that controls 0.91%.
Therefore, the TOP 10 Major Holders control 37.12%, and
Barclays/Associates control 10.12% of Hewlett-Packard.

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© 2009 by Edward Ulysses Cate
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