That's What, Like 4 Hours of Profit?

Facebook has just paid a $14 million fine for cheating on its H1B applications.

The law says that you have to look for , and advertise for, US employees, but, like almost every other company that avails itself of the program, did not do this in good faith.

Of course, because they are Facebook, they did not even go through the motions:

Facebook has agreed to pay penalties totaling more than $14 million under a settlement with the Justice Department over findings that the company’s hiring practices intentionally discriminated against U.S. workers in favor of foreign workers, U.S. officials said Tuesday.

The social media behemoth has also agreed in a settlement with the Labor Department to do more to recruit U.S. workers for technology jobs and be subject to federal scrutiny for up to three years, the officials said.

The agreements came after the Justice Department sued Facebook in December for allegedly failing to properly advertise at least 2,600 jobs — and consider applications from U.S. citizens — before offering the spots to foreigners whom the company was sponsoring for green cards granting permanent residency in 2018 and 2019.

The lawsuit said Facebook’s practices violated federal laws that require employers to demonstrate that there are no qualified U.S. workers available before offering positions to temporary foreign workers they are sponsoring.

Facebook has agreed to pay a civil penalty of $4.75 million to the U.S. government and up to $9.5 million to eligible victims of Facebook’s alleged discrimination, which officials said was the largest monetary settlement of its kind under the anti-discrimination provisions in U.S. immigration laws.

………

In its complaint in December, the Justice Department said the company eschewed its traditional hiring process in cases where it wanted to hire an employee on an H-1B visa for a permanent position. When a temporary visa holder sought such a job, Facebook “diverged from its normal recruiting protocols,” according to the government, opting in some cases against “advertising the position on its external website.”

If a U.S. worker applied for one of these jobs — and Facebook determined they were qualified — the company appeared to hire them in a different capacity, the lawsuit found. Federal law generally allows a company to sponsor a temporary worker for a permanent position only in cases where there is no qualified U.S. applicant.

The record-breaking penalty will have little impact on Facebook’s bottom line, as the company generated about $29 billion in revenue in the second quarter of this year alone.

Like I said, a fine equivalent to 4 hours profits, that's just a cost of doing business.  

You need a real fine, and perhaps some felony prosecutions for a racketeering and criminal conspiracy.

The fine for H1B fraud can be as high as $250,000 per individual.

2600 jobs?  That comes to $650,000,000, so the $14 million fine is about 2% of that.

We need real enforcement against the BUSINESSES who blithely violate immigration laws.

Massive fines and handcuffs is the way to go.