RW Tech Bro on Immigration & H1Bs
....who used to be a full-blown Libertarian
A few weeks back I published an essay titled “I took all the pills.” It basically covered all of the crazy ideas and ideologies I had tested, lived and experimented with over the years, and how I found my way to the “white pill.”
The Blue—>Red—>Black—>White pill progression is probably something many of you have also gone through, albeit via unique paths. This is important, because the point of taking the different pills is to integrate each element into your psyche. A bit like how Don Beck’s Spiral Dynamics works. The point of climbing the consciousness spiral and reaching the “Yellow Level” is the integration of all the different layers. This is why Ken Wilbur calls his variation “Integral Theory.”
Of course, all models are wrong, but some are useful. In the case of Spiral Dynamics, the position of the Green level is ridiculous. It may have seemed accurate or enlightened at the time, and may also represent a chronological progression for many young people, but it is certainly not representative of emotional, psychological, social maturity; or for that matter, a higher level of consciousness. Green is the naive child or teenager who in reality lives between Blue and Red.
That being said, what is useful about this model is the idea of a level representing an “integration” of all other levels which echoes ideas found in Bushido, Chivalry and other traditional codes of virtue. They each speak of a tension between complementary virtues as necessary, so as to not stray too far from the golden path. I discuss this “tapestry” of virtues at length in my book.
While compassion is necessary, over-indexing for it will lead you to opening all your borders, letting the enemies in and feminising everything around you. Look no further than modern, liberal society. On the flipside, while justice is necessary, if you over-index for it, you will become so rigid that you kill creativity and spirit. In fact, you might just even create the conditions to not only break your hierarchy but to push back (hard) the other way, eg: the 60s counter-culture revolution.
What a healthy individual and society needs is a full “constellation” of virtues.
So…what does this all have to do with me being a Right Wing Tech Bro and my opinion on H1Bs and immigration?
Well…it’s only relevant as context.
Speaking from Experience
Having taken “many pills,” and not only believed different things throughout my life but actually lived out many of these ideas, I can understand and steel-man different arguments. This is the case with Libertarianism for example. I’ve read everything you have (and probably more) by Rothbard, Hayek, Mises, etc.
It’s also the case for being a tech bro. I’ve been a founder/CEO for over fifteen years and built many different products (some successful and many failed), with tech as my focus for a decade. In that time, I’ve hired roughly 500 people, probably interviewed 30x that, and sifted through 200x that many resumes, applications or LinkedIn profiles.
While arguably still anecdotal in the grand scheme of things, I have found some clear patterns and learned a couple things along the way. Here’s what I can confidently say:
My best hires have always been Westerners: Australians, Americans, Canadians, Europeans. Yes, there are exceptions to the rule, but they are few & far between.
I’ve hired loads of Eastern Europeans and Latin Americans too. They’re good, generally speaking, and more cost-effective – but there has always been a cultural issue with the former (i.e., they sometimes don’t get why we’re building what we’re building) and a last-mile issue with the latter (it’s as if 90% = 100% in their minds). That being said, when on a budget, you can live with this.
The group of people I’ve had the most trouble with, not in terms of output, but in terms of the quality of outcome - is Indians. This doesn’t mean that EVERY Indian is bad - I happen to know a couple very capable ones (although they’re more entrepreneurial, and not employee-kinds) - but no matter how many times I’ve given one of them a chance, I’ve received sub-par work that I’d have been better off paying a premium for a Westerner to complete. I don’t think I’ve ever seen as much consistent over-promising and under-delivering anywhere else and this has been the case not only for me, but for every other startup entrepreneur I know (even the capable Indian ones).
Hiring, Immigration, Countries & Corporations
Hiring is incredibly important. Your people are your business. Mediocre people can take a great product or business and turn it to shit, in the same way A-players can take a shit product or business and either transform it into something great or discard it and build something else.
Steve Jobs (and all great business leaders) repeatedly said that the CEO’s primary role is to hire the VERY BEST people, then to train and retain them.
The trouble is, the best talent is hard to find. By definition, they are rare - which is why everyone wants them. The best talent are exceptional, not only for the skills they have, but for their attitude, character, vision and cultural fit. Top talent is a blend of factors that cannot simply be quantified by numbers on a spreadsheet. It’s not just what they know, but who they know, where they grew up, how they grew up, how well they know the culture or customer they’re building for, and many more unseen factors.
Just because Arjun or Abdul scored well on a math test and got a CS degree doesn’t mean that their values and cultural predisposition match the work environment they’ve been asked to enter. Matthew, on the other hand, who does have the right cultural fit, may just need to be taught the appropriate skills.
The latter approach is 100x better than hiring for skills alone, or first.
This is a KNOWN hiring principle taught by every great business leader and commentator. You hire people for cultural fit first, and skills second because skills can always be taught, while culture cannot.
It’s only controversial when discussed in the context of immigration, because the same guys who will tell you to hire for fit, will pretend as if someone’s actual cultural background doesn’t matter just so they can virtue signal their anti-racism. It’s such bullshit.
The classical liberal idea that “all men are born equal” is just not true. We are not all equal. We are all different, not only psychologically and emotionally, but biologically and culturally. Culture is supremely important and it’s very easy to disturb and even destroy if you press on one lever too hard (see highlight below):
The older I get the more conservative I become because I’ve experienced more of reality (reality is fundamentally conservative). Life experience makes you wiser and wisdom recognises conservatism.
With this, for me and many others, is the realisation that a country is more than just an economic zone. It is also an ethnic and cultural zone inside of a real geographic zone, and like the constellation of virtues outlined above, over-indexing for one aspect at the expense of the others can lead to ruin. There has to be a healthy tension between each. A tonos. You can’t just be economically healthy – you also have to be culturally, geographically and ethnically healthy too. And this is extremely hard when you create a free-for-all.
The idea that you can just “assimilate” people has been proven false again and again, both in modern and ancient history. People bring their culture with them, because to a great extent it is a part of them and their race – which is not skin deep, but blood and bone deep. I don’t say that as a bad thing. You actually want cultural diversity across regions. What you don’t want to do is mix them all up into one giant multi-cultural melting pot that will spill over. The following video from an Indian teacher (clearly an outlier) explains this:
So contrary to what the globalists and alot of liberally inclined tech-bro’s want to believe, people are not simply replaceable like numbers on a spreadsheet, especially those with different cultural backgrounds (which the tech bro’s should know, but choose to ignore). This might explain why, despite their often incredible ability to build and scale things, the city at the centre of their universe is a hell-hole. Although I’d credit that to more than just tech-bro naivete (for another essay).
The Country Part
did an excellent tweet on this which I’ve linked to. Here’s the preview:
At the end of the day, a corporation’s role is to hire the best people, not to bring people into the country; especially when most jobs can be outsourced remotely, automated away or given to locals with a bit of training (current unemployment numbers are unacceptable). I can’t see why or how it would be easier to try and bring people from other cultures in than it is to find people from your own – especially in a country with over 300m people. I can understand if you’re hiring in the UAE or El Salvador, for example: their population and therefore talent pool is small. But from a pool of hundreds of millions? Come on.
This is where the role of the Nation-State becomes apparent & necessary. Its role, among other things, is to develop the very best of its OWN people, and to establish a strong perimeter with a low degree of permeability so the internal culture can remain strong and cohesive.
Coming to terms with this is a major reason why I am no longer libertarian-pilled.
As I state (no pun intended) in the book , a ‘state’ will always exist. We can’t get away from this. Anarchy is merely transitory. Anarcho-capitalism for example, is just a territory organised by cooperative & competing private entities – which I’m sure is good for commercial purposes, and would likely work better than 99% of current governance models – but if it was ever achieved, it may also turn out to be extremely dry and devoid of life considering that you “get what you optimise for;” and in life, there are things more important than just money, profit, markets and sound economics.
A strong footing in sound economics is indispensable, but you also want organising principles that are more than economic in nature. People yearn to align around values, religion, culture, race and lifestyle.
The function of a country or nation state is therefore not only to be fiscally responsible and economically prosperous, but to also be culturally healthy and socially cohesive. Low-permeability borders and high standards for entry help in this regard (see Japan, Singapore, UAE).
Note: That also doesn’t mean being rude to visitors. There’s a very big difference between how the UAE or Japan treat their tourists and how the US does. The former make you feel welcome, as if you’re entering their home. You are treated with the dignity and respect of a guest. The US on the other hand makes tourists feel unwelcome, but somehow paradoxically also gives foreigners more rights, handouts and advantages than it does its own people. It’s a very strange state of affairs.
What about Meritocracies?
This essay has gone on way too long so I will just say this:
Meritocracy is a Western Idea. It doesn't exist among the cultures of the people being imported en masse into the West. As such, a meritocracy can only exist insofar as the culture around it can support it. I’ll let our friend drive the point home further:
How to do it right: the UAE as an example
There seems to be a way to do immigration intelligently. The UAE is a small country whose citizenry make up only 12% of the total population! How have they not been overrun? It’s because they give their own citizens preferential rights and treatment, all while opening the door for the best people from other cultures to come live, work and build there, AND for the unskilled to come and have a better opportunity than in their home country – but with very strict rules.
This is a functional form of meritocracy:
Look after your own people. Blood and nation first.
Give incentives and open residency (not citizenship) to the very best people from around the world
Give the unskilled workers and migrants an opportunity to work, but that’s it.
Number 2 and 3 don’t have the ability to organise or vote, other than with their feet or their money. Simple.
Could America and the West more broadly do this? I don’t see why not. It’s even easier than remigration (although this might have to happen first). It only seems and sounds radical because of the liberal open-border paradigm we live in. It’s clearly very possible to do and the fact that there are successful precedents should encourage all of us. My hope is that the Musk’s of the world are genuine in their desire to do what’s right here and will look into this further (or maybe this whole thing was his way of playing 5D chess and getting cover, while allowing the conversation to blow up - which it certainly has, on X).
DEI and the enemy within
I’ve not even discussed the bigger problem with DEI and what straight, white males have to deal with in the job market. Not only is their own government opening the doors to foreigners, but it is actively keeping them OUT of work and seeking to replace them with said foreigners. I don’t have the time or expertise to write about this here, but you can follow Aesthetica on Twitter who has been exposing a significant amount of this information. See here:
I also urge you to read this and definitely this from an ex Apple hiring manager who worked with them for a decade during their meteoric rise.
I’d also recommend reading the following three essays on the issue, by three of the best minds on Substack. They cover this whole debate and the many nuances far better than I have.
Immigration kills birthrates by
The Great Christmas H1B War of 2024 by the man himself,
Migration & the Sovereign Firm by
In closing
I know I said I wouldn’t discuss politics anymore, but this topic seemed far too relevant and at least 20 people asked me about my stance, considering I’m apparently “right wing” and I’m also in tech. So here it is.
The funny part is that I’m not even American, and what I’m saying here would be detrimental to my own hopes of one day moving there – but I don’t care: the truth is more important here.
America is the last bastion of the West. Europe is being absolutely destroyed and converted into some blend of Eurindia and Eurabia. We have to push back, and this can only be done with an approach that takes into account MORE than just the economic dimension.
That’s why I like the UAE as a model. They clearly value the economic side of things and they want great talent and money to come to the region. But, they put their own people first.
The US needs to do the same. All of Europe and the West also need to do the same because there are less of them, and more outsiders
Their territories are the destinations people are seeking to enter (not the other way around). It makes no sense that it’s easier to enter and become a citizen of the United States than it is to do the same in China, or for that matter most African countries.
With regards to the H1B’s specifically, they either need to be hard-capped, or abolished entirely and replaced with very specific visas for exceptional talent, like what already exists with the O1 visa.
In a world of increasingly digital and remote work, greater automation and high local unemployment, there is no reason to just open your borders, PARTICULARLY when your culture is at risk of dissolving.
Aleksandar Svetski
Buy: The Bushido of Bitcoin on Amazon
That lecture from Jayant Bhandari is absolutely devastating for Indians.
Segregation is at our door. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1Mg4nXJ21Y
In a world where developed countries have 1.x TFRs and constitute only 15% of the world’s population, any kind of mass immigration policy will inevitably lead to ethnic suicide within a couple of generations. If anything, it should be backwards; open the immigration tap a little more when native demographics look healthy.
The Liberal tabula rasa view of humans also needs to be cut out, root and branch. It’s the ideological first principle that undergirds the whole Western immigration policy that’s built on top of it.