Let's face it, for many countries, the US is still seen as dreamland, in particular to those many who don't connect the dots between the root cause of the problems in their homeland and the 30% tax that will be taken away from their income once they start working in the US.

This dreamland illusion is so strong that even the locals believe it. I have to deal with this on a monthly basis at the border custom patrol: the officers constantly stop me at the border and investigate me with tons of questions aiming at evaluating whether or not I am trying to "sneak into the country to steal work from honest US citizens" (sic). Every time, I am treated like a lost soul who's dreaming of working in the US (and who's very probably a criminal considering my skin color). Last time I crossed the border I was even warned that my passport doesn't show proof that I left the US, it only shows every time I entered it so technically, they don't know if I am staying there more than 90 days. How do you respond to this without being insulting? The thing is: I hate the idea of working in the US so much that I can't even talk honestly about what I feel fearing I would be arrested.

So, yes, "why US?", you asked the right question. But these guys are living in the exact same illusion than the US citizens are: "Our country is the best place in the world, the only place you're free of your opinions and where you can become a billionaire." The illusion is so strong they would even work for free...for free...for free...for free...

You can't do much against this.

This boggles the mind. "Hey, I'd love to have an exit date stamped on my passport. But I don't make the rules." First time I went to the US I got apprehensive because I didn't see an "exit" stamp. My passport was full of such stamps, mostly from Portugal and so I expected one. Only after arriving back at my country and turning the data package in my cellphone on is that I discovered that the US issues no such stamps.

> the US is still seen as dreamland, in particular to those many who don't connect the dots between the root cause of the problems in their homeland and the 30% tax that will be taken away from their income once they start working in the US.

Only 30%? That's nothing. Were in the world would you pay less?

> The thing is: I hate the idea of working in the US so much that I can't even talk honestly about what I feel fearing I would be arrested.

You give crap to law enforcements, specially immigration officers, and you are in for a bad time, anywhere. I bet your attitude has something to do with it too. Try to be polite.

My experience with US immigration is that they are cuddly teddy bears compared to Japan.

I can tell you all about this. Technically, the onus is on the air carriers to use their passenger manifests to report back to DHS, who tracks it all centrally. You can imagine how well that works.

Read More: http://cis.org/biometric-exit-tracking-feasible-and-cost-eff...

Well, aside from any compliance problems, its quite possible (and legal!) to leave the US by means other than air travel. (And, to respond to the link you provided, also quite possible and legal to do so by means other than commercial air or sea travel.)

  Only 30%? That's nothing. Were in the world would you pay less?

27,5% for income and 15% for capital here in Brazil. What is very expensive considering the quality of public services. And the taxes paid for products are much higher.

If you're a remote worker, that's heaven.

Maybe, but there are definitely other options. I am an immigrant myself and the steep USA's visa process made me to look to another place.

I am happy living in Canada now but my second option (Australia) still looks attractive too, and that is just to name two.

You may improve your life temporarily but it will all come crashing down one day when the immigration authorities catch up to you. You will be deported and banned from re-entering the US. There are many developed countries where someone with your skills can obtain a temporary work visa easily. You can live and work freely and legally, get on your feet financially and maybe attend university there to help you get into the US legally in the future.

Maybe it will help if you tell us where your citizenship is and we can help you with suggestions of other developed countries that will allow you to come for a 1-2 year temporary work visa.

http://flagtheory.com/

It's a points based system, which is punitive of age and education.

30 years is the cut off for the 'easy', one year, restricted 'working holiday' visa that you may have been thinking of.

For regular immigration, you'll need a working visa, which requires your hiring company to handle the paperwork.

Likewise, if you're trying to immigrate without an already found job, with no college degree, the OP will find the point system probably weighing heavily against him.

One of the most flexible countries at the moment is Spain. The weather is great, the food is great, and it's a fun country.

Pretty much the same than Canada but still way less restricting than USA.

>One of the most flexible countries at the moment is Spain. The weather is great, the food is great, and it's a fun country.

Spain has still a pretty significant unemployment rate, also (this may vary depending of the region and where are you originally from) some people are not very polite with some immigrant even if they are Spaniard-decendent (anecdotical experience from some friends living over there)

There's two types: one gives you 1 year residency (can be extended, of course) - application is decided within 10 days.

Another gives you 2 years, decision in 20 days.

Entry requirements are low. It's worth checking out.

In 10 days, you could be in Spain. There are many decent tech companies hiring as well.

http://foundersgrid.com/spain-entrepreneur-visa

I have also had various family members overstay visas for very long periods of time and they weren't dirt poor. On the other hand, this kind of hiding in plain sight is hell when kids turn 18 and can't attend a university. That's the most sad part of the existence and a big reason for support of the DREAM act.

I know a large number of people in the tech industry with questionable immigration status.

Please, don't get offended. I'm not a heavy user here and I don't have permission to downvote posts.

https://www.google.com/search?q=deportation&espv=2&biw=1600&...

I think the purpose of all this discussion was whether OP should come to the States and work under the radar, and the general consensus is that being here illegally strongly caps your upside, and has a pretty uncertain downside.

PS - My friend's now the chief engineer of a successful business in London... I always thought it was such a shame for a guy who worked his way from being an orphan on a farm in Kenya to live 90% of the American Dream, only to be kicked out of the country after putting in his all at Stanford and at a few startups.

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/may/07/experien...

in capitalist America, we ALSO deport intelligent workers

You need a "blue card" to work to work in the EU, its comparable to the US Green Card, but (i think) easier to get. From the Wikipedia-Article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Card_(European_Union)) :

Acquisition of Blue Card has several requirements. The applicant must have a work contract or binding job offer with a salary of at least 1.5 times the average gross annual salary paid in the Member State. A Blue Card acquirer must present a valid travel document (and in specific cases a valid residence permit or a national long-term visa) and documents proving the relevant higher professional qualification.

Here is more information regarding Germany (but it is from 2008): http://www.wohin-auswandern.de/blue-card-en

To be honest, the salary probably won't be a problem, with your expertise you should be able to land a pretty decent job.

I didn't get Blue Card since I didn't get job offer with really high salary, but instead I got Work Permit which don't require salary 1.5 times higher than the average.

Also in Netherlands there are two options: Blue Card and High Skilled Migrant.

Requirements for High Skilled Migrant are much lower than for Blue Card.

In Sweden and Netherlands you can work without university degree.

In Germany, you can not get Blue Card without university degree. And if you want to get Work Permit as alternative, you should know German language (Sweden and Netherlands don't require you to know their language).

So Germany isn't good option. I recommend Sweden and Netherlands if you don't have university degree.

AFAIK, no-one has ever received a Blue Card in the NL. The salary requirement is higher than for knowledge migrants, so it doesn't even make sense to try.

Knowledge migrant law discriminates on age. If he's over 30, the salary requirement is prohibitevely high - high enough that it is highly improbable he'll find a company willing to pay him that much with his profile.

If he's under 30, than the salary requirement is around €3k per month, and that might be doable if he does his interview exceptionally well and convince them he has a "thinking level" of somebody with a university degree.

https://ind.nl/en/individuals/employee/costs-income-requirem...

You should earn €4189 per month. It's not a lot of money if you are good software developer.

Booking in Amsterdam pay more than this!

From my personal experience (I don't have degree), I can say that companies like Booking, Amazon, Facebook, Google etc don't care about your degree.

If someone is handsome with algorithms and scalable architecture, then he/she can easily get more than €4K in Amsterdam.

Seriously, if only I can get a job at one of them.

That's difficult to believe. I barely make half of that in Canada.

I recently acquired a blue card kind of accidentally, after landing a permanent contract with a company as an iOS dev. The HR person took me into the foreigners office to apply for a sponsored work visa (where I would be tied to a specific company) and we walked out with a blue card tied to my profession instead, on the spot. Blue cards are really amazing - you have free movement inside the entire Schengen region, can work for anyone, you get unemployment benefits and it's a relatively short period before you can get permanent residency (with a language requirement - B1 in 21 months).

I'm West-Flemish myself and still live here, but I also get my share of snarky remarks of blogging in English or reading stuff primary in English. If you have a website with some text in Dutch and you make a spelling mistake then you will certainly get (angry) mails about it. Or when you use an English word instead of a Dutch, for some that is another capital offence.

If that sounds ridiculous keep in mind we have people proverbial running after busses and filling complaints when the bus company dares to advertise something with English words in it.

Ans seeing how many Dutch related contests Flemish participants win, I have sometimes the feeling that we are better in Dutch than our neighbours in the Netherlands. So yeah the Dutch language is really important in this part of the world.

For some things I can see the benefits of being able to promote (or even force) the local language. I'm personally convinced that from a social POV it helps when your neighbour understands you and speaks the same languages.

But on the other hand in the global age we are living we shouldn't overestimate the importance of it. It sometimes depresses me if I see how much energy gets lost in those kind of discussions.

The people were very nice (like, almost Hot Fuzz nice :-D), probably why the few who berated my Dutch speaking abilities stood out :-)

Fortunately a lot of people don't mind if you aren't fluent in it as they value the effort more then being 100% correct. And those who react hostile just don't understand how difficult the language is. Hell even natives have sometimes problems with all the grammatical rules the Dutch language has!

Hot fuzz is really one of my favourite movies, then again I'm a bit of an anglophile regarding movies/series/... . :-) I lived btw also in Blankenberge for 12 years and born in Bruges. Nowadays I live at the other end of West Flanders.

West-Flanders is actually (almost) Dutch only, not a lot of IT in here and a lot of agricultre. I don't mind, but i suppose a lot of older people ( who don't know english) could have a hard time having a conversation with you :)

Where did you live?

How come? Just no interest? Don't like it?

So it's worth a shot. Looks like we could use more programmers here.

Only requirement is to get job offer with enough salary.

But in this case, to work legally, he'd need a work visa as you say, which I imagine is even harder to get?

There are some societal problems with xenophobia and racism though. Probably affects Muslims the most. Avoidable by going to a major city like Berlin or Hamburg.

Work visas are generally only issued if you already have an offer. Which is hard to get unless you're in the country...

In southern Germany, engineering jobs have been difficult to find for my expat friends that don't know German. "Sehr gute kenntnisse auf Deutsch / Englisch" accompanies most any listing.

As RowanH suggested above. Have a look at www.seek.co.nz

In short, you only have to get job offer to relocate to Sweden.

They didn't even check my employment history.

So western countries get more high qualified people like me and my friends.

Putin motivate high qualified people to find a job in Europe :)

And as everybody agree in 21 century, high qualified people is everything for growing economy.

Basically, you need to get a job offer from a company in Sweden with a competitive ("normal") salary, and you are in.

IF your line of work is on the shortage list, such as IT work.

http://www.startupjobs.asia/

http://e27.co/jobs

https://angel.co/singapore/jobs

Shoot me an email (in my profile) if you need help / are strongly considering HK.

I have to get a job offer with more than 6000 SGD per month in order to get employment pass without university degree.

Also, gmazzotti, I believe you wanted to say "foreigners" instead of "forgeries".

I have very limited info about Uruguay and I appreciate it if someone could help me and provide more details about the situation there

I don't think knowing spanish is a requirement. At least I know of a few people who manage with only english, but you will enjoy life much more if you try to learn it. Uruguayans are nice, warm and very sociable, you will be missing out if you only talk to those that know english well enough.

Regarding work prospects, Uruguay is expensive and the salaries don't seem to reflect that. You will probably manage, but will have to be more frugal than someone in Australia. (There is plenty of good paying programming jobs though. Uruguay is the top software exporter in Latin America.)

All in all, Uruguay is underrated country. It has lots to offer and is growing everyday, but it still requires more effort to make a living than western countries. I wouldn't advice it for someone whose top goal is money, but I would strongly recommend it to someone who enjoys life's little pleasures, food, tranquility, friends, health, education and being away from almost all of the world conflicts.

I have started my Express Entry application and very soon I will say goodbye to US , I don't mind the cold in Canada. I will have freedom to change jobs, won't be an indentured servant. I will also get permanent residency fast. US green card for Indian citizen is around 10 years backlogged.

I suggest it's best for you to apply for the Canadian Express Entry for skilled workers.

And at the same time they lobby the Congress for an increase in H1B visas claiming there aren't enough US workers, they send out ads asking for ten years experience in HTML5 and CPU design, offering $30k for an "entry level" position, and say they can't find anyone here to fill it. Of course not, your requirements are insane and the wage is equally insane.

Yes, there are plenty of companies using H1B ethically, but for every ethical H1B, there are 5 unethical ones. It's a disservice to both American workers AND foreign workers.

PS: I'm not anti-immigration. I'm very much pro-immigration. What's that? You're intelligent, hard working, and want to come to my country to work your butt off and get rich? COME ON OVER! All I want is an immigration system that's fair to everyone, both those coming in to get a fair shake and have protections, and those of us already here, preventing immigrants from being used as cheap replacement labor.

Companies like these use up most of the H1B slots such that truly skilled high tech jobs that pay well, and would accept H1B if they could, are going unfilled. This is why you see so many U.S. companies setting up branches in Europe and Canada.

During that switch, the idiosyncrasies of the US' broken immigration system played a major role in my salary negotiation with my new employer. Many have an opinion that Indian H1Bs are unskilled. I am not going to judge them. AFAIK , I went through many rounds of interviews (whiteboard,project,cognitive) and I am pretty much sure I have engineering skills which are in demand. I am brave enough to state that I have more mathematical skills than many of my American counterparts.

Let me explain the idiosyncrasies of the US immigration system for an H1B worker.

While I was making the switch , my current employer came to know about my interview (possibly through a mole in my team) and the manager wanted to send me back to India. So he started the process of cancelling my petition.

So now I was under pressure to switch. The new employer knows that I am on H1B and they low balled me. This employer is not a body shop. This employer is simply trying to take advantage of my visa restrictions. Since my previous employer was in the process of cancelling my petition , I had no other choice but to accept the offer and join the new employer.

Your petition and visa is tied to your employer. Your job & freedom is under their mercy. If your employer cancels your petition , you are an illegal alien from the very next day. There is no grace time. (think about booking flight tickets, selling your car, breaking the lease and what not. Imagine school, kids and their state of mind. Its a mental torture).

So I joined my new employer and started working. I am beginning to feel that I am assigned a lot of work than my American counter parts , but I am not given any recognition and I am pretty much sure , I will be the one to get the lowest appraisals , because I cannot bargain. If my new employer fires me , I am an illegal resident from the very next day. I cannot search for a job , because there is no grace period. No employer will hire me because my petition would have been cancelled by then.

Not only Indian companies exploit H1B workers. American companies does that too.

Remember , American is a capitalist country. No employer whether Indian or American care about H1B workers. They just exploit them to the maximum extend because of this broken immigration system.

How to change it ? Immigration reforms like employer portability will be a good start.

But I am not waiting on these to decide my career & future. I have applied for the Canada Express Entry system and qualify with high points. My visa & permanent residency will not be controlled by employers in Canada. Soon I will say goodbye to this country. It has taught me many good things to remember and bad things to forget.

You hit the nail on the head. This is why rather than more H1Bs we need a better H1B.

IMO doing away with the lottery and granting the visa to the <N> highest paid applications would go a long way to make things better.

It would kill H1B sweatshops, motivate employers to look for American candidates a little harder and make it easier for companies willing to pay H1B workers well to fill the positions they cannot fill locally.

It's also a proposal that - I feel - could gain bipartisan support in congress. Unfortunately, I don't hear many people speaking out in support of it.

ps : I never visited aboard, don't want to travel aboard just because i'm a cheap labour :)

<typo-2> who is in America are not technically

I am not really sure if I should be taking this up considering the ridiculous cost of living in the Bay. Also, I don't know how much I'll be saving at the end of 2 years considering the fact that my wife will be travelling along with me (she doesn't have a STEM degree).

Although there are these cost of living calculators they just take into account a lifestyle that is 'just enough' to get by.

I do have some questions regarding working/living in the Canada. Is there an email I can reach out to you for some questions and advice? Would appreciate it. Cheers

Also, if H1B worker wants long term stability and wants to stay in the US beyond the 6 yr period, then the employer needs to apply for Permanent Residency (Green Card). The H1B worker needs to employed for that employer for the entire duration of that GC process. The icing on the cake is that the H1B worker needs to find new employment within a month of being terminated or leave the US. Again, possible in a good economy but near impossible in a bad one.

All in all, this creates the perfect hostage scenario with H1B workers pursuing stability till they get their green card.

Never switch before the petition is approved.

But the poster's employer has probably applied for a green card. Since the poster is Indian, that is a 10+ years process (4 for China and 1 for everyone else). If the poster changes employer (or accepts a promotion), the 10 year clock is reset to 0.

So for all practical purposes, the poster is locked to the employer. He is also locked at the same level and pay. Employers love this since they get an experienced person locked in at the same pay for a decade or more. Obviously this reduces wages for everyone.

This couldn't be more wrong. there is this little thing known as AC21 clause where you can change employers after some part of your green card has been pending for more than 6 months. This doesn't reset the green card clock at all if you're waiting to be current, but you do have to do the first couple phases again with the new employer (which are really quick)

I have seen many people I know use this to change employer with no problem. If someone under green card is unable to change employer, chances are they just can't find a better job.

Also it is wrong that you can't accept a promotion. For example going from software engineer to senior software engineer is fine. As long as the new position is at least 51% similar to the previous one you are fine, and it is easy to prove on paper with a little bit of magic with your lawyers.

Also wrong that you are locked at the same pay... Seriously I have never heard this yet, where did you get that? I know plenty of people (and myself included) who while waiting for the green card got multiple raises with no problem.

The AC21 allows you to change employer when you have filed the I-485. That is step 3 of the 4-step green card process. One can't file the I-485 until the "priority date" is current. That is not an issue if you are from any country other than India, China, or Philippines. Else you are looking at a delay of 4 to 11 years. So as I said, not practical for the poster who is from India.

Technically it is also possible to accept "normal career progression" changes in employment, i.e., promotions and raises, as you correctly pointed out. However in practice, what constitutes as "normal" is subjective, completely at the discretion of a visa officer. For a long time, this was very easy and a formality. In the last 1-2 years, the Visa Officers have become anal about this. Cases are being audited for something simple like Data Scientist using Python to Data Scientist using R (actual anecdote in my company).

Also visa officers are going back to approved cases from several years ago and retroactively denying them on some technicality like the above. So even if you know cases that were easily approved in the past, they can be suddenly denied and the employee can retroactively become "undocumented" for the past several years (again actual anecdote).

My experience (as an employer) is that it's become much harder over the last year or so to get the re-application through. At the very least they tend to have substantial delays. I'm not aware of the underlying reason.

Also, money or not, if you're working in US in capacity that usually someone would get compensated for, even for a company outside the US, you need to have work permit in the country.

If I were you I would look for jobs within Middle East like Qatar, UAE. Jobs related to tech are there, US universities are there, and the requirements with immigration are basically "if employer wants you get in." Rack up a few years of experience, then getting H1B would be viable.

And due to cyber security laws, you will notice no one is going to sat more than that in a GCC state.

If you're there for manual/low skilled work then the pay and conditions (relative to, say, Europe) can be appalling.

Given what he posted, he is either from Syria or Yemen. And this is why, knowing the breakdown that you summarized, he will most certainly face a tough time.

I work with many people on both sides of this spectrum, and hence my warning.

Proving experience without employment contracts is really hard to impossible.

Do not work for free.

Once more, please, do not work for free.

1. You don't have to work for free, far from it. You have in-demand skills and experience in a global job market. You can make really good money in many, many desirable locations around the world.

2. I would be extremely wary of anyone who would take you up on the basis you're proposing. Anyone who would give you such 'charity'[1] may have very questionable morals - 'oh sure, I'll take this desperate[2] man's skills, make potentially a LOT of money off of him without giving him his due reward, and that's completely fine with me, because that's what he said he wanted'. Imagine the sort of person who would utter such a sentence - do you want to tie your livelihood for the next however many years to such a person? I'm sure you know, there is a whole class of criminal activity in developed countries which exploits illegal immigrants based around this very premise. DO NOT put yourself on that path.

3. Never put yourself at the mercy of any one person or organisation for your survival. Your current situation is awful, but what kind of life would that be to move to? How will you feel waking up in a morning in a bed someone is letting you sleep in, eating some food they gave you for breakfast, then going to work all day only to guarantee an evening meal and bed when you return home. Repeating every day for a long time. That is not a life.

[1] That's what they might justify it as, at least. The reality is the opposite.

[2] I really don't mean to offend here, I know that's not what you are, at your core. But that's how they will see you, and that's the position you will put yourself in and indeed what you will become by following such a path.

I agree that I would guess you can do better, especially looking at other countries (there are so many out there! and wonderful people everywhere). But worse comes to worse, don't be afraid that the sky will fall down on you if you can't find better than this arrangement. Just keep working hard and leaping for better (and do keep your eyes peeled as there absolutely could be people who would take advantage of you).

I can't relate to what he's going through but I know he's looking for an out from his current situation, under a great deal of stress, and from that vantage point it's usually difficult to see how varied your options are.

I meant for my overall message to be positive - OP, you do not have to resort to this plan! There is virtually zero chance that this plan is your best option. Assure yourself of that, and take a serious look at the vastly better alternative options you have - some great ideas for which are on this thread!

While I am sure there are conditions that will allow you to come and stay in the country, I would be careful what your arrangement is with any potential startup and how it is worded.

Perhaps another individual on HN has more insight into U.S. visa rules and can provide better guidance?

Good luck nonetheless!

> just food and a place to live in transportation would be nice too but i am not going to take money from you and i am not going to ask your for health insurance or be your employee, i don't want to break any rules

There is a good chance that, as well as raising immigration law issues, this arrangement could also cause your non-employer to violate federal and state minimum wage laws.

I second the advice of others who suggest consulting an immigration attorney. This is a challenging and important problem, and it really demands the advice of a professional. If you don't think you can afford one you should: 1) schedule an initial consultation with a good immigration attorney anyway. You should get at least this first conversation for free. (And beware: there are many truly awful immigration attorneys. Do a little research.) 2) Look to see if there are any law schools in your area that have immigration law clinics. They may well take your case for free and, although you will be assisted by law students, they will be supervised closely by faculty and will probably provide you with very good advice.

Good luck.

However, I don't think there's anything illegal about paying an independent contractor who's living in another country. So my suggestion to codeornocode would be to find some sort of work in the US that could be done remotely from some safe third country. Immigration authorities care a lot about displacement of their own citizens, but in the places I've lived they don't give a hoot about somebody who is on a working vacation.

[1] http://wwoofinternational.org

OP, you really should consider making your way here to NZ.

Having said that, Auckland felt like a bit of a technical wasteland... I've heard it's better down in Wellington or Christchurch, but I never regretted moving to San Francisco.

I sponsored s.o. for their permanent resident visa and we were told to wait until the status has been approved before any kind of work can be done. The immigration hotline mentioned that volunteer work would be possible during that time, but it would still require an application from the employer. It took the employer a few days to get all the paperwork sorted out and 2 weeks later the application was denied, leaving everyone a bit disappointed & furious about all the wasted time and promised opportunities on both sides.

Generally speaking: even if you do work as a volunteer, the kind of work you're going to do is most likely s.th. that should either be paid for or could be done by a local resident/citizen. If the US system is anything like the Canadian one, then you'll still get in trouble if they figure out that you've been working, even if it's for free/volunteer work.

My suggestion is to not do this. Enter as a tourist and enjoy your time in the US. If you want to work in the US, do it legally. Do work on an open source project and try to network and get a job that that way. Maybe try to join a huge company like Google or Facebook from abroad and transfer. That's your best way, especially if you get an L1 visa.

It is just not worth the risk and definitely not someone of your caliber needs to. There are other countries where you could fare better. Perhaps Canada?

All the best to you!

- Once you get citizenship in one country, you can freely work on any of the other countries, or move there and live there. Creating a much bigger area of opportunity for jobs. You could have citizenship in France, and work at a cool startup in Amsterdam

- Though it causes a lot of political instability currently (immigrants constantly drowning in the ocean, trying to get across), getting a visa here isn't that hard, especially when you're from a conflict zone and can show you have a good chance to get a job.

- Europe is pretty awesome.

Coding for a startup and not receiving pay, is likely still not legal. In my experience with US immigration (I'm Australian, living in Canada...traveling to the US from time to time) they don't really care about the money, they really just are about if you're taking away work that could have otherwise been done by a US citizen. Which leads me to the point of:

The fact you're doing the work for free is very likely to be irrelevant, its just the fact that you're doing work that is an issue, irrespective of the reimbursement you're receiving.

US Border Patrol denied my entry to the US once because a coworker and I were coming over to oversee the installation of a number of electrical devices our company built/designed/tested and shipped to the client. We didn't have the adequate paperwork to state that this was a contractual "job" and we were simply there to assist local tradespeople in the installation should they have any questions since, you know, we designed the thing.

When we were turned around at the border it was explained: without the paperwork to detail what we were doing, that this was agreed upon ahead of time and likely a bunch of other legal matters they had no method of knowing whether we were hired to save wages that would otherwise go to an American citizen. We weren't being paid for this work, it couldn't be done by anyone else (short of them taking the design work and learning it from the ground up over several months) and we were still denied entry.

OP, work, even if free, is still work. Contact legal aid for what you are and are not allowed to do.

Wouldn't that be compensation, technically? Also, I'd expect a company to be required to pay someone at least a minimum wage, but I could be mistaken.

> I am doing this because i live in a war torn country, some issues happened and i've lost all my savings

Dude, forget the US for now. Your first priority is to get a safe place to live in and a stable job so you can build your financial life back. Try other countries, such as the Netherlands, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland. These have way better immigration policies, specially for people in tech.

Then, when you are ready, try California again. Having no money will be an obstacle otherwise. How are you going to get translated, notarized documentation otherwise? Not to mention any kind of fees, plus transportation.

> i can't get an H1B visa because i don't have a university degree

Then don't, try another route. Such as via a big US multinational company. Or get the degree, if you follow the suggestion to go to an "easier" country first. You are young, you have time.

While a work visa is not likely to be easy, the current tech scene has huge demand for programmers of all kinds. Especially if you're expert in Unity/Full-stack.

If it'll help, let me know here, and I'll connect you to someone in this very area (game programming, Unity SDK programming).

Other options would be Canada, Mexico, Vietnam, or anywhere else you can work remotely.

For visa details see http://www.immihelp.com/nri/indiavisa/employment-visa-india....

If you want any more information about India - dont hesitate to mail me. It's a great startup ecosystem and great food. Yes, we have our shit - but fairly democratic and good opportunities can be had in general.

Tech work in India can be used as a stepping stone to the middle east, Singapore or the US.

A very narrow exception exists for unpaid interns. But that requires one to also be authorized to work in one form or the other for e.g. as a student who needs work experience in his/her field of study.

If you are interested in moving here, shoot me a mail. Alternatively, check out my blogpost on medium: "Eight reasons why I moved to Switzerland" (https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-t...)

Also, paying 300-500 CHF per month for health insurance out of pocket might sound not to bad considering the fact that your net-salary is probably 3000 CHF higher here. (In Switzerland you pay 16-22% as income-taxes compared to 60% in Sweden).

I'm going through the immigration process right now and everyday Canada looks like a good option. I know it's not the US but it's still an awesome western country and has a reasonable immigration system.

Good luck!

There are plenty of Jobs which you can get without knowing German, and many employers provide free classes where you can learn some basic German. IMO knowing a new language is also a very marketable skill depending on where you are from. Depending on the company you may get 25-30 paid day offs in a year.

You can get paid well if you are qualified/experienced. Living costs are low as well, I live in Berlin in a spacious 3 room apartment in a great area (http://i.imgur.com/qLqzqN7.jpg). The infrastructure is amazing. My daily commute is 20 mins door to door (subway or cycle) and I don't need a car at all. My daughter goes to daycare for free, and the healthcare system though it has its quirks, works quite well.

Getting a blue card is easy and with your qualifications you should be able to get it quickly, with the blue card you can travel outside the EU and come back within 12 months, no questions asked.I just took a 3-week vacation back home and plan to take another one this year.

If you wanna explore some options I would be more than happy to help, drop me an email at winash@outlook.com

You can find a job on oDesk (upwork now). I did it before, I earned $3K/month and worked 5 hours a day only. It's a good money for these countries (well and for US too).

Just work remotely, live there, save money. One day you'll find a job and will legally move to U.S. (seems like you'll be qualified after 9 years of professional experience).

Doesn't make any sense, but that's how it is.

Firstly, there's the Refugee Cash Assistance (RCA) program: https://www.sccgov.org/sites/ssa/debs/calworks/Pages/refugee...

Here are some other California refugee programs: http://www.dss.cahwnet.gov/refugeeprogram/

List of other refugee programs: http://www.visaus.com/benefits.html

Next, food aid (food stamps) is called CalFresh (req 5 yrs of residency for noncitizens)

After that, there's MediCal (state-run health insurance available at the county social services agency) (unsure of requirements)

Lastly, General Assistance (emergency cash, a pittance) (only 15 days of residency is required). You can sign up for it at a local social services agency office.

Here's the main website for Santa Clara county: https://www.sccgov.org/sites/ssa

(Beware of name clash: federal Social Security is also called SSA. I hear any sort of Social Security benefits usually takes a very long time and lots of paperwork to get.)

GA policies: https://www.sccgov.org/ssa/general/gachap06.pdf

Other California counties' websites are listed here: http://www.counties.org/

Yadav.rakesh (at) gmail

No need to work for free - definitely not when you know how to program and build systems. We don't seem to have enough of those.

Good luck.

Specifically Australia, Canada, Germany all have working holiday visas which are flexible and would let you do this sort of thing. Generally anything to do with the US and visas is a bad day.

if you are interested, let me know.

Also, the US immigration and refugee systems are arbitrary, byzantine, gotcha minefields that can suck would-be visitors into indeterminate imprisonment or expelled for minor paperwork errors or unintentionally breaking one of a billion unclear rules.

The border guards said that unless he was a citizen or had a work visa then he was not allowed to work on fixing up his own house, and would have to hire a local to do it.

tl;dr working for "just food and a place to live" is still technically working, and unless you have permission to do so it would be risky for all parties involved.

Then tourists are not allowed to cook and must go to restaurants, and coding for open source is also illegal? I think guards were wrong.

I don't know if you'd be allowed to work, but instead of taking grants from the US as a refugee, you could maybe convince them that you are a skilled-refugee who is leaving your war-torn country and you would like to work instead of being given a handout.

Something tells me that the red-tape in the US won't allow this, but it is worth a shot, especially if you speak to an immigration lawyer about it.

And on the global search for alternatives, should US not work out, here's some overview data of 110 most startup-friendly cities in the world: http://my.teleport.org/ -- and a mobile app for searching among them: http://teleport.org/mobile (visa data layers coming soon, too, but dozens of other cost & quality of life criteria already there)

Also, please keep us up to date regarding your situation.

Respectfully,

D. Virgillo

1. Take a deep breath and be calm. It will be ok. You have a visa which is the option to move. you are in a good place already.

2. Think of the most stable (infrastructure and cost wise) country you can access visa free, go there and try getting a remote position in the US. With that, you can fun living a fairly stable life in the mean time.

3. DO NOT risk your B1/B2 by trying to trick the system. Aim for a maximum of 4 months/year in the US on it.

4. With your B1/B2 you can travel to Mexico and Turkey for a while too.

Finally, DO NOT risk your B1/B2 and always have a decent reason when entering. the paper you have in your passport is merely for the CHANCE to gain entry at the immigration border and not a visa in itself.

It will be ok bud!

What about working on some open source projects? I don't think that would fall into the danger zone of immigration law(since you wouldn't be working "for" anyone).

Alternatively, maybe a company here can offer you an internship? The visa requirements could be less.

Does anyone here know an immigration lawyer that could help this person get out of a bad situation?

http://www.quora.com/O1-Visa

I have exactly the same problem. I'm from Russia and I don't have university degree so I can't get H1B visa right now (but I will when I have 12 years of exp).

US is really hard country to get in.

I relocated to Stockholm, Sweden since Sweden doesn't require university degree for work permit. Software developers are in shortage occupation list.

Sweden is easiest wealthy western country to get in.

If you will bored in Sweden, you can later apply to UK (as far as I understand Tier 2 General doesn't require degree either).

You can get your job in Hong Kong and Singapore without university degree but it will be a bit harder.

So I recommend Sweden. It's better to be normal employee in Stockholm than working for food in California.

Also, don't stay for a few months in US on tourist visa. Next time they ban you to issue new visa!

Once in Sweden you will either fall in love with the on the surface reserved people, or if you don't, work 5 years, apply for citizenship, then be a Swedish citizen (best passport in the world for traveling along with U.K. passport) and automatically a E.U. citizen, which means you can work anywhere in the E.U. without any limits at all. As a E.U. citizen and especially Swedish citizen it can be easier to get into the U.S. and Canada, I hear anecdotally. There are also sizable communities of almost all war affected ethnicities in Sweden you can socialize with. Stockholm is the most international city, you can live there a life time on English alone and not feel left out too much. Everywhere also you can still live on English alone, but the social life with locals will suffer if you don't learn Swedish, IMHO. All Swedes know English, but you will miss out on little chats etc. Also minorities often communicate more in Swedish than their native tongue, especially children of immigrants, so paradoxically to connect with your own kin, you also need to learn Swedish. Integration issues varies from place to place, there are some problems with racism especially towards people of color, but far from as much as in Germany. Also the racism is kind of specific and weird, if you are black but from the U.S. you are still almost celebrated by the Swedish locals.

TL/DR: Sweden is awesome. Easy to come in, if you love it, you will love it a lot. If you don't, become citizen then move on to the rest of the E.U.

http://www.seekasylumsweden.info/

Sweden is not California, but California is not Sweden. Why the pity party trying to stay in the US, when Sweden is welcoming--and a great place to live?

After I get permanent residence, I should live ANOTHER 5 years to get Swedish citizenship.

So it's 9 years in total, not 5 years.

http://www.migrationsverket.se/English/Private-individuals/E...

Are you suggesting that the U.S. immigration authorities are banning people for using visas to their capacity, for their intended purpose?

If immigration officer has opinion that you are potential immigrant, he will refuse you a new tourist visa.

Or another definition:

If there is no clear evidence that you are not potential immigrant, you will be refused to get a new tourist visa.

For example, people often won't get US tourist visa:

1. Who spent too much time in US on tourist visa (even if they formally didn't break their limits);

2. Who previously had a visa under "Work and Travel" program;

3. Who are young single girl;

4. Who said that he/she has relatives or friends living in US;

I wasn't careful and said that I have a friend living in US. They immediately refused to give me US tourist visa!

I read several hundreds interviews with US immigration officers (people posted their experience after refusal) and I think I clearly understand how US immigration authorities made their decisions. But it's too late, I did it AFTER my interview with immigration officer.

I didn't want to stay in US illegally but immigration officer think so.

US immigration authorities are very, very, very suspicious about Russian and Middle East citizens.

BE CAREFUL WITH THEM!

Basically (from the page above) for a tech job:

* Valid Passport

* Job offer BEFORE traveling with average level salary

Edit: if you can get a job offer, that's much better than the asylum process. Waiting time for asylum decision is like 1 - 2 years and you are not allowed to work during that time. You may get in, especially if you face persecution in your country of origin, but your soul will be crushed in the asylum process. :-/

I think you can get work permit in Sweden without relevant work experience. But I think there is some risk for refusal.

You will be attached to your employer only for the first two years.

But work conditions are very soft here. Nobody push me work hard.

I think your best option is to ask for Asylum [1]

[1] http://www.uscis.gov/humanitarian/refugees-asylum/asylum

I'm from a very remote part of Brazil and I used www.seek.com.au to get a programming job in Australia in 2008.. The company ran some remote tests with me and paid for all the relocation costs. You should try this.

Also you can try to get a permanent visa even before you try to move there. You can use the Immigration Points Calculator (https://www.wannamigrate.com/tools/) to know if you have the basic requirements for these same countries.

https://skillselect.gov.au/SKILLSELECT/ExpressionOfInterest/...

Also, there _may_ be nothing stopping you from living in the US but working remotely for a company in another country. That may be a good path to getting an Australian/European/other company to sponsor you for skilled migration.

Best of luck!

Also, holding children in prison camps unfit for human habitation, because they have not been granted asylum status, isn't that much better.

Anybody can start class and you qualify to join signup for a professional degree after getting A in 3 or more classes. Good luck !

You can contact the Helsinki Citizens Assembly or the International Organization for Migration for advice.

However, as many others have suggested, I too would recommend you to try another country, where visa rules are relaxed.

If you have all this time, why not develop an app and sell it on the internet? You can always say you're working for your own company back home.

Good luck; we're rooting for you.

For a skilled Ruby dev with a diploma(for a third world country, this is a requirement) you can get around here pretty easily.