I want to be careful not to wade too deeply into the H1B debate, because it's an absolute hornets nest, but I figured I'd at least compile some simple statistics to refute the idea that the good paying jobs I post here are all just going to be farmed out to H1B petitioners so shouldn't be taken seriously.

The biggest employer in the area is John Deere (Moline, IL), so not surprisingly, they have the most H1B petitions on record: 120 approved in 2024. But, that's out of 4,215 employees in the Quad Cites. The H1B job holders make up less than 3% of the total jobs at Deere, so consider that 97% of the posted jobs go to locals.

The rest of the employers in the QCA barely use the program at all. There are a total of 45 non-Deere H1B job holders in the entire QCA, out of a population of 380k. Stated otherwise, .00012% of available jobs outside of John Deere went to H1B holders in 2024.

So toss that excuse away, it's just another aspect of the mindkiller.