You have put your finger on a key pathology of software development in general, not just H1-B: Mediocrities with terrible ideas about software love to have their bad ideas implemented without question. This explains why companies can easily end up paying more for H1-B labor. Egos get stroked. Nobody is asked WTF. Bad software is piled on top of bad software.<p>Not only is this a source of wage depression and age discrimination, it results in the kind of horrible-but-expensive IT that runs banking, health care, government, etc. and makes it much harder than necessary to apply technology to reforming those sectors.