1. How, if at all, do a company's ethical obligations to employees from its own country differ from its ethical obligations to employees who are citizens of other countries?
2. Should U.S. companies that have laid off U.S. workers try to hire only U.S. workers? Why or why not?

For years now, U.S. corporations have bemoaned a labor shortage of workers with advanced technical and scientific knowledge. Often, they have sought to fill the talent gap with workers from other countries. Some of these employees come to the United States with an H-1B visa, created to allow companies to hire individuals with exceptional talent. The H-1B program generally does not require employers to exhaust the search for a U.S. citizen before hiring someone with one of these visas.
Many people accepted that practice as a business necessity. But in the recent economic downturn, many high-tech companies have laid off swaths of their workforce.
That gives rise to a question: Should companies in the United States be expected to fill positions with U.S. citizens before they should be allowed to look overseas? Iowa Senator Charles Grassley wrote a letter to Microsoft, calling on the company to give U.S. workers priority. Similarly, Grassley and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders introduced a bill in Congress forbidding banks that received federal bailout money from hiring workers under the H-1B program. Microsoft's reply to Grassley's letter indicated that it has targeted layoffs based on assessment of its human resource needs in the present and future. In addition, some people question whether favoring U.S. citizens would run afoul of laws requiring equal employment opportunity.
One impact of the economic downturn has been a slowdown in requests to use the program. Until recently, petitions to hire these workers met the 85,000-visa limit almost as soon as the application period opened. But in 2009, when the five-day application period ended, many slots remained available.
Meanwhile, the number of graduates in math, engineering, science, and technology in the United States continues to trail far behind projections for the number of people with these skills who are expected to be needed in U.S. jobs.