Anti-outsourcing bill gets defeated in US Senate

A bill moved in the Senate by the Democrats to bring jobs back to America by granting payroll tax breaks to participating companies was defeated on Tuesday by 53 to 45 votes The measure - A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to create American jobs and to prevent the offshoring of such jobs overseas - was put to vote on Tuesday and defeated in a vote predictably along party lines. The Business Roundtable, a pressure group comprising the US's top CEOs, who account for US$6 trillion in revenues and employ 12 million people, wrote a letter to the senate arguing for the move to be dropped. The development comes a week after a NASSCOM delegation, comprising representatives of top IT companies such as Infosys, Wipro and TCS visited the US and lobbied with the key Congressmen and corporations. "We welcome the move. The anti-offshoring bill was more of an electoral rhetoric. We had met the Congressmen, key Government officials and American industry last week and expressed our concerns against the protectionist measures," NASSCOM Vice-President Ameet Nivsarkar said. US
President Barack Obama is pushing to end the tax breaks for companies, which ship jobs overseas saying they should go to firms who create jobs in America. The Obama administration has also recently hiked fee for professional visas.