Google, Microsoft, Wall Street Giants Plan To Shift More Jobs To India As Layoffs And Trump’s Immigration Curbs Bite: Survey

About 28% of survey respondents said the shift is due to the new U.S. H-1B visa policy, which includes a $100,000 filing fee and skill-based prioritization.

• A new Blind survey says major employers are increasing hiring in India this year.
• In some cases, India hiring is poised to replace certain roles previously based in the U.S.
• U.S. workers face increased uncertainty amid mass layoffs driven by AI.

About 93% of professionals in a new survey said their employers – major multinationals including Uber, Google, Capital One, the D. E. Shaw Group, and Microsoft – are increasing hiring in India this year, reflecting a shift toward moving more U.S.-based roles to the region amid layoffs and visa constraints under the Trump administration.

About 38% said India hiring is replacing U.S.-based roles, while 23% said it complements U.S. hiring, suggesting that offshoring is increasingly viewed as a substitute rather than a supplement, according to a Blind survey of 2,392 verified professionals across the U.S. and India between Jan. 5 and Jan. 11.

Blind is an anonymous professional networking platform where verified employees discuss workplace insights, culture, salaries, and layoffs.

The survey results indicate that companies are redirecting growth to India, signaling a structural shift in global workforce planning. Regarding how companies are expanding in the region, 25% said their employers are scaling up existing India teams, while about 20% reported creating new roles in India, and another 20% said specific projects or functions are being moved there.

Late last year, President Donald Trump’s administration revised its H-1B visa policy to include a one-time $100,000 fee for new H-1B petitions filed after Sept. 21, 2025. It also revised its selection process to prioritise higher-skilled, higher-paid workers over the traditional random lottery.

Meanwhile, major companies – especially in the tech sector – continue to carry out large-scale layoffs, driven by redundancies and project reorganisation as they adopt AI. Wall Street firms Citi and BlackRock recently announced layoffs, while Microsoft is reportedly planning a massive retrenchment. 

There were a total of 1.17 million job cuts last year, the highest level since the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, when 2.2 million layoffs occurred, according to a CNBC report. TechCrunch has a detailed list of layoffs across major tech companies.

About 28% respondents in the Bling survey said the new H-1B visa restrictions have pushed their companies to increase hiring in India.

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