We could probably make many other scandalous headlines from the same group of people:

"GM lays off engineer who contributed to trade union organising his colleagues"

"GM lays off engineer who only two years earlier contributed to patent XXX which saved $$$ for the company"

"GM lays off engineer who was recovering from cancer and is now at risk of relapse"

"GM lays off engineer whose seven dependents are now facing an uncertain future"

This is not to belittle what Hemanth Kappanna did, but there are four thousand stories out of which one is now lifted up, even though what he did previously is, as far as we know, not at all connected to this position being terminated. Contribution of Kappanna and his colleagues was to first to WVU and then the world as a whole, not GM. So perhaps a job at GM shouldn't be his "reward"; something else should be.

But I hope that the NYT headline might help him with that.

I had working software until the company updated to Windows 10.

In the process of making it work again, me and thousands of others were let go.

My boss knew what I was working on, but couldn't/was afraid to stick their neck out.

The world isn't fair, but now I'm doing similar development at a competitor.

this means your boss wasn't doing their job.

Organizations have short memories, except when it comes to grudges.

As far as I know, they hired him after his participation in exposing the VW scandal. If this exposing is what made him "undesirable", why did they hire him in the first place?

I find it more believable that this is just the usual outcome of corporate restructuring, i.e. layoffs in units.

Citizenship (or at least a green card) should be his reward.

The part that makes it tragic is that these people have no chance of getting a green card in their lifetime and have to be at the mercy of corporations to maintain their temporary visa status simply due to their nationality, no matter how long they have been staying or working.

Getting laid off is an unfortunate reality that happens to people now and then. It becomes especially nerve-wracking when it is tied to your ability to reside in a place without having enough time to find alternate employment.

Now, it seems pretty obvious to me that these people are probably much more productive and better contributors to this country and its economy than most of our own natural-born citizens, but the fact that we're losing them means we're basically shooting ourselves in the foot. The US isn't the only country where skilled engineers can find good work; these people should be able to find good jobs in another country where they can get a better deal w.r.t. immigration. Germany seems like it's much more welcoming to highly-skilled immigrants, for instance.

I think this should be a cautionary tale to skilled immigrants.

Germany and other EU countries have expressed their welcoming attitude to immigrants in general ("Wir schaffen das"), often exaggerating the skills of people who actually had no relevant training or competence at all (plenty of quotes available for this). But the current discussion in EU about the recent immigration wave has turned into a blame game of "why does Eastern Europe not carry its share of the burden".

That was before Trump was elected.

I know some people did accuse GM of emission cheating, but haven't heard of any actual proof.

Your headlines are indeed scandalous. While the one picked by the NYT correctly emphasizes that as part of the layoff plan, GM management decided that the department responsible for investigating emissions was not worth of funds.

If this person was from any other country, he would have a green card by now. But now, he has to leave everything behind and go back. This is all too familiar for Indian nationals working in the US. It has become way more precarious for Indian families now due to the current administration arbitrarily denying visa extensions for people in tech.

Hopefully he finds a good job in India, Canada or Europe.

And you'll be retired too.

If people living around you keep paying more and more for expensive lifestyle, eventually you will be paying 5mil for a 2bd house in a so-so neighborhood. Because everyone already paid 7mil for the houses with 3bd.

I admittedly have never lived in SF with kids, but this seems like a series of choices and likely some exaggerations. If one of you is making >$500k and both of you chose to work, have kids, and you don't have the option to shift morning/evening so nanny/daycare is only 40 hours these are all choices.

Even at the rate you quoted it doesn't seem unreasonable to be able to stash away significant amounts of money. The problems are very similar, but the solutions are a lot more enviable than most of the US.

4k a month is probably average for an over the table nanny at 45 hours a week with 1 kid.

Au pair is an inexperienced person which is fine, but not for the type of nanny work someone may need if they are working a lot of hours.

I believe you should be able to save serious money at 500k if you dont over extend yourself on a large apartment, but things add up very quickly so I can see how it might not be much left over with 2 kids.

SF totally jumped the shark.

But even if my figure is wrong then it's only because I accidentally posted it from three or four years in the future. But I suppose it's good news that a one bedroom is only $40k a year rather than $60k. At the moment anyway. And if you made 100k, then it's only 2.5 times more than taxes and leaves you a full 40% of your salary to thrive on, so that's nice.

You can get a 3 bedroom with that budget.

Only the new construction in soma is more than that.

$200k/year is middle class in the most expensive areas.

The conditions may have their downsides but they are the ones you agreed to and in exchange for agreeing to them you were provided access to opportunities that would not have been available to you in your home country. It sounds to me like now that you have reaped the benefits you want to stop paying the price you agreed to in exchange for those benefits.

Compared to (most of) the rest of the country, Toronto has pretty moderate winters though (if a bit of wet cold off the Great Lakes). 4-5 months in Toronto being horrible though? I've lived in Vancouver a bunch, and the late fall/winter there can be a dreary mess (though I still like it).

You are right though, that much of Canada has absolutely brutal weather. I grew up in one of those places. It's help set my barometer for what really bad weather looks like.

Keep in mind there's much of the States that is way colder in winter!

I realize there are places in Canada that are much colder than that, though.

Also, there are other places to work, even if they don't pay as much as the Bay Area (but they also cost less to live in). Canada is pretty immigrant-friendly. If you don't like the weather, that sounds like some pretty petty complaining; you enjoy a lifestyle and income that most of the people on the planet would envy.

Can you elaborate this a bit (or provide some links)? I am well aware that there are some policy changes around H-1B extensions, and that Indian workers make a huge percentage of the total denials, but I don't understand the connection between the two.

It has to do with the fact that green cards are allocated based on a per-country quota. Other visas, especially H1B are not.

So, to simplify:

- Assume there are 1000 H1B visas and 1000 green cards allotted each year and that an H1B worker can apply for a green card after living in the US for a year.

- 50% of H1Bs are from India, so there are 500 H1Bs a year from India

- But green cards are subject to a 100/year/country quota. So, the next year, only 100 of the Indian H1B workers can apply for a green card.

- This creates a backlog of 5 years for all the 500 to get a green card

- The problem keeps getting worse because the next year, there are 500 more Indian workers applying for a green card but the queue only has 100 more green cards to allocate, so now the wait for the last applicant is now 8 years.

- This process then repeats for a few years and workers from India now have a 100+ year wait for a green card.

In reality, not all H1B workers apply for a green card and there have been some temporarily relief mechanisms passed in the past to mitigate the delays, but you can see why the problem is especially bad for workers from India. In the past, it was a problem for Chinese workers as well, but with the economy in China improving in the past few years, there is lower demand from Chinese workers for green cards.

Let us restrict work visas to one or less than one per country to make it fair to Vatican City.

Or put another way - India, the country, might not be discriminated against, as it gets the same allocation of green cards as everyone else. Indians, the people from India, are discriminated against, as there are far fewer green cards per person allocated.

(the situation is of course more complicated than each country getting a flat number of green cards, but the idea holds)

The cap for Vatican City is far larger than the population. This does not change just because no one used it.

There is certainly reform needed in how, to whom and with which companies H1B visas are granted. However, let's put that aside as a separate issue and assume for now that H1B visas are granted in a fair, non-discriminatory fashion.

How does it make sense to limit the total green cards for any country to 7% of the total, regardless of that country's desire to immigrate to the US or even that country's overall population? What legitimate, non-discriminatory reason is there to cap green cards this way? (Vatican city is brought up because has the same cap on green cards that India has, despite much lower population and non-existent demand.)

The cynical view here (and one I suspect is at least partially correct) is that the relative inability of Indian workers to get green cards makes Indian H1B workers more cost effective and valuable to the companies that bring them to the US to work precisely because they are easier to exploit.

A truly fair system would impose identical caps on both H1B visas and green cards. (Ideally, this cap would scale somewhat with the overall population of that country.)

As it is, we have system seemingly designed to provide companies with low cost workers who are more easily exploited. This is bad not only for Indian workers, but for those worker's American peers and labor force competitors.

What we should have is a system designed to bring high quality, diverse workers with needed skills into our country and provide all those workers with a fair and realistic path to citizenship.

It is especially deceitful to compare absolute numbers from a tiny city-state with among the lowest populations againt a giant country with the second-highest population. At least divide by each country's total population to get per-capita numbers.

Vatican City is an atypical country. As other posters mentioned, there are many reasons why no-one with a Vatican City passport wants a nonimmigrant work visa for the US. Every individual who might possibly be eligible to have Vatican City citizenship and who wanted to work in the US would likely use their primary passport--probably Italy.

You're cherry-picking. And the cherry you picked is rotten.

That's why wait times are miniscule outside of India/China, but are several decades long if you're from India.

See: https://www.uscis.gov/tools/glossary/country-limit

These people from India are forced to spend their lives in the U.S. on the H-1B visa. A visa which prohibits spouses from working, deports your non-U.S.-born children[3] when they turn 21, makes it difficult to switch employers, prohibits unemployment / taking a break, and prohibits starting your own company.

This all goes back to the 1965 Immigration Act. That was the Act that made it possible for people from outside Western Europe to immigrate to the US. It allowed a limited number of highly-skilled people to immigrate if they were sponsored by a company (and the company proved there was no minimally qualified Americans willing to do the job).

Some rather-racist members of Congress were presciently concerned about a lot of skilled immigrant coming from China and India, which were the two most populous countries back in 1965 as well. To appease them, a 7% limit was put based on country of birth.[1] No more than 7% of immigrants in a numerically-limited category can be from the same country of birth.

Again, when the 1965 law passed, there were hard numerical limits on immigration. To appease the racists, Congress reserved most of the green cards for family members. Even the majority employment-based green cards go to family members.[2]

Effectively, out of the 80,000 skilled immigraiton (EB-2 and EB-3) green cards, around 55% are used by family members. That leaves around 36,000 spots for skilled immigrants a year. With the 7% per-country limit, you end up with a limit of ~2500 per year per country.

[1] Specifically, Section 202(a)(2) of the Immigration Nationality Act (Sec 202 is codified as 8 U.S. Code § 1152 Numerical limitations on individual foreign states): https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1152#a

[2] Family Members Use Most Employment-Based Green Cards (Cato Institute): https://www.cato.org/blog/family-members-use-most-employment...

[3] An extremely sad story about this: https://www.statesman.com/news/20171013/commentary-how-a-20-... Quoting:

> My wife and I came to the United States nearly 20 years ago from India with our daughter, Himani — legally — in hopes of a better life and an aspiration to succeed and contribute positively to American society. Unfortunately, due to immigration laws, she was unable to stay in the United States due to massive backlogs. This is a problem that affects thousands of immigrant children.

> She has lived in Williamson County following all the legal processes — but last year she aged out of the system, when she had turned 21 while we were still waiting for her permanent status. Under the current immigration system, a child can only stay on their parents’ visa as a dependent until he or she is an adult. We had been waiting in line for 20 years to get permanent residence but are now stuck in a massive backlog that is extremely disheartening.

> [...] This is all she knows and can call her “home.”

> Juvenile memories — such as her lemonade stands and attending prom her senior year — are some of the beautiful things she had to leave behind. We still cannot digest the reality of the situation. As a parent, it is bearable to see your child leave home voluntarily for college or their career — but not when they’re forced to leave through the result of unfair laws.

> She initially went back to India alone last year with a big smile and positive attitude. Since then, life has been a struggle to live for her: assimilating to a new culture, undergoing chronic illnesses due to her environment in India, and trying to figure out her life in general.

> She says it feels like someone has spontaneously taken everything away, including her identity. On top of that, her college education in the U.S. was abruptly stopped because she was unable to obtain a student visa; there is a law where gaps between a dependent visa and the college semester start date should not exceed 30 days. Unfortunately, she was five days over the limit. She has since applied to another university in India, where she will spend another four years studying.

> She hadn’t been able to see us for a year but later opted for a visa to “visit” a nation that is practically her home.

They’re choosing to spend their lives in the US on an H-1B; they’re not being forced to do that.

By birth the kid is a citizen at age 18. In [3] the kid is born before moving to the US, that's what makes the situation even more difficult.

But if the US didn't limit by country how would people from less populous countries be able get green cards? Given the exponential size differences in play I'd expect many years to have 0 immigrants from <insert small country here> and that doesn't seem right either.

This isn't an argument for the current system. I'm just not sure what a system would look like that doesn't unfairly disadvantage someone.

I guess the argument for the current system is that it makes the process reasonable for people from small countries. If it were all one giant pool then the process would be an unworkable nightmare for everybody instead of just people in highly populated countries.

I can understand the argument for and benefits of diversity of thought, of culture etc. But why passports? It makes as much sense as trying to insist that there must be equal number of right-handed, left-handed, and ambidextrous skilled immigrants.

As of current, that is what the congress prefer. They made the law. Indirectly it was the american public preference because it is the representative of american people.

Yes, that much is obvious. The question, if it was not clear, was an attempt to understand why this is the preference.

Note: This thread is already gone much pedantic IMO, but I give you the benefit of doubt that it is some miscommunication in language. If your point is "it is the way it is, and no explanation is owed to anyone", I will withdraw from the discussion because we don't have much to discuss.

Eliminate the program, and increase the quotas to compensate. The path to citizenship for an educated, English speaking individual should be less impeded than it is now.

I imagine USA is a capitalist country, and since we are talking about high-skilled immigrants here, how about ranking these potential immigrants based on their last 5 years W2 income and handing out green cards to the top "x".

I'm sure valuable people are paid more. I don't see how nationality needs to come into this. There is always a Diversity Visa lottery for people from less populous countries.

I'm fairly confident a medical doctor in the US is paid more than a janitor.

Now, you can make an argument about whether a doctor in a rural area is more valuable than a software engineer in SF but there is an NIW (National Interest Waiver) category that can be utilized to grant residency.

Funnily, in the current system, janitors and meat packers (from other countries) get their green cards earlier than doctors and engineers from India [1,2]

[1] https://www.myvisajobs.com/GreenCard/SearchAll.aspx?ST=Certi... [2] https://www.myvisajobs.com/GreenCard/SearchAll.aspx?ST=Certi...

This is just not true.

Most developed countries will let anyone with the requisite funds buy property, with no particular restrictions on foreigners. It’s certainly the case in the EU, Japan, the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

I live in Europe. I wonder what my Chinese landlords (who've lived their whole lives in China) would say if they read your comment.

Moreover, until recently, their spouses were prohibited from working. The Obama administration issued regulation that granted permission to work for spouses of people with approved (I-140) green card applications, who've been waiting for over a year. In a cruel and sadistic manner, the current administration, decided to revoke these authorizations, so that their spouses don't "enter the labor market early"[1].

> But now, he has to leave everything behind and go back

I don't think this is necessarily true. Can't he try to find another company that will sponsor him for an H-1B? If he has an approved I-140, he's cap-exempt, practically forever.

[1] https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/eAgendaViewRule?pubId=2018... Quote:

> Anticipated Costs and Benefits: > DHS anticipates that there would be two primary impacts that DHS can estimate and quantify: the cost-savings accruing to forgone future filings by certain H-4 dependent spouses, and labor turnover costs that employers of H-4 workers could incur when their employees’ EADs are terminated. Some U.S. workers would benefit from this proposed rule by having a better chance at obtaining jobs that some of the population of the H-4 workers currently hold, as the proposed rule would no longer allow H-4 workers to enter the labor market early."

Yes, he has exactly 60 days to find another employer and get the visa application through before accruing unlawful status. And according to this article, he did try but couldn't get a job, so he left.

Infinite visa extensions are all fine until you either:

1. Hit a recession or an industry slowdown (like the situation here)

2. USCIS decides your job isn't a "specialty occupation" anymore and denies your visa extension.

3. You become old (imagine an Indian national engineer at age 50-55 trying to get a company to sponsor H1B).

Most of these people dont even get to progress much in their career because [2] can happen.

If this engineer had a green card, he would have more time to search for another job if laid off.

This is not entirely true. In U.S. immigration law, "unlawful presence" and "violation of status" are distinct concepts. Unlawful presence of 6+ months results in 3 year bar, and of 12+ months results in 10 year bar. These bars are probably lifetime bans as far non-immigrant non-dual-intent visas are concerned.

However, you don't accrue unlawful presence as long as your I-94 is valid. That's the date stamped on your passport, and usually coincides with the expiry date of your visa, or H-1B approval notice (I-797A/I-797B), whichever is longer. If your company had filed for an extension, and are beyond the I-94 deadline, and you're waiting for adjudication, then you could accrue unlawful presence (if you lose your job).

I'm well-aware of the 60 day rule. (The 60-day grace period which itself was created in January 2017; prior to that you had no grace period.) Within 60 days, you change jobs, and start working at a new job, if the employer files the petition before the 60 days is up.

However, if you've gone past the 60 day limit, you can still get an employer to sponsor you -- you just need to leave the country and return, before you can start. Also, you need to make sure the file your H-1B/other I-129 petition while you're outside the country, so that USCIS doesn't have an excuse to issue an NTA (which can itself easily result in 10-year ban).

I was not aware that you won't be considered to have unlawful presence until your I-94 date. Very helpful information for people on H1B.

I've had several visas (including multiple H-1Bs) approved, regardless of my past visa violations. I've been careful to read up on the law. You can't be denied a visa you unless there's a clear basis for denial under the INA. Violations of status while you are within an "authorized period of stay" do not result in a bar.

Honesty is important though. There's a question in the DS-160 visa application form, that asks something to the effect of "Have you ever been illegal in the U.S.?" I've always been very careful to completely and honestly disclose all my past visa violations -- since dishonesty can you get you barred from the U.S. for life. My answer to that question in the DS-160 grows longer and longer, as the years pass. With every visa application, I list all my past violations, starting with my ancient F-1 visa violation. It's never been an issue.

There was one time a consular officer made a comment about it, but that was it. They've been more surprised by my salary. The last time I renewed my visa, post-Trump, they asked to see all my tax returns, and other information. The consular officer actually went through my tax returns in front of me, and seemed kind-of taken aback by my income, and made a comment saying "you've been doing quite well". Most of my visa applications have been at the consulate in Chennai.

I was also outside the US for a little while, 6 years ago, and during that time, I even got a B-1/B-2 visa approved, which is a non-dual-intent visa, and therefore harder to get approved. (The B visa is often denied for people with strong ties to the United States, under Section 214(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which prohibits immigrant intent--and having lived many years in the US is likely a strong indicator of immigrant intent.)

The important thing to keep in mind is to be well-aware of the law, and of what can trigger lifetime/10-year/5-year/3-year bars. Dishonesty results in a lifetime bar. Being turned away at the airport results in a 5-year bar. Many H-1B holders were turned back in 2010 during the recession[1]. Actual unlawful presence results in 3-year or 10-years bars. Getting an NTA while on a temporary visa inevitably leads to a 10-year bar.

Violations of status do not directly result in a bar. Right now, USCIS can initiate removal proceeding (by issuing an NTA) if you file a petition requesting a change-of-status, while out-of-status. However, they don't go after people on humanitarian or employment-based statuses[2]. (Previously, under the Obama administration, officials in USCIS were actually prohibited from issuing NTAs or attempting to deport status violators.)

NTAs inevitably lead to 10-year bars because they give you a court date that's always over a year ahead in the future. You have the option to arrange "voluntary departure" on your court date. But if you leave before the court date, you're considered to have been forcibly deported, and a 10-year bar is slapped on you. If you wait until your court date, you accrue unlawful presence, and get a 10-year bar.

Even some corporate immigration lawyers aren't fully aware of the laws. My last company's immigration lawyers freaked out when they saw my visa violations, and thought there was no point in porting my H-1B since I surely was subject an unlawful presence bar (they must've thought my past approvals were all accidents). I had to actually provide them with links to the USCIS Adjuticator's Field Manual (AFM) pointing to the relevant sections of what counts as a bar (along with references to statutory (U.S.C.) and regulatory (C.F.R.) law) and show that them that I've never actually ever unlawfully present. They did a bunch of their own research, and then came back to me and said "you are right", and proceeded to file paperwork for my new job.

[1] https://redbus2us.com/why-were-h1b-holders-sent-back-at-port...

[2] https://www.uscis.gov/legal-resources/notice-appear-policy-m... -- Quote: "USCIS will not implement the June 28, 2018, NTA Policy Memo with respect to employment-based petitions at this time. Existing guidance for these case types will remain in effect."

- Minimum pay 120k (something that would indicate the person being brought over is in fact valuable) or maybe more?

- Citizenship granted after ... 3 years?

Something like that.

- Do not tie the applicant to a particular employer, and

- in addition to min salary requirements, also require independent demonstration of in-demand skills. Otherwise this system is too easy to game for large employers/sectors, who could do the equivalent of dumping by temporarily paying high salaries and then ratcheting down once they anticipate the market will clear at their desired price.

So basically, turn the H1B into an O-1 style visa where you don't need to be as extraordinary as long as you're well-compensated.

Which was exactly the intent of the H1B in the first place!

> Citizenship granted after ... 3 years?

I like the intent, but that's pretty aggressive. Permanent residency after 3 years is maybe a better way of phrasing that.

I'm cool with bringing people over to work if there is a real need. I really just want it to have an upfront cost that is tied to the need... some way of proving that need and skills would be nice.

I'd be ok with permanent residency, anything that disallows the employer able to kick you back home at a whim kind of threats.

Every year there's a finite amount of green cards available, and a rule that says: a country can not claim more than 7% of all the green cards each year.

So every year the max number of Indians that can get green card is the same as the max number of Portuguese, but India has 100x the population of Portugal, so if in proportion to their population, as many Indians applies for green card as Portuguese, the Portuguese have a much higher chance of getting it approved this year

The Indians who didn't get it because of reaching that 7% are added to a backlog.

The following year, the same thing is repeated, but now in addition, you have all the people in the backlog, ... Repeat that many years, and now the backlog is more than a decade long: people who applied for the Green card a decade ago are still waiting.

It's already more difficult, expensive and time consuming to get a Greencard vs. permanent residency in comparable Western nations. My Greencard will take 18+ months, $15k and a very flexible employer and I'm walking into the system with a lot of advantages. I feel for Indians and Chinese people in the system.

disgraceful. USA needs highly educated (and other) immigrants so if he has been working at such high level positions for 17 years, why not roll the carpet?

Besides, the law itself is fucked up and backwards. Trying to enforce a bad law is itself not good.

You're saying not allowing anyone into this country is a fucked up law and backwards? Lol ok. I'd love to see you integrate into a shady Mexican community.

Citation? Why do our federal and state budgets have multi billion dollar line items for funding universities if it's just international students paying for everyone.

State universities accept a lot more than 3 in state students for every international student.

Clearly, you have no idea how the education system works in US. Most probably, only his PhD education was funded by a research agency for doing research, or if he was unlucky, like many PhD students he had to do TA apart from doing research for a living salary. Undergrad education is almost always not funded for any international student.

Your tone seems to imply you do not believe he should be granted citizenship.

What requirements do you have for granting citizenship that this guy doesn't meet?

He's spent nearly two decades in this country being a productive member of society - at a level most citizens don't ever achieve in their lifetime.

Why do you feel he shouldn't be allowed to permanently belong here?

What he did in his grad school, mind you, is certainly much more than random immigrants or even US citizens do in their lifetimes.

And what was it he did?

Here's an article about their testing.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/25/business/vw-wvu-diesel-vo...

This article makes very clear Dan Carder initiated and was in charge of the project. The article also gives shout outs to the grad students Marc Besch and Arvind Thiruvengadam for driving, and quotes Hemanth Kappanna as saying that they they attributed the discrepancies to technical defects or design flaws in the cars rather than deliberate wrongdoing: "It was interesting, but we never thought it would blow the lid off Volkswagen. Never, ever." This now has become a thriller of a hero unmasking a fraud through diligent insight and breathtaking research. Who devised this study, directed it and did the key research?

Mentioned in today's article is that Kappanna helped fill out the grant application. OK, that's something. And that is "more than US citizens do in their lifetimes". I am not convinced that is true. I will agree though that most US citizens don't in their lifetimes do 12 years of college followed by a brief undistinguished 4 year career, all by age 41. Most people in the US who are 41 have worked more than that. Most people in the US don't have the privilege and opportunity to attend college for 12 years. Wouldn't you agree? Is this what you are referring to when you talk about US citizens doing far less? You clearly have sneering disregard and contempt for US citizens, which is a common position these days, particularly from people raised racist societies based on hate and systems of entitled generational privilege such as the caste system, in contrast to the US's culture and legal system which repudiates all of that, instead being the land of opportunity, with nearly all of the population descended from recent immigrants, coming from every nation and ethnic group on earth.

I do have a problem people trying to diminish the credentials of a person whom they do not know and have no idea about circumstances of his professional or personal life. He did not get asked to publish in NYTimes. Many immigrants are returning to their home countries, how many have stories have you seen published ?

He deserved an award, not to be sent "home" after 17 - seventeen - years in the US.

Dieselgate wasn't about particulates, and unlike petrol cars every diesel car of the last 10-15 years has a particulate filter...

Now petrol cars are getting particulate filters too, because new emission standards (e.g. Euro 6c) include particulate restrictions for petrol engines, which they didn't previously have, and direct injection engines utterly exceed those restrictions.

Not true here in the UK - I buy and sell secondhand cars of this vintage as a side job, and not all the diesels I've seen have DPFs (I'd say it was 50% have them) - lots of models didn't have them, including quite a few vans (which pollute more due to bigger engines, lower mpg, etc). And anyone who's bought anything of this age range also knows that the DPFs are a reliability nightmare. Lots of people removed them (which is now at least tested on the MOT, although it's possible to remove it in a way that is not detected by an MOT test).

But most importantly, although dieselgate wasn't about particulates, it still means getting diesels off the road, which is a good thing. If particulates had been accurately measured in vehicles after a few years, I'm sure many more would be off the road, particularly 1st gen DPF cars.

The problem is that most people now equate a vehicle with a DPF as being a nightmare, and then by association don't care about the effect on the environment as the effect on their wallet is a more pressing need. Much the same as EGR valves, which are a reliability issue on most vehicles regardless of fuel. People block them off, leading to increased NOx pollution and better fuel consumption, and when it can cost hundreds of pounds to get it replaced (if it has to be calibrated to the ECU, etc, often a main dealer trip is involved), it's not surprising that this happens.

The sooner we can all go electric, the better, IMO. And I say that as someone who has considerable skill and experience in repairing and maintaining ICE cars.

That being said DPF issues seem to mostly impact people who only use the car for short distances; I've lived with DPF diesel cars for ~10 years and no issues. That being said any ICE powered vehicle is completely unsuited for travelling short distances, not just from an ecology point of view. Some more than others, though, it seems.

Yet just yesterday, in “ultra low emission zone” Central London, I saw a Ford diesel van with a 16 plate (meaning, it’s a late-2015 Model at the earliest) spewing a cloud of black soot every time it pulled away at an intersection.

It’s clear that there are still too many DPF removals going on, and lax controls about monitoring emissions from supposedly-compliant vehicles.

(Motorcycles are another huge issue. They may be compliant with noise and emissions regs at the factory gate, but too many people swap the exhaust for a loud, polluting, illegal one.)

Then let's see how popular the practice would remain.

Diesel cars should have a mandatory pre sale environmental inspection to root out buyers getting stuck in the 2nd hand market.

I feel like you might get a wee bit of pushback on the idea of crushing people's modes of transport because they stuck a non-regulation exhaust on there. All-or-nothing regulations such as the one you propose are rarely sustainable. Even CARB (the California Air Resources Board), the bane of California automotive enthusiasts, isn't that draconian.

This is England we're talking about. American respect for individuals and their private property does not apply and Europe tends to come down hard at anyone that dares thumb their nose at authority by intentionally breaking the law.

Furthermore making it strictly illegal to perform the work would assist.

Also, in the US the 8th amendment prohibits excessive fines. It is likely that courts will look on crushing a nearly new car as an excessive fine.

Where is gets interesting is when they take a hard-line stance on some things but not on others. Like you get a slap on the wrist for theft from another commoner but if you're caught stealing fish from the lord's stream without the proper license you're strung up by your thumbs in some castle dungeon for a month.

Of course, because executing people when they have the tiniest amount of drugs on them has also worked so well across the world rolls eyes

From what I personally observed on my EU6 Diesel (a very common VAG 2 litre diesel... sadly ?) that, the net effect of that comes out as approx 50-100 mile reduction in the range. The reason being more fuel being used to up keep the DPF.

In summer (June till October) I observed about 600 mile range from a full tank. Between November and up until February I observed 500 mile from a full tank (between 62 to 64 litres)

I was alarmed by the difference and then tried the "Economy" mode. I guess it detunes the peak output to 150ps (from 190ps) and also disengages the engine from the gearbox i.e. the car seems to be coasting in neutral when the accelerator pedal is not pressed.

With that, I was able to get 550 miles from a tank so far and recently the weather has warmed up again and the on board computer shows a potential range of about 600 miles.

I do make sure to never drive with a heavy foot and even on motor way try to stick below 70mph limit as long as it is safe. However, most of the miles done in that car are strictly urban (max speed not exceeding 50mph)

The cost of ownership of electric car didn't quite work out for us as a family when we downsized from two cars to just the one (keeping in mind the cost of public transport in UK)

I still somehow think that Diesel is the lesser evil compared to Petrol. It has (hopefully) lower CO2 emission. The problem is NOx which is (hopefully) neutralised by SCR and Particulate which is neutralised by DPF. And you need to burn less of it over the same distance.

But sadly it is hard to conclude what's what when the governments and industry keep showing different facets of their relationship every half a decade or so.

In the Economy mode, the ECU decides to shift into 5th gear at about 31mph and then I let the car coast.

I would think 2k at 160kph is where this engine would be too if ever I drove at that speed. 99% of the times the max I have done is about 110kph where it is in 7th gear at under 2k rpm (having read about the engine and the owner's manual, that 7th gear is out of power band and is effectively overdrive, not possible to accelerate in 7th even gently)

https://www.avontuning.co.uk/services/dpf-removal-delete

Proudly professing their removal service, and with a caveat at the end to say that it makes the vehicle illegal for road use and is for off-road use only.

I don't think it should be allowed, personally, but I'm sure there are libertarians who think they have a right to pollute...