Employers looking to hire native English-speakers are reporting a lack of interest on the part of potential employees, partly because so many recent immigrants continue to maintain their American jobs, even after moving here.

Although the reports are mostly anecdotal, some employers say that the shortage is especially acute in professions like marketing, editing and graphic design - jobs that are relatively easy to maintain even after the transatlantic move.

According to estimates, between 20 and 30 percent of recent North American immigrants are either commuting or telecommuting to jobs abroad. The growing phenomenon allows people to perform their job no matter where they are and means that many more olim have greater financial security after making the big move. But it also means that fewer are looking for jobs in the local market.

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"We are trying to expand, but we can't find workers," said Chevy Weiss, owner of Global Visions Israel, a public relations and marketing agency in Beit Shemesh. "We're looking to hire people and there are companies that want to give jobs to Israel, but we have to say sorry because we can't take on the extra work.

"Olim are coming, but they are not willing to take the jobs that Israel has to offer. Some of our clients also want to expand but they're having problems getting Anglos to take the jobs because olim are coming with certain financial expectations. People walk off the plane and some are expecting to get the same salary they were getting in America.

"I recently sat with someone who wanted $200 an hour, which is what she got in America. I wanted to be nice and encouraging, but I kept thinking, 'What world are you living in?' She didn't speak a word of Hebrew and hadn't gone to ulpan yet," Weiss said, referring to the intensive Hebrew-language course offered to immigrants.

Spurred by the ease of telecommuting and international travel, some immigrants are now less willing to compromise financially after aliyah, employers say. "Peoples' expectations have changed," said Deena Porat, director of human resources at CityBook Services, a company that provides paralegal work to the U.S. real estate industry and hires mostly ultra-Orthodox Anglo women.

"Many of the recent olim didn't come with the attitude, anu banu artza livnot u' lehibanot [literally: we came to this land to build it and to be built by it.] They expect American salaries and American conditions. It's become a very different aliyah in the past five years," she said.

According to Porat, people who come in for interviews will sometimes "expect two to three times what we pay. Individuals will say that it's just not worth leaving their clients in Baltimore."

Others who work specifically in the Anglo employment sector say that some immigrants scoff at a starting salary of NIS 30 an hour.

"The salary we pay is nice for Israelis but not nice for Americans," says one staff member at a company that employs a large concentration of native English-speakers. "People who come to us are used to an American salary, so we're having some difficulty finding people."

Take immigrants who are trained as graphic designers, for example. While they may have earned up to $60 an hour in the U.S., here they are paid just a fraction of that sum. "It's natural to continue working for an American employer, as opposed to working here and earning $10 to $15 an hour," says Eli Kazhdan, co-founder of Jerusalem Design, a custom publishing and graphic design company based in New York and Jerusalem. "People will work 15 hours a week at $60 an hour, rather than full-time for an Israeli company."

Pnina Halberstadt, a job developer at the Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel (AACI) in Jerusalem, says that "immigrants are comparing what they are offered to what their salaries were in the States. Olim who telecommute are much better off financially and so unless the offers they are getting here are more competitive, employers will continue having a hard time finding people."

IDT Global Israel, the local arm of the U.S.-based communications giant, currently employs about 1,000 people, making it one the largest employers of native English-speakers in the country. But the company, which operates call centers, now has some 470 job openings and is having difficulty finding people to fill them.

"We advertise like crazy and we are at all the employment fairs and ulpanim, but it's impossible to fill all the spots," said Eli Ninio, CEO of IDT Global Israel. "We don't have enough workers."

An IDT salary can run upward of NIS 7,000 a month - a respectable salary by Israeli standards. But, Ninio admits, "it's not the dream of every Jewish mother to work at a call center."

To be sure, telecommuting offers financial stability that was never available to past generations of immigrants. But despite its economic benefits, some experts warn of its drawbacks.

"It does affect people's integration because they're not out in the work place, meeting colleagues and having water-cooler chats," said Josie Arbel, director of klita (absorption) services at AACI. "They are working in their living room."

"More and more people are telecommuting, but some feel locked into it," said another Anglo employer. "People who come on aliyah make up an economic plan and sometimes, take mortgages that require them to stay at their American jobs, even if they don't want to anymore. They're locked into the decision."