President Obama will announce his plans for immigration
reform Thursday evening. He's largely expected to address the status of
unauthorized immigrants. But there's hope in the tech community that he will
also propose reforms to the visa policies for high-skilled, legal immigrants.
Foreign students disproportionately study tech fields, but
there are limited options for them to stay in the U.S. after graduation. This
hurts the U.S.' competitiveness and stifles innovation, especially since foreign-born
entrepreneurs account for 44% of Silicon Valley founders, according to Vivek
Wadhwa, a fellow at Stanford Law School.
Here's what techies and experts are concerned about:
The H1-B visa policy
is too restrictive.
The H-1B is the most popular visa for high-skilled
foreigners. But it's capped at 85,000 a year and the quota is filled through a
lottery. According to U.S. Citizen and Immigration Services, more than twice
that number of people applied in one week this year.
However, it's not within Obama's executive power to increase
the annual number of H-1Bs, according to Tahmina Watson of Watson Immigration
Law. But he could tap unused visas from a previous decade.
While work visas are in high demand now, that wasn't always
the case. There are at least 200,000 unused visas from 1992 to 1997. These
visas could be used to bolster quotas for visas like the H-1B.
There's no startup
visa for young entrepreneurs.
An H1-B requires foreign entrepreneurs to show they can be
hired, fired, paid and controlled by the company, so it's very difficult to
launch a startup.
A startup visa has been proposed for years (the Kauffman
Foundation estimated it could create at least 1.6 million new jobs over 10
years), but has been unable to pass in the House.
Without visa opportunities, many entrepreneurs are choosing
to start their companies elsewhere. The country is implementing changes to
cater to entrepreneurs, launching a startup visa in April 2013.
Congressional approval is needed for a new visa class, so
Obama won't be announcing this tonight. But he could eliminate the
employer-employee relationship mandated by the H-1B. If he loosened the
restrictions, startup founders would be more likely to receive an H1-B.
Separately, he could revamp criteria for the 0-1A visa (for
individuals of extraordinary ability or achievement) to include things like
admittance to startup accelerators. These visas don't have a quota and would
help more entrepreneurs stay in the U.S. Experts say Obama is most likely to
address the H-4 visa, which is for spouses of H1-B holders.
There is a visas for
entrepreneurs -- but it caters to the rich.
The E-2 visa allows entrepreneurs from select countries to
be self-employed. The problem, though, is that the E2 requires a
"substantial" cash investment (typically $100,000) and at least 51%
ownership of the company.
And the green card
allocation system isn't helping the backlog.
There are 140,000 employment-based green cards issued each
year, but many go to dependents. Watson said Obama has the ability to change
the way these green cards are counted (for instance, grouping an entire family
together as "one" green card, thus expanding the total number
available).
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