International Labor in the US - Do We Need to Reform the VISA Program?

On April 2nd, there was a first achieved in the United States, and it was a dubious achievement in the eyes of employers and government officials alike. For the first time ever, the supply of H-1B Visas available to foreigners who wish to work in the United States - all 65,000 of them - were filled in the span of one day. In fact, the number of petitions applying was nearly two and a half times the number of visas on the first day, something the Immigration and Naturalization Service has never experienced before. Though this seems to be somewhat of an achievement in the eyes of the government, the number of applications for these visas, among other factors, may be signaling the need to reform the system to allow more international workers into the country, relieveing what is becoming a pent up supply of international labor in the world market willing to come and work in the United States.

H-1B Visas are special work visas that allow workers of "special skills" to work in the United States. Often, these workers are leading workers in their fields, and often include science and finance professionals in disproportionate numbers. These visas are usually a gateway to allowing these workers to become full citizens after their visas expire, and are often utilized to help further research in many fields in the United States.

However, the standing opinion, at least to employers in the United States, is that the number of visas available to these workers needs to be expanded. Some groups want to see the number permanently increased threefold, others even higher. In the late 1990's the US government allowed for the number of visas to be temporarily increased to allow software companies the ability to hire enough coders for their products, but the increase was rolled back after 2000 to the current standing level of permits.

Most economists and labor analysts believe that the United States is hurt in the world market by not allowing for more of these skilled workers to enhance the American labor market. The belief is that there is much to be gained from adding this expertise to the labor pool and allowing the US to continue to be at the forefront in as many fields as possible. Skilled workers also help to fill gaps in the labor market where our own workers and students are not developing sufficient human capital and are beginning to lag behind or see the lead in certain fields narrowing. Another concern among these experts is the amount of international students (who are often here to study in those fields these skilled workers are brought in to staff) who are leaving the country to return home and use their skills to further their home economies. The combined drain of the human capital when these students return home combined with the limited ability to bring in new workers from outside of the country in those fields is beginning to leave the US at a competitive disadvantage.

I believe that there should be an expansion of the H-1B visa program to allow more international workers to come to the United States. The impact of these workers on the labor market as a whole is negligable in terms of the number of jobs they take from domestic workers, and often, these workers are going into positions where there is a deficit of labor supply in the markets as it stands. As for how many visas should be granted yearly, I cannot make a guess at a number per se. A level around 200,000 workers a year (as was the case in 2000's trial period) seems to be a bit excessive, but the level of 65,000 is much too low.

Do you think that there needs to be an expansion of the Visa program? If so, what would your estimate for the number of visas that would be given out per year be?