Updated: October 7, 2020 5:09:23 pm
Four weeks before the election, the Trump administration announced stricter rules for the H-1B visa program, which American businesses have long prized. (The New York Times: Doug Mills)
In other change of policy stance on the H-1B visa Within six months, the US administration said on October 6 that it was announcing an “interim final rule” that will “strengthen” the nonimmigrant work visa program. The new rules will take effect 60 days after their publication in the Federal Register, which is the official journal of the United States government, as is the Indian Gazette.
What is a provisional final rule?
Executive policies announced by agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) or the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) require them to consult with interested parties and give them a 60-day notice period and look for comments before making radical changes. This method allows agencies like DHS to act urgently and within a specified time after a new rule or law is enacted.
In the latest announcement on the proposed policy changes, DHS said USCIS would waive the usual 60-day comment and notification period to “immediately ensure that the employment of H-1B workers will not worsen the economic crisis caused by COVID-19” .
The impact the pandemic was having on the US economy and its domestic workers was an “obvious and compelling fact” that justified the agency issuing an interim final rule.
Read also | ExplainSpeaking: How Strong is India’s Economic Recovery After the Covid-19 Lockdown?
What are the new proposed changes?
According to the Department of Homeland Security, whose primary job is to protect the U.S. from the threats it faces, the H-1B work visa regime had gone beyond the years of the mandate for which it was launched, often “To the detriment of American Workers.” Therefore, to restore integrity to the work visa regime, DHS has announced some changes that would ensure that H-1B petitions are approved only for “qualified beneficiaries and petitioners.”
While DHS is likely to announce the exact outlines and specifications of the change during the week, it has specified that the new rule will narrow the definition of what constitutes a “specialty occupation.”
This means that companies and agencies that hire workers on H-1B visas will have a difficult time proving to immigration agencies that such employees are not available in the domestic pool of American workers.
The second proposed change relates to companies allegedly making fictitious job offers to fictitious employees just to meet their quota of approved H-1B visa applications. The US administration has alleged in the past that both Indian and US-based companies have often offered H-1B work visas to foreign employees “on paper only”, allowing them to evade part of the taxes while reducing jobs. for eligible US workers.
The third and final proposed rule change speaks of better enforcement of the new H-1B standards to be announced later. This, DHS said, will be done through workplace inspections and compliance monitoring, before, during and after the H-1B work visa is approved.
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How will the changes affect Indian IT and other H-1B visa holders?
Each year, the United States administration issues 85,000 H-1B work permits in total. Of these, 65,000 are for people in specialty occupations, while the remaining 20,000 are reserved for those foreign workers who have earned a master’s or higher college degree in the U.S. Each year, Indians and Indian companies account for the largest share. part of the number of H-1B work permits issued each year.
As of April 1, 2020, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) had received about 2.5 lakh of H-1B work visa applications, according to official data. The Indians had applied for up to 1.84 lakh or 67 percent of all H-1B work visas.
Since DHS has proposed lowering the definition of what would constitute a “specialty occupation,” the 65,000 visas issued each year are likely to be significantly reduced.
Although Indian information technology giants such as TCS, Infosys, Wipro, HCL and others have insisted in the past that they have reduced their reliance on H-1B visas to a great extent, a reduction in the overall quota of workers with visas. H-1B still means the number of workers who would have to shell out more money to hire local talent or pay more to existing H-1B work visa holders.
The proposed change could also affect global IT companies that hire H-1B workers in large numbers.
According to official figures from the US government, global tech giants like Amazon hired up to 3,000 H-1B work visa holders in 2019, while Google hired up to 2,500 of those workers during the year. Most of these H-1B work permit holders were Indians.
H-1B visas, most commonly used by Indian and Chinese companies, are generally approved for a three-year period for one person, but many visa holders change employers to extend their stay in the United States. Visa regulations have often been criticized for allowing cheap labor into the United States at the expense of its local workforce.
What about the old rules and advertised relaxations on the H-1B visa regime?
Although DHS has put forth a comprehensive plan on what it intends to do to “reform” the H-1B work visa regime, the final outlines and exact changes are not yet known. The changes are also seen as a promise from the poll that US President Donald Trump is keeping.
Trump, while taking office as president in 2017, hinted that the visa regime would be overhauled to ensure that the system was no longer misled by companies that continued to pay less than the average annual wage paid to American workers, thereby reducing their jobs. .
Once DHS issues the final rules, it remains to be seen whether the new rules apply only to new work visas that are issued or to existing visa holders as well. Until then, the relaxations announced by the Trump administration in August would continue to apply.
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