The Trump administration has proposed eliminating the computerized lottery system to grant H-1B work visas to foreign technology professionals and replacing it with a selection procedure based on salary level, a decision that is expected to counteract the stress on Workers’ wages. Americans.
On Thursday, a notice about the revised system will be issued in the Federal Register. Interested parties have one month to respond to the notification, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Wednesday. The move also becomes important, as it comes less than a week before the US presidential election.
DHS said the proposed amendment is expected to help address the downward stress on American workers’ wages that is created by an annual influx of new H-1B workers capped and with relatively low wages.
“Prioritization and selection based on salary levels better balance the interests of petitioners, H-1B workers, and American workers.”
The H-1B visa, the one most desired by IT professionals in India, is a non-immigrant visa that allows American companies to hire foreign workers in specialized occupations that need theoretical or technical experience. The H-1B program was established under President George HW Bush to allow companies to fill specialized jobs as the technology sector began to boom and it became difficult to find qualified workers. Many companies maintain that they still need the program to fill key positions.
The United States can issue up to 85,000 H-1B visas per year for jobs such as computer programmers, accountants, architects, and database administrators. They are generally issued for an initial period of three years and can be renewed. People from India and China make up the majority of the estimated 500,000 H-1B visa holders in the US.
“The H-1B program is often exploited and abused by American employers and their American clients, primarily seeking to hire foreign workers and pay lower wages,” said Acting DHS Under Secretary Ken Cuccinelli, according to the PTI news agency.
In particular, the president of the United States, Donald Trump, who has expressed his opinion on the regulation of the immigration policies of the United States, signed on June 22 the executive order that temporarily prohibited the issuance of new H-1B and L visas. -1 until December 31.
Renewing America’s immigration policy is a key promise in the Republican leader’s polls under his America First policy.
“The current use of random selection to assign H-1B visas makes it difficult for companies to plan their hiring, fails to leverage the H-1B program to truly compete for the best and brightest in the world, and hurts American workers by bringing relatively lower earnings – foreign labor paid at the expense of American labor, “added Cuccinelli.
According to DHS, reviewing the H-1B cap selection method by replacing the random selection process with a selection process based on salary level is a better way to award H-1B when demand exceeds supply. This new selection process would incentivize employers to offer higher wages or apply for positions that require more skills and more skilled workers rather than using the program to fill vacancies with relatively lower wages, he said.
“The proposed changes would maintain effective and efficient administration of the H-1B boundary selection process while providing some prospective applicants the ability to potentially improve their selection chances by agreeing to pay H-1B recipients higher salaries that match or exceed the highest prevailing wage levels, “said DHS.
He added that this is necessary to advance the administration’s goal of prioritizing registrations subject to H-1B limits for applicants seeking to employ higher-skilled and higher-paid workers, which is more in line with Congress’ overall intent for the H program. -1 B.
Similarly, it discourages abuse of the H-1B program to fill lower-paying and less-skilled positions, which is a major problem in today’s recruitment system. With limited exceptions, H-1B applicants are not required to demonstrate a labor shortage as a prerequisite for obtaining H-1B workers, he said. The number of H-1B petitions subject to the cap, including those filed for the waiver of advanced degrees, has frequently exceeded the annual H-1B numerical allocations.
For at least the last decade, USCIS has received more H-1B applications than the annual H-1B numerical allocation in those respective years. Since the 2014 tax cutoff season (April 2013), USCIS has received more H-1B applications (or registrations) in the first five days of filing (or initial registration period) than the annual H-1B numerical assignments. The H-1B visa required by Congress has an annual limit of 65,000 visas.
(With PTI inputs)
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