Topher Cyll

After one day, the H1-B Visa cap has already been reached.

What is an H1-B?

It's a special kind of visa that lets foreign workers with specific knowledge and eduction work in the United States. This year, in one single day, over 150,000 applicants applied for just 65,000 visas. Compare that to last year when the applications took a little under two months to cap out.

And what's crazy is we're turning away these smart, educated individuals that want to come contribute to the American economy and telling them to go work for competitors in other countries.

(A tag two blocks from my apartment.)

Admittedly, there are serious moral questions surrounding the brain drain of developing nations. But that's not why the H1-B visa limit wasn't increased last year. Instead, there's a growing perception that these workers are "stealing" American jobs, and that's resulted in a backlash of public opinion.

Which just doesn't jive with my economic intuition. It reminds me of the antiquated view that wealth is constant (every gain must have a corresponding loss), instead of created. These people aren't job stealers, they're job creators.

(The rest of it.)

Or at least, that's what it looks like to me. Luckily, it's possible to study this sort of thing (although, potentially difficult to experiment with), so hopefully we'll have some answers someday soon.

Unfortunately, in the meantime, there are also some real problems with the current H1-B program. Particularly disconcerting is the way workers are bound to their company in an asymetrical power relationship. The law specifies that "H-1B aliens may only work for the petitioning U.S. employer and only in the H-1B activities described in the petition."

This gives companies extra leverage, since the worker's residency depends on his or her company. Interestingly, the law prevents companies from paying H1-B workers less than the prevaling wage, thus protecting American workers from being undercut (although there have been some cases where this provision was violated).

But despite that, an H1-B removes a worker's power to "vote with their feet" (well, unless they want to leave the country). It's a right we sometimes take for granted, but the ability to leave a bad job not only protects us as individuals, but forces companies across the economy to have higher work place standards.

Anyways, if these individuals actually help grow our economy, the way I suspect they do, it makes more sense to me to just grant them citizenship. Then we not only free them from the one company lock, but we also make them a permanent part of the American economy. A smarter, stronger economy.

Which does finally bring us to the moral questions about brain drain. I'm not sure what's right here. On one hand, it's easy to see how bringing these workers to America prevents them from developing the economies of their own countries. But if they want to come to America and we want to hire them... well, it's a hard call.

Anyways, the issue is closer to home this year since I know two applicants who may not get their visas. Luckily, one of them has completed his PhD which opens up an additional 20,000 slots for workers with advanced degrees.

Fingers crossed.

posted on: 04/04/2007 | path: /life