USCIS Memo on H and L Timing & H1B/H-4 Decoupling

From MurtyDotCom:

The USCIS has just released a memo dated December 5, 2006, that makes significant positive changes to the counting of time for H1Bs, H-4s, L-1s, and L-2s. This Memo addresses three separate issues. It decouples time spent in H-4 or L-2 status from the time limits spent in H1B or L-1 status, respectively. It permits extensions beyond the six-year H1B limit even when an individual has not been maintaining H1B status. Finally, it permits a person who departs the U.S. for more than a year prior to completion of the six years in H1B status to return for the time remaining of that six-year H1B period without again being subject to the H1B cap.

Ours To Lose

It is a fallacy to believe that in the incoming 110th Congress, there will be many newly-elected moderates/conservatives in the Democratic caucus. Writing in Roll Call on November 16, 2006, noted political analyst Stuart Rothenberg said "... I met dozens of Democrats running in 2006 - no, not everyone, but most of them - and I can’t find much more than a couple who merit the label "conservative." That’s not meant to be either criticism or praise. It’s merely a statement of fact ... Virtually all of the Democrats I interviewed were pro-choice, favored rolling back President Bush’s tax cuts and sounded traditional Democratic themes on education, the environment and foreign policy ... Now let me be very clear about my point. I’m not saying that it’s good or bad that most of these Democrats are likely to be pretty typical members of their party. I’m only saying that’s where they fit. A bunch of conservative Democrats didn’t win election last week."

The idea that immigration reform prospects early in 2007 must be limited because the Democratic caucus may have too many moderate/conservative Democrats who will resist liberal immigration laws is hogwash. However, there have been numerous press reports since the election which paint a grim picture for rapid progress on significant immigration benefits legislation in the early weeks and months of 2007. Here's why we have had this mis-information campaign.

Immigration lobbyists closely allied with liberal Democrats realize full well that they are now, for the first time since 9/11, on the offense, not defense. They realize full well that they are now on the cusp of enactment of major immigration benefits bills. However, with this new perspective has come hubris. Many of them now think that S. 2611 (the amended McCain-Kennedy bill) which would have granted legalization to 5 million, established significant quota relief for both employment and family immigration, established a modest guest worker program, etc does not go far enough, and is too punitive in its other provisions. In order to increase the reach of legalization, reduce punitive provisions, etc, they are pursuing what is essentially an all-or-nothing strategy. The immigration lobbyists' attitude appears to be that unless they get the original un-amended McCain-Kennedy or better, they would rather have no relief at all for the next several years.

We believe that the window of opportunity on immigration benefits is much smaller than most people think. We need not just a bill, but a conference report, in weeks, not months. Perhaps the memories of divided government have faded inside the Beltway. The last time we had a different party in charge at either end of Pennsylvania Ave (in the Clinton years), we had an ugly political climate, and legislative grid lock. There is every reason to believe that the same might happen again in a few months. Once the new Democratic staff are hired, and once the subpoenas from the new Democratic Chairs start to flow, Washington DC will be all-ugliness all-the-time. Furthermore, when last in the opposition pre-1994, the Republicans proved that they were masters of obstruction (does any immigration lobbyist relish the idea of crossing swords with the master-parliamentarian Mr. Lamar Smith, who will do everything in his power to destroy immigration benefit hopes from his new perch as ranking member of the House Judiciary committee?).The window of opportunity is only a few months (not the many months till the start of the 2008 Presidential season).

We believe it would be more prudent to pursue a limited strategy in early 2007 of obtaining a "down-payment" on comprehensive immigration reform. Perhaps we could just get DREAM, or just move the registry date from 1971 to IRCA's date, or perhaps, Congress could return to the business left unfinished on the morning of 9/11/01, when the House was to have voted on a Senate-passed extension of 245(i). We do not believe that the prospects of comprehensive immigration reform would be in any way damaged by getting a down-payment in hand first (a bird in hand is worth two in the bush). If later, we can get more reform, the immigration champions on the Hill will be heroes. If not, immigration champions will then be able to hold their head up high and say that at least they got something concrete in hand from this historic opportunity now before us.

We welcome readers to share their opinion and ideas with us by writing to editor@ilw.com.

Here We Go Again, Another Cycle of CIR Circus Soon?!

From Immigration Law:
A news report indicates that the Congress may introduce another form of Comprehensive Immigration Reform bills soon after the new Congress (110th) opens next year. The Congress keeps coming back to the immigration bills early each year without fruits at the end of the year. People are more or less exhausted of the circus. Let's see what kind of drama will unfold next couple of months.

January 2007 Visa Bulletin

Every month around the 15th day, the U.S. Dept. of State, releases the visa bulletin which lists who can avail of a visa number next month to adjust status to permanent residency. This bulletin breaks down the numbers based on the category and also separates out over-subscribed countries from the rest of the world. When you apply for permanent residency you get a case number and a priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the date listed in the visa bulletin for your application category, USCIS will proceed with your case and in most cases you will get your permanent resident card in a few months. Here are the cut-off dates for employment-based permanent residency categories from the January 2007 visa bulletin:

For persons born in India:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	08 Jan 2003	No change
EB3	08 May 2001	Moved ahead by 16 days

For persons born in China:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	22 Apr 2005	No change
EB3	01 Aug 2002	No change

For persons born in Philippines:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Aug 2002	No change

For persons born in Mexico:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	15 May 2001	Moved ahead by 7 days

For rest of the world:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Aug 2002	No change

Schedule A visa numbers which are used by Nurses and Physical Therapists are now retrogressed to 15-Jun-2004 for all countries. They have been current since Jan 2005 when the current retrogression started.

Last minute effort fails once again

Sen. Cornyn attempted to push passage of the SKILL bill in the Senate during the Lame Duck Session in the earlier half of December. However, within the Republican court of the Senate, there are some Republican Senators that oppose this bill. Besides, considering the fact that the Lame Duck Congress went out of session at the end of the week, unless a miracle happened, passage of this bill both in the House and the Senate would not have materialized.

Retrogression Math for Dummies - EB3 India Edition

For the seventh month in a row, the Employment based third preference category (EB3) visa cut-off date for persons born in India remains in April 2001. During the same period, EB3 worldwide has advanced by 13 months to August, 2002. Before reaching the April 2001 brick wall the cut-off date had moved steadily by 3 months during the previous 3 months.

So what could be possible reasons for this stalling? Some think that since Schedule A numbers are now used up, they're allocating EB3 numbers to the them and since a majority of the Schedule A numbers went to nurses and the likes from India, EB3 India is now at a stand still.

Others think its because of the amnesty given to illegal immigrants under section 245(i) which had a cut-off date of April 2001 and many illegal Indian immigrants may have taken advantage of this provision. This still wouldn't explain why countries like Mexico with traditionally higher number of illegal immigrants have better cut-off dates than India.

Finally that's when you switch on your calculator and start working with the numbers. There are 140,000 visa numbers available under all the employment based categories, with 7% per country limit and 28.6% allocated for EB3 and dependents counted into the numbers, there are only about 115 EB3 primary applicants allowed from India per month. Throw in a few thousand illegals into the mix and now you have the royal screw-up as is happening now. The law allows visa numbers from unused countries to be transferred to the oversubscribed countries but with nearly every category retrogressed this law won't apply for a while.

So there you have it, unless there is a change in law to at least temporarily accommodate the thousands of applicants whose lives are in limbo there is no chance that we'll see the numbers move anytime soon.

Here's a solution that would appeal to all those of you who say "well, if you don't like it then you can leave!". To them I would say, since a majority of the EB3 applicants were once on H1-B visas, why don't we put a 7% per country limit on the on H1-B visa numbers. That way only an equal number of people from India or China would come in as would from Kazakhstan and you wouldn't have this problem. You know that's never gonna happen. Why? Because the U.S. needs the Indian and Chinese skilled professionals in thousands to keep themselves globally competitive. The visas expire but there's always a new pool of foreign workers eager to come in (with the hope of green cards) every year. When its time to give them back something in return, they whimper. Grow some hair!

Excellent Q&A on backlogs, green card categories

Maryland Immigration Law blog has an excellent question and answers section on all the questions that you can ask regarding employment based permanent resident categories, backlogs and questions people have when they're stuck in backlogs.

Visa Retrogression Questions & Answers

Top stories from InformationWeek

Every week I get this email of top outsourcing news, well this week I thought I'd share some of them. First up is from China. Zilog Inc, which delivers quality embedded technology in Microcontrollers, Microprocessors, Infrared, IrDA, Communications and TV solutions, is increasing its investment in China.

Zilog to Increase Investment In China
Pegging much of its future growth on Asia, Zilog Inc. intends to increase investment in its Shanghai design center so that it can be more responsive to its increasing number of customers here.

TI Veteran Sets Up Firm In India
A new venture offering analog and mixed-signal design and layout services has been launched by Vivek Pawar, an industry veteran who was most recently at Texas Instruments India for 15 years. Christened Sankalp Semiconductor, the firm plans to provide methodology and automation-oriented high-end services and solutions in these areas.

And finally, here comes the AMD chips of the future...
SemIndia Chips to Roll Out In A Year
With the first batch of chips from SemIndia Inc.'s fab in Hyderabad scheduled to come off the production line in less than a year, the facility has already procured an order worth about $400 million, according to a Thursday (Oct. 19) report by Cybermedia News.

Indian Community Burgeoning in America

Roughly every third person who lives Edison, a New York suburb, is of Asian Indian ancestry. Many are new immigrants who have come to work as physicians, engineers and high-tech experts and are drawn to "Little India" by convenience it's near the commuter train and familiarity.

Roughly 2.3 million people of Indian ancestry, including immigrants and the American-born, now call the U.S. home, according to 2005 Census data. That's up from 1.7 million in 2000.

They have big communities in New Jersey, New York, California and Texas, and their average yearly household income is more than $60,000 35 percent higher than the nation overall. Indian Americans, along with Indian expatriates worldwide, sent about $23 billion back to India in 2005, World Bank data show.

News story: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=2596841

Non-US citizens rights to challenge detention taken away

U.S. President George Bush today signed a bill allowing tough CIA interrogation and military trials of terrorism suspects. The expected purpose of this "torture" bill is to legally allow intelligence professionals to use techniques like sleep deprivation and induced hypothermia while questioning "terror" suspects without facing legal court challenges from the suspects.

"This bill provides legal protections that ensure our military and intelligence personnel will not have to fear lawsuits filed by terrorists, simply for doing their jobs," Bush said, lauding the CIA interrogation program as a "vital tool" that has thwarted numerous attacks. At the signing ceremony, Mr Bush could not resist a swipe at Democrats, an indirect shot far short of campaign stump speeches in which he charges they are soft on terrorism.

TimesOnline reports the other side of the bill from a legal angle. The bill strips away the right to challenge detention without charge from all non-US citizens not just those detained outside the U.S but including those within the U.S. This means the CIA can pick anyone up without charges for questioning using torture techniques and not allow him or her to legally challenge the detention in courts. This applies to the 12 million permanent residents who are not citizens. This should be a serious consideration for anyone trying to legally immigrate to the U.S. You just lost another right universally accepted in western society.

Legal challenges saying that it is unconstitutional to remove the right of habeas corpus from anyone are already in train. But the potential application to 12 million people within the US will add political heat that was absent when it covered only 500 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

November 2006 Visa Bulletin

Every month around the 15th day, the U.S. Dept. of State, releases the visa bulletin which lists who can avail of a visa number next month to adjust status to permanent residency. This bulletin breaks down the numbers based on the category and also separates out over-subscribed countries from the rest of the world. When you apply for permanent residency you get a case number and a priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the date listed in the visa bulletin for your application category, USCIS will proceed with your case and in most cases you will get your permanent resident card in a few months. Here are the cut-off dates for employment-based permanent residency categories from the November 2006 visa bulletin:

For persons born in India:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	01 Jan 2003	Moved ahead by 6 months
EB3	22 Apr 2001	No change

For persons born in China:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	15 Apr 2005	Moved ahead by 14 days
EB3	01 Jul 2002	Moved ahead by 2 months

For persons born in Phillipines:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Jul 2002	Moved ahead by 2 months

For persons born in Mexico:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	08 May 2001	Moved ahead by 7 days

For rest of the world:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Jul 2002	Moved ahead by 2 months

Schedule A visa numbers which are used by Nurses and Physical Therapists are now retrogressed to 01-Oct-2005 for all countries. They have been current since Jan 2005 when the current retrogression started.

Pre-PERM rush involved some fraud

The Portland Press Herald recently did a series on immigration to investigate fraud in the H-1B program in Maine. The investigation was triggered when a number of applications for the H-1B and permanent residency programs began to come through the local Labor Department for labor certifications. The investigations discovered a few companies using addresses in Maine to circumvent the prewailing wage criteria for jobs that actually existed in places like New Jersey. Maine is a rural state with very limited high-tech industry with lower wages and such high number of applications was suspect.

As the boxes of paperwork piled up in Maine and other rural states, foreign labor experts came to understand what they were seeing: Small companies moving ahead of federal immigration system changes scheduled for March 28, 2005 (PERM), were flocking to rural states, hoping that their applications for foreign labor would be processed quickly and efficiently.

While both opponents and supporters of the H-1B visa program cannot agree more that abuses should be prevented and punished, the differentiation occurs in how the abuses are presented to the regular folks. The fraud factor is really low here, about 1 percent or so. There's more fraud in Medicare, so should we stop Medicare too? Genuine users of Medicare deserve better if the abuses are detected and stopped. Same is the case with the H-1B. Stop the abuses not the program. Add to this the fact that some politicians use this for fear mongering so prevelant these days.

"I think what your series teaches us is that it isn't enough just to tighten security at our borders, that as long as legitimate visa programs like the H1B program can be so easily manipulated or subjected to outright fraud, that border security - while important - is an incomplete answer," said Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, chairwoman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

"Is it possible to game the system? I guess it is," said Theodore Ruthizer, past president and general counsel of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and a lecturer in law at Columbia Law School. "My sense is the allegations of fraud and abuse are way overstated and they're not a serious problem."

Diversity (Lottery) Visa Changes

Here's some news and analysis from a fellow poster at ImmigrationVoice.Org

The entry for the DV 2008 (aka Visa Lottery) commenced yesterday and would run until noon of Dec. 3. While some countries like India and China are not eligible to participate, it is important to point out some changes that might be indicative of what would happen per current immigration legislations.

In the entry form, questions about educational qualifications and country of present residence have been included. These questions have never been asked in the 13 years the visa lottery has been running. I suspect this is anticipatory of the CIR (or some variations or portions of the CIR) being passed before the results of the lottery start to trickle out in April next year. If you all would recall, the dead CIR bill passed by the senate in May had provisions that the Visa Lottery should be modified to reserve 75% of the 55K visas to applicants with advanced degrees and it would be strategic to capture this data in advance in anticipation of legislative changes.

Now, while this is not good news in it self, it could however be that the Dept. of State knows or anticipates that the piece of legislation in question and indeed more immigration legislations would be passed after the November elections and more than likely, before April. I think this is a good pointer for us and we can't but wait to see how things unfold.

In the interim, you can visit http://www.dvlottery.state.gov/ to fill out an application if you are from an eligible country.

Tancredo addresses a hate group

This news is a month old but still important. Tom Tancredo, the number one anti-immigration Congressman (Republican from Colorado) and head of the House Immigration Reform Caucus made an appearance at a gathering organized by a neo-Confederate hate group called League of the South (LOS). SPLC reports on the proceedings:

While Tancredo's hard-line "deport 'em all" stance on immigration has made him a favorite politician of white supremacists, this marked the first time the congressman has appeared at a hate group event.

Tancredo's appearance was part of a five-day sweep through conservative South Carolina, which hosts an early GOP primary and has seen the Southeast's largest percentage gain in foreign-born residents since the 2000 Census. Rising to his friendly audience, Tancredo blasted South Carolina Senator Lindsay Graham for being too soft on immigration and basked in the long applause that followed his harangues against illegal immigrants and "the cult of multiculturalism" that glorifies disunity and refuses to acknowledge the "Christian principles enshrined in the U.S. Constitution." (Tancredo did not appear to grasp the irony of addressing the "lack of unity" in America in front of a group dedicated to Southern secession.)

Tancredo has expressed his intention to run for the GOP Presedential primary in 2008, I don't think bonding with hate groups is going to be the recipe for success though! Incidents like these will harm his credibility if he's serious about his political future. Last month we witnessed a racial slur from Senator George Allen which maligned his image.

At the close of Tancredo's speech, several men in confederate-themed clothing stood up and bellowed the first notes of "Dixie," the Confederate anthem. They were soon joined by voices from throughout the large hall, which was now entirely on its feet. Tancredo, a second-generation Italian-American from Denver, appeared confused by the sudden burst of strange song. He quickly worked his way toward the exit with his staff.

The truth hurts. Retrogression!

Every once in a while I repost my very first posts just to remind everyone why I started this blog. Please read on...

During the 1990s and through the dot-com boom upto the recession of 2002, a large number of engineers/scientists came to the USA from all over the world. The most popular ways of coming were to come as a skilled-worker(H visa), foreign employee(L visa) or international student(F visa). After coming here, many believed that this was a land of opportunity and wanted to pursue a career and a life here and applied for permanent residency (green card) through one of the employment based(EB) categories. However, the USA only allows a fixed number of employment based immigrants per year. This number is fixed at 140,000 per year since 1990. This number also includes the dependents(spouse and children) of an EB applicant and in addition there is a per-country limit set at 7% of the total. While, most people applied for permanent residency and continued on with their daily lives, they were unaware of a major bottleneck being created in the system which came to light in January 2005. Retrogression!

First there was denial, then there was anger, then frustration. While many went on to hope and prayers, some decided to take matters into their own hands. These are the people of the likes at ImmigrationVoice.Org, who decided to do something to reverse the steady decline of the American dream for the highly educated, skilled individuals or as I like to call them, "the cream of society". These are the people who generate wealth in a economy. They use their brain power to come up with products and innovations that drive companies to profits, driving up the economy and ultimately resulting in employment creation for all. It would seem suicidal for any country to create an atmosphere which discourages these people from migrating to their country. There is already a steady outflux of these PhD holders, Masters' degree holders and others with extensive industry experience from this country out to either competing economies or albeit third world, but fast growing home economies.

So, before you decide to make plans to come here, understand that there is no red carpet welcome here even if you topped your university back home. You will have to work hard for your future and there will be no guarantees of any sorts. I've learnt my lessons the hard way, hope you don't have to do the same. Happy enlightenment!

US tumbles in ranking of world's economies

A few weeks ago I posted this on how the U.S. is falling back in attracting and retaining foreign talent. The World Economic Forum has now come up with a report on global competitiveness of the worlds greatest economies. The U.S. which used to be number one for a long time? is now toppled to sixth place. Switzerland is at the top most spot. Boston Globe reports some of the reasons for the U.S. performance:

The high budget and trade deficits, disappointing response to Hurricane Katrina, government corruption, and a decreasing talent pool for employment due to immigration restrictions were factors cited by the forum, which moved the United States to sixth in its global competitiveness index from the top spot a year ago.

Interesting to see how the biggest emerging economies fared in this list:

Emerging economies such as China's and India's fared modestly. India came in at 43d, carried by its innovation and the sophistication of operations. China dropped six places from last year, to 54th

Competitiveness Can't Compete With Politics

President Bush unveiled the so-called American Competitiveness Initiative during his State of the Union address in January. Since then, though, the ambitious plan with bipartisan support has been stalled by election-year politics.

After pressing since 2004 for legislation to help the United States maintain its technological dominance, the tech industry thought everything was aligned for action this year. Tech executives thought the whole package would be wrapped up in months, not years, and warned that the United States risked falling behind in the global economy unless Congress acted quickly.

"These CEOs aren't Washington guys, and in their minds, when everybody agrees that something's necessary … they just can't see why action is so difficult," said Bruce Mehlman, executive director of the Technology CEO Council, a public policy association of nine top high-tech chief executives.

"We're sorry that some of the important provisions got tied up in much more controversial issues," said White House science advisor John H. Marburger III. "We can't just give up after a year. The stakes are sufficiently high to view this as a multiyear campaign."

The experience has provided another lesson in Silicon Valley's political education: how the crosscurrents of a high-stakes election can derail even broadly popular legislation.

News story: Competitiveness Can't Compete With Politics

October 2006 Visa Bulletin

Every month around the 15th day, the U.S. Dept. of State, releases the visa bulletin which lists who can avail of a visa number next month to adjust status to permanent residency. This bulletin breaks down the numbers based on the category and also seperates out over-subscribed countries from the rest of the world. When you apply for permanent residency you get a case number and a priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the date listed in the visa bulletin for your application category, USCIS will proceed with your case and in most cases you will get your permanent resident card in a few months. Here are the cut-off dates for employment-based permanent residency categories from the October 2006 visa bulletin:

For persons born in India:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	15 Jun 2002	Was previously unavailable
EB3	22 Apr 2001	Moved ahead by 7 days

For persons born in China:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	01 Apr 2005	Moved ahead by 1 month
EB3	01 May 2002	Moved ahead by 2 months

For persons born in Phillipines:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 May 2002	Moved ahead by 2 months

For persons born in Mexico:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 May 2001	Moved ahead by 9 days

For rest of the world:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 May 2002	Moved ahead by 2 months

Most IT related applicants would fall under EB3. That's backlogged by 5 years now for applicants born in India.

Congress ends session without fixing immigration

With the Congress session now drawing to a close and the mid-term elections in November, its really hard now for any bills favoring legal immigration to pass this year. As a last minute PR effort, some House republicans brought a new bill to build a 700 mile fence along the U.S. Mexico border. These provisions already existed in the CIR bill but House republicans didn't want to tackle the immigration implications of building a fence and stalled the bill from passing for the last 2 months.

ImmigrationVoice has started a new fund-raiser campaign to prepare for the next session and has a target of $60,000 within the next three months. I only hope that this time they choose a bill which has chances of passing both houses without much controversy to get their legal immigration provisions through. Some good candidates include the SKIL bill which is mostly ready to be introduced in Congress but the sponsors are looking for an opportune moment. Unfortunatley for the thousands of legal immigrants stuck in the quagmire called retrogression; waiting for another year because of pure political reasons is something that they didn't expect from a country that likes to call itself the greatest nation on the planet.

Global talent: U.S. falls back as other countries take lead

Many industrialized countries have in the past 5 years introduced laws that attract highly skilled foreigners to immigrate to their countries while the U.S. is still squeaking by with decades old laws with quotas that were set in an economy that was very different from what we have today. Among the countries that have much favorable immigration policies for the highly skilled over the U.S. are Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain, New Zealand.

Many of these countries didn't have any immigration policies for the high skilled until recently and have woken up to the global high skill shortage. They have worked with their educational institutions, industries and come up with immigration policies that will give them the technical leadership that all nations strive to achieve. Many with much lower population than the U.S. have no numerical limits on immigration and attract the high skilled with incentives such as the ability for spouses to take up employment.

Even countries that traditionally were emigrant countries have started policies to stop the bleeding of talent. China offers incentives for its nationals settled abroad to return back. India's economic boom of the last few years has brought many of its nationals working abroad back. Historically, Ireland has been a country of emigration. However, during its economic boom of the mid-1990’s, known as the “Celtic Tiger,” Ireland began to experience a shortage of skilled workers that was felt by many other industrialized countries. From 1999 to 2003, the number of work visas issued rose from 6,250 to 47,000.

While many of these countries traditionally looked up to the U.S. to emulate its immigration policies, they have now learnt enough and have taken the lead with much better policies to attract the global talent while the U.S. is taking a reactionary approach for short term goals and clubbing high skilled immigration in the same bill that deals with illegal immigration. Talk about being clueless!

Senator racially insults Indian

One day we have an Indian among the most powerful positions in America and the next day we have an insensitive and misinformed racial slur against an Indian. Senator George Allen (Republican from Virginia) repeatedly used the term 'macaca' - a racial slur used by White supremacists against people of color - on an Indian American student filming him on his election campaign.

One thing that is very clear in this remark is that the majority of Americans have no clue where India is and consider everyone between Europe and China as the same. 'Macaca' is a racial slur used by French Whites against North Africans who immigrate in large numbers to France. By using that term to refer to an Indian, the Senator representing the best of Americans displayed how much knowledge of the world he has.

Among one of the Senator's defense points is that he didn't know what the term meant. It doesn't matter! He meant to use a racial slur, it doesn't matter if he got the wrong one. That only shows he is stupid and not a closet racist.

So, my non-White friends, welcome to America, you will be racially profiled and treated differently in many places, be it police intolerance or general public ignorance. This is particularly important in the wake of 9/11, the London bombings and the recent foiled plot in England. You will always feel different no matter how long you stay here. While they will go to great lengths to show that they do not discriminate against race, you will definitely find out soon enough that some do!

September 2006 Visa Bulletin

Every month around the 15th day, the U.S. Dept. of State, releases the visa bulletin which lists who can avail of a visa number next month to adjust status to permanent residency. This bulletin breaks down the numbers based on the category and also seperates out over-subscribed countries from the rest of the world. When you apply for permanent residency you get a case number and a priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the date listed in the visa bulletin for your application category, USCIS will proceed with your case and in most cases you will get your permanent resident card in a few months. Here are the cut-off dates for employment-based permanent residency categories from the August 2006 visa bulletin:

For persons born in India:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	Everyone can apply!
EB2	Unavailable	No one can file under this category
EB3	15 Apr 2001	Moved ahead by 14 days

For persons born in China:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	01 Mar 2005	No change
EB3	01 Mar 2002	Moved ahead by 5 months

For persons born in Phillipines:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Mar 2002	Moved ahead by 5 months

For persons born in Mexico:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	22 Apr 2001	No change

For rest of the world:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Mar 2002	Moved ahead by 5 months

Most IT related applicants would fall under EB3. That's backlogged by 5 years now for applicants born in India.

Immigrant Success Story

The anti-immigrants have to hate this immigrant success story. IIM, Calcutta and Yale University alumni Indra Nooyi is the first Indian-born CEO of PepsiCo. She is also only the 11th woman CEO of a Fortune 500 company. Congratulations to her! This has to be a wonderful Independence Day gift to her family and friends.

After spending her first 23 years in India and attaining an MBA from IIM Calcutta, she came to the U.S. on student visa to study at Yale University. She studied hard and worked nights to make ends meet. Twenty seven years later she is the CEO of PepsiCo, not only one of the biggest Fortune 500 company but also an icon of the Great American Dream. While at PepsiCo, Nooyi has played a vital role in starting Tricon . She also took the lead in the acquisition of Tropicana in 1998.

Where are the anti-immigrants now? If they had their way this woman would never have been in the U.S. in the first place.

Is opposition to H-1B racially biased?

With an overwhelming majority of H-1B visa holders coming from India, China or other Asian countries, may be there is a racial element to the opposition. Would there have been so much opposition and misinformation had it been that such large number of H-1B visa holders were Caucasian? Won't they have increased the visa numbers if they could not get in?

There is indeed such a visa in existance exclusively for Australians (where 92% of the population is Caucasian) called the E-3 visa which allows the same kind of people who are eligible for an H-1B visa to come in and work in the U.S. Moreover unlike H-1B visa holders they can stay indefinitely and their spouses can work too. Since the E-3 visa will also essentially have the same effect on American workers as the H-1B visa then why don't we see any opposition to this visa?

Obtaining U.S. permanent residence frustrates foreign professionals

News article from the Sacramento Bees: Hired hands: Wait for green card tries visa holders

Raghu Ballal, a civil engineer for the Shaw Group, plans to get his MBA in the United Kingdom after being frustrated at the wait for a green card in the U.S. He will apply for fast-track residency through the U.K.'s Highly Skilled Migrant Program.

"If I go to the United Kingdom now, I would be a U.K. citizen even before I became a green card holder in the United States," said Ballal, 30. Ballal's decision to try his luck in Europe is the byproduct of America's overtaxed system for legally admitting foreign workers, which could leave him hanging for five or more years and prevent him from pursuing a promotion while he waits.

Here again we have pricks at the Programmer's Guild talking crap to get attention. Their solution to end the green card wait? Kill the H1-B visa program.

"There wouldn't be so many people waiting for green cards if there weren't so many people on H-1B visas," said Kim Berry, a Sacramento high-tech worker who is president of a group called Programmers Guild, an anti-temporary visa group.

Brainiacs aren't they? No wonder then that they try to attract the unemployed with 1 dollar membership deals!

In the United States, about 140,000 employment-based green cards are available annually for applicants and their families. As of January of 2005, more than half a million applicants were waiting for visas, which are granted after a prolonged, multi-agency review.

In Britain's point-based system for highly skilled visas, Ballal's MBA from Berkeley or UCLA, not just Oxford, would give him a boost. So would his perfect English, education and work experience. Britain's highly skilled program doesn't require that an employer sponsor him for his initial visa. He can petition for himself even without a job offer if he can prove his skills are in demand. If he's accepted, he can change jobs and apply for the equivalent of a green card in two years, likely getting it in weeks. After two years he can apply to become a U.K. citizen, which would take months rather than years.

The truth about "H-1B only" ads

Many times consulting companies provide IT staff to other companies they call clients. These clients who don't want to deal with hiring their own IT staff outsource it to the consulting companies. The actual jobs exist at the client companies and not the consulting companies. The clients don't want to deal with recruiting, be it American programmers or H1B programmers and they look to the consulting companies for their IT needs. This business practice is called staffing and very common place in the U.S.

The consulting companies come in a variety of sizes from large (Keane, Oxford, IBM, Wipro etc) to small (Hanu Software). Whatever the size their business model is pretty straight forward - bill the client at a certain rate, take their cut for profit and pay the consultant the rest. Obviously as a consultant you wouldn't be happy if you are billed to the client at say $100/hour and what you get paid is $35/hour.

This is where smaller companies like Hanu Software come in. They target those candidates who have been at a client's project for sometime and are confident about them being there for some more time but want a better slice of the pie. So to attract these type of folks they put up ads in Dice or Monster and other community portals like Sulekha. The key here is that companies like Hanu Software don't have a job offer, it's the candidate they're looking for who has the job but wants to switch companies to get better pay. Companies like these are the only bargaining chip that seasoned consultants have to demand better pay since their visa is tied to the consulting company. The guild is actually hurting this unofficial competition and exposing the consultants to abuse by attacking these smaller companies.

Now Programmer's Guild is making a big fuss about these type of ads saying they're discriminating against Americans by only hiring H1B candidates. Are the people at the guild stupid or do they think the people who read their complaints are stupid?! It has to be one or the other. Which American would like to work with a company which takes half their pay when they can directly work for the client without a visa? There is no job! So how can they hire an American or anyone for that matter.

It is because there are not enough quality Americans for the jobs the client companies are outsourcing it to IT staffers in the first place. If there are more Americans readily available for the job, can't they easily undercut the consulting companies rates?

It seems with the IT job market now being very healty the guild is loosing its members and are making all the noise to get more attention and $$ via membership.

The guild's at it again!

Here's another attempt by the Programmer's Guild (PG) to malign the H1-B program. The U.S Department of Labor publishes certain information about all the H1/L1 visas it issued, like the name of the company, the salary being paid and the duration of work. As per the high standards of processing at the Dept. of Labor (snicker!) they release this once a year at the end of the fiscal year which is every September.

Now PG is demanding that the Dept. of Labor should publish data for fiscal year 2007 immediately?! Are they kidding?!! I think they need to research the processing efficiency at the Dept. of Labor before they dream about things like this. Heck, the Dept. of Labor hasn't even finished entering Labor Certification application data they received in 2000, they were so inefficient that after repeated demands from the applicants they had to create backlog processing centers. Now PG wants faster access to the data for 2007?. Lol!

Without some serious overhaul or investments, they can't achieve this. If they do decide to invest, who is gonna pay for this additional cost? The fees charged for the application which is over $2000 for an H1 visa fund the program and some more, where is the extra money to speed up the process going to come from? The applicants don't need it fast. It's PG who needs it.

The normal H1 processing takes about 2-3 months. Even after processing is complete it takes until the next fiscal year before the applicant can get a visa if the visas are used up. PG wants this time frame for U.S. applicants to apply for those jobs. What they conveniently forget is that U.S. companies don't hire foreigners if they can get a U.S. worker they like. The months long waits plus high costs of application and legal fees is a definite deterrent unless the company feels strongly about a certain foreign applicant. In such cases, I can't see how they will recruit someone with lower skills or brain power.

Most of the people who are still unemployed , displaced or under-employed (I like how they come up with nice words for stupid wannabe programmers) are of lower quality who mostly just swarmed into IT during the boom times of the late 90s and were quickly gone once the market went bust. I've heard about carpenters and construction workers move into IT without even a Bachelor's degree in IT or related fields. These people should never have been in IT in the first place and it was the labor shortage that allowed them to get into IT.

So, other than making up more work for the Dept. of Labor I don't see any benefits from these demands by PG.

August 2006 Visa Bulletin

Every month around the 15th day, the U.S. Dept. of State, releases the visa bulletin which lists who can avail of a visa number next month to adjust status to permanent residency. This bulletin breaks down the numbers based on the category and also seperates out over-subscribed countries from the rest of the world. When you apply for permanent residency you get a case number and a priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the date listed in the visa bulletin for your application category, USCIS will proceed with your case and in most cases you will get your permanent resident card in a few months. Here are the cut-off dates for employment-based permanent residency categories from the August 2006 visa bulletin:
For an analysis of the visa bulletin visit Murthy.com

For persons born in India:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	01 Jan 2006	No change
EB2	Unavailable	No one can file under this category
EB3	01 Apr 2001	Moved back by 14 days

For persons born in China:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	01 Mar 2005	No change
EB3	01 Oct 2001	No change

For persons born in Phillipines:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Oct 2001	No change

For persons born in Mexico:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	22 Apr 2001	No change

For rest of the world:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Oct 2001	No change

Most IT related applicants would fall under EB3. That's backlogged by 5 years now for applicants born in India.

US 'could be going bankrupt'

As most of us immigrate to the U.S. for its superior life style, The Telegraph has a report on how the U.S. might be in for bankruptcy according to research conducted by Boston University Professor Laurence Kotlikoff

According to his central analysis, "the US government is, indeed, bankrupt, insofar as it will be unable to pay its creditors, who, in this context, are current and future generations to whom it has explicitly or implicitly promised future net payments of various kinds. If these burdens exceed the resources of those generations, get close to doing so, or simply get so high as to preclude their full collection, the country's policy will be unsustainable and can constitute or lead to national bankruptcy."

Most of you may know that the U.S. government prints money based on selling U.S. Treasury bonds to foreign investors one of the biggest of which is the Chinese government.

The scenario has serious implications for the dollar. If investors lose confidence in the US's future, and suspect the country may at some point allow inflation to erode away its debts, they may reduce their holdings of US Treasury bonds.

What this means is that inflation and a depreciating dollar may burn out all your savings 10 to 20 years from now as you are getting ready to retire. At that point there may not be a lot of difference between what you have and what your friend who is in your home country has in terms of wealth.

CIR bill is dead

It's not official but as I had feared the comprehensive immigration reform (CIR) bill is dead and buried as the House has not yet come up with the list of members for the conference committee let alone a decision on the bill itself. This is another side of politics where with elections for the House seats in November there is not enough political will power to pass a controversial bill. No politician wants to get caught on the wrong side during election time. So they will let the bill die as the summer session comes to an end and experts believe the bill may come up again late this year or early next year once the elections are through. Meanwhile all the legal immigrants waiting for green cards can enjoy the rest of the summer and continue waiting.

Dubious companies and bench-time

Seeing the complaints that Programmers Guild filed against certain companies for advertising jobs only to visa holders and the media coverage that it received, I thought about informing the talented folks who may be looking for an opportunity to work in the U.S. about two issues that are important to consider if you are a visa seeker.

Cost
Never pay anyone for sponsoring an H1-B. It is illegal and more importantly the employer itself is probably dubious and doesn't have any work for you. They are making money off your visa sponsorship, if they did have any real work for you, then it should easily cover the cost of visa sponsorship (which is now over $2,000 excluding legal fees - another story). I know the desire that many foreign job seekers have to come to the U.S. to earn a decent living for the betterment of their family and their future, but do not fall into this trap. These type of employers are preying on your desire to immigrate to the U.S. and they may tempt you to pay BIG money in return for visa sponsorship. Did I mention that it is illegal too?

Bench-time
Back in the days I used to hear about bench-time, the period between projects. Many times companies would not pay the consultants when they're out of project. It is common place in the U.S. for companies to do this to permanent residents or U.S. citizens. Its illegal for companies to not pay salary to visa holders during bench-time, it is OK to be unpaid if you are a permanent resident or a U.S. citizen. Infact if a permanent resident or U.S. citizen gets laid off, they can claim unemployment benefits while they look for another job. So its not surprising and also makes economic sense that you don't see them on bench, they're just laid off so that they can get those benefits. Visa holders on the other hand cannot get any unemployment benefits and if they're laid off they have to leave the country. This is one of the many discriminatory rules against job seekers who are on visas. Another reason why the H1 visa should not be tied to any company but to an individual. This will prevent many of the visa abuses that parties like the Programmer's Guild often cite.

The H1 visa program enables talented, amibitious hard-working people from all around the world to pursue the American dream. The U.S. in return gets these highly trained and skilled brains for no cost at all. It is really sad to see some dubious companies preying on the needs of ambitious youngsters who only want to work and earn a living. Its even more sad to see organized groups use the devious schemes as examples to bad mouth the H1 visa program. Do they ever thank the thousands of folks who have contributed immensely to the economy? Considering a 5% unemployment rate, 65,000 is less than 0.45% of the total unemployed. What the U.S. should be worried about is not the few jobs that go to these brilliant foreign talent but the day when these people do not wish to come to the U.S. anymore!

Programmers Guild file H1-B visa complaints

A major point of argument against foreign workers on H1 visas is that they're not skilled or competent enough but just cheap labor that companies often abuse. Programmer's Guild, another IT workers lobby group has filed various complaints to the U.S. Department of Justice that certain U.S. companies use words like "We require candidates for H1B from India" and "We sponsor GC [green card] and we do prefer H1B holders". They remind us that these are against the U.S. Immigration laws and that these companies should try and hire Americans before they hire a foreigner. They argue that these companies only want to hire foreigners as cheap labor and essentially use these examples to black label the visa program itself.

According to the USCIS definitions, H1-B speciality occupations include such diverse fields as architecture, mathematics, social sciences, accounting, arts, law, education. Candidates should have atleast a bachelor's degree or equivalent. If indeed companies wanted to bring in cheap labor, shouldn't we see more foreign architects, lawyers, accountants, professors, doctors as they should be as easily available in any other country as programmers are? Then why are there mostly only IT workers being brought in on H1-B and significantly lesser numbers in other occupations? Everyone knows how highly paid some of these other occupations are and shouldn't companies just hire them cheaper abroad if that was their only goal?

While I agree that those who abuse the program should be punished, the few abuses itself should be no reason to stop or cut back the program. Let the markets decide what is the required number and let the labor groups and the Government agencies ensure that wage abuses are monitored and prevented. The complaints that the guild filed mention ads on sites like DICE and MONSTER, but they also mention dozens of ads on SULEKHA.com, which is a community web portal for expatriate Indians. Are they suggesting that companies should not advertise vacant job positions to foreign nationals? The guild is just using technical reasons to promote its own agenda. One look at their home page is enough to understand whether they're concerned more about improving the quality of the visa program or whether they are against the visa program itself and are finding reasons to stop it.

The truth is, there is a lack of "QUALITY" people and that's it. IT is only about 1.5% of the total U.S. work force and high-tech jobs are ever increasing. The shortage of "QUALITY" people drives up the wages of the few people who are employed in IT. These people who are then fundamentally opposed to bringing foreign workers will go to great lengths to find flaws in the system. If these so called "abuses" in the H1-B system are fixed, then they will find other ways to oppose it, that's just their job!

Why U.S. Tech Firms Need More, Not Fewer, Indian Workers

IT is still in its developing stages in many parts of the globe. The demand for skilled tech workers is still going strong. InformationWeek has this story today which explains why U.S. firms need to hire more in India and other developing nations.

"Less than one half of IBM's revenues derive from sales to customers in the United States. Earlier this week, Indian outsourcer TCS bagged two deals worth more than $30 million in Latin America. Here's why these two facts combined show why American tech services firms have no choice but to continue adding staff in India and China while trimming down their more expensive U.S. workforce.

The anti-offshoring lobby tends to forget that American firms--in tech and in most other industries--aren't selling just to U.S. customers. IBM, EDS, HP and others have sizeable sales opportunities in Europe, South America and, most significantly, the Asia Pacific region. But, those same opportunities await foreign IT services vendors--including Atos Origin, Cap Gemini, Wipro, Infosys and the above mentioned TCS.

So imagine if, as some lobbyists and protectionist politicians would have it, strict limits were placed on the ability of U.S. companies to establish offshore operations in places like India and China. Were that to happen, there is no way that these firms could compete internationally with foreign rivals that are either based in, or have sizeable operations in, countries where skilled tech labor is considerably cheaper than in the U.S.

Indian outsourcers exist, and they are radically changing the economics of the IT services market globally. All the wishing, hoping and cussing in the world isn't going to change that. IBM and the other U.S. tech services vendors need to radically adjust their cost basis to reflect that reality or they will be reduced to small, regional niche players. How many layoffs do you think we'd see then?"

Has the U.S. really increased the number of visas?

A few weeks back I reported that the U.S. Senate passed the CIR bill. Since then I've been approached by a few friends who said that the U.S. has increased the number of visas for the high-skilled. This is another example of painting the rosy picture by the news media. While it is true that these provisions exist in the CIR bill, it is not true that the U.S. has passed these provisions. The CIR bill has only passed the U.S. Senate. The U.S. House of Representatives has to reconcile it with their version which didn't have any immigration benefits, instead they had provisions for fencing the border and deporting illegals. So at the end of the House-Senate conference committee (which has not yet been formed and which some House Republican members are threatening to kill), it may be possible that no pro-legal immigration provisions come out at all. Whatever comes out of the conference committee will be signed into law by President Bush.

Last year there was a Budget Reconciliation Bill, the Senate version (S.1932) of which included increasing visa numbers; but in the House-Senate conference, the House members managed to remove all immigration benefits except allocating 50,000 re-captured visas for nurses . House members are local politicians who don't care much about the U.S. as a whole and Senate members are mostly more educated and are more world-conscious. All bills have to pass both houses before they can be signed into law by the President.

For a quick skinny on the U.S. Congress visit this link at Wikipedia.

Why does this blog sound so gloomy on the U.S. ?

So a friend of mine asked me why I'm being discontent when "they" have increased the number of visas to 1.5 lacs and when there are lots of jobs available in the U.S. It is for reasons like this that I get motivated writing this blog. As I say right under the banner, my blog will contradict some of the rosy picture painted by the media.

First of all, let me start by saying that the job scenario is almost like the pre dotcom bubble era. It's getting harder to find quality candidates as most of them are comfy with their jobs. Fresh graduates are increasingly finding jobs they like and more people are switching back to IT now that the real-estate frenzy has died down. You can find these aspects in the news media easily and that's why I don't write about them. So, reading my blog will surely seem gloomy as I show only one-side of the coin but then so does the news media - they show the brighter side, I show the darker side.

Non-immigrant spouse worries

What do you think about your wife working? It's a very personal question and depends on various factors. Does she need to work to help with finances or does she need to work to keep herself busy? It's really upto the husband and wife to decide. Well, now how would you feel if the Government told you that your wife is not allowed to work. Will you feel like some right of yours is being violated? This is exactly what the U.S. does to the spouses of non-immigrant (work and student) visa holders.

U.S. does not allow your wife (or husband) to work if you are on a work or student visa. So she has to sit at home all day even if she has a Masters degree and years of experience that will clearly benefit the U.S., if she were to work. To make matters worse, she is not even allowed to have a social security number which is tied to the credit score that is used by banks and lending institutions in deciding if she is eligible for a loan. She may have trouble getting a driver's license which is the de facto ID for all local purposes. If she enrolls into college for further studies, she has to pay the higher tuition fees that are charged to non-residents even if she has stayed there for many years. She is truly a non-existant entity, a second class resident without some of the most basic rights. In this stage she is vulnerable to depression and domestic abuse. That's equal rights, American style! Now for some eye-openers.

• The UK with its much higher population density and cost of living allows the spouse of non-immigrants to take any job he or she pleases to. Go there if you care about your wife.
• Everyone knows how the U.S. likes to boast about its values of freedom and liberty, specially to the conservative middle-eastern countries. Well know this then, even the UAE allows the spouse of a non-immigrant to work.

The right to work is a basic human right that the individual should be the one to choose and not the Government. Doesn't it seem like protectionism on the part of U.S to bar spouses from working? Isn't there already a numerical limit on the number of non-immigrants allowed? How does some women working to spend their time hurt the general population? Even if it does hurt some what, does it trump over their basic right to work? Do not allow people to come in if you're that worried. If you let them in, then allow them all rights and treat them as you would treat anyone else.

Cheese in a mouse-trap

An excellent personal account I found today details the emotional journey of an ambitious young engineer through his 10 year stint in the USA. Reading it has inspired me to write the following:

Early 1990s were the days when the American dream was becoming more of a reality for many brilliant engineers from India. These were the type of guys who could re-invent electricity if needed. A poor nation with scarce natural resources, corrupt bureaucracy, abundant poverty and an embarassing caste-system had finally found a niche - intelligent, educated, english-speaking and motivated youth.

The cheese
America seemed the place where the best of everything was. Indian youth were getting exposed to the world of opportunities outside its poor motherland. Indians are extremely patrioitic, yet these young men and women wanted to embrace a different land. May be they had given up hope on their own country. May be they wanted a short-cut to a more materialistic life. American companies valued their skills and talent and were willing to hire people from countries half way around the globe.

The mouse-trap
Many came to the U.S. on work-permits that would allow them to work in the U.S.A for a few years. Once here, companies would sponsor them for permanent residency ("green" card) which would allow them to stay in the U.S. permanently. While all this sounded good, little did they know that the decades old immigration laws were going to trap them in a state of limbo soon. October 12 2005 was the D-day for most green card applicants when their applications were further delayed back by 5 or more years after having waited 3 years or more. This came as a rude shock for most people who were just going about their lives until then. This had completely destroyed all their future plans. From marriage, to buying a house, to changing jobs.

Freedom
When things go as expected people feel a sense of freedom to plan their lives. When everything you do is constrained by an unknown date of attaining permanent residency, you loose the freedom to plan your life. When the U.S. law makers willingly ignore the pain and agony of living every day waiting for the next visa bulletin, you know you are not wanted here. When America is not the dream you thought it was, it is time to break free.

July 2006 Visa Bulletin

Every month around the 15th day, the U.S. Dept. of State, releases the visa bulletin which lists who can avail of a visa number next month to adjust status to permanent residency. This bulletin breaks down the numbers based on the category and also seperates out over-subscribed countries from the rest of the world. When you apply for permanent residency you get a case number and a priority date. If your priority date is earlier than the date listed in the visa bulletin for your application category, USCIS will proceed with your case and in most cases you will get your permanent resident card in a few months. Here are the cut-off dates for employment-based permanent residency categories from the July 2006 visa bulletin:

For persons born in India:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	01 Jan 2006	No change
EB2	01 Jan 2003	No change
EB3	15 Apr 2001	Moved ahead by 7 days

For persons born in China:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	Moved ahead by 11 months
EB2	01 Mar 2005	Moved ahead by 8 months
EB3	01 Oct 2001	Moved ahead by 3 months

For persons born in Phillipines:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Oct 2001	Moved ahead by 3 months

For persons born in Mexico:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	22 Apr 2001	No change

For rest of the world:

Category	Cut-off Date	Movement from previous month
EB1	Current	No change
EB2	Current	No change
EB3	01 Oct 2001	Moved ahead by 3 months

Most IT related applicants would fall under EB3. That's backlogged by 5 years now for applicants born in India.

IBM ups investment in India

Last month I brought up an article that showed how IBM was moving high-end research jobs into India. Well here is a continuation of that story.

IBM to invest $6B in India over next three years, tripling its investment of past three years. It dwarfs the $3.9 billion combined investment announced last year for India by three U.S.-based companies Microsoft, Intel and Cisco Systems. IBM said it planned to expand its services, software, hardware and research businesses in India.

I remember in 2000 when IBM opened a development center in Andheri (a western suburb in Mumbai) where they only hired the most brilliant few that they could find. IBM only had 4,900 employees in India in 2002, now it has 43,000. That's still only 14% of its worldwide number of 300,000. There is more room to grow. And don't just limit this to IBM, the competition is going to imitate the leader, meaning more jobs coming to India and other developing countries.

Now what is the reason to immigrate to a foreign land when all these companies are setting up shop next to your home?

IEEE-USA slams immigration bill

The Senate passed immigration bill has provisions to increase the H1-B visas to 115,000 per year and exempt certain U.S. Master's degree holders from the cap. What may come as a surprise to most of you is IEEE-USA is strongly opposed to allowing foreign high-tech workers. They say they're concerned about the "alleged" abuse of the H1-B and the L1 visa programs and the system needs to be fixed before it is expanded.

I remember during my college days when applicants to U.S. universities would pay money and take up membership with the IEEE. Little did they know that their own money would go to advocacy against their ability to work in the USA.

While their passion to oppose the H1-B program is understandable, their opposition to legal high-skilled immigration is truly appalling and both a disservice and a misrepresentation to all the aspiring immigrants who were or are members of the organization. Why is a professional enhancement organization getting into politics?

Unemployment rate in IT is at 2% compared to the 5% overall U.S. unemployment rate. That's practically full employment. Sure the economic recession of 2002 drove out a large part of the IT work force into other fields but they're now free to come back to IT. If they can, then why is the unemployment rate so low? What IEEE-USA members are interested in is to raise their wages to higher levels by allowing the work force shortage to continue. That's their goal and they will swoop to any levels to achieve it.