EB2-3 Predictions (Rather Calculations) - 2014

[qesehmk]

Zz - as usual the retrogression is temporary until Jun/Jul when it additional numbers will become available. By now this pattern is quite clear.

I sure hope this turns out to be case of conservative lawyer speak. I would be so disappointed if the CO dates do not touch 2009 by end of FY 2014.

11/27/2013: India EB-2 Number Became Unavailable Effective 11/20/2013 for November Visa Bulletin Pending Cases

AILA reports that no additional EB-2 numbers was allocated for EB-2 India for I-485 adjudications in November 2013. This confirms reports in immigration tracking discussion board. Reportedly, Indian EB-2 demand was so unprecedented that State Department received Indian EB-2 visa number requests about 150 per day between November 10 through November 20, causing its action to stop releasing any numbers effective 11/20/2013. Reportedly, State Department allocated 15,000 EB-2 visas for Indians in August and September alone using preadjudicated EB-485 cases. A lot of these cases are reportedly Indian EB-3 cases which had been upgraded to EB-2.
At this point, no firm predication can be made, but reportedly there is some possibility that Indian EB-2 may return to August 2008 cut-off date in August or September 2014, meanwhile the worldwide EB-3 can move backward before the end of FY 2014 if demand increases next year.

2013-Q4 PERM Data Released.

FY-2013 Summary:
Total:44,152
Certified:35,203
Den/Withd:8,949 20.3%
INDIA:20,930 59.5%
CHINA:2,135
MEXICO:718
PHIL:928
ROW:10,492 29.8%

IND account for 59.5% of total PERM approvals in 2013.
Total ROW approvals dropped below 30%

Veni - Thanks. I was going through the data and what struck me is that the median wage is 81K-105K range i.e. approx 93K. There are very few below 60K and a ton of them above 100K too. So the broader range is as high as $1M. That's pretty darn good. Just goes to show how much skill gap there probably is in the labor market.

As per the PERM data, the data is simply outstanding for all backlogged countries. What it shows is that there is 36% drop in PERM approvals compared to prior year. For ROW the drop is even worse - 40%. So this partly explains breakneck speed of EB3ROW date movement. Also this is a very good reason why EB2I is going to have another great year despite having less quota number compared to last year. I will update the header over the weekend.

[Pundit Arjun]

Thanks for taking your time to provide the info and also deciding to update the header, Q. Eagerly looking forward for your weekend update. Hope you will give a ballpark (as always) as to where you would see the EB2I dates in June/July.
More specifically, am eager to know if I will get GC this year (PD + 5 years)

[tomhagen]

I see this as very good sign for EB2. Reason is drop in PERM approvals eventually leads to less porting. So in next two years statusquo will be re instantiated

[vizcard]

I see this as very good sign for EB2. Reason is drop in PERM approvals eventually leads to less porting. So in next two years statusquo will be re instantiated

more immediately it means more spillover for backlogged countries

[CleanSock]

I am sorry I didn't get the meaning of status quo here. Can someone explain it to me?

Thanks

I see this as very good sign for EB2. Reason is drop in PERM approvals eventually leads to less porting. So in next two years statusquo will be re instantiated

[tomhagen]

Well two years before porting was minimal and majority of the EB2 numbers were consumed by original EB2 filers. Status Quo is that point

[gkjppp]

Zz - as usual the retrogression is temporary until Jun/Jul when it additional numbers will become available. By now this pattern is quite clear.



Veni - Thanks. I was going through the data and what struck me is that the median wage is 81K-105K range i.e. approx 93K. There are very few below 60K and a ton of them above 100K too. So the broader range is as high as $1M. That's pretty darn good. Just goes to show how much skill gap there probably is in the labor market.

As per the PERM data, the data is simply outstanding for all backlogged countries. What it shows is that there is 36% drop in PERM approvals compared to prior year. For ROW the drop is even worse - 40%. So this partly explains breakneck speed of EB3ROW date movement. Also this is a very good reason why EB2I is going to have another great year despite having less quota number compared to last year. I will update the header over the weekend.

By 2014 sep EB2I dates will be around Sep-Dec 2009. In 2015 you could see definite forward movement for EB2I(i mean to say it may cross May 2010 date).Current date Nov 2004 might not stay for longer time, it should move to 2007 atleast by apr'2014.Its amazing EB3I inventory decreasing faster than EB2I. As everyone know Jan'2014 485 Inventory may give clear picture for rest of year pattern.

[willywonka]

Q,
I have a question about the statement below from your post on the first page.
There was EB2ROW backlog of about 8k at the beginning of last FY that doesn't exist this year. So, if everything else is more or less the same, shouldn't the overall spillover be the same as last year ?


This year i.e. 2014, there will be 10K extra visas from FB that will be used in EB category. Last year that number was 18K. So in 2014, the movement of EB2I should be somewhat less than last year - if everything else being equal.

[qesehmk]

Willy - That number this year is 4-5K if you look at the latest 485 inventory. (assuming you want to draw line at Jun 2008 for EB2I).

Sorry i have stopped doing manual calculations. So cant really answer the second question. However to vaguely answer your question - Is everything else really equal? e.g. EB1 EB2ROW consumption. Porting. EB5 consumption.

Q,
I have a question about the statement below from your post on the first page.
There was EB2ROW backlog of about 8k at the beginning of last FY that doesn't exist this year. So, if everything else is more or less the same, shouldn't the overall spillover be the same as last year ?


This year i.e. 2014, there will be 10K extra visas from FB that will be used in EB category. Last year that number was 18K. So in 2014, the movement of EB2I should be somewhat less than last year - if everything else being equal.

[qesehmk]

Header updated.

[CleanSock]

Thanks for the explanation!

Well two years before porting was minimal and majority of the EB2 numbers were consumed by original EB2 filers. Status Quo is that point

[veni001]

Zz - as usual the retrogression is temporary until Jun/Jul when it additional numbers will become available. By now this pattern is quite clear.


Veni - Thanks. I was going through the data and what struck me is that the median wage is 81K-105K range i.e. approx 93K. There are very few below 60K and a ton of them above 100K too. So the broader range is as high as $1M. That's pretty darn good. Just goes to show how much skill gap there probably is in the labor market.

As per the PERM data, the data is simply outstanding for all backlogged countries. What it shows is that there is 36% drop in PERM approvals compared to prior year. For ROW the drop is even worse - 40%. So this partly explains breakneck speed of EB3ROW date movement. Also this is a very good reason why EB2I is going to have another great year despite having less quota number compared to last year. I will update the header over the weekend.

Q,
I am not quite sure about the prospects for EB2 backlogs for 2014, offcourse FY2013 PERM statistics looks promising but number of I-140 receipts and approvals skyrocketed for the same period. I did not get a chance to analyze that data yet, this is something you don't want to miss for your forecasting model.

[qesehmk]

Q,
I am not quite sure about the prospects for EB2 backlogs for 2014, offcourse FY2013 PERM statistics looks promising but number of I-140 receipts and approvals skyrocketed for the same period. I did not get a chance to analyze that data yet, this is something you don't want to miss for your forecasting model.

Veni you are right. There were 68K approvals in 2012 vs 81K in 2013. But the difference could easily be attributed to rapid advancement in EB3-ROW dates as well as good movement in EB2I dates.

140 is a tricky data to build demand model on because it contains data from backlogged and current categories and its very difficult to separate those two. Without such separation spillover prediction is impossible.

PERM on the othre hand does come sliced by country and looking at salary data one can at least make some intelligent guesses about EB2 vs EB3 split. That's why PERM data is more reliable in predicting future demand than I-140. Makes sense?

p.s. - BTW here is 140 receipts story - it fell to alltime low in Nov 2009 to 55K annual approvals, then in Jun 2011 it reached all time high of 89K per year. then it again fell in 2012 Jun to 68K and now this year in Jun it was 81K annual. At least I can't figure out a way to correlate that to future demand. That's why I would rather base future demand off of PERM. To be honest - that too is imperfect but better than doing it using 140 data.

[helooo]

When will we see demand data?

[qesehmk]

Heloo - there is a calendar in the menu above. I had creating recurring events that are useful for EB immigrants. One of the events was monthly data. So check that out. It is aproximate but will give you rough idea.

When will we see demand data?

[kkruna]

visa bulleting for Jan (html address needs to be corrected on travel.state.gov link):
http://www.travel.state.gov/visa/bul...etin_6228.html

NOW THE LINK ADDRESS ON TRAVEL.STATE.GOV IS CORRECTED...

[imdeng]

So the Jan bulletin is out. As expected, no movement in EB2-I. One month movement in EB2-C.

The whopper is that EB3-ROW/C/M keeps running - now to 01-APR-2012. Seriously - how low is EB3 density post 07/07 that they have not yet have enough inventory after pushing PD by 5 years in past few months!! Not that I mind - this is indirectly good news for everybody. There is not even any future guidance like last VB.

Poor EB3-P, they are stuck with 1 month movement when the rest of EB3 (except I of course) is having a party.

[tomhagen]

But in long run this will be good for EB3 I. According to the last inventory (published in Oct), EB3 ROW has 13,756 cases, where as demand is just 260. If you see other forums like trackitt, people are bashing EB3 I to EB2 I porting. But I believe that is nothing when compared with porting in ROW category. So it makes me think that EB3 ROW doesn't have enough inventory. Eventually it will start giving the spill over which goes to most retrogressed in that area i.e. EB3 I. Hence this is a good sign for EB3 I folks to cheer.

[qesehmk]

But in long run this will be good for EB3 I. According to the last inventory (published in Oct), EB3 ROW has 13,756 cases, where as demand is just 260. If you see other forums like trackitt, people are bashing EB3 I to EB2 I porting. But I believe that is nothing when compared with porting in ROW category. So it makes me think that EB3 ROW doesn't have enough inventory. Eventually it will start giving the spill over which goes to most retrogressed in that area i.e. EB3 I. Hence this is a sign for EB3 I folks to cheer.

Totally agree Tom. I believe this will happen sooner rather than later. IMHO next year we should see EB3I receive spillover!!

[imdeng]

Well - my hunch is that the rapid movement in EB3-ROW will reduce the porting into EB2-ROW. That would allow EB2-I to get a larger horizontal spillover since EB2-ROW demand will reduce. If the incoming rate for EB3-ROW is low enough then yes EB3-I might see some spillover in future - but EB2-I will see the positive impact before EB3-I will IMO.

For EB3-I to receive spillover, we need PD movement of more than an year from here, all accumulated inventory (however small) to be wiped out AND the rate of incoming demand to be lower than quota. It can happen - but there are too many conditions. Plus - if job market improves and hiring picks up, all bets of off. 2014 is expected to have more growth in the economy.

Totally agree Tom. I believe this will happen sooner rather than later. IMHO next year we should see EB3I receive spillover!!

[tomhagen]

Couldn't agree more . I am desperately waiting for the demand and first quarter inventory. Any idea when we are going to see those ?

[tomhagen]

Agree with you some extent. But you see the number of cases registered in trackitt for EB3 ROW starting 2012, I observed a significant down trend. Ofcourse not every user will register in trackitt. But I generally assume 8% of users will end up in trackitt. That always gave me more or less close to accurate numbers. So overall porting is ruining every equation we are following till now to predict the movement. At a certain point of time EB3 ROW also will be like EB3 C.

IMHO if EB3 categories are moving forward faster than EB2, people will start laughing at us

[qesehmk]

I think you are right on porting. Right now we don't even know how much EB3ROW porting exists. Perhaps the final 2013 numbers will give some indications.

As per EB3ROW movement - the speed at which dates moved and are continuing to move indicate EB3ROW will be current next year. Which also means EB3I could very likely receive spillover.

I agree about job market and all. So we can watch out for PERMs. But given the 2013 PERM data - I wouldn't say with confidence that 2014 will be drastically different.

Well - my hunch is that the rapid movement in EB3-ROW will reduce the porting into EB2-ROW. That would allow EB2-I to get a larger horizontal spillover since EB2-ROW demand will reduce. If the incoming rate for EB3-ROW is low enough then yes EB3-I might see some spillover in future - but EB2-I will see the positive impact before EB3-I will IMO.

For EB3-I to receive spillover, we need PD movement of more than an year from here, all accumulated inventory (however small) to be wiped out AND the rate of incoming demand to be lower than quota. It can happen - but there are too many conditions. Plus - if job market improves and hiring picks up, all bets of off. 2014 is expected to have more growth in the economy.

[imdeng]

I am stunned frankly with the speed of EB3ROW movement. When EB2-IC inventory accumulation happened, we had a pretty good idea how many folks will show up every month (sigh - how I miss Spec - /sigh) and the actual numbers were in the ball park. EB3ROW OTOH is moving beyond the wildest speculations and even now does not seem to be stopping. It is unprecedented.

I think you are right on porting. Right now we don't even know how much EB3ROW porting exists. Perhaps the final 2013 numbers will give some indications.

As per EB3ROW movement - the speed at which dates moved and are continuing to move indicate EB3ROW will be current next year. Which also means EB3I could very likely receive spillover.

I agree about job market and all. So we can watch out for PERMs. But given the 2013 PERM data - I wouldn't say with confidence that 2014 will be drastically different.

[MeraGC1]

Hi,
Sorry to post this here. Moderators, please move this to appropriate thread

My MIL visited and stayed with us for 6 months on B2 visa. She left US at the end of October 2013. She is planning to visit us in Jan 2014 for 3 months. The gap between her last exit and entry will be 2 months. Will this cause any issues at POE?

Does anyone have similar experience?

Thanks in advance