EB2 Predictions (Rather Calculations) - 2011

[Spectator]

Spec yes the logic is right. But i guess for EB2I, since EB2I is not current there are no new 485 coming into system other than conversions. (Granted PWMB is a possibility but a remote one since PWMB horizon starts sometime in 2007 as PERM approvals were coming in on time during early 2007) and right now the date is May 06. Does that make sense?

And so I would imagine any increase in inventory plus Q1 quota is a fairly accurate estimate of conversions (save any miniscule denials withdrawals etc).

p.s. Oops now i am seeing the light. u mean that some conversions may relate to a date post may-06 and so conversions may be understated by my formula? Right?

Q,

Certainly, one of the things I am saying is that the data needs to be treated differently, depending whether it is pre May 2006 or not.

I am not arguing that additions are anything other than Porting (the majority) or PWMB (less at the moment).

Maybe if I try to illustrate my point with real figures from the Inventory it would be clearer.

Let's start with months that were not Current during Oct-Dec 2010 (May 2006 (except for 7 days) to August 2007, since I don't think we disagree on those. I'll choose a range that has positive and negative differences.

Month/Year --- Oct 2010 --- Jan 2011 --- Diff
Apr 2007 ------ 1,370 ------ 1,420 ------ 50
May 2007 ------ 1,123 ------ 1,070 ----- (53)
Jun 2007 ------ 1,307 ------ 1,272 ----- (35)
Jul 2007 ------ 1,518 ------ 1,673 ----- 155
Aug 2007 -------- 202 --------- 95 ---- (107)

Since there has been an increase in April and July, these must represent new cases that weren't present in the October Inventory.

In May, June and August, since the dates aren't Current, the reductions must be due to Withdrawals/Denials.

So the real change to the Inventory is the sum of the values +10.

Even in this case, for the purpose of counting NEW applications for Porting purposes, reductions should be ignored - there are 205 new applications - the reductions only help how far the PD might advance.

Now let's look at some months that were Current in the period Oct-Dec 2010. Those are months before May 2006.

Month/Year --- Oct 2010 --- Jan 2011 --- Diff
Jan 2004 --------- 21 --------- 15 ------ (6)
Feb 2004 ---------- 7 --------- 13 ------- 6
Mar 2004 --------- 33 --------- 20 ----- (13)
Apr 2004 --------- 13 --------- 20 ------- 7
May 2004 --------- 22 --------- 19 ------ (3)


Again, since there has been an increase in February and April, these must represent new cases, which weren't present in the October Inventory.

For reductions in January, March and May, these are most probably due to approvals in October to December 2010, since those PDs were Current. They would therefore have been present in the October Inventory and don't represent a change involving new applications. They will be counted when we add on the approvals during Oct-Dec (757) later. If we include the reduction now, it will net off from within the 757 figure to zero and effectively reduce 757 to 735.

Thus, the real difference becomes:

Jan 2004 --------- 0
Feb 2004 --------- 6
Mar 2004 --------- 0
Apr 2004 --------- 7
May 2004 --------- 0

and the real difference between the Inventories is +13 rather than the -9 that would be calculated using all the figures.

Thus (and I know these aren't the correct figures), if approvals were 100 in Dec-Oct, then with the net addition of 13, Porting would be 113, rather than 91 if the reduction due to approvals is accounted for.

The difference in how different date ranges are treated might only be important to me, since I use the results to derive a new October 2010 Inventory figure starting point for my calculations. Conceivably and probably, it doesn't affect how you derive your figures for overall movement throughout the year.

But the point about only counting additions stands for calculation of Porting.

To use an analogy:

If there are 5 women in a room at the beginning (the October Inventory) and then over a period of time (Oct-Dec) 12 men enter the room (new applications), but the 5 women leave (are approved) it doesn't alter the fact that 12 men are in the room. You can't say that there are only 7 men because 5 women left.

I'll probably get into trouble for using men and women in the analogy, but there is no intent to offend.

That's the best I can do. If that's not good enough, let's just leave it be.

[qesehmk]

Spec

I think you and I are saying similar things except following points:

1) I am not including denials withdrawals to be conservative.
2) I am not including PWMB as I am thinking they will kick in after Jan 07 or even mar 07.
3) I am assuming all portings to be prior to Jul 07 (or in fact may 06). (to be conservative)

If you look at your method and use same assumptions I think you will arrive at the same macro formula I am using.

One of the reasons I usually am reluctant to look at monthly numbers and changes to those numbers is because sometimes numbers change for nothing indicating USCIS is correcting its records. But anyway .. thanks for the discussion. I think you are very very thorought Spec. And BTW Your illustration is good with me ! Keep it up :-)

Q,

Certainly, one of the things I am saying is that the data needs to be treated differently, depending whether it is pre May 2006 or not.

I am not arguing that additions are anything other than Porting (the majority) or PWMB (less at the moment).

Maybe if I try to illustrate my point with real figures from the Inventory it would be clearer.

Let's start with months that were not Current during Oct-Dec 2010 (May 2006 (except for 7 days) to August 2007, since I don't think we disagree on those. I'll choose a range that has positive and negative differences.

Month/Year --- Oct 2010 --- Jan 2011 --- Diff
Apr 2007 ------ 1,370 ------ 1,420 ------ 50
May 2007 ------ 1,123 ------ 1,070 ----- (53)
Jun 2007 ------ 1,307 ------ 1,272 ----- (35)
Jul 2007 ------ 1,518 ------ 1,673 ----- 155
Aug 2007 -------- 202 --------- 95 ---- (107)

Since there has been an increase in April and July, these must represent new cases that weren't present in the October Inventory.

In May, June and August, since the dates aren't Current, the reductions must be due to Withdrawals/Denials.

So the real change to the Inventory is the sum of the values +10.

Even in this case, for the purpose of counting NEW applications for Porting purposes, reductions should be ignored - there are 205 new applications - the reductions only help how far the PD might advance.

Now let's look at some months that were Current in the period Oct-Dec 2010. Those are months before May 2006.

Month/Year --- Oct 2010 --- Jan 2011 --- Diff
Jan 2004 --------- 21 --------- 15 ------ (6)
Feb 2004 ---------- 7 --------- 13 ------- 6
Mar 2004 --------- 33 --------- 20 ----- (13)
Apr 2004 --------- 13 --------- 20 ------- 7
May 2004 --------- 22 --------- 19 ------ (3)


Again, since there has been an increase in February and April, these must represent new cases, which weren't present in the October Inventory.

For reductions in January, March and May, these are most probably due to approvals in October to December 2010, since those PDs were Current. They would therefore have been present in the October Inventory and don't represent a change involving new applications. They will be counted when we add on the approvals during Oct-Dec (757) later. If we include the reduction now, it will net off from within the 757 figure to zero and effectively reduce 757 to 735.

Thus, the real difference becomes:

Jan 2004 --------- 0
Feb 2004 ---------- 6
Mar 2004 --------- 0
Apr 2004 --------- 7
May 2004 --------- 0
[/FONT]
and the real difference between the Inventories is +13 rather than the -9 that would be calculated using all the figures.

Thus (and I know these aren't the correct figures), if approvals were 100 in Dec-Oct, then with the net addition of 13, Porting would be 113, rather than 91 if the reduction due to approvals is accounted for.

The difference in how different date ranges are treated might only be important to me, since I use the results to derive a new October 2010 Inventory figure starting point for my calculations. Conceivably and probably, it doesn't affect how you derive your figures for overall movement throughout the year.

But the point about only counting additions stands for calculation of Porting.

To use an analogy:

If there are 5 women in a room at the beginning (the October Inventory) and then over a period of time (Oct-Dec) 12 men enter the room (new applications), but the 5 women leave (are approved) it doesn't alter the fact that 12 men are in the room. You can't say that there are only 7 men because 5 women left.

I'll probably get into trouble for using men and women in the analogy, but there is no intent to offend.

That's the best I can do. If that's not good enough, let's just leave it be.

[Spectator]

Spec

I think you and I are saying similar things except following points:

1) I am not including denials withdrawals to be conservative.
2) I am not including PWMB as I am thinking they will kick in after Jan 07 or even mar 07.
3) I am assuming all portings to be prior to Jul 07 (or in fact may 06). (to be conservative)

If you look at your method and use same assumptions I think you will arrive at the same macro formula I am using.

One of the reasons I usually am reluctant to look at monthly numbers and changes to those numbers is because sometimes numbers change for nothing indicating USCIS is correcting its records. But anyway .. thanks for the discussion. I think you are very very thorought Spec. And BTW Your illustration is good with me ! Keep it up :-)

No problem.

To be clear, I am not implicitly including PWMB either. I am just saying they are indistinguishable from Porting or a transfer from a Field Office. They all add one new case to the numbers.

The only Porting numbers that are important at the moment are those that are in dates that we think might be Current this FY. Outside that range, they will affect future years.

I guess if I were to boil down to the simplest level what I was trying to say, it would be that:

To be a Porting case, it must be a new application. A new application will cause the Inventory to rise. Therefore, the only apparent Porting cases will appear in months that have a rise in numbers. By definition, if the numbers reduced, we can't see any new cases so it is effectively zero for calculating new cases.

I too am wary at looking at individual months - and I don't. For my purposes, I have grossed up the individual changes into a single figure.

I think above all, it shows how difficult (impossible actually) it is to infer the Porting rate from the numbers. For instance, if a month had reduced by 100 we have no idea if that is 300 - 400 or 0 -100. Similarly, if the figure increased 100, we have no idea if that is 300 - 200 or 100 - 0.

The best we can do is a rough approximation. I think we have probably exhausted this topic.

[qesehmk]

I think above all, it shows how difficult (impossible actually) it is to infer the Porting rate from the numbers. For instance, if a month had reduced by 100 we have no idea if that is 300 - 400 or 0 -100. Similarly, if the figure increased 100, we have no idea if that is 300 - 200 or 100 - 0.

Exactly. And that's why we bring in another check which is the Q1 quota of 750 that we assume is entirely applied. But who knows what the actual consumption is? Again ... its all educated guesswork at best.

[viypr07]

All,
Just joined. Been following this for past week. Appreciate the discussion and insight provided by all here.

[TeddyKoochu]

Teddy, you are way overly optimistic about EB2 ROW. Please have a look at

http://www.sewashree.com/forums/show...&p=371#post371

and the post before that.

Quoting Q's take from that post:

8K ROW PERM approvals in last 4 months translate to 24K approvals for full year. Of which 12K are EB2ROW. Which translate to 26K EB2ROW 485s for full year approvals - which means about 8K SOFAD to IC (given MP are already in the PERM approvals). Even otherwise MP have low EB2 demand and whatever demand they have would be offset by possible rejections/withdrawals within the ROW labor going to 140 and 485 stages.

Thanks!

kd2008
I believe you are referring to Sangiano's analysis wherein he arrived at the figure of 32K for the fill year, Q has provide an interpretation of his analysis. Following are some of the assumptions that I would disagree with.

- For ROW he has made the assumption that EB2-EB3 is 50-50 this appears to be highly flawed. Its probably 1:2 at best.
- There is an assumption that every approved perm will lead to an approved 485 this also appears to be incorrect, IMHO atleast 20% cases would not make it.
- Perm became faster in 2010 and we all know that most of the people got approved last year itself. Now Sangiano's calculation for this year is ~32K so last year should have been 65K if that was the case then we would not have seen any SOFAD last year.
- My preference for EB2 ROW would be to check Trackitt to see the actual approval trend, I agree that this is not official published data in anyway but Trackitt is fairly popular with ROW folks the ration of Oct - Dec 2010 to 2011 is 135 to 207. Assuming EB2 ROW cases have no resistance for approvals the only factor preventing approvals would be lower demand. I would tend to agree more with dg0320.

Spectator- Many thanks for your feebback, I missed adding the EB2-I / C approvals to the offset as you have identified. Friends I have updated the post based on Spec's feedback.

[qesehmk]

Teddy

You are right in terms of trackitt approval. I have always advocated using trackitt. However what we have learnt last year is that we can't only look at 485 pipeline. You also need to look at 140 and PERM pipeline. The rate of approval may be low so far. The question is - will USCIS flush 140 and PERM pipeline to boost ROW demand and utilize the quota? In all probabibility yes.

Regarding denial and withdrawal I agree w you that yes its legitimate to factor them in to boost prediction. However, its better to be conservative and not count on denial and withdrawals.

Going back to first point the question is how are 140 and PERM pipelines for ROW behaving compared to last year?

p.s. - I just checked ... 140 is behaving similar to last year. But Atlanta perm is in sync with 485 for ROW (i.e. 2/3 demand compared to last year). So Teddy, the question is how much did ROW consume last year?

kd2008
I believe you are referring to Sangiano's analysis wherein he arrived at the figure of 32K for the fill year, Q has provide an interpretation of his analysis. Following are some of the assumptions that I would disagree with.

- For ROW he has made the assumption that EB2-EB3 is 50-50 this appears to be highly flawed. Its probably 1:2 at best.
- There is an assumption that every approved perm will lead to an approved 485 this also appears to be incorrect, IMHO atleast 20% cases would not make it.
- Perm became faster in 2010 and we all know that most of the people got approved last year itself. Now Sangiano's calculation for this year is ~32K so last year should have been 65K if that was the case then we would not have seen any SOFAD last year.
- My preference for EB2 ROW would be to check Trackitt to see the actual approval trend, I agree that this is not official published data in anyway but Trackitt is fairly popular with ROW folks the ration of Oct - Dec 2010 to 2011 is 135 to 207. Assuming EB2 ROW cases have no resistance for approvals the only factor preventing approvals would be lower demand. I would tend to agree more with dg0320.

Spectator- Many thanks for your feebback, I missed adding the EB2-I / C approvals to the offset as you have identified. Friends I have updated the post based on Spec's feedback.

[Spectator]

Spectator- Many thanks for your feebback, I missed adding the EB2-I / C approvals to the offset as you have identified. Friends I have updated the post based on Spec's feedback.

Teddy,

Glad the feedback helped.

Regarding your comments. I would have the following observations based on my reading of kd2008 post.

- For ROW he has made the assumption that EB2-EB3 is 50-50 this appears to be highly flawed. Its probably 1:2 at best.

That seems to be at completely the other end of the spectrum. 33% EB2 to 67% EB3 is unrealistic IMO.

The generally accepted ratio used to be 40:60. With retrogression in EB3-ROW as well, much like India, no one is going to file an EB3 unless they have to. Similarly to India, I actually think this fact probably has shifted it nearer to 50:50.

- There is an assumption that every approved perm will lead to an approved 485 this also appears to be incorrect, IMHO atleast 20% cases would not make it.

I think there was a discussion about this previously. 20% seems high and I think it was felt 5% was a more realistic figure. I don't know if the calculation factored in any rejection rate.

- Perm became faster in 2010 and we all know that most of the people got approved last year itself. Now Sangiano's calculation for this year is ~32K so last year should have been 65K if that was the case then we would not have seen any SOFAD last year.

Your statement doesn't seem correct. In the post, the figure quoted was around 24.5k for ROW or 27.5k including Mexico and Philippines.

The 65k figure isn't a valid extrapolation, since the post says that the figures were based on what ROW was doing in the last 4 months of the year, as an attempt to see what was happening going into FY2011. At that point, nearly 80% of the approvals were as a result of PERM applications that had only been submitted in FY2010. I imagine that the reasonably high level from FY2008 would be audit cases, since they have a processing time of 2 years. Together they seem to account for 94% of cases being approved at the end of the year.

The table showing the full year gives an entirely different picture, although that appears to be for all Countries and not just ROW.

Given that the time from PERM approval to I-485 approval is not instantaneous, the majority of those PERM approvals in the last 4 months would not have been approved in FY2010, even with Premium Processing of the I-140.

- My preference for EB2 ROW would be to check Trackitt to see the actual approval trend, I agree that this is not official published data in anyway but Trackitt is fairly popular with ROW folks the ration of Oct - Dec 2010 to 2011 is 135 to 207. Assuming EB2 ROW cases have no resistance for approvals the only factor preventing approvals would be lower demand. I would tend to agree more with dg0320.

I agree that Trackitt has always tended to give pretty good figures for EB2-ROW. Since backlog reduction appears to be complete, perhaps we should expect a more linear approval trend now.

EB2-ROW has been remaining steadily on course for around 24k approvals (that's the daily average from December onwards). It is a bit lower at the moment (23k) because there does seem to have been a lull in approvals recently.

Trackitt has never been very good for Mexico or Philippines in any Category, so if the 3k prediction was correct, then that would be 27k.

[TeddyKoochu]

Teddy

You are right in terms of trackitt approval. I have always advocated using trackitt. However what we have learnt last year is that we can't only look at 485 pipeline. You also need to look at 140 and PERM pipeline. The rate of approval may be low so far. The question is - will USCIS flush 140 and PERM pipeline to boost ROW demand and utilize the quota? In all probabibility yes.

Regarding denial and withdrawal I agree w you that yes its legitimate to factor them in to boost prediction. However, its better to be conservative and not count on denial and withdrawals.

Going back to first point the question is how are 140 and PERM pipelines for ROW behaving compared to last year?

p.s. - I just checked ... 140 is behaving similar to last year. But Atlanta perm is in sync with 485 for ROW (i.e. 2/3 demand compared to last year). So Teddy, the question is how much did ROW consume last year?

How much EB2-ROW got last year can only be answered by the DOS annual report itself, however what we were able to deduce is that EB1 + EB2 ROW Sofad = 13.5K. In my calculations I have assumed EB2 ROW as 10K and EB1 as 3.5K.

[TeddyKoochu]

Spec responses inline

Teddy,

Glad the feedback helped.
Thanks
Regarding your comments. I would have the following observations based on my reading of kd2008 post.


That seems to be at completely the other end of the spectrum. 33% EB2 to 67% EB3 is unrealistic IMO.

The generally accepted ratio used to be 40:60. With retrogression in EB3-ROW as well, much like India, no one is going to file an EB3 unless they have to. Similarly to India, I actually think this fact probably has shifted it nearer to 50:50.
Ok lets start with the ratio as 40-60, these days despite PD porting happening comapnies are scared of filing in EB2 for fear of audit. I have a colleague whose consulting company refused to file in EB2 despite having 10 + years of experience. The EB2-EB3 is actually better for India in fact its upside down, I believe that 50-50 is way too high maybe 40-60 is still more realistic.
I think there was a discussion about this previously. 20% seems high and I think it was felt 5% was a more realistic figure. I don't know if the calculation factored in any rejection rate.
This calculation does not use any rejection rate it takes 100% as the rate forward.

Your statement doesn't seem correct. In the post, the figure quoted was around 24.5k for ROW or 27.5k including Mexico and Philippines.

The 65k figure isn't a valid extrapolation, since the post says that the figures were based on what ROW was doing in the last 4 months of the year, as an attempt to see what was happening going into FY2011. At that point, nearly 80% of the approvals were as a result of PERM applications that had only been submitted in FY2010. I imagine that the reasonably high level from FY2008 would be audit cases, since they have a processing time of 2 years. Together they seem to account for 94% of cases being approved at the end of the year.

The table showing the full year gives an entirely different picture, although that appears to be for all Countries and not just ROW.

Given that the time from PERM approval to I-485 approval is not instantaneous, the majority of those PERM approvals in the last 4 months would not have been approved in FY2010, even with Premium Processing of the I-140.


I agree that Trackitt has always tended to give pretty good figures for EB2-ROW. Since backlog reduction appears to be complete, perhaps we should expect a more linear approval trend now.

EB2-ROW has been remaining steadily on course for around 24k approvals (that's the daily average from December onwards). It is a bit lower at the moment (23k) because there does seem to have been a lull in approvals recently.

What Iam saying is slightly different, in 2010 the perm process encomapssed 2007, 2008 and 2009 cases and part of 2010, so if say the calculated extrapolated figure based on this calculation is say 28K then what should have seen approval in FY2010 itself the previous 8 months would be say double lets say ~ 50K by this logic. So if this were to hold true then there woud have been absolutely no SOFAD last year, thats why Iam doutful about this calculation.

Trackitt has never been very good for Mexico or Philippines in any Category, so if the 3k prediction was correct, then that would be 27k.

[Spectator]

I've just been to the DOL website http://icert.doleta.gov/ to check that my 2 year timeframe for PERM audits was correct. It was. Currently they are processing cases from December 2008.

What did catch my eye was this:

OFLC has initiated an intensive effort to reduce the Permanent Labor Certification Program's pending caseload. Our goal for FY 2010 is to reduce the backlog by 50%. We are on schedule, and we will continue this effort as part of our larger Departmental commitment to customer service.

We have assumed that the backlog reduction effort was largely completed and that PERM approvals would solely reflect current demand, even if we can't agree what that demand is. That would potentially put a brake on the number of PERM approvals to those that were "Current".

This seems to be true for normal cases, as the processing date for these is December 2010.

The backlog has only been reduced by 50% according to the statement above. I think it would be fair to believe that the remaining 50% probably includes the Audit and Appeal cases (or would it?).

If DOL now turn their resources to reducing the remaining 50% backlog as they have said, then PERM approvals in FY2011 are going to remain at a high rate and consist of Current applications plus more backlog applications.

I've always understood that EB2 cases have been more likely to attract an audit, although I don't know the truth of this statement. It does make sense.

If indeed we start to see a reduction in pending audit cases (perhaps this would be evidenced by a reduction in audit processing times?), then this could lead to a higher proportion of EB2 approvals compared to a normal distribution.

It is something to consider anyway.

[Spectator]

What Iam saying is slightly different, in 2010 the perm process encomapssed 2007, 2008 and 2009 cases and part of 2010, so if say the calculated extrapolated figure based on this calculation is say 28K then what should hav seen approval in FY2010 itself the previous 8 months would be say double lets say ~ 50K by this logic. So if this were to hold true then there woud have been absolutely no SOFAD last year.

That's not correct. It would be if the split for the full year was the same as the final 4 months - but it is not.

The only comparable figures in the post relate to all Countries and the Calendar Year, but they illustrate the same point.

Full Year
2010 -- 18,050 -- 25.70%
2009 -- 38,422 -- 54.70%
2008 -- 10,942 -- 15.58%
2007 --- 2,726 --- 3.88%
2006 ------ 84 --- 0.12%
2005 ------ 13 --- 0.02%

Total - 70,237 - 100.00%

Last 4 Months
2010 -- 16,064 -- 74.602%
2009 --- 2,659 -- 12.348%
2008 --- 2,622 -- 12.177%
2007 ----- 176 --- 0.817%
2006 ------ 10 --- 0.046%
2005 ------- 2 --- 0.009%

Total - 21,533 -- 100.00%

For the whole Year, only 26% of the approvals were from applications submitted in 2010.

However, for the final 4 months, 2010 applications represented 75% of approvals.

It is a similar story for other years. The % is very different.

What is happening at the end of FY2010 is a much better indicator of what will happen in FY2011, even more so when the full FY2010 contained so many backlog cases.

[TeddyKoochu]

Teddy,

Glad the feedback helped.

Regarding your comments. I would have the following observations based on my reading of kd2008 post.


That seems to be at completely the other end of the spectrum. 33% EB2 to 67% EB3 is unrealistic IMO.

The generally accepted ratio used to be 40:60. With retrogression in EB3-ROW as well, much like India, no one is going to file an EB3 unless they have to. Similarly to India, I actually think this fact probably has shifted it nearer to 50:50.


I think there was a discussion about this previously. 20% seems high and I think it was felt 5% was a more realistic figure. I don't know if the calculation factored in any rejection rate.


Your statement doesn't seem correct. In the post, the figure quoted was around 24.5k for ROW or 27.5k including Mexico and Philippines.

The 65k figure isn't a valid extrapolation, since the post says that the figures were based on what ROW was doing in the last 4 months of the year, as an attempt to see what was happening going into FY2011. At that point, nearly 80% of the approvals were as a result of PERM applications that had only been submitted in FY2010. I imagine that the reasonably high level from FY2008 would be audit cases, since they have a processing time of 2 years. Together they seem to account for 94% of cases being approved at the end of the year.

The table showing the full year gives an entirely different picture, although that appears to be for all Countries and not just ROW.

Given that the time from PERM approval to I-485 approval is not instantaneous, the majority of those PERM approvals in the last 4 months would not have been approved in FY2010, even with Premium Processing of the I-140.


I agree that Trackitt has always tended to give pretty good figures for EB2-ROW. Since backlog reduction appears to be complete, perhaps we should expect a more linear approval trend now.

EB2-ROW has been remaining steadily on course for around 24k approvals (that's the daily average from December onwards). It is a bit lower at the moment (23k) because there does seem to have been a lull in approvals recently.

Trackitt has never been very good for Mexico or Philippines in any Category, so if the 3k prediction was correct, then that would be 27k.

That's not correct. It would be if the split for the full year was the same as the final 4 months - but it is not.

The only comparable figures in the post relate to all Countries and the Calendar Year, but they illustrate the same point.

Full Year
2010 -- 18,050 -- 25.70%
2009 -- 38,422 -- 54.70%
2008 -- 10,942 -- 15.58%
2007 --- 2,726 --- 3.88%
2006 ------ 84 --- 0.12%
2005 ------ 13 --- 0.02%

Total - 70,237 - 100.00%

Last 4 Months
2010 -- 16,064 -- 74.602%
2009 --- 2,659 -- 12.348%
2008 --- 2,622 -- 12.177%
2007 ----- 176 --- 0.817%
2006 ------ 10 --- 0.046%
2005 ------- 2 --- 0.009%

Total - 21,533 -- 100.00%

For the whole Year, only 26% of the approvals were from applications submitted in 2010.

However, for the final 4 months, 2010 applications represented 75% of approvals.

It is a similar story for other years. The % is very different.

What is happening at the end of FY2010 is a much better indicator of what will happen in FY2011, even more so when the full FY2010 contained so many backlog cases.

Spec help me understand the following. The full year was 70237 while the last 4 months was 21533, so effectively 2/3rds of the cases saw 485 approvals in FY 2010. If that was the case then we would have hardly seen any SOFAD in 2010 as th EB2 ROW demand would have consumed everything. Iam ok with the extrapolation but the figures don't seem to add up.

[qesehmk]

How much EB2-ROW got last year can only be answered by the DOS annual report itself, however what we were able to deduce is that EB1 + EB2 ROW Sofad = 13.5K. In my calculations I have assumed EB2 ROW as 10K and EB1 as 3.5K.

I think the SOFAD was more than that. Just look at EB2 IC reduction which was almost 57.5 - 35.5 = 22K. (Where 57.5 is from Dec 09 and 35.5 is OCt 10).

I would like to think that most of it came from EB1 rather than EB2ROW because of accelerated PERM approvals. So that puts EB2ROW almost at full utilization for 2010. i.e. approx 32K. For 2011 if the rate is 2/3rd i.e. approx 22K then EB2ROW can only give as much as last year since the 10K reduction here is offset by FB spillover being gone this year. So whatever ROW gave last year + whatever EB1 gave last year was approx 22K. Right?

That's counting the optimistic projection that ROW in 2011 is running at 2/3rd of 2010 demand.

So I believe 35K is a very wild projection for 2011 especially given that 10K FB spillover is absent this year.

p.s. - The DHS report will be tremendously helpful. Lets keep our fingers crossed!

[TeddyKoochu]

I think the SOFAD was more than that. Just look at EB2 IC reduction which was almost 57.5 - 35.5 = 22K. (Where 57.5 is from Dec 09 and 35.5 is OCt 10).

I would like to think that most of it came from EB1 rather than EB2ROW because of accelerated PERM approvals. So that puts EB2ROW almost at full utilization for 2010. i.e. approx 32K. For 2011 if the rate is 2/3rd i.e. approx 22K then EB2ROW can only give as much as last year since the 10K reduction here is offset by FB spillover being gone this year. So whatever ROW gave last year + whatever EB1 gave last year was approx 22K. Right?

That's counting the optimistic projection that ROW in 2011 is running at 2/3rd of 2010 demand.

So I believe 35K is a very wild projection for 2011 especially given that 10K FB spillover is absent this year.

p.s. - The DHS report will be tremendously helpful. Lets keep our fingers crossed!

Q as per the AILA report the total SOFAD was 26.5K. Another report suggested that EB5 was 7K and knowing that Eb2 I+C = 6K what we got from EB2 ROW was 13.5K. My belief has always been despite everything that majority of the SOFAD ~ 10K came from EB2 ROW while ~ 3.5K came from EB1 this is based on the 2009 trend that EB1 use even more than its allocation. However if most of the SOFAD came from EB1 and not EB2 ROW the whole equation changes. The available data for EB2 ROW is good however for EB1 it cannot be relied upon. If we were to have the same SOFAD as last year after including for the loss of FB then the PD in Sep 2011 may just be 01-JAN-2007 it would be a 10K reduction from the 35K. I believe expecting more than 25% reduction in EB1 maybe unrealistic.

[qesehmk]

If we were to have the same SOFAD as last year after including for the loss of FB then the PD in Sep 2011 may just be 01-JAN-2007 it would be a 10K reduction from the 35K.

I would put this a little differently. If we were to have teh same demand as last year then in 2011 we will see 10K less SOFAD (because FB spillover is gone).

Right?

So the question is where do we think demand may actually go down? EB5/4/2ROW/1 ? As you noted EB2 may have 1/3 less demand compared to 2010. Now that's a big one. If true and if in 2010 ROW utilized all its quota then in 2011 EB2ROW reduction is roughly equivalent to 10K and compensates the FB spillover reduction.

So if everything else stays same then in 2011 we will expect same SOFAD as last year i.e. 26.5K. Right.

That looks like an optimistic scenario (if all our base assumptions are right.). So I think what sangiano said and I am saying and I think spec you think similar - is that the likely SOFAD would be in the range 22-28K. My own range is bigger than that given the uncertainty in many assumptions. But the mean revolves around 24-26K range which is hardly going to cross Dec 06.

That's why still struggling with your 35K claim.

[Spectator]

Spec help me understand the following. The full year was 70237 while the last 4 months was 21533, so effectively 2/3rds of the cases saw 485 approvals in FY 2010. If that was the case then we would have hardly seen any SOFAD in 2010 as th EB2 ROW demand would have consumed everything. Iam ok with the extrapolation but the figures don't seem to add up.

Teddy,

Let me start by saying that I enjoy our conversations immensely. I find them very stimulating and they make me think about the issues and assumptions even more. We appear to be polar opposites in that you are the ultra optimist and I am the ultra conservative. I think that is a good thing for the forum.

To answer your question:

The 70,237 and 21,533 represent all Countries and all Categories, not just EB2-ROW, Mexico & Philippines.

Lets just look at the CY2010 cases. I say this because many or most of the other years will be due to backlog, which wouldn't be a factor for FY2011 and it is these (actually FY2010) figures that the calculation in kd2008 post is based on.

The last 4 months of FY2010 had 16,064 cases approved that were submitted in CY2010 by all Countries.

We also know that there were a total of 18,050 cases submitted in CY2010 by all Countries approved in the whole of FY2010, so only 1,986 can have been approved in the first 8 months of FY2010.

That implies that 4,016 per month current (in fact not all current since the FY began in October) cases were being approved at the end of the year, compared to 248 per month over the first 8 months. That is for all Countries, not just EB2-ROW.

For EB2-ROW all we can say is that of the 16,064 cases submitted in CY2010 and approved in the last 4 months, EB2-ROW accounted for 5,799 of them.

What is missing is the corresponding breakdown by FY submission for all Countries over the last 4 months and the FY submission breakdown for ROW for the whole of FY2010. I might see if I can compile the figures from the data I have.

In fact, I have studied kd2008 post in more detail and found that the calculation was actually very conservative.

It was based only on applications submitted in the current FY. Judging by the evidence, it excluded any contribution from cases coming out of audit and largely ignores any normal cases that take longer than average to approve. We could take the % for these to be 16.26% and 5.61% respectively, although I have heard the audit % is rather higher.

If we take into account that you believe the denial rate at I-140/I-485 stage is 20%, then these would pretty much cancel each other out and the figures would remain as they are.

[veni001]

The DHS report will be tremendously helpful. Lets keep our fingers crossed!

We may have to wait until July/August to get this report!

[Spectator]

I think the SOFAD was more than that. Just look at EB2 IC reduction which was almost 57.5 - 35.5 = 22K. (Where 57.5 is from Dec 09 and 35.5 is OCt 10).

I would like to think that most of it came from EB1 rather than EB2ROW because of accelerated PERM approvals. So that puts EB2ROW almost at full utilization for 2010. i.e. approx 32K.

I actually pretty much agree with Teddy on this one.

Our figures differ slightly, mainly because of a different amount for EB5 (must check that).

I believe the 20.5k spillover for FY2010 was comprised of EB1 - 2.3k, EB2 - 9.4k, EB5 - 8.8k. If Teddy's lower figure for EB5 is correct, the difference would come from EB1, since most of the EB2 figure is derived from Trackitt data. The part I am unsure of is the contribution from Mexico and Philippines.

[qesehmk]

Spec

I am ok with EB5. As per EB1 or EB2 ROW ... since all we can do is guess .. lets hope DHS report comes out soon and ends our guesswork as well as provide some basis for 2011 prediction!

I actually pretty much agree with Teddy on this one.

Our figures differ slightly, mainly because of a different amount for EB5 (must check that).

I believe the 20.5k spillover for FY2010 was comprised of EB1 - 2.3k, EB2 - 9.4k, EB5 - 8.8k. If Teddy's lower figure for EB5 is correct, the difference would come from EB1, since most of the EB2 figure is derived from Trackitt data. The part I am unsure of is the contribution from Mexico and Philippines.

[Spectator]

Spec

I am ok with EB5. As per EB1 or EB2 ROW ... since all we can do is guess .. lets hope DHS report comes out soon and ends our guesswork as well as provide some basis for 2011 prediction!

I am also really looking forward to the report as well.

To be pedantic, it is the Visa Statistics from DOS that we will see first and that should be out within the next month. The DHS Yearbook is also very useful since it gives such information as the breakdown of EB1 into A, B & C. I think that is usually published in August, which is too late for our purposes this year.

As you said, I can be rather anal at times!

[qesehmk]

LoL !!

I am sorry I meant DoS report at this link

I think that report should've been in by Dec 10. DHS report to congress is another thing. And DHS year book of immigration statistics is yet another one.

I am also really looking forward to the report as well.

To be pedantic, it is the Visa Statistics from DOS that we will see first and that should be out within the next month. The DHS Yearbook is also very useful since it gives such information as the breakdown of EB1 into A, B & C. I think that is usually published in August, which is too late for our purposes this year.

As you said, I can be rather anal at times!

[Spectator]

I actually pretty much agree with Teddy on this one.

Our figures differ slightly, mainly because of a different amount for EB5 (must check that).

I believe the 20.5k spillover for FY2010 was comprised of EB1 - 2.3k, EB2 - 9.4k, EB5 - 8.8k. If Teddy's lower figure for EB5 is correct, the difference would come from EB1, since most of the EB2 figure is derived from Trackitt data. The part I am unsure of is the contribution from Mexico and Philippines.

I found the source of my EB5 prediction from earlier in the thread.

This document http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/Outreach/...014%202010.pdf discusses the EB5 program.

On page 9 it gives preliminary figures for FY2010 Visa Usage of 1,886. The figures quoted for previous FY match to the Visa Reports.

In FY2010 EB5 had a quota of 7.1% of 150,657 visas, which is 10,697.

If only 1,886 were actually used, then EB5 contributed 8,811 to SOFAD.

[bieber]

can someone help me understand,

if SOFAD for last year was 26500, why there is only 22000 inventory went down for EB2(I+C)?

[Spectator]

can someone help me understand,

if SOFAD for last year was 26500, why there is only 22000 inventory went down for EB2(I+C)?

Hi bieber,

The USCIS Inventory does not contain all cases that are available for approval.

In addition there are Consular Processed cases, cases approved directly from Field Offices, new applications received and approved between Inventories and Porting cases.

A combination of these would account for the missing numbers.

The FAQ section contains an explanation of this topic.