General Immigration Discussion

[qesehmk]

Do you know what will happen after todays testimony? how long or what is the future of this? if they will listen to the three things that Bob stressed towards the end it will be a miracle, but miracles do happen.

None of us know. But given that the presidential election season has just started, I would bet ... nothing happens there.

don't misunderstand my username---- it's from larry the cable guy......sorry for increasing the noise to signal ratio

I have heard it from my white colleagues with southern roots. They usually pronounce it "git-er-dun"!

[soggadu]

As Obama put it "I need a dance partner on immigration".

Too many "head winds" here - 9+% unemployment (which is irrelevant but its all about politics), split Congress (which I feel will continue even after the next Congressional elections), etc.

In any case, nothing will happen on CIR till after the elections..... and that too IF Obama gets re-elected. Republicans are historically anti-immigration

I dont agree that Republicans are anti immigrants... please understand the difference in opinion... anti illegal immigration is not anti immigration on the whole... when i talk to tea baggers, it really puzzles me that people at the grass root are so not aware of the plight of the legal immigrants... and they are pro legal immigration... I see a lot of rep senators introduce bills for helping legal immigration...but Dem's on the other hand are using the card w.r.t illegals and trying to gain mileage....

[natvyas]

As Obama put it "I need a dance partner on immigration".

Too many "head winds" here - 9+% unemployment (which is irrelevant but its all about politics), split Congress (which I feel will continue even after the next Congressional elections), etc.

In any case, nothing will happen on CIR till after the elections..... and that too IF Obama gets re-elected. Republicans are historically anti-immigration

The stats that someone mentioned in the Senate Judiciary committee on unemployment are as follows : -

Unemployment rate for people with Bachelors Degree around 4.5%
Unemployment rate for people WITHOUT Bachelors Degree around 10%

[qesehmk]

Republicans are historically anti-immigration

That's true. Lets not pretend otherwise. There is a very strong anti-progressive, anti-minorities, anti-multicultural streak within republican party. And don't be fooled with the northern lincoln republicans with today's southern republicans. Over time northern republicans turned into what are today's democrats and souther democrats turned into republicans. So its not very hard to see where all the anti-immigrant sentiment is coming from.

anti illegal immigration is not anti immigration on the whole...

while broadstroke statement is always difficult to agree. .... in general illegal immigration is just a fake front in my opinion. An anti-illegal-immigration person more often than not is anti-immigration. Its just they say it a bit carefully. So don't be fooled by appearances.

There is a terrific statement by pastor Martin Niemoller (from wikipedia) about the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group.

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

[Monica12]

That's true. Lets not pretend otherwise. There is a very strong anti-progressive, anti-minorities, anti-multicultural streak within republican party. And don't be fooled with the northern lincoln republicans with today's southern republicans. Over time northern republicans turned into what are today's democrats and souther democrats turned into republicans. So its not very hard to see where all the anti-immigrant sentiment is coming from.


while broadstroke statement is always difficult to agree. .... in general illegal immigration is just a fake front in my opinion. An anti-illegal-immigration person more often than not is anti-immigration. Its just they say it a bit carefully. So don't be fooled by appearances.

There is a terrific statement by pastor Martin Niemoller (from wikipedia) about the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group.

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Wow ! GREAT one Q. This is so true...

[Spectator]

That's true. Lets not pretend otherwise. There is a very strong anti-progressive, anti-minorities, anti-multicultural streak within republican party. And don't be fooled with the northern lincoln republicans with today's southern republicans. Over time northern republicans turned into what are today's democrats and souther democrats turned into republicans. So its not very hard to see where all the anti-immigrant sentiment is coming from.


while broadstroke statement is always difficult to agree. .... in general illegal immigration is just a fake front in my opinion. An anti-illegal-immigration person more often than not is anti-immigration. Its just they say it a bit carefully. So don't be fooled by appearances.

There is a terrific statement by pastor Martin Niemoller (from wikipedia) about the Nazi rise to power and the purging of their chosen targets, group after group.

First they came for the communists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Q,

One of my favorites too.

Unfortunately the same is true within the would be immigrant community.

We have all seen the anti porting, anti EB1C or anti DV sentiments in various fora. Everyone seems to be trying to change the immigration system to benefit themselves.

Whilst controversial, the same is true of calls to abolish per Country limits. It seeks to allocate more of the SAME numbers of visas to one group, whilst disadvantaging another group.

It cannot be the answer and only creates divisiveness within the immigrant community.

Even recapturing visas is no long term solution - all it does it get most of the people currently in the queue out of it. It doesn't address the fact that future applicants will have exactly the same problem. Perhaps people just don't care about that. More "crab mentality".

Personally, if we all had to support one measure, I would choose not counting dependents against the numerical limits. It raise the effective number of visas to 315,000 without the headline figure of 140,000 being changed. That makes it something that could get passed. It certainly has been proposed as part of various Bills. I think H.R. 2161 contains it from memory.

It is a measure that gives an advantage to EVERY person in the immigrant queue, whether now or in the future. It is a proposal that ALL immigrants could support and lobby for under a common banner. That would be very powerful.

With the equivalent of 315,000 visas available every year, spillover would rise from around 25k to 200k per year.

It would become totally irrelevant whether per Country limits exist or not and the arguments either for or against them - there would be sufficient visa numbers for everyone.

Call me naive, but it makes sense to me. Don't flame me - nor will I debate that view.

Feel free to add your own solutions that benefit EVERYBODY.

[qesehmk]

Spec

Thanks for moving it here. Its better that we don't hog the bandwidth of teh other thread!

I absolutely like the provision of not counting dependents. I do think that's my most favorite provision. I also think that giving a GC to american graduates with a job offer in hand makes a lot of sense.

I do think that doing away with country quota is equitable and trust me I would've said the same even if I was from Madagascar! The reason being it is equitable and it is useful for economy. It doesn't hurt ROW because then everybody becomes FIFO (at least within EB2 and EB3 and so on if not across categories).

I do like recapture since that will bring so much required relief to EB3.

But at the end of the day - I think we need to understand that immigration is not a right its a privilege. Some of the political opposition is understandable. But sometimes it turns outright nasty and I think one is going to face thoes kind of people regardless you become GC holder or citizen. Even after you die your children are going to face some racism and discrimination (and to your point I do concede that many of us are also guilty of the same things ... only in different context). But one must take a stance and choose sides as per your own judgement. Right?

Q,

One of my favorites too.

Unfortunately the same is true within the would be immigrant community.

We have all seen the anti porting, anti EB1C or anti DV sentiments in various fora. Everyone seems to be trying to change the immigration system to benefit themselves.

Whilst controversial, the same is true of calls to abolish per Country limits. It seeks to allocate more of the SAME numbers of visas to one group, whilst disadvantaging another group.

It cannot be the answer and only creates divisiveness within the immigrant community.

Even recapturing visas is no long term solution - all it does it get most of the people currently in the queue out of it. It doesn't address the fact that future applicants will have exactly the same problem. Perhaps people just don't care about that. More "crab mentality".

Personally, if we all had to support one measure, I would choose not counting dependents against the numerical limits. It raise the effective number of visas to 315,000 without the headline figure of 140,000 being changed. That makes it something that could get passed. It certainly has been proposed as part of various Bills. I think H.R. 2161 contains it from memory.

It is a measure that gives an advantage to EVERY person in the immigrant queue, whether now or in the future. It is a proposal that ALL immigrants could support and lobby for under a common banner. That would be very powerful.

With the equivalent of 315,000 visas available every year, spillover would rise from around 25k to 200k per year.

It would become totally irrelevant whether per Country limits exist or not and the arguments either for or against them - there would be sufficient visa numbers for everyone.

Call me naive, but it makes sense to me. Don't flame me - nor will I debate that view.

Feel free to add your own solutions that benefit EVERYBODY.

[nishant2200]

I agree with you. I also think the idea of visa recapture is correct, it has been done in the past for nurses.

1. So Visa Recapture will eliminate current backlog.
2. Strict enforcement of laws and scrutiny for fraud, combined with the not counting dependents for visa numbers will make future backlogs very much smaller if any.

Q,

One of my favorites too.

Unfortunately the same is true within the would be immigrant community.

We have all seen the anti porting, anti EB1C or anti DV sentiments in various fora. Everyone seems to be trying to change the immigration system to benefit themselves.

Whilst controversial, the same is true of calls to abolish per Country limits. It seeks to allocate more of the SAME numbers of visas to one group, whilst disadvantaging another group.

It cannot be the answer and only creates divisiveness within the immigrant community.

Even recapturing visas is no long term solution - all it does it get most of the people currently in the queue out of it. It doesn't address the fact that future applicants will have exactly the same problem. Perhaps people just don't care about that. More "crab mentality".

Personally, if we all had to support one measure, I would choose not counting dependents against the numerical limits. It raise the effective number of visas to 315,000 without the headline figure of 140,000 being changed. That makes it something that could get passed. It certainly has been proposed as part of various Bills. I think H.R. 2161 contains it from memory.

It is a measure that gives an advantage to EVERY person in the immigrant queue, whether now or in the future. It is a proposal that ALL immigrants could support and lobby for under a common banner. That would be very powerful.

With the equivalent of 315,000 visas available every year, spillover would rise from around 25k to 200k per year.

It would become totally irrelevant whether per Country limits exist or not and the arguments either for or against them - there would be sufficient visa numbers for everyone.

Call me naive, but it makes sense to me. Don't flame me - nor will I debate that view.

Feel free to add your own solutions that benefit EVERYBODY.

[skpanda]

I have moved the discussion about the Senate Committee Testimony to the General Immigration Discussion http://www.qesehmk.org/forums/showth...ion-Discussion

Just in case anybody is interested to hear the entire hearing ... here is the video link:

http://www.senate.gov/fplayers/CommP...y072611&st=xxx

All other Testimonies can be found at:

http://judiciary.senate.gov/hearings...c3baeba62beeb0

There seems to be lot of awareness on GC backlog and most people agree that High Skilled Immigration reform should happen irrespective of CIR (comprehensive immigration reform). There is good mention of the removal of 7% country cap by multiple panel members.

Dr. Ronil Hira seems to be the only person who had some negative sentiments and made baseless and stupid allegations such as L1 foriegn nationals get paid 10K per year. Its so absurd that I laughed at the level of stupidity some people have. Moreover, i think this hearing was for Immigration (GCs) and not non-immigrant visas like H1/L1.

Its good that Immigration community is recognized and representative was included in the panel. We should also thank IV for achieving this recognition on behalf of our entire immigrant community.

PS:
1. Dr. Aurora is a Vice President of IV. I have nothing to do with him nor am I doing publicity for IV here.
2. Dr. Ronil Hira is a 1st generation American (i think). If his parents were not allowed to immigrate to US, he would not be sitting in that panel. For some reason he fails to appreciates that and is anti immigration. It is in everybody's interest if the loopholes in the visa programmes are fixed, Fraud is scrutinized. However making baseless and stupid allegations just to garner attention is unethical and does not help US.

[ssvp22]

I think the 7% quota per country should be abolished. If there is no per country quota while you are getting H1-B/L1, why is there a quota when you are in line for GC. Not having a quota at the time of H1/L1 sets false expectations for immigrants. Same thing for counting visa numbers of spouse and children. If you are not counting them at the time of H1-B or L1, why at the time of GC. Whichever way US twists the words, i find no justification for this.

[ssvp22]

Dr. Ronil Hira seems to be the only person who had some negative sentiments and made baseless and stupid allegations such as L1 foriegn nationals get paid 10K per year. Its so absurd that I laughed at the level of stupidity some people have. Moreover, i think this hearing was for Immigration (GCs) and not non-immigrant visas like H1/L1.

I guess they need to do a sanity check of folks being brought into these hearings.

[gcq]

I guess they need to do a sanity check of folks being brought into these hearings.

Grassley might have brought Ron Hira the anti-immigrant. It is good that Charles Shcumer gave him the last chance with the statement "last but not least". At some point Grassley himself asked Ron not to speak against microsoft.

[qesehmk]

Dr. Ronil Hira seems to be the only person who had some negative sentiments and made baseless and stupid allegations such as L1 foriegn nationals get paid 10K per year. Its so absurd that I laughed at the level of stupidity some people have. Moreover, i think this hearing was for Immigration (GCs) and not non-immigrant visas like H1/L1.

...
Dr. Ronil Hira is a 1st generation American (i think). If his parents were not allowed to immigrate to US, he would not be sitting in that panel. For some reason he fails to appreciates that and is anti immigration. It is in everybody's interest if the loopholes in the visa programmes are fixed, Fraud is scrutinized. However making baseless and stupid allegations just to garner attention is unethical and does not help US.

Thanks skpanda. Its amusing to see this person (obviously of Indian descent) mount such foolish opposition. Fortunately the tailwinds for globalization are far stronger than these people with narrow world view. Globalization is not just about capital, its also about labor, products, lifestyle, culture and politics. Who cares what this guy thinks. Different people make different career choices. This seems to be his career choice and claim to fame.

[zenmaster]

Many a times when filing 2nd I-140(or porting), lawyers/us forget to mention the A-Number from the 1st 140 approval notice.
I think that is the main reason, the PD is not copied to the new 140 approval.
Another confusion is about the A number received in the EAD card on OPT/ 485 filing.

I found some good info regarding the A-Number here and thought of sharing with you all.
Hope this helps people filing multiple 140s like me....
A-Number Explained :

We have all heard or seen references to the “A Number.” Many USCIS forms ask for it, and many of our clients have asked us, “What exactly is the ‘A Number’?”

The “A Number” stands for Alien Registration Number. It is a number that starts with an “A” followed by eight-digits. Not all foreign nationals have an A Number. Most people get A Number when they apply for adjustment of status, seek employment authorization document (EAD), apply for a V visa or are subject to deportation proceedings.

There are four separate kinds of A Numbers:

Eight-digit A Numbers are manually assigned at local offices. If you have one of these numbers, simply treated it as if it was “0″ plus the number;
Nine-digit A Numbers that start with the digit 1 are used for employment authorization cards, usually related to students;
Nine-digit A Numbers that start with the digit 3 are used for fingerprint tracking of V visa applicants;
All other nine-digit A Numbers are permanent A Numbers and remain permanently with you for life.

Many USCIS forms ask for the A Number and we have advised our clients to enter “NONE” if they have not been issued one yet. However, if you have an A Number, it is important to enter it on any USCIS forms.

[neospeed]

How can you justify a person of Monaco (0.7 sq miles) origin getting a gc in six months where as folks from I/C getting in 5 to 6 years ?. It should be atleast based on country population size. We already have diversity lottery to accomidate the diversity factor. I dont think ROW will wait for 5 to 6 years for there GC, all the countries gc wait time will be reduced to 2 to 3 years when country limit is removed.

[stillanoptimist]

Spec, Q - thanks for your response.
Firstly - forget my first post (which is deleted anyway). Its a new day.
I have been a "Guest" here for almost 4 months, and well aware of Specs calculations, so on hindsight would not have preferred to start with that as the first post. But honestly I could not interpret Specs comments (even here) as anything other than saying that per-country limits are OK and that something else should be the solution. Hence the outburst.
Whether there will be one provision that is beneficial or multiple ones, only time and political appetite will tell. Beggers cannot be choosers. According to me, no single relief measure, even if implemented alone, can and should be ruled out. It will probably be a stepping stone to overall/large-scale relief.The way I look at it, per-country limits only rectifies a wrong and if a particular group(s) such as ROW that have benefited from the imbalance so far have to face an even playing field and wait along with the entire EB community, I think thats fair game. My colleagues here from Bangladesh agree with that and shake their head whenever they hear my GC story. The understand the perspective, having started in this company with me together 6 years ago and having come to the US, at the same time 9 years ago.
Frankly, I am with anyone who can push ANYTHING through. COngrats to our friends with PD in 2007, who see light at the end of the tunnel. But honestly for folks with 2008 PDs and beyond, its an excruciating wait without even being able to file for I485/EAD/AP.
I look forward to seeing your continued good work here..but only hope its on calculations dealing with smaller backlogs and wait times for everyone

[TeddyKoochu]

Friends following is a link from WAJ related to the congressional testimony about Green cards and per country limits. Iam posting for everyone’s benefit.
http://online.wsj.com/video/opinion-...683FC308C.html

[natvyas]

If companies are hiring like 1999,

the unemployment rate won't stay at 9% level, even more specific to our EB the h1b quota should have been already exhausted.

yes, IT sector hiring may be better than other sectors (i haven't read the article you suggested yet) but my statement was just on overall economy and I re-presented it, not derived

Beiber

stats suggest that unemployment rate for people with bachelors degree is around 4.6% and the same of people with High Schoool degree and lower is around 10.2%

This explains why the PERM filings continue to remain high

[bieber]

Beiber

stats suggest that unemployment rate for people with bachelors degree is around 4.6% and the same of people with High Schoool degree and lower is around 10.2%

This explains why the PERM filings continue to remain high

Natvyas,
Unemployment rate for people with bachelors degree was around 2% in 1999 and 2006-2008, so 4.6 or ~5% is highest since atleast 1992.

I'm no way trying to create a linear equation between unemployment rate and number of perms, but in general the overall unemployment camedown from 10% to 8.6% during 2009 to 2011 and now reversing and stayed at 9.2%, so my point is if this trend continues the perm will repeat the 2009

[rahil1]

Natvyas,
Unemployment rate for people with bachelors degree was around 2% in 1999 and 2006-2008, so 4.6 or ~5% is highest since atleast 1992.

I'm no way trying to create a linear equation between unemployment rate and number of perms, but in general the overall unemployment camedown from 10% to 8.6% during 2009 to 2011 and now reversing and stayed at 9.2%, so my point is if this trend continues the perm will repeat the 2009

I think we should not be too concerned about unemployment rate. It doesn;t mean much. The unemployment for people in IT is 3.5 which means.. no unemployment

[gcseeker]

I think there will be an strong correlation due to two things.

1.Tech has enjoyed an rebound(mid 2009) and effective unemployment rate of 4.5%-3.5% thanks to the false sense of security injected by the first round of stimulus.There will be no more stimulus (thanks to the debt deal that was cut ) ....so now things will go back to the true normal and we might see an uptick in that figure.Good examples of the above will be the recent layoffs at networking companies like Cisco and Juniper which are hit hard by cutting down spending in government equipment.

Moving forward I would expect PERM filings to come down to 2009 levels in 2012.Even though it is an election year...bama will not be able to salvage the economy.

2.People jumping to new jobs in 2009 and 2010 were asked by major companies to wait for an year before PERM could be filed.Even for recapture of PD PERM is required and it was common policy at most places since they had layoffs to wait for an year before PERM could be filed. This could account for the correlation factor with some delay thrown in.....

The economy is on a roller coaster ride and a double dip is not ruled out ..at best it might be stagflation combined with growth recession(high unemployment mixed with inflation and slow growth ) .The effects of the stimulus are wearing down and there will be a few jitters ,shakeouts and layoffs at firms. All these will contribute to delay in PERM filings.

I do not know what the Sep VB will bring and have no expectations too...but one thing am damn sure about is that the economy is not getting better. It is a false event horizon or as it has become popular to say...there is an black swan event lurking around the corner.

if you plot the perm numbers from my previous post and compare it with DOW, you will be amazed with the corelation (just an observation)

[ssvp22]

recent layoffs at networking companies like Cisco

Cisco layoffs are due to the crappy products they make that people dont want to buy.

[jackbrown_890]

Cisco layoffs are due to the crappy products they make that people dont want to buy.

I agree with you on Cisco layoffs but it seems like overall trend of crappy job recovery is at its bottom. Job market is correcting itself. If nothing goes wrong in next few months, the real job recovery should start soon in next few months. and there is possibility this Friday job report may not be good. I am hoping the weekly unemployment will stay close to 400,000 for next 3-4 weeks and thn come down 20-30000 below that number from September. If that happens EB2 ROW filing will go higher in 2012 and so less SOFAD for I/C.

[ssvp22]

I agree with you on Cisco layoffs but it seems like overall trend of crappy job recovery is at its bottom. Job market is correcting itself. If nothing goes wrong in next few months, the real job recovery should start soon in next few months. and there is possibility this Friday job report may not be good. I am hoping the weekly unemployment will stay close to 400,000 for next 3-4 weeks and thn come down 20-30000 below that number from September. If that happens EB2 ROW filing will go higher in 2012 and so less SOFAD for I/C.

Personally i dont have much hopes that the momentum will be sustained. All tech companies(Zynga, LinkedIn, Zillow, Yandex, Groupon and all) are trying to cash_in/cashed via IPO route as quickly as possible. They do that only when they are sure that exit door might be shut for next 2-3 years pretty soon. Besides that, the valuations of some of these coupon companies are out of the whack. I am not an investment expert, but past 2 recessions have taught me the tell tale signs.

[mesan123]

ssvp22 ....do you feel there is another recession ahead of us ...

Personally i dont have much hopes that the momentum will be sustained. All tech companies(Zynga, LinkedIn, Zillow, Yandex, Groupon and all) are trying to cash_in/cashed via IPO route as quickly as possible. They do that only when they are sure that exit door might be shut for next 2-3 years pretty soon. Besides that, the valuations of some of these coupon companies are out of the whack. I am not an investment expert, but past 2 recessions have taught me the tell tale signs.