Compete America endorsed the Senate Judiciary Committee's approval

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PrinceofJungle

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the link:
http://www.competeamerica.org/news/alliance_pr/20051020_visashort.html

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Washington, D.C. - Compete America endorsed the Senate Judiciary Committee's approval today of a budget reconciliation measure that would provide interim relief from the current crisis-level shortage of H-1B and employment-based visas (green cards).

Compete America believes the package will give American employers temporary, but critical access to the talent needed for continued innovation, job creation and economic expansion in the worldwide economy, even thought the proposal was amended to halve the number of "recaptured" H-1B visas allowed per year. In addition, the measure would more than meet the full Judiciary Committee budget reconciliation obligation of $300 million over five years through increased license and applications fees.

"The relief provided by the Senate bill is a stop-gap measure necessary to ensure that the United States has the ability to attract and retain critical talent." said Sandra Boyd, Vice President, National Association of Manufacturers and Compete America Chair. "We are grateful to Chairman Specter and Ranking Member Leahy for their leadership in moving the Senate in the right direction on this issue. We look forward to working with the House towards adoption of a similar measure."

Among the specifics of the measure approved today, the following are critical to easing visa shortage, while raising significant Federal revenue:



o The measure would "recapture" employment-based (green card) immigrant visa numbers that were available by statute but unused in previous years due to processing backlogs, and make them available again at a rate of up to 90,000 per year;

o The measure would provide that only employment-based immigrants, and not their spouses and children, would count toward the annual limit on employment-based immigration; and

o It would "recapture" H-1B visa numbers that were available by statute but unused in previous years, and make them available again at a rate of up to 30,000 per year.
"At no time in our nation's history has the door been as closed to talent as it is today," said Lynn Shotwell, Executive Director of the American Council on International Personnel. "The H-1B visa quota for fiscal year 2006 was exhausted well before the new fiscal year even began, and there are years-long backlogs for green cards."

To illustrate the growing problem, Shotwell pointed to the fact that from 2001 to 2004, 141,365 employment-based third (EB-3) preference category visas were left unused - despite significant demand - due to processing delays at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
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Good Luck
 
Very good news..

Will EB2 India cutoff date become current? Is my wish or dream too much :) :) :) ?
 
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i guess 90000 will be split between EB1, EB2 and EB3. Then applies 7% country quota. If my math is correct that will leave 2100 for EB3 India which will be again split in 4 processing centers. By this way PD can come upto 2001. still long wait for other PDs. Am I going crazy here? :confused:

No I must have missed something. :confused:
 
I am sure This will have positive impact on VISA numbers!
I am positivcely ambitious!
EB1 & EB2 surely can relax little bit more than Eb3.
 
Well, let me calculate this:

90,000 visa numbers with EB1 & EB2 & EB3 all have 28.6%, which is 25,740. Per country limit of 7%, which is 1,802.

This tells me that there are at most 1,802 for EB1 or EB2 or EB3.

fiveice
 
Good News, but still some steps to go !

This is good news, but there is still some way to go.

This has to be approved by the house judiciary committee, the house of reps and then back to the senate floor and then to be signed by the pres.
We need to keep up the pressure.

Pls continue to write, fax and call the congressmen and senators.
The link for judiciary committee for the house of reps is :
http://judiciary.house.gov/
 
If other countries won't use up their visa numbers, China and India still can NOT use theirs due to the per country quota of 7%. 1,802 is the maximum a country can get according to my calculation.

fiveice
 
What about AC-21? Bottomline, if you are not a guru, then do not pretend to be one. Everyone is stressed these days, and negative opinion that is not true is the last thing we need here. Just my 2 cents.

fiveice said:
If other countries won't use up their visa numbers, China and India still can NOT use theirs due to the per country quota of 7%. 1,802 is the maximum a country can get according to my calculation.

fiveice
Click to expand...
 
Throw your two cents into the ring

Does the country quote apply to 90,000?

1)If India and China use 14%, would the other 86% be used to get non-(India , China) members (Eb1, EB2, EB3) current.

2)After that, if there are any numbers left, Would the people from India and China get them? :mad:

This makes no sense. If this is the case, there is only on +ve news out of all this is eliminating dependents from the number game. Atleast, the dates will move twice as fast...by two days instead of one :eek:
 
Guys my Understanding is:
Last time when unused visa numbers were captured sometime in 2001 they were all used up irrespective of the country of origin.

So this time too I am optimistic that recaputred visas will not have any country quota ??? and also guys the wording of the proposed bill says max of 90k will be capured every year ... but it does not mention how many years back they will to go to recapture ? They are talking abt recapturing H1B visas from 1990 onwards... so lets see
 
Hey Hope,

If they do not apply country quota then atleast we have some hope. I guess we would have to ask someone on this. My attorney said he is not aware fo this atleast.
 
In my opinion, the recapture of 90000 visas + "Not counting Spouse and Children of employment based peititioners" would substantially increase the visa pool of numbers. This would certainly make all the EB visa categories current. Also don't forget that Schedule A EB3 already has another 50K visas recaptured, which means among the spread of recaptured visas between EB1, EB2 and EB3 categories - EB3 stands to gain most (30K+50k recaptured for Schedule A + Spouses/Children not counted). Also, 7% per country limitation are in force only when all the countries have used their immigrant visas.

Lest not forget that the last time when INS recaptured just 130K in 2001, the EB categories became current. This time the numbers are substantially more when you factor in 90 K + not counting spouses and children.

http://travel.state.gov/pdf/FY2001 app D.pdf

The downside - It looks like we would have to shelve out another $500 per person to be a beneficiary of the recaptured visa number. Uncle Sam just figured how to plug their budget deficit by pinning it on immigrants back.
 
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Hey - I think most of us would GLADLY pay $500 if it would ease the situation.

Heck - its much much less than what I would have to pay on EAD and AP renewals for eternity if the numbers stayed at the 1998 range !!!
 
Good points!

Catch, you made great points here! I am rather optimistic on its effect on retrogression.

It does make BIG difference that dependents are not counted towards the EB visa numbers. About 52% of visa numbers goes to dependents, that means, 90K visas will be equivalent to 180K+ visas in the "old" accounting system!

Also I have an impression, don't quote me on that though, there was a change of rules on visa number allocation a few years ago, that allows:
1. unused visa numbers from other countries go to China and Indian applicants;
2. unused EB1 numbers go to Eb2, and unused EB2 numbers go to EB3.

Someone with better memory / knowledge please confirm this...

Cheers,
:) :)

catch_22_4_GC said:
In my opinion, the recapture of 90000 visas + "Not counting Spouse and Children of employment based peititioners" would substantially increase the visa pool of numbers. This would certainly make all the EB visa categories current. Also don't forget that Schedule A EB3 already has another 50K visas recaptured, which means among the spread of recaptured visas between EB1, EB2 and EB3 categories - EB3 stands to gain most (30K+50k recaptured for Schedule A + Spouses/Children not counted). Also, 7% per country limitation are in force only when all the countries have used their immigrant visas.

Lest not forget that the last time when INS recaptured just 130K in 2001, the EB categories became current. This time the numbers are substantially more when you factor in 90 K + not counting spouses and children.

http://travel.state.gov/pdf/FY2001 app D.pdf

The downside - It looks like we would have to shelve out another $500 per person to be a beneficiary of the recaptured visa number. Uncle Sam just figured how to plug their budget deficit by pinning it on immigrants back.
Click to expand...
 
Limitation on Per Country Ceiling

Section 104(a) of the AC-21 Act provides that if, on a quarterly basis, the number of visas available in all the employment-based preferences exceeds the number of immigrants qualified to receive the visas, then the overflow of visas may be allocated without regard to per-country ceilings. Persons born in visa backlogged countries like India and mainland China will have access to any unused employment-based visas even if the per-country quota has been reached.

I hope this will help -- but next quarter means Jan -Mar 2006 is the period India - china eb3 should look for...

For the world wide hmm might be a happy crusing soon.
 
Visa Bulliton was amended with this.

HOW IS THE EMPLOYMENT-BASED PER-COUNTRY LIMIT CALCULATED?

Section 201 of the INA sets an annual minimum Family-sponsored preference limit of 226,000, while the worldwide annual level for Employment-based preference immigrants is at least 140,000. Section 202 sets the per-country limit for preference immigrants at 7% of the total annual Family-sponsored and Employment-based preference limits, i.e. a minimum of 25,620.

The annual per-country limitation of 7% is a cap, meaning visa issuances to any single country may not exceed this figure. This limitation is not a quota to which any particular country is entitled, however. The per-country limitation serves to avoid monopolization of virtually all the visa numbers by applicants from only a few countries.
The AC21 removed the per-country limit in any calendar quarter in which overall applicant demand for Employment-based visa numbers is less than the total of such numbers available.
In recent years, the application of the rules outlined in AC21 has allowed countries such as China – mainland born, India, and the Philippines to utilize large amounts of employment numbers which would have otherwise gone unused.
During FY-2006, due to anticipated heavy demand, the AC21 provisions are not expected to apply, and the amount of Employment numbers available to any single country will be subject to the 7% cap. It is anticipated that the addition of unused FY-2005 Family numbers and the remaining AC21 numbers to the 140,000 annual minimum will result in an FY-2006 annual Employment limit of 152,000. This will mean an Employment per-country limit for FY-2006 of approximately 10,650.
To illustrate the effect of the reduced per-county limitation during FY-2006 on the oversubscribed countries, it should be noted that during FY-2005 India used approximately 47,175 Employment numbers.

Therefore untill senate judiciary committee's proposal comes into the law, the country quota will continue. If they recapture 90000 visa numbers the country quota will not be applied to this number only. However, the country quota will be enforced on current year quota of 140,000.
 
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