US companies seek increase on H1B visa cap

A very interesting article from the Arizona Republic details the efforts of various American companies to lobby Congress to raise the cap on H1B visas, which are temporary employment visas for foreign born workers. Statistics show more than 50% of PhDs and Masters degree graduates from American universities are foreign born in fields that are very needed such as engineering, math, etc. H1B visa holders currently represent 0.06% of the American labor force. I remember the days when H1B cap was not an issue as the number of visas issued hardly reached the numbers allowed by Congress each year. After a drastic reduction of more than 50% of the available visa numbers a few years ago, the H1B process became a race with uncertain results, as I spoke about in an earlier blog. The Arizona Republic article can be found here.