Recently, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) drafted a proposal to develop a mandatory online registration system for H-1B petitions. The new registration process will allow U.S. employers to supply basic application information to the USCIS online instead of submitting a full-blown H-1B petition, prior to the randomized H-1B visa lottery, which is implemented when the number of petitions exceeds the limit set by the USCIS (in a matter of weeks or even days).

In the event a visa lottery is executed during a good hiring year, a full-blown H-1B petition will not need to be initially submitted, which will eliminate the need for U.S. employers to unnecessarily prepare and file tedious H-1B petitions without any guarantee that an H-1B cap number will be assigned to that particular petition. Along with helping the USCIS manage H-1B petitions more efficiently and effectively. For...

January 2011 brings a tale of two Visa Bulletins: the employment-based Visa Bulletin shows modest gains in almost every category, while the family-based Visa Bulletin shows severe retrogression (i.e., the backward movement of priority dates) in almost every category. Forward movement was seen in nearly every category of the January 2011 employment-based Visa Bulletin.  The EB third preference category perhaps benefited the most, with priority dates advancing for all foreign nationals.  Mexico saw the biggest leap forward, with a jump of 9½ months to 04/15/2003 in both the EB-3 and Other Workers category.  All other countries besides India, China, and Mexico moved ahead by 1 month, to 03/22/2005.  India moved to 02/01/2002 in both the EB-3 and Other Workers categories, a progression of 9 days, and China moved ahead by 1 week to 12/15/2003. The only other employment-based category to move forward is the EB second...

Earlier this month, the Swiss Federal Council released the 2011 quota for work permits. The 2011 quota for work permits is set at 12,000, which eclipses the quota of the last three years by 1,000. In addition to the increased quota for 2011, the Swiss Federal Council has decided to allocate permits between foreign workers from member countries of the European Union (EU) or the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) and foreign workers not from the EU/EFTA. The quota of 12,000 will be divided between short term L-Permits and long term B-Permits. Next, the “L” or “B” permits are further allocated to EU/EFTA or non EU/EFTA foreign nationals (as seen below). The quota will be effective starting January 1, 2011.

• 8,000 L-Permits
• 4,000 B-Permits

...

Last week, the U.S. Census Bureau released its data on the 2010 Census. According to the data, as of April 1, 2010, the total U.S. resident population reached 308,745,538, which indicates that the total resident population has grown by 9.7% over the past decade. Most noteworthy though, is that three-quarters of the 9.7% growth rate was due to immigration. Since 2000, 13.1 million new immigrants (legal and illegal) have arrived in the U.S.  Additionally, immigrant women gave birth to approximately 8.2 million babies. Despite the findings, it's also essential to report how the recession has altered the immigrant population throughout the U.S.

Prior to the recession, cities such as Tampa, Phoenix, and Riverside-San Bernardino experienced a strong growth in immigration. Currently, these cities are losing immigrants, with Phoenix suffering the greatest loss of 64,000, equating to roughly 9% of Phoenix’s foreign-born population. At the same time, Houston experienced the greatest increase in its immigrant population with 74,000. Miami came in second with 54,000, followed by Dallas with 50,000 new immigrants. Lastly Jackson, Mississippi and Birmingham, Alabama experienced the largest percent increase in their foreign-born populations with 50% and 25%, respectively.

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As of December 23rd, the UK Border Agency (UKBA) will no longer accept Tier 1 (General) applications due to the cap on this category being met.  More significantly, the Tier 1 (General) category will be permanently eliminated. The UKBA also recently announced that the Tier 2 (General) category will have a limit of 10,832 certificates of sponsorship until 5 April 2011. The new modifications to Tier 1 & 2 do not affect the permanent cap, which goes into effect in April of 2011.

 

The recent changes all stemmed from a hearing on Friday December 17th, which nullified the temporary cap in place because the High Court ruled it as “unlawful”. The High Court came to this conclusion because Home Secretary Theresa May did not allow the temporary cap to receive parliamentary examination. In other words, Home Secretary May bypassed Parliament and implemented the interim cap. In response to the ruling, Immigration Minister Damian...

This past weekend, the Senate failed to pass the DREAM Act with a 55-41 vote. The DREAM Act fell 5 votes short of the required 60 to end debate on the matter and vote for or against its passage into law. Heavy Republican opposition and Democratic support was expected after the House passed its version of the bill roughly two weeks ago. Hence, only three Republicans voted in favor of the measure during the Senate’s hearing of the bill, while five Democrats surprisingly voted against the legislation. President Obama said, “Common sense did not prevail” and deemed the vote “incredibly disappointing.” On the other hand, critics viewed the bill as a backdoor grant of amnesty that promotes illegal immigration to this country. Senator Jeff Sessions expressed that, "The bill at its core is a reward for illegal activities.” Regardless, the Obama Administration urged that it will continue to fight for immigration reform....

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) released H-1B cap numbers as of 12/17, receiving 53,900 toward the 65,000 cap-subject H-1B petitions and 19,700 towards the 20,000 H-1B Master's category.

Thus, H-1B cap numbers remain available, and there is still time to submit your FY2011 H-1B visa application for foreign national applicants beginning employment on October 1, 2010 or later.

Contact your immigration services provider to see if this is an option for you/your foreign national.

Photo attribution: http://www.flickr.com/photos/8042373@N03/

Even with its stable economy, Australia’s net immigration has been declining abruptly. In October 2010, 9,370 immigrants arrived in Australia, the lowest amount since March of 2004. At the same time, October is not the only month with low immigration numbers; Australia has seen declining net immigration over the span of the entire year.  The latest figures show the difference between the number of permanent and long-term arrivals versus permanent and long-term departures (net immigration), which was 210,400 as of October 2010.  During the same time period last year, net immigration was 324,700. In other words, net immigration has declined by approximately 35%.

Australia’s low immigration numbers could negatively impact its economy. Commonwealth Securities economist, Craig James explains, “Job markets...

Home Secretary Theresa May recently announced a number of modifications to UK’s permanent cap, designed to place a limit on non-EU economic migration, which goes into effect in April 2011. Important changes to the cap will include the elimination of the Tier 1 (General) category, the addition of an exceptional talent category, and the restructuring of the entrepreneur, investor and intra company transfer categories, which will not see cap limit enforcement. Until the permanent cap takes full effect in April of 2011, applicants can still submit visa applications under the previous tier system. However, for the month of December, the Tier 1 (General) category limit has already been met.

Below is a summary of the changes made to the cap:

Tier 1  (General) option will be eliminated.  After April 2011 anyone hired for a position from outside the European Union will therefore need to qualify for a Tier 2 General...

Big waves were made last night in the lame duck session (the time between Election Day and before January 3 of the following year, when the new session of Congress is sworn in), as the DREAM Act passed in the House of Representatives for the first time in its 10-year legislative history. The act was passed with a 216-198 vote. The excitement was expected to weaken when the vote moved to the Senate; however, a motion to table the vote was made by Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) – arguably the DREAM’s biggest supporter, due to a declaration by Republicans to block every bill until tax cuts and government funding have been determined.  By tabling the vote until next week, supporters of the DREAM Act have paved the way to gain the Republicans undivided attention by allowing them time to resolve their current discrepancies.

Preceding the House vote, politicians heard moving speeches from many supporters of the DREAM Act, including Steny Hoyer (D-MD), whose...