To understand the future of the immigration debate, one must first understand the H-1B visa program. Though not very well known among ordinary Americans, the program, first established in 1990, has grown enormously, and at least some lawmakers are hoping to expand it further still.
What exactly is the H-1B visa program? Essentially, it is a guest-worker program for the college-educated set. H-1B-visa holders are foreign nationals who agree to come to the United States to work for three years and to return to their native countries when this period draws to a close, unless they renew their H-1B visas for one (and only one) additional three-year period. There are other types of visas for other categories of guest workers, from agricultural workers to workers “of extraordinary ability or achievement,” a category that famously smoothes the way for film starlets and other glamorous people to settle in Williamsburg and West L.A. Yet it is the H-1B, for workers in “specialized occupations,” that attracts the most attention, since this is the visa program that Silicon Valley and Wall Street see as absolutely essential to their financial health.
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