US senators push for high-skill immigration reform
Country turning away tech experts, politicans warn
By Grant Gross | IDG News Service | Published 11:19, 27 July 11
Facebook0Twitter0LinkedIn0Google Plus0Share ThisNew

IBM planning jobs 'bloodbath' as 110,000 employees to go, claims respected journalist
Big Blue to surpass historic 1993 cuts, says IBM critic >>
After Oracle spat licensing campaigners plan attack on IBM and SAP
Customers can log their experiences through Campaign for Clear Licensing online surveys >>
TTIP Update XLIX
New leaks show how transatlantic regulatory bodies will undermine EU and national sovereignty >>
Microsoft Windows 10 launch: Will it be relevant in today’s enterprise environment?
IT managers share their expectations for the new operating system from Microsoft >>
Coding in British schools: A review of the first term
It's been a learning curve for teachers as well as children >>
A group of US senators has pledged to open up the country's borders to more high-skill immigrants, with lawmakers arguing that the US is turning away some of the world's smartest people.

Senators Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, and John Cornyn, a Texas Republican, both called for immigration reform that would allow more high-skill workers into theUS

The Senate Judiciary Committee's immigration subcommittee is working on legislation that would open up the country's H-1B visa system and would give green-card work permits to foreign students who graduate fromUS colleges with science, math and technology degrees, Schumer said during a hearing.

Schumer didn't reveal details of the immigration legislation he's working on, but it follows similar efforts in the House of Representatives. Schumer said he hopes to push forward a comprehensive immigration reform bill, dealing with other immigration issues as well as high-skill jobs, even though other recent attempts to pass a wide-ranging bill have failed.

It doesn't make sense for the US to make foreign graduates return to their home countries, then apply to come back to theUS under the H-1B visa program, Schumer said. "If we do not enact an immigration policy that continues to attract the world's best minds, we will cease to be the world's economic leader," he added. "Unfortunately, our broken immigration system discourages the world's best and brightest minds from coming to America to create jobs."

Some other countries are now offering top scientists and engineers huge bonuses to move there, Schumer added.

Representatives of Microsoft and the Nasdaq OMX Group testified in support of loosened immigration rules. Fourteen companies listed on the Nasdaq exchange, employing nearly 500,000 people, have foreign-born founders, said Robert Greifeld, CEO at Nasdaq.

Top tech companies continue to have trouble finding qualified US workers, said Greifeld and Brad Smith, general counsel at Microsoft. The job board StartUpHire.com currently has 13,000 job openings, and Apple, eBay, Google and Yahoo all have more than 550 job openings in the San Jose area, Greifeld said.

Without a new immigration policy,US tech companies will move more jobs overseas, Smith said. "The world economy has changed," he said. "It used to be that people would move in search of the right job, but increasingly, jobs move in search of the right people."