The US Chamber of Commerce -- 'the world's largest business federation, representing more than 3 million businesses and organisations of every size, sector and region' -- has fired off a missive to all lawmakers in the US House and Senate calling for expeditious reform of employment-based Green Card and H-1B visa programmes.
In a letter to the legislators, R Bruce Josten, the Chamber's vice president for governmental affairs, argued that the lack of reform in both of these programmes was clearly the prime reason American companies have to resort to the much maligned outsourcing phenomenon.
Josten, while noting that the chamber represents numerous companies and organisations that need to bring thousands of foreign workers and students into the United States each year, said, "The inability of these companies to bring highly educated workers and students into the United States severely hurts their competitiveness in the global market and often leads to companies moving operations overseas."
Thus, he wrote, 'It is imperative that any comprehensive immigration reform includes changes that would allow employers in the United States to recruit and retain highly educated foreign talent and guarantee our continued global economic competitiveness and success.'
The US-India Business Council, that counts among its members over 100 Fortune 500 companies doing business in India and outsourcing work in that country, as well as the Coalition for Partnership with India, that was among the lobbying forces that pushed through the enabling legislation to facilitate the US-India civilian nuclear agreement, are both appendages of the Chamber and are housed in its H St, Northwest headquarters in Washington, DC.
Josten recalled that the announcement last week by the US Citizenship and Immigration Services stating that the H-1B visa cap for the fiscal year 2008 was reached on the first day applications were accepted, 'marks the dire need for changes in the system.'
'This is also the fourth consecutive year the H-1B cap (of 65,000 visas) was met before the fiscal year event starts,' he wrote,' and noted that the USCIS will now conduct a 'computer-generated random selection process to determine which of these needed workers will be excluded.'
Josten complained in his missive that 'other areas of US immigration system for highly-skilled immigrants face similar daunting barriers' from years of waiting for a Green Card to the inability of hiring a student from a United States university as a permanent worker right after graduation.'
He argued that 'the current system is counterproductive to the country's economic, security and social goals,' and made the case that 'retaining the best and the brightest foreign workers help make the US economy strong.'
Josten said that it were 'these artificial barriers are forcing some companies to conduct business elsewhere, wherever they can hire the necessary talent.'
