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A Suggestion to Digitize Visa System in U.S.
January 17, 2011 US – According to a new policy brief issued by the Brookings Institution, the United State’s of immigration policy should make revisions to give priority to people with education backgrounds in innovative technologies.
Under Darrel West write up released in Jan 12, the change should require digitization of the visa system and strategic changes in visa policies affecting skilled workers, including automatic green cards for foreign students who graduate from math and science university programs. (Darrel West is the director of the institute’s Center for Technology Innovation)
He said that a digital system could reduce errors and delays. Of course, the infrastructure for considering and granting visas currently requires paper documents. The United States could follow the example of Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia with regards of paper states. These countries put less emphasis on family reunification and more on attracting highly skilled workers. There are 36% of the immigration visas granted in Canada which are mostly in the skilled worker category compared with 6.5% in that category in the United States.
The paper also advocated the demand for visas for foreign students who complete math and science degree programs in the United States. It emphasizes that US should make it as easy as possible for those highly trained students to stay since the expansion of job opportunities in India, China and other growth-oriented countries now offers them attractive opportunities. West wrote that the counterproductive policy simply puts the United States in the position of training global competitors.
West suggested increasing the availability of EB-5 visas to foreigners who invest at least $500,000 in the nation’s rural or targeted employment areas or at least $1 million in other areas and increasing the availability of the O-1 visa program for people with extraordinary abilities in the arts, sciences, education, business or athletics.
Depending on economic conditions, immigration levels could be adjusted up or down as having congress link overall annual levels of immigration to the unemployment rate and growth in the gross domestic product.
source:
fcw.com
