The Waiting Game Part II: Immigrating Through An Employer, Other Ways to Immigrate

The Immigration Act of 1990 limits the total annual number of immigrant visas distributed each year to between 416,000 and 675,000. See, Randal Monger and James Yankah, “Annual flow report,” April 2012, DHS Office of Immigration Statistics. 

The limit of 675,000 visas does not include spouses and minor, unmarried children of the visa-holder who immigrate with the visa holder. Additionally, people who immigrate as refugees and asylees are not counted in the 675,000 visas.

So while approximately 675,000 immigrant visas are distributed each year, the number of annual actual immigrants was just over one million in 2011. The only ways people can legally immigrate to the United States are listed in the chart in this blog post and in the last blog post, The Waiting Game Part I.  

There are very few ways to immigrate to the United States legally unless you have a close family member who is a U.S. citizen or a lawful permanent resident, or unless you possess job skills needed in the United States.  

To give these numbers and the numbers published last week some context, the United States is currently accepting the same number of immigrants to the United States as we did in the early part of the last century. 

After 1914, immigration went down to between 300,000 and 800,000 immigrants per year until the 1930s. During the Great Depression and World War II, immigration to the United States was historically very low between 30,000 and 90,000 people per year. 

From 1945 until 1988, immigration to the United States was between 100,000 and 600,000 people per year. From 1989 to the present, immigration to the United States has remained steady at around 1 million per year. There was a spike in 1990 and 1991 of approximately 1.5 and 1.8 million per year, respectively. This spike is likely accounted for by the amnesty program enacted by Congress in 1986 under President Reagan. 

According to the U.S. Department of State there were 4,624,399 approved immigrant visas pending in 2012. In other words, more than 4.6 million people are waiting in line to immigrate to the United States. They are the lucky ones; most people don’t even have a way to immigrate. See also, Jeb Bush and Clint Bolick, “Solving the immigration puzzle” The Wall Street Journal, Jan. 24, 2013.

In the some of the comments over the past week, I noticed a concern about immigration fraud. While it would be naive to claim that there is no fraud in immigration, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of State are very good and detecting and reducing fraud. 

Many people who immigrate through a family member must submit DNA evidence to prove the familial relationship. Additionally, when people immigrate through a spouse, DHS conducts very thorough fraud interviews where they suspect fraud.  Having sat through several of these interviews, I realize that it is easy to pass the interview if you are truly married to your spouse, but almost impossible to pass if you are not in a true relationship. If you are not living with your spouse, how do you know who wakes up first in the morning and how your spouse wakes up? I will discuss these issues in greater depth in up-coming posts.

Similarly, I noticed that some people could not understand how peoples’ cousins immigrated to the United States. There are a few possible scenarios which would account for this immigration. First, the cousins’ parents could be a sibling of a U.S. citizen and they could immigrate to the United States and bring their spouse and minor, unmarried children. However, siblings from most countries have to wait for 12 years to immigrate, while siblings from Mexico have to wait 17 years, and siblings from the Philippines have to wait approximately 25 years to immigrate. Another way would be if the cousins’ parents were immigrating either through an employer or through the diversity lottery.

Today’s post focuses on employment-based immigration and miscellaneous forms of immigration including diversity lottery immigrants and refugees and asylees.  Refugees and asylees are people who flee their home-country because of persecution usually due to political beliefs, religious beliefs, or because the person is a member of a persecuted social group. 

An example of a refugee or asylee would be a women’s rights activist from Afghanistan who survived several murder attempts by the Taliban or a Christian in Pakistan whose family founded and ran a Christian school and the family was subsequently persecuted by local government officials and by Pakistani mobs.  The difference between a refugee and an asylee is that a refugee applies for relief outside the United States and an asylee applies for relief inside the United States. 

Diversity lottery immigrants are people who apply for and are granted immigrant visas through the diversity lottery, the purpose of which is to increase immigration from countries with historically low levels of immigration to the United States.  Citizens of many countries such as Mexico, Canada, China, and India are precluded from participating in the lottery. In fact, in 2013, only three immigrant visas are set aside for all of North America – more specifically the Bahamas. 

There are roughly 250 applicants for each diversity lottery visa.

Below is a chart listing all of the people who can immigrate through an employer or who can immigrate as an entrepreneur. For most of these categories (except for the priority workers—the first category on the chart) an employer must apply on behalf of the immigrant. The employer must show that there are no U.S. workers who are willing or able to take the job; that the employer is paying the higher of either the prevailing wage in the industry or at the company; and that the employer has not trained the worker for this position. It is a very complex process and more than half of all immigration lawyers specialize in employment-based immigration. In the spirit of full disclosure, I do not practice employment-based immigration law.

Immigrating through an employer or as an entrepreneur

 Who Can Immigrate

How Many People Immigrated in this Category in 2011

How Long is the Wait for this Category

Immigrants known as “Priority Workers” (generally those with PhDs or who have won significant awards like a Nobel Prize or an Olympic Medal) their spouse and minor children

25,251

There is currently no wait for this category

Professionals with advanced degrees or “exceptional” immigrants and their spouses and minor children

66,831

Immigrants from India must wait about 8.5 years; immigrants from China must wait about five years; there is no wait for immigrants from any other country

Skilled workers, professionals, and unskilled workers, their spouses and minor children. To qualify the employer must show that there are no U.S. workers able to do this work; that the employer is paying the prevailing wage in the industry; and that the employer did not train the worker for this position

37,216

Immigrants from India must wait about 10.5 years; immigrants from the Philippines must wait about seven years; immigrants from China must wait about 6.5 years; and immigrants from other countries must wait about six years

Religious workers, their spouses and minor children

6,701

There is currently no wait for this category

Entrepreneurs and their spouses and minor children. To qualify the entrepreneurs must invest between $500,000 and $1 million (depending on where they locate the business); hire at least 10 U.S. workers; and make sure that the money is at risk. An investor cannot get this visa by buying $500,000 or even $1 million worth of Apple® shares

50,103

There is currently no wait for this category

Miscellaneous Ways to Immigrate

Who Can Immigrate

How Many People Immigrated In This Category In 2011

How Long Is The Wait For This Category

Immigrant Diversity Lottery.  Only citizens from certain countries qualify.  For example the 2013 lottery is limited to 3 immigrants from North America (the Bahamas) and their spouses and minor children, and 775 immigrants from South America and the Caribbean.  Most people who are eligible for the lottery are from Africa (22,000) and Europe (13,400) 

50,103

There is no wait

Refugees and Asylees and their spouses and minor children

168,460

There is no wait

Undocumented immigrants who are granted relief in removal proceedings.  These people must show that they are of good moral character, that they have been living in the United States for ten years before being placed in removal proceedings, and that it would cause their U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident parent, spouse, or child(ren) "exceptional and extremely unusual hardship" if they were deported.  It is very difficult to get this form of relief.

7,430

There is no wait

Given these long waits, especially for highly skilled employees, it makes sense that Mitt Romney, when running for President told the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials:  “As president, I'd reallocate green cards to those seeking to keep their families under one roof. And we will exempt from caps the spouses and minor children of legal permanent residents. And we will eliminate other forms of bureaucratic red tape that keep families from being together." He added: "And if you get an advanced degree here, we want you to stay here. So I'd staple a green card to the diploma of someone who gets an advanced degree in America."  http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/06/22/romney-immigration-promises-hard-to-deliver/#ixzz2GZK5acKe.  Senator Marco Rubio (R. Fl.) has put forward his plan for immigration reform, a bipartisan group of Senators have put forward their plans and Obama is expected to set forward his plan later this week. In the coming weeks, after examining the border and border security, I will analyze each one of these proposals.  Enacting immigration reform would help the waiting game and probably help the U.S. economy at the same time.

Next week:  Securing The Border – Hint:  It’s Already Secured