Bill Gates renews calls for limitless H-1Bs

It looks like there is lots of immigration news today.  At a hearing before the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, Bill Gates urged a three-pronged strategy to secure the United States’ technological future: better equipping US students and teachers in the areas of math and science, increasing research spending, and overhauling the H-1B program.

The H-1B program provides temporary visas for immigrants with specialized knowledge.  Companies in the high tech industry have relied on the program, which is capped at 65,000 visas per year.  Gates said there’s a “terrible shortfall” in the number of visasavailable to high-tech companies.  He said the US will”find it infinitely more difficult to maintain its technologicalleadership if it shuts out the very people who are most able to help uscompete.”

Asked what the cap should be, Gates said he didn’t think there should be one.   The members of the Committee did not seem to think that was a realistic possibility, although some seemed receptive to expanding the program.  Such an expansion is certainly not universally supported, with advocacy groups like the Programmers Guild claiming that not enough is done to recruit and hire US workers.  More on Gates’ testimony and the subject of H-1Bs is here.

-jmc