Businesses Air Concerns About Immigration Bill
As the Senate continues to debate an immigration reform package, business interests are ramping up efforts to influence the legislation, especially with regard to high-tech visas, a guest-worker program, and employee verification.
High-tech visas: Currently 65,000 workers are allowed annually to enter the United States on a temporary basis on H-1B visas, designated for skilled workers in specialty occupations. Technology companies have encouraged Congress to permit more of these high-tech workers to enter the country, and the current Senate bill includes a provision to increase H-1B visas to 115,000. However, other provisions outline a complex point system for a skilled worker to gain citizenship, a hurdle the technology companies are not gung-ho about.
Guest-worker visas: The proposed number of new visas for workers under the guest-worker program also poses difficulties. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which represents more than 3 million businesses and organizations, asked the Senate on May 22 not to gut the number of new visas, advocating a program with 400,000 new temporary visas for immigrants to come into the country to work for employers who cannot find American citizens to fill the jobs. But the next day, the Senate voted to slash the size of the proposed program from as many as 600,000 workers to 200,000.
Worker verification: Conservatives favor a proposed mandate on employers to check their employees' Social Security numbers via a database to ensure they are legally working. The chamber is generally in favor of employee verification though doesn't want a program that would unduly burden employers. The HR Initiative for a Legal Workforce, which represents human resource professionals, actively advocates such a system encouraging employers to "pick the legal worker."
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