What Are H-1B Visas And New Wage-Based Rules?

The US Government has once again made amendments H-1B visa norms. The old lottery system of work visa selection will not be followed now.

What was the lottery system for the selection of H-1B and other work visas?

Currently, every year the US administration issues 85K H-1B work permits. Of these, 65k is for people with specialty occupations, while the rest are reserved for foreign workers who have earned a Master’s or a higher university degree in the US.

Each employer who wants to employ an H-1B worker must fill out a registration form on behalf of the employee who they wish to employ. Since the no. of applications for H-1B visas filed each year exceeded the 65,000 cap in the specialty occupations and 20,000 for the higher education category, the USCIS then employed a random lottery selection of the eligible applicants to fill the 65 thousand vacancies and then moved on the fill the next 20,000. This lottery system was completely randomized and did not take into account any requirements such as skills, wages, or needs of the employer.

What is the new wage-based H-1B work visa regime?

The new wage-based work visa will now give priority in the selection of visas to applications of those employers where the “proffered wage equals or exceeds” the prevailing level in that area of employment.

What is the proffered wage?

The proffered wage is the wage that the employer intends to pay the beneficiary. This will be done for both the 65,000 regular visas and the 20,000 advanced degree exemption visas. Also taking into account the skill set that the respective worker brings to the country and verify whether such a skill set is available at the same cost among the US workers.

As per USCIS, it is difficult to individually judge the skill set of all the applicants to the H-1B work visa, so, salaries are the best to judge as employers would only pay high to the most deserving candidates.