
H1B Visa Lottery for FY 2014 - suyash
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f35e66f614176543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=5051f359827dd310VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=e7801c2c9be44210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD
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enraged_camel
I don't know where I read it, but I think it's true: every generation of
Americans has tried to close the door to immigrants that try to come after
them. This is simply the latest example.

Except it is not simply that. I think this is far more important. In an age
where competition for talent has become global, any country that wants to get
ahead (or remain ahead) needs to do everything it can to both train _and_
attract said talent. And since American universities are not turning up enough
people with technology degrees, America has to turn to foreigners to fill in
the gaps in the tech sector.

Does this depress wages and screw over some Americans? You bet. Welcome to
globalism. Your citizenship no longer matters to the labor market. Soon, your
physical location won't matter either. Hopefully you have some other means of
setting yourself apart from the (now) global pool of candidates.

~~~
fakeer
>> _..every generation of Americans has tried to close the door to immigrants
that try to come after them_

And the first generation(and next few) butchered the native habitants or
sidelined them to the _reserves_. Is this the entire story?

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neubyr
My H1B application is in lottery despite already having an H1B visa. Here's
why -

There are two types of H1Bs -

    
    
      * cap exempt: For non-profits, public/state universities , public university hospitals and national labs.
      * cap subject: For profit making companies.
    

According to visa rules, an applicant is subject to cap-based system if he/she
hasn't been counted in the cap in last six years. You need to find an employer
who will apply for your H1B in April and then wait for you until October. Not
many employers will hire such candidate. So it's extremely difficult to
transfer job from cap-exempt H1B employer to cap-subject H1B employer unless
you have been counted in the cap-based H1B system before.

Moral: Don't take your first H1B job with a non-profit (Khan Academy??),
national lab or public university.

You would think you may get some benefits by working for a research or non-
profit organization, but sadly that's not the case.

~~~
suyash
So are you saying you've been on H1B visa for 6 years of more as of now? This
is a great point, can you please share?

~~~
gokulk
hes just applying again for H1B the second time after his 6 years expired for
the previous time he was granted ( 3years reg + 3 years extension). Thats
normal logic

~~~
suyash
His comment created confusion with "cap exempt" vs "cap subject" logic.

~~~
neubyr
Murthy folks have explained this in better manner:
[http://www.murthy.com/2013/01/14/moving-from-cap-exempt-
to-c...](http://www.murthy.com/2013/01/14/moving-from-cap-exempt-to-cap-
subject-h1b/)

Seems like there are many like me..!

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nearst
It took only 5 days this year...

Past years: "FY 2010 cap numbers lasted until December 21, 2009. The FY 2011
cap was reached on January 26, 2011, the FY 2012 cap was reached on November
23, 2011, the FY 2013 cap was reached on June 11, 2012, and the FY 2014 cap
was reached on April 5, 2013." Source:
[http://www.nafsa.org/Resource_Library_Assets/Regulatory_Info...](http://www.nafsa.org/Resource_Library_Assets/Regulatory_Information/H-1B_Cap_Resource_Page/)

~~~
suyash
Next year it could be worse, like the 1st day the cap might be reached. It
only shows how important and urgent is to fix the legal immigration system in
this country.

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jmharvey
The "apply in April and spend six months in limbo" structure of the H-1B
program seems like it would heavily favor multinational companies that can
hire someone for a position abroad, and relocate them to the US if their visa
comes through. I wonder if that's why Infosys et al account for such a large
portion of the H-1B pool.

Can anyone more familiar with the situation comment on whether this is how the
process actually works? Do people who would be Infosys employees in the US
continue to work for Infosys in India if their visa application gets rejected?

~~~
abraham_s
If you are talking about people who get hired in India, then yes they continue
to work for Infosys. I am not sure about what will happen to people who get
hired in the US(like international students). Companies like Infosys are large
enough that there is always another project where you can move to even if you
dont get a visa.

~~~
ktsmith
Depending on what the classification of the U.S. student hire is they may
qualify for extensions. For example an F-1 student that is nearing the end of
their OPT work period (90-120 days) and is working towards a STEM degree can
get an F-1 STEM OPT extension of 17 months. The employer they are working for
must also be enrolled in E-Verify to qualify to employ an F-1 student with a
STEM extension.

Then you have Cap-Gap. An F-1 student that has completed their OPT period and
with a pending or approved H-1B petition may qualify to remain in F-1 status
and get extended work authorization until Sept 30th (H-1B status and work
authorization periods start on Oct 1). USCIS publishes the specifics for each
fiscal year about Cap-Gap.

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kozikow
I am writing this so people in situation like me will feel better.

People didn't know what day it will run out, so we can assume than number of
applications on 5th probably wasn't higher than on previous 4 days. We don't
know on what time on day on 5th day it ran out. What's more majority of
applications were made on 1st day (a lot of companies were expecting this
situation, one which is getting me h1b included). I'd say expected probability
of not getting a VISA is below 10% .

To counter the fact that USA government does "weekly" accounting of number of
applications (that 65k-th application was made earlier this week, but only
today government realized this) is this document from 2008 -
www.uscis.gov/files/pressrelease/H1BFY08Cap040307.pdf , where USCIS released
document the next day after cap was reached, the next day after they started
accepting applications.

~~~
makmanalp
I realize this is guesswork but it makes me feel slightly better :) Thanks.

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tn13
I think H1B visa is pretty horrible for start-up employees. Large Indian
outsourcing companies like TCS, Infoasys etc. are using H1B for sending their
half-trained software donkeys as cheap labor to US.

How can you equate a start-up founder with a QA guy working in TCS ?

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tn13
I think there should be two different visa categories.

1\. Those who are employed in their respective country for an outsourcing
company and are applying for H1B. 2\. Separate category for US based companies
hiring global talent. 3\. Separate caps for small companies.

What is wrong with lottery system.

My wife worked with an Indian outsourcing giant. She worked on a project by an
American client. When they wanted to send someone to US on B1 visa they put 10
of their employees in the pipeline. Idea was if anyone's visa gets rejected
the next person will try for it. They also divided these 10 people in 4
buckets and each bucket applied with a separate embassy in India.

I suspect with H1B lottery such large companies will also try to make more
applications. Bad for everyone.

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everest81
If government really wanted to fix this, they would give priority to
international students graduating from universities in US first, then allocate
any remaining H1-Bs for consultancy agencies from India and elsewhere.

~~~
suyash
True, outsourcing companies such as Infosys, Wipro, Satyam, Tata etc gobble up
majority of H1B visas for sending cheap labor to US.
<http://www.businessweek.com/table/08/0305_h1b.htm>

~~~
prostoalex
The data is for 2007, when financial sector was one of their primary
customers. A bunch of Infosys and Tata's major customers (Lehman Brothers,
Bear Sterns) are out of business, other entities are significantly smaller in
size. That list might look very different in 2013.

~~~
suyash
Here is the list from 2013, the situation is even worse, most Indian Offshore
companies are among top 10 now:
[http://www.epi.org/blog/top-10-h1b-guestworker-offshore-
outs...](http://www.epi.org/blog/top-10-h1b-guestworker-offshore-outsourcing/)

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harichinnan
The program was first come first server after financial crisis. Now US economy
became more attractive to foreign engineers and consulting companies once
again.

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makmanalp
God damn it, this screws me over pretty bad. Anyone else?

~~~
gokulk
same here.. my OPT gets over in a few months.. this may screw me over
completely and force me to go back to native country. Dreams in Silicon Valley
burnt due to extremely limited cap.

~~~
GuiA
I'm in the same boat as you. My OPT ends on September 30th, ironically enough
(H1B starts Oct 1st).

A backup plan I've been thinking about would be to move to the Canadian west
coast if I don't get a visa (EU citizens, your country may or may not have
visa agreements with Canada that allow you to work there- France has nice
things in that regard) to be not too far from my team.

~~~
ktsmith
Look into STEM OPT extension. It's good for 17 months. Your student advisor
should know about it and your employer must be enrolled in E-Verify. You'll
need the employers E-Verify # when applying and you'll get a new I-20 from
your school. Nothing with USCIS is ever that simple but the employers I work
with have lots of F-1 students that qualify and quite easily get their STEM
OPT extension. You have to apply well before your OPT expires though (90-120
days).

~~~
GuiA
Yeah, we thought about the OPT extension. The problem is that we're not
enrolled in e-verify, and the company that we outsource HR etc. too doesn't do
it at the moment either.

We might go down that path anyways if H1B fails; we'll see what happens.

~~~
ktsmith
Enrolling in E-Verify is very easy and if the company you outsource HR to
can't process E-Verify for your I-9 Forms I'd be extremely worried.

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shaohua
#NeedImmigrationReform Nobody tells me that I need to win a lottery to just
work...

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kozikow
Do I understand it right, that lottery will be only for applications made on
5th day, not for applications made through whole week? My application was on
1st and I don't know if I still can get screwed by randomness.

~~~
suyash
No, USCIS collects all the applications received during the 1st five business
days and put them together before they are lottried out. So any application
received after today would automatically be rejected.

~~~
robot
Since the cap was reached today, does that mean 60K cap + all excess
applicants that applied today, are put in the lottery for 60K slots?

~~~
suyash
exactly, the applications received were more than quota, thus the lottery.

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mh_yam
Meanwhile, Obama gives citizenship to illegal immigrants.

~~~
suyash
Exactly, I never understood Obama's stance on Immigration. He comes to SV and
promises us that he will fix High Tech Immigration Problem but in actuality he
does little. His policy instead focusses more on Illegal Immigration. This is
where I prefer Republican party's agenda.

~~~
enraged_camel
Republican Party's agenda... of building a long-ass fence across the US-Mexico
border, or of punishing the kids of illegal immigrants for choices their
parents made decades ago?

~~~
suyash
I don't necessarily agree with that either, I prefer Republican party's stance
over high tech legal immigration. We need to give Green Cards to qualified
people who will start tech startups and employ thousands of qualified people
in america before we start giving green card to illegal aliens.

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robot
Is the lottery nationality based, or completely random?

~~~
suyash
It is completely random, so an international student who is a CS grad from
Stanford is in the same boat as a Infosys QA guy from India.

------
suyash
I believe a lot of Companies would get angry when they realize their candidate
did not get H1B. #NeedImmigrationReform

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knowshan
Do they review 85k (general and Masters combined) applications or grant 85k
visas?

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kevinprince
Well that sucks.

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octix
wow, that's 1st time since a few years...

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openforce
Ridiculous!

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tn13
You are an Indian who has just finished your MS in Stanford. To get a job now
you compete in a lottery which puts you and a software donkey from TCS with a
degree from pretentious engineering college at the same odds.

~~~
Cherian_Abraham
How is this tripe modded up? A software donkey? Has it ever occurred to this
guy that he is talking about another human being? And has history belonged to
only those who passed through the hallow halls of Stanford? WTF?

~~~
tn13
I have do not mean to disrespect any human being sir. (Also, I think I should
apologize for using a specific company name in my comment but please read it
only as Company X). To be more clear I belong to one such companies which is
sending large number of H1B guys to US. When H1B visa is over its the turn of
B1 Visa.

H1B visa is for specially skilled people who are in short supply in US. Most
of the people including me in reality have no "special" skill that is in short
supply in US.

We come here to US and paid enough just to survive + Indian salary.

