Saturday, May 21, 2016

How many H-1B in the United States?

How many H-1B in the United States?

Many more H-1B than the experts have estimated


Subjects: H-1B, Michelle Malkin, Center for Immigration Studies, Economic Policy Institute

At about 13:00 mmss in the accompaying video, Malkin looks to the panel for confirmation that 650,000 H-1B are in the country.  USCIS reports indicate the number of H-1B filing for ACWIA fees is 1.6 million during the most recent six year period.

Adjustments, put the number of H-1B working in the US at about 1.07 million, but we only account for six years on the AC21 backlog -- which is still H-1B status.  It is known that there are H-1B backlogged in AC21 since 2012, but that number is not possible to quantify due to an unknown number of departures.




In, "Temporary foreign workers by the numbers", By Daniel Costa and Jennifer Rosenbaum • March 7, 2017, the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) declares that there are 460,749 H-1B working in the United States. 

The EPI report completely ignores the population of H-1B from the prior decade, who are beyond the six year limitation, living and working in the US on AC21 extension.  EPI actually deducts two years of these H-1B extensions (52,184) from their estimate.  These individuals are still in H-1B status!



So I guess EPI's logic goes as follows: in addition to H-1B exemption to the rule concerning direct replacement of professionals performing the job, exemptions to the statutory caps for certain types of employers, an extension for STEM-OPT students to work 3 years before the H-1B is granted and the AC21 permanent extension (beyond the six year statutory limigation) for those who can find a sponsor, the EPI arbitrarily removes a huge population, who are technically still on H-1B.

Until the AC21 petitioner secures another form of Employment Authorization Document (EAD), they are collateral damage from the H-1B and remain classified as such.  They are primarily foreign undergraduates who have not completed an FBI background check and the labor certification for the jobs they hold are postponed years beyond the H-1B six year limitation.

Some of the data the EPI uses comes from the USCIC "FY 20xx Annual Report: H-1B Petitions" reports. We can do a sanity check for a six year period to gauge how many light-years the EPI is off on its estimate.


H-1B: Filed (ACWIA fee)
2010 =  247,617
2011 =  267,654
2012 =  307,713
2013 =  299,467
2014 =  318,824
2015 =  348,669

Total = 1,789,944



H-1B: Approved and approval rate  (ACWIA fee)
2010 =  192,990 (77.94%)
2011 =  269,653 (100.75%)
2012 =  262,569 (85.33%)
2013 =  286,773 (95.76%)
2014 =  315,857 (99.07%)
2015 =  275,317 (78.96%)

Subtotal = 1,603,159 (89.56%)


H-1B: Change of employer (Fraud detection fee)
2010 = 27,551
2011 = 40,476
2012 = 37,290
2013 = 43,400
2014 = 51,029
2015 = 50,504

Subtotal = 250,250

Total = 1,352,909
(Approved ACWIA Fees w Change of employer  Fraud Deduction Fee instances deducted).


If we include a commensurate EPI estimate of LPR status awarded to H-1B (2 x 139,303 = 278,606), this still leaves us with 1,074,303 approved ACWIA filings -- 614,154 more than the EPI's estimate.



Update:
Zamora: H-1B adjustment of status to Legal Permanent Resident (LPR)


2010 = 40,717
2011 = 47,764
2012 = 42,318
2013 = 49,221
2014 = 42,167
2015 = 44,437 (avg. of prior yrs.)

Total H-1B to LPR= 266,624

Note 1: The 1 year extensions, deducted by EPI (52,184 for two years), are still H-1B visas, there is no reason for EPI to deduct these H-1Bs to arrive at, "...H-1B workers were employed in the United States..." (on page 18).

Note 2: 
Because of the (purported) six year limitation on H-1B visa, this data does not consider AC21 extensions prior to 2010.  USCIS and EPI claim that these extensions are filed either annually, or triennially.  The presumption made here is annually, as only paying the ACWIA fee every third year would markedly increase the estimate of those on AC21 extension.

Note 3: The number of second extensions for 2010 to 2015 was 225,807, which again is a mixed bag of single-year and three-year extensions. We know that some green card categories are backlogged 12 years, so a sample of 2010 to 2015 would not be all inclusive. The number of adjustments to LPR status deducted from this data-set exceeds second extensions; therefore, renewals of second extensions (regardless of duration) are statistically irrelevant to the total.

Source Data:

Table 3. Number of H-1B Petitions Approved by Quarter and Reason of Exemption from ACWIA Fee: FY 20xx
Table 5. Number of H-1B Petitions Approved Requiring Fraud Prevention and Detection Fee: FY 20xx
https://www.uscis.gov/tools/reports-studies/reports-and-studies
Zamora: "Are 'Temporary Workers' Really Temporary? Turning Temporary Status into Green Cards"
EPI: "Temporary foreign workers by the numbers"

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