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Bipartisan Group of Senators to Introduce High-Skilled Immigration Bill


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Sen. Orrin Hatch

"We ought to keep these master's degrees and Ph.D.s that can help us to regenerate our business community and our economy, and this bill will help us to do that," says Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah).

Credit: KCSG

H-1B visas would jump to a cap of 115,000 from the current cap of 65,000 under a high-skilled immigration bill that will soon be introduced in the Senate with bipartisan backing. If the cap is hit early in the year, a "market-based H-1B escalator" would allow even more visas with a cap of 300,000.

The bill's sponsors, Sens. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), believe the measure is "very doable" and will help the U.S. economy.

The technology industry is likely to support the Immigration Innovation Act, as the bill is currently titled, as a way to help fill engineering, programming, and research jobs. The bill also would lift the current 20,000-per-year cap on H-1B visas for those with advanced degrees from U.S. universities, and permit dependent spouses of the visa holders to work in the United States.

From The Hill 
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Abstracts Copyright © 2013 Information Inc., Bethesda, Maryland, USA


 

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