While immigration has dominated the political debate in Europe and the U.S. for several years, one important but often overlooked issue is the range of skills, education, and productivity some immigrants bring to the table, which can boost economic growth and create jobs in the host country – even when their visa status is strictly temporary. On that note the Trump administration is pursuing a self-defeating strategy by blocking temporary high-skilled immigration, according to Daniel Griswold, a senior research fellow at Mercatus, who warned against counterproductive immigration policies in an op-ed in The Hill.
- Research shows that every temporary high-skilled worker in the U.S. helps create 5 to 7.5 new jobs in the firm where they’re hired. Meanwhile foreign students make up 81% of U.S. grad students in electrical engineering, as well as high proportions in other STEM fields.
- The H1-B visa program, approved by Congress in 1990, creates a channel for temporary skilled immigration, but the numbers of H1-B visas issues haven’t increased in decades.
- Trump has talked a good game before, calling legal immigration a key driver of economic growth in his February Statue of the Union address. However the administration’s actions haven’t followed suit: there has actually been an increase in H1-B denials, meaning approval rates fell from 2016-2017.
- There’s some evidence that the reduced approval rates may be scaring off foreign talent: total numbers of applicants also decreased 4% from 2017-2018.
- The administration needs to reverse these policies and start issuing more H1-B visas if the U.S. wants to maintain its lead in the increasingly competitive global innovation economy.
