Business and the Workforce

What role do immigrants play in American business and the American workforce? Immigrants work in a range of skilled positions in the U.S. and start businesses that boost the American economy. Learn more about immigrant entrepreneurship and workforce participation.

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December 12, 2019
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced that U.S. employers will have to pay a $10 fee and register to have a chance at filing an H-1B petition subject to the statutory “...
November 8, 2019

The Trump administration, acting through U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), is disrupting the process by which U.S. employers obtain work authorization for highly skilled foreign...

November 1, 2019

At a time when skills related to the burgeoning field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) are in very short supply, the U.S. government is making it harder to recruit highly trained professionals from...

October 1, 2019

Newly released documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) reveal that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) rolled out a major policy change impacting petitions for...

September 17, 2019

Tech startups are engines of innovation, economic growth, and job creation. Yet U.S. visa policies may be preventing startups from hiring the highly skilled foreign professionals they need to...

August 16, 2019

Legal immigration channels to the United States are continuing to suffer under the Trump administration. These restrictions are having an effect on employment-based immigration—particularly...

July 30, 2019

From the highest levels of corporate America to virtually every level of the labor force, immigration creates new jobs in the U.S. economy. The businesses founded by immigrant entrepreneurs...

April 19, 2019

In a welcome immigration-related development, the Trump administration has proposed increasing the annual allotment of H-2B visas for temporary nonagricultural workers. As employers have long...

April 11, 2019

American businesses rely on foreign-born workers in many industries and the country’s immigration system has channels specifically dedicated to employment-based immigration. The Trump...

April 8, 2019

As another H-1B season comes to an end, one thing is clear: the demand for educated foreign workers is as high as ever. The annual H-1B cap was reached within a mere 5 business days. U.S....

February 9, 2022

A skyrocketing number of migrant teens from Central America are finding their way into the undocumented workforce of the United States. They are doing rigorous, grueling work often meant for...

February 4, 2022

The House of Representatives passed an economic competitiveness bill on February 4 that includes several immigration provisions. The bill is called the ‘‘America Creating Opportunities for...

February 4, 2022
The U.S. House of Representatives passed an economic competitiveness bill focused on advancing the United States’ innovation and global competitiveness, which also proposes reforms to U.S. immigration law to help attract and retain immigrant talent.
January 26, 2022

The Biden administration recently announced four actions intended to improve immigration “pathways” for noncitizens in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. However,...

January 25, 2022

The labor shortages currently afflicting many sectors of the U.S. economy are being aggravated by the arrival of fewer and fewer workers from abroad. Although immigration has been slowing since...

January 21, 2022
The Biden administration announced new efforts to modernize parts of our immigration system, and remove barriers to legal immigration. DHS will add 22 new fields of study in the STEM Optional Practical Training program through the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, and will implement a series of additional changes to allow foreign students, scholars, and researchers to come to the United States and make meaningful contributions to America’s scholarly, research and development, and innovation communities.
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December 16, 2021
The American Immigration Council and 13 other organizations urged USCIS to expand premium processing to ensure the agency remains solvent while efficiently and effectively adjudicating all...
December 1, 2021

A lesser-known group of young people who grew up in the United States with immigration status—typically the children of noncitizens who entered the U.S. on temporary work visas—is increasingly at...

November 11, 2021
Five workers in the United States filed a nationwide class action lawsuit today challenging unlawful log-jam and extreme delays at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that have resulted in the government’s failure to process the work authorization renewals for asylum seekers.
The Council and partners filed a nationwide class action lawsuit to ensure timely renewal of work authorizations documents for asylum seekers.

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