Visa Backlog Risks Foreign Students' Business Dreams

Parent Cafe
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<p>[The</a> Next Big Idea Stuck in Visa Limbo. Other countries court skilled immigrants frustrated by U.S. visa laws](<a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/other-countries-court-skilled-immigrants-frustrated-by-us-visa-laws/2013/02/18/73d9f7ce-7137-11e2-ac36-3d8d9dcaa2e2_story.html]The”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/other-countries-court-skilled-immigrants-frustrated-by-us-visa-laws/2013/02/18/73d9f7ce-7137-11e2-ac36-3d8d9dcaa2e2_story.html)</p>

<p>Very interesting article. Two post-doc mechanical engineers at MIT, both from India, have developed a water-decontamination technology that could be used to dispose of billions of gallons of contaminated water produced by natural gas hydraulic fracturing (fracking). They have started a company to sell the system to oil businesses. Scientific American magazine said is is one of the top 10 “world-changing ideas” of 2012.</p>

<p>Both have student visas which will expire in a few months. Due to the restrictive US visa system, they will be forced to move their company to another country.</p>

<p>Leaders in academia and business feel that this could be a major threat to the US economy. Our immigration laws chase away highly skilled foreigners who are educated in US universities. For most, their education is being funded by US taxpayer dollars.</p>

<p>The article goes on to say that the US puts strict limits on visas for highly skilled workers where they may end up on a waiting list for years. In the meantime, other countries are actively recruiting them.</p>

<p>“We train these people and then we push them away, while Chile and the UK and Canada are coming in to recruit them,” said the managing director of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship. “These are people who are creating jobs. This is so outrageous to me.”</p>

<p>According to business leaders in the Silicon Valley, we are in desperate need of highly skilled workers in the STEM fields.</p>

<p>The Brookings Institute reports that about 50% of all STEM PhDs and 40% of all MIT grad students are foreign born. It costs about $250,00 to educate a single MIT PhD student and the government pays for 80% of it.</p>

<p>“Essentially we are funding their research; then we make it hard for these people to stay here. If you want more innovation in this country, fix the visa situation,” says the executive director of MIT’s Deshpande Center for Technical Innovation.</p>

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<p>As opposed to the educational system?</p>

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<p>I hoped there might be some discussion of this article.</p>

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<p>As the parent of a US kid who will likely be looking to get into a Physics PhD program in a few years, I wish we weren’t funding their research to start with… just saying.</p>

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<p>I would guess that these two guys wouldn’t have problems if they wanted to work for a big US oil company. We hire lots of folks like this where I work.</p>

<p>There is a path to residency - I don’t know what the amount is but if you come into the US with a certain amount of money and state that you’re going to start a business and hire workers, then I think that you can get residency. A lot of countries permit this though the amounts vary. Could they raise that money from VC’s?</p>

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<p>$1M own money invested:</p>

<p>[USCIS</a> - Employment-Based Immigration: Fifth Preference EB-5](<a href=“http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=facb83453d4a3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=facb83453d4a3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD]USCIS”>http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=facb83453d4a3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=facb83453d4a3210VgnVCM100000b92ca60aRCRD)</p>

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<p>If MIT legal department did their job correctly, these two guys cannot just take their research and move the company to another country without licensing the technology from MIT.</p>

<p>If these guys are any good, they will have no problem staying in US. Where I work we employ, many PhDs without US citizenship or green card, including people from India. It is a little bit of a hustle to work out visa details, but no one was turned down because of the visa issues.</p>

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<p>Sadly, even if MIT filed patents covering the technology in India, such patents will be infringed if there is an incentive to the infringers. BRIC countries are notorious for not going after patent infringers. However… I wonder how widespread fracking is in India… These guys will not be able to sell their product in the US or Canada or any other country that is serious about IP without proper licensing…</p>

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<p>My understanding is that the reason why we are funding their research is because there are not enough US citizens competing for the spots in PhD program.</p>

<p>The reason why my place of employment has so many non-US citizens, non-green card holders, is because we cannot find enough US citizens with PhDs. For the jobs requiring clearance, we have to resolve lowering education requirement to MS level to get US citizens.</p>

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<p>I didn’t see that in the link that you provided.</p>

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<p>From the link. “Note: Investment capital cannot be borrowed.”</p>

<p>More here:</p>

<p>[Immigrant</a> Investor Visas](<a href=“404 - Page Not Found”>404 - Page Not Found)</p>

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<p>If I invest someone else’s money, I’m not an investor - I am a fund manager.</p>

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<p>Can you think of a way for someone to get a million dollars that isn’t their own that they didn’t borrow? I certainly can.</p>

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<p>More on the subject of EB-5 (“Investor”) visas:</p>

<p>[Local</a> News | Wealthy immigrants can invest way to visas | Seattle Times Newspaper](<a href=“http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2016987542_investorvisa11m.html]Local”>http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2016987542_investorvisa11m.html)</p>

<p>BC, if you have proper documentation that shows your ownership of the funds (e.g., via gift transfer, as in the abovementioned ST article - see the last paragraphs), that’s all. :)</p>

<p>It all depends on the USCIS’s definition of “borrowing” ;)</p>

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<p>^^</p>

<p>Not that hard … as there are more ways to raise capital than borrowing money. The entrepreneur could sell rights, shares, advanced royalties, etc that could all show up as earned income and help meet the easy requirements. </p>

<p>On the main issue of the article, the problems might be of a different nature:</p>

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<p>The United States is wonderful when it comes to talking about what needs to be done, but only do what it is right after exhausting all other possibilities. Students DO react to market conditions and incentives. If we want to create more scientists born and raised in the United States, it is not only necessary to create an environment but also define clear incentives. Most of the funding in higher education is wasted, and time has come for more austerity and … selectivity measures. A good start would be to make access to research funding directly relevant to the creation of jobs for Americans in the United States. And implement stronger policies of admission and funding for international. The entire world relies on quotas; and so should we! </p>

<p>We will continue to spend what we do not have as long as the borrowing comes easy. And that easy money is then wasted, including in educating a world that will in turn compete with us at every chance they get. And we justify that because we need to keep our research institutions alive and kicking! And our research institutions need a constant flow of indentured servants to keep the faculty fat and happy. And protect the easy life. </p>

<p>It is that exact self-preservation plan that will hasten our demise.</p>

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<p>I don’t know how you necessarily go about doing this. There’s a lot of research which discovers something or discovers that something can’t be done or doesn’t work that doesn’t directly result in something commercially viable but it could be used in further research that results in something commercially viable.</p>

<p>This is kind of like the discussion of applied vs theoretical. Back in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, bit companies ran research operations which spent large sums of money on research project where researchers didn’t necessarily have to come up with something commercially viable. That changed quite a bit in the later 80s as companies wanted applied research. I guess that we’ve left the theoretical to the universities now.</p>

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<p>ho hum, just part of the drumbeat campaign for Open Borders, oops “reform”. </p>

<p>The Indian guy with a combover and a Phd profiled is not who we are talking about when we decide to grant status to millions new immigrants.</p>

<p>The idea that “other countries” are rushing to do this is a scare tactic. And when a salesman tires a scare tactic to make a sale its best to walk away- whether its aluminum siding, a used Datsun or an emigration bill.</p>

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<p>BC –</p>

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<p>Not sure if you got a chance to read the entire article (it’s quite long). But this is all explained in the article. These two engineers are currently about to close on millions of dollars in financing. Unlike Canada and other countries, the US offers no specific visa for young entrepreneurs like them who want to start a business in our country. Countries such as Canada, Singapore, Australia and Germany are trying to attract foreign entrepreneurs with relatively easy visas. So why are we making it so difficult here in the US?</p>

<p>“The law says that people on student visas must intend to leave the country after their studies end. But because he has started a company in the US, lawyers tell him he could easily be denied a new student visa.” The most common visa for high-skilled immigrant workers is the H1-B, but the government often denies those visas for people working for businesses they started themselves. He could apply for an EB-1 visa for those with exceptional ability, but only about 2% of visas awarded each year are in this category.</p>

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<p>Do we want to encourage industries that benefit from fracking?</p>

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<p>argbargy –</p>

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<p>Please, let’s not make this political. The article had nothing whatsoever to do with open borders.</p>

<p>emeraldkity4 –</p>

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<p>So you’re saying we should deny visas to scientists who have developed an extremely valuable water decontamination technology just because it could be used in the fracking industry?</p>

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<p>It does because its all part of the drumbeat that Something Must Be Done!</p>

<p>Here are the “More on this Story” references for this article:
-Push to change immigration laws sparks power struggle within GOP
-Parties united on need to tackle immigration but divided on to do it
-Why Reagan’s 1986 immigration law fell short
-Give me your tired’ but . . .</p>

<p>The video that goes with the story:
“President Obama on Tuesday called on Congress to send him a “comprehensive immigration reform bill” in the next few months.”</p>