It seems fending off illegal immigrants today is no longer enough.
Asserting that the H-1B visas for high-skilled foreign workers have been “deliberately exploited to replace” American workers, President Trump’s Sept. 19 executive order slaps a slew of restrictions — including a $100,000 fee — on newly issued visas. With an overwhelming majority of the applicants from technology-related sectors, the order is another speedbump for the most sought-after foreign technology professionals during the fiercest global artificial intelligence talent race yet.
As competition from China calls for the strongest possible advance, the H-1B visa fee is a decisive retreat. The H-1B remains a most cost-effective tourniquet against an imminent technology brain drain. Rather than charging a hefty premium, the U.S. should double the H-1B quota to avoid training a workforce only to gift it to other countries — or worse, to its adversaries.
Contrary to the executive order’s claim, the H-1B has been a safeguard for American workers, capping the number of foreign workers at a dismal low. The H-1B annual quota has by and large remained constant at just 65,000 since 1990, with an additional 20,000 for advanced degree holders since 2006. Under the randomized “H-1B lottery,” even those with a graduate degree have reportedly less than a 50 percent chance of securing the visa. Meanwhile, foreign students in the U.S. have roughly tripled. For the 2023-24 academic year, international students brought in $44 billion revenue and helped create 378,000 jobs in the U.S.
For the U.S. to welcome top students from around the world while simultaneously denying them long-term employment is to invest in human capital without reaping the benefits. In the field of AI, the loss is compounded by a tectonic turn: While just over 20 percent of AI Ph.Ds. worked in industry in 2004, that number had jumped to 70 percent by 2020. Since the H-1B quota targets industry jobs, the surge of foreign AI doctoral students headed for the private sector means the program intended to retain them has instead induced a gushing hemorrhage out of the American technology jugular.
But the bleeding is only the beginning: Effective Oct. 1, China will be debuting its K Visa, tailored specifically for attracting foreign science and technology talents.
In contrast to H-1B’s stringency regarding permitted activities, the K Visa boasts exceptional flexibility for its holders. Our research has shown the critical importance of allowing innovators to engage in activities other than employment, as much of innovation occurs outside of formal work. By offering less freedom at an extra $100,000, America is poised to toss its would-be star recruits straight into the arsenal of its No.1 rival — a move that China would gobble up with gusto.
China’s new visa class exemplifies a deep understanding of immigration, not as an end but as a means to economic growth by way of maximizing the creative value of knowledge workers. Faced with the extraordinary challenge of a historic brain grab, it’s China, not the U.S., that has stepped up with extraordinary measures that defy even its own long-held dogma of oversight and control.
The H-1B visa has more than protected American workers. It has done so by keeping out foreign high-skilled workers now at a rate that’s starting to erode America’s sharpest edge — its relentless drive for frontier innovation. The Pax Americana prevailed over the alternatives because of the openness and meritocracy it embodied. The one way to maintain America’s lead is to hold those values close, and its brightest minds — wherever they be from — ever closer.
Meicen Sun is an assistant professor at the University of Illinois School of Information Sciences and an affiliated faculty at MIT FutureTech.
