Thank you for contacting me regarding the high-tech job market in America and the H-1B visa program for highly skilled foreign workers. I appreciated hearing from you.

In 1998, Congress passed legislation to raise the cap on visas for skilled foreign workers in the face of an array of evidence demonstrating that Americans were not filling the specialized jobs covered by the H-1B visa category. At the time the Information Technology Association of America estimated that there were more than 346,000 unfilled positions for highly skilled workers in American companies. The Department of Labor estimated that the American economy would generate 1.3 million new jobs each year for a decade in the computer and information technology industries, but that American universities would be able to supply only a quarter of the graduates needed to fill those jobs. The Hudson Institute predicted that in a few years this worker shortage, if not addressed, would cause a five percent drop in the growth rate of our economy -- a $200 billion annual loss in national output.

The American Competitiveness Act of 1998, which I cosponsored, raised the annual cap on H-1B visas for skilled professionals from 65,000 in Fiscal Year 1998 to 115,000 in both FY 1999 and FY 2000, and to 107,500 in FY 2001. Nonetheless, even the higher number of H-1B admissions authorized by Congress, for FY 1999 was reached only eight months into that fiscal year, and the FY 2000 cap was reached in March 2000, or only six months into the current fiscal year.

Congress is currently considering legislation to further raise the annual cap on H-1B visas. I support S. 2045, the main bill before the Senate on this issue, which would add an additional 297,500 H-1B visas between FY2000 and FY 2002, as well as expand the availability of math, science, and technology scholarships for Americans. The 106' Congress is expected to take up this legislation before adjourning in late 2000.

Further raising the H-1B cap is a short-term solution to the skilled-worker shortage in the United States, but over the long term, I believe we need to address the underlying problem resulting in a shortage of skilled American workers. Consequently, on October 27, 1999, I introduced S. 1804, the 21st Century Technology Resources and Commercial Leadership Act, which addresses the need to improve Americans' skills in math, science, engineering, and technology in order to maintain our world leadership in high-tech fields. Several other bills before Congress would raise the H-1B visa cap, but focus less on the long-term goal of educating and training Americans to fill available high-tech jobs. S. 1804 would encourage innovation in improving elementary and secondary education in math, science, and engineering, as well as provide powerful incentives to retrain American workers who lack the skills to compete in the high-tech economy. In the interim, to provide for the requisite number of highly skilled professionals until we have educated and trained a sufficient number of Americans to fill these jobs, the bill would lift the cap on H-1B visas through 2006. All current information indicates that the supply of American professionals in the math, science, engineering, and technology fields will not meet the demand of American industries through at least that date.

Specifically, S. 1804 provides for grants to be awarded under the supervision of the Secretary of Commerce in consultation with the Office of Technology Policy and the National Science Foundation, on a competitive basis, for implementing programs that will improve the math, science, engineering, and technology skills of American students and professionals. The types of programs to be awarded grants are not specified so that Congress does not unintentionally foreclose new and more innovative ideas from surfacing. The grants would be funded from current H-1B visa application fees and could be awarded to companies, organizations, schools, school districts, teachers, and institutions of higher learning.

My legislation would use H-1B visa fees to encourage innovation in our schools, to teach American students the skills they will need to succeed in the 21st century economy, and in our companies, to train and retrain American workers in the high-tech skills American businesses rely upon. The legislation would support corporate partnerships with schools or school districts to improve math and science curricula; scholarships for students willing to study advanced engineering or technology fields, and for those who agree to teach math or science for a period of time after graduating college; and innovative worker training and retraining programs within American companies. It leaves open grant support for any proposal that promises to improve the American talent pool in high-tech fields.

I understand the concerns expressed by those who fear legislation to raise the H-1B visa cap would cause unemployment among American workers. In fact, current law penalizes any employer who lays off an American worker in order to replace him or her with an H-1B visa holder and pays that individual anything less than the average prevailing wage in that line of work -- a standard which often results in a higher salary than that made by American entry-level workers. Any company with a significant number of H-1B workers must also attest that it will not lay off an American employee after filing a petition for an H-1B professional. Moreover, the Department of Labor is empowered under the law to investigate and penalize willful abuse of the H1B visa program and has done so repeatedly since the program began in 1990. These safeguards protect American workers from wrongly losing their jobs to H-1B visa holders.

Thank you again for contacting me about legislation to increase the pool of American talent in high-technology fields Please feel free to do so regarding any matter.