Regaining the Economic Edge: Policy Proposals for High-skill Worker and Student Authorizations

The unrivaled dominance of the United States’ economic power and institutions of higher education, coupled with its need to compete for hearts and minds in third-world countries during the Cold War, led to the development of a U.S. immigration system which focused more on family unification, refugee protection, protection of U.S. labor markets, and diversity than on the need to compete economically with other nations. This framework can be seen in both the rules surrounding foreign students attending U.S. universities and in rules regarding permanent residence and short term visas for highly skilled foreign workers. A recent report by the National Foundation for American Policy found that foreign students comprise “70 percent of the full-time graduate students (masters and PhDs) in electrical engineering, 63 percent in computer science, 60 percent in industrial engineering, and more than 50 percent in economics, chemical engineering, materials engineering and mechanical engineering.”1 Given this alarming statistic that the majority of critical science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) graduate students are foreign visitors, how will the critical occupations requiring these skills in the United States be filled? More specifically, setting aside for purposes of this paper the larger issue of the need to grow U.S. student interest in STEM fields, how can the short-term STEM needs of the United States be met? Beyond this domestic concern, is the current balance of education simply working to train foreign students to compete with the United States after they return home? In this paper we will examine the current state of noteworthy U.S. practices in higher education, short term professional visas, and permanent residence. After this analysis of current U.S. practices, we will offer several practical suggestions for reforming U.S. laws in these areas.