One of the massive holes in the process is the definition of maximum duration of "6 years", of course that is 3 years at a time. So Indian outsourcing companie

One of the massive holes in the process is the definition of maximum duration of "6 years", of course that is 3 years at a time. So Indian outsourcing companies get a visa in October 2010, do not send the person to US till June 2011, the person does a 6 month project then goes back, comes back 6 months later and spends some time and goes back again. At the end they file for lost days recapture and keep on extending the H1 for 8-9-10-12 years because the person has not spent 12 years employed. While this works for the outsourcing companies, the existence of this model creates perverse incentives for any employer as they have no obligation to pay a person simply because they can classify as being employed in different branch (India), on vacation (sometimes), on unpaid vacation (bench). If the visa was given for 3 or 6 years (with renewal) but you had to a) pay the person or surrender the visa, maybe if you use only 80% for year 1 and the visa gets canceled, and b) there was no extension because of any sundry reasons : initial visa issued in October 2010 expires in September 2016 come what may, you could maybe fix it a little bit. Of course business cycles can bring in some uncertainty but then maybe we can not penalize a single H1 but if the company has deployed only 70% of its H1 staff on US salary, and is still asking for a visa in the next year, it is obviously a no no : if you are such a company then further visas are just not granted.