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Only PhD's and equivalents can get green cards in 1-2 years, it takes much longer for everyone else regardless of country of origin. As far as H1's having job o

Only PhD's and equivalents can get green cards in 1-2 years, it takes much longer for everyone else regardless of country of origin. As far as H1's having job options to pick from, the difference between Large Corp 1 and Large Corp 2 is small enough not to matter. Are small tech firms interested in foreign workers as much as their bigger brothers are?

udit99 13y ago
>Only PhD's and equivalents can get green cards in 1-2 years Not true. The EB-2 category (Masters Degree/5+ years of experience) has no waiting period as long as you're not from a handful of countries. The category is "current", which is to say that the time taken to get a GC in this category is going to be pretty much the time taken to file/process paperwork + a 180 day mandated period. This is what totals up to 1-1.5 years. > Are small tech firms interested in foreign workers as much as their bigger brothers are I can't speak for all companies, but in the Bay area, I've had offers from more than one 20-100 person startups with the assurance of H1/GC filings.
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > The EB-2 category (Masters Degree/5+ years of experience) has no waiting period as long as you're not from a handful of countries Which handful, because of the way the system works, are (pretty much by definition) the ones where most qualified and sponsored applicants come from, since the waiting lists are simply the result of the degree to which fully qualified (including sponsored) applicants in the category from the country exceed the by-country limits for the category.
  - udit99 13y ago
    China, India, Mexico, Philippines.[1] The system doesn't explicitly discriminate against "talented" countries, it just stacks the odds against highly populated countries since there is a per-country cap on the number of GCs issued. [1]http://travel.state.gov/visa/bulletin/bulletin_6062.html http://travel.state.gov/visa/bulletin/bulletin_6062.html
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      > The system doesn't explicitly discriminate against "talented" countries, it just stacks the odds against highly populated countries since there is a per-country cap on the number of GCs issued. It stacks the odds against countries with a large number of qualified applicants in any category (since the caps are per category.) Population plays a role, but only because it influences representation in the category (which is a big factor for India and China), but so does interest level (which is a big factor for Mexico and the Phillipines, which are particularly impacted for family-based immigration as well as employment-based immigration categories.)
      - udit99 13y ago
        Agreed
- null_ptr 13y ago
  > I can't speak for all companies, but in the Bay area, I've had offers from more than one 20-100 person startups with the assurance of H1/GC filings. That's really cool to hear, wouldn't have expected.
- jlees 13y ago
  I can vouch from experience for this one, as a UK citizen with two Masters degrees my green card took under 18 months total.
- BadassFractal 13y ago
  In practice I've seen this easily take people 3-4 years due to how long it takes to process this paperwork on the govt end.

udit99 13y ago

>Only PhD's and equivalents can get green cards in 1-2 years Not true. The EB-2 category (Masters Degree/5+ years of experience) has no waiting period as long as you're not from a handful of countries. The category is "current", which is to say that the time taken to get a GC in this category is going to be pretty much the time taken to file/process paperwork + a 180 day mandated period. This is what totals up to 1-1.5 years. > Are small tech firms interested in foreign workers as much as their bigger brothers are I can't speak for all companies, but in the Bay area, I've had offers from more than one 20-100 person startups with the assurance of H1/GC filings.

dragonwriter 13y ago
> The EB-2 category (Masters Degree/5+ years of experience) has no waiting period as long as you're not from a handful of countries Which handful, because of the way the system works, are (pretty much by definition) the ones where most qualified and sponsored applicants come from, since the waiting lists are simply the result of the degree to which fully qualified (including sponsored) applicants in the category from the country exceed the by-country limits for the category.
- udit99 13y ago
  China, India, Mexico, Philippines.[1] The system doesn't explicitly discriminate against "talented" countries, it just stacks the odds against highly populated countries since there is a per-country cap on the number of GCs issued. [1]http://travel.state.gov/visa/bulletin/bulletin_6062.html http://travel.state.gov/visa/bulletin/bulletin_6062.html
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > The system doesn't explicitly discriminate against "talented" countries, it just stacks the odds against highly populated countries since there is a per-country cap on the number of GCs issued. It stacks the odds against countries with a large number of qualified applicants in any category (since the caps are per category.) Population plays a role, but only because it influences representation in the category (which is a big factor for India and China), but so does interest level (which is a big factor for Mexico and the Phillipines, which are particularly impacted for family-based immigration as well as employment-based immigration categories.)
    - udit99 13y ago
      Agreed
null_ptr 13y ago
> I can't speak for all companies, but in the Bay area, I've had offers from more than one 20-100 person startups with the assurance of H1/GC filings. That's really cool to hear, wouldn't have expected.
jlees 13y ago
I can vouch from experience for this one, as a UK citizen with two Masters degrees my green card took under 18 months total.
BadassFractal 13y ago
In practice I've seen this easily take people 3-4 years due to how long it takes to process this paperwork on the govt end.