The American Spectator

The Nation's Pulse

Immigration was a hot topic at the Conservative Leadership Conference in Reno, Nevada. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney placated the crowd by affirming his opposition to illegal immigration. But he added, "I love legal immigration, especially when immigrants bring skills."

It's a critical distinction. The U.S. long has taken for granted its position atop the international economic heap. But the sound of footsteps behind America grow louder. Productivity is rising far more rapidly in Asia. The U.S. is falling behind in the number of degrees granted in engineering and science, as well as patents issued. Now the rancorous political fight over immigration risks creating serious collateral economic damage: a reverse brain drain.

Large-scale illegal immigration has many and complicated consequences. Uncontested is the benefit of legal immigration by the technically talented and economically entrepreneurial from overseas. With an open economy and democratic polity, America attracts the world's best and brightest. They result in an enormous economic pay-off.

Researchers at Duke, Harvard, and New York University have been studying the impact of immigration on economic competitiveness. They discovered that between 1995 and 2005 immigrants founded one in four engineering and technology firms, which in 2006 generated $52 billion in revenues and employed 450,000 people. The largest number of entrepreneurial immigrants came from India; United Kingdom, China, Taiwan, and Japan followed as sources of productive immigrants.

The latest study by the same researchers found that immigrants "were named as inventors or co-inventors in 25.6 percent of international patent applications filed from the United States in 2006. This represents an increase from 7.6 percent in 1998." The rate of increase has been rising, growing fastest since 2004.

Foreign invention played a particularly significant role in California, followed by Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Texas, Illinois, and Pennsylvania. The role of immigrants varied dramatically by industry and firm. They played only a minor role for Microsoft, General Motors, Medtronic, and 3M, for instance. But immigrants were involved in 56 percent of Wyeth's patents, 58 percent Freescale Semiconductor's and Intel's patents, 60 percent of Cisco's patents, 63 percent of Siemens's patents, 64 percent of General Electric's patents, 65 percent of Merck's patents, and 72 percent of Qualcomm's patents. Interestingly, four in ten patents filed by the U.S. government involved foreign participation.

Chinese, Taiwanese, and Indian immigrants accounted for more than one-third of the patents involving immigrants. Their numbers dwarf the contribution of American citizens of Chinese, Taiwanese, and Indian descent.

The largest number of patents involving foreign nationals involved medical or dental uses and electric digital processing. In these cases immigrants provided an important supplement to the work of American citizens. The bump approached or exceeded 50 percent of the number of patents granted citizens in several fields.

With notable understatement, notes researcher Vivek Wadhwa, a fellow at Harvard Law School, "The United States benefits from having foreign-born innovators create their ideas in this country." These people create wealth rather than consume welfare; they engage American culture rather than promote their native cultures. They help America retain its international economic dominance.

Yet for all of these benefits, the U.S., a nation of more than 300 million people, awards only 120,000 employment-based visas for permanent residence every year. Moreover, fewer than 10,000 are available for any one country, even those, such as India and the United Kingdom, which provide so many talented entrepreneurs. Yet there are about 560,000 principals and 620,000 family members, for almost 1.2 million overall, in employment-based categories awaiting visas.

IN SHORT, IMMIGRATION BREAKS DOWN into two separate issues. One, which has received by far the most attention, is how to deal with the flood of unskilled labor pouring over America's southern border. The second is how to take better advantage of the much smaller number of economically talented entrepreneurs desiring to settle in the U.S. Doing a better job on the second would ease the financial burden of confronting the first.

The current system of employment-based visas is broken. In general, visas are available for professionals of outstanding ability or executives subject to transfer to the U.S. As of last year, some 200,000 principals were awaiting labor certification, the first step to gaining permanent residence status. Some 50,000, roughly seven times the number a decade ago, were lodged at the second stop, the I-140 application. More than 300,000, treble the number ten years before, were at the final, I-485 stage.

The overall waiting time is about 4.4 years -- which doesn't even include visa processing time. Warns the report, "Waiting for visa processing makes a stressful time even more stressful." Wait times have been getting longer, though the relevant agencies have declared themselves determined to clear up the backlog. Unfortunately, one-third of employment principals polled are uncertain about remaining in the U.S. or actually plan to leave. Returning home is an increasingly viable option for Chinese and Indian nationals, whose native economies have begun to grow substantially, including in high-tech fields.

p>There are two separate problems. One is statutory limits on the number of employment-based visas. The other is agency incompetence in processing applications. The combination is costing America money and jobs. Observe the researchers: br>

topics:
Business, Law, Immigration