Recent Study: Indians will die in the endless Green Card Queue

Research conducted by Cato Institute’s Associate Director of Immigration Studies David J. Bier showcased the gargantuan Green Card queue, its congestion, and its hopeless speed of procedure. According to the research, Indian immigrants will have to wait 134 years to obtain a Green Card. In the meanwhile, they are not permitted to work lawfully in the United States, nor are they permitted to sponsor their parents for green cards.

Applicants are expected to die while waiting for their Green Card.

According to a recent analysis by David J. Bier, around 424,000 applicants are expected to die while waiting for their Green Card.

“The 1.1 million Indian cases in the backlog bear the majority of the burden of the broken system.” “New applicants from India will face a lifetime wait, and more than 400,000 will die before receiving a Green Card,” Bier stated in the study.

Children migrate to the United States from other nations to remain under the H-4 visa requirements. It is a non-immigrant visa for H-1B visa holders’ wives and children. H1B visas are temporary work permits for highly talented professionals for the uninitiated.

However, once the children reach the age of 21, they are no longer eligible to stay in the United States under the H-4 visa category. These “documented dreamers” are then given two options: seek an F-1 or a student visa, which permits them to study in the US but does not allow them to work without an Employment Authorisation Document (EAD). To obtain the document, one must go through a lengthy and costly process.

They can also return to their native country and wait for their parents to receive a Green Card. This may also be a time-consuming and tough procedure, with no certainty that their parents will be granted a green card.

Bier stated in the study, “The fact that Chinese and Indians dominate the backlog is the result of country caps under which Green Cards are not issued proportionally to the number of pending applicants in each country but rather arbitrarily limited at 7% per nation of birth.”

The Biden administration has made some attempts to reduce the backlog of Green Cards. The administration stated in March 2023 that it would boost the number of Green Cards issued each year by 300,000. According to the government, it is also working on a mechanism to prioritize green cards for family members of US citizens and permanent residents.

According to the research, the backlog for the EB2 and EB3 categories (which are combined since applicants can move between them) is practically a life sentence for new applicants from India. Around 424,000 job seekers would perish in the process, with Indians accounting for more than 90% of them. Given that Indians now account for half of all new employer-sponsored applications, about half of newly supported immigrants will die before receiving a green card.

Over half of the backlog is in the EB‑2 category for employees of U.S. businesses with advanced degrees. Another 19 percent are in the EB‑3 category for employees with at least bachelor’s degrees.

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