The annual H-1B visa petition filing season began on April 1, and demand will certainly far exceed supply. If the past is any guide, then more than 20,000 employers will file hundreds of thousands of registrations hoping to secure approval to submit petitions to sponsor one or more foreign nationals for their businesses.
Only 85,000 H-1B visas are allocated annually, and they largely go to specialty-occupation workers, many of whom are graduates of U.S. institutions. Of this total, 65,000 visas are open to all candidates, and 20,000 are reserved for foreign nationals with a master’s degree or higher from a U.S. university.
There were more than 170 million people working in the U.S. in January 2025, so these highly skilled workers reflect only one-half of one percent of the workforce, and they are all paid the prevailing wage or actual market wage, whichever is higher.
Additionally, a 2022 report found that between 2003 and 2021, the median wage of H-1B workers grew by 52 percent. During the same period, the median wage of all U.S. workers increased by 39 percent. Which is to say, they are not cheap replacement workers, undercutting Americans' wages.
H-1B holders contribute to the U.S. economy and have helped virtually every industry innovate. They are doctors, technology professionals, engineers, professors, accountants, financial analysts, researchers, geneticists, quantum physicists, data scientists and so much more.
Many of these H-1B skilled workers are at the forefront of innovative technologies such as artificial intelligence that will be vital if the U.S. is to retain its dominance in information-technology development.
Indeed, in a Jan. 23 executive order, the Trump administration acknowledged the vital role that AI technologies will play for the U.S., stating that “with the right government policies, we can solidify our position as the global leader in AI and secure a brighter future for all Americans.”
Further, research has routinely found positive impacts of the H-1B visa program on U.S. labor demand. For example, two recent studies found that increases in the presence of H-1B workers in an occupation are associated with a decrease in the unemployment rate within that occupation.
In addition, another recent study found that restrictions on and higher denial rates for H-1B visas may lead some U.S. multinational corporations to increase employment in their overseas operations and decrease the number of jobs they offer in the U.S.
A 2022 study also found strong correlations between the presence of H-1B workers ...
