Bill Gates, the chairman of Microsoft sounded precisely that theme in Senate testimony last month when asked about the visa program for skilled workers, the H-1B.
Mr. Gates said that these workers are “uniquely talented” and highly paid — “taking jobs that pay over $100,000 a year” — and that America should “welcome as many of those people as we can get.”
But that is not how the H-1B visa program as a whole is working these days, according to an analysis by Ronil Hira, an assistant professor of public policy at the Rochester Institute of Technology. The median salary for new H-1B holders in the information technology industry is actually about $50,000, based on the most recent data filed by companies with the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services agency.
