The H-1B visa is issued to foreign professionals who wish to live and work in the United States. Every year, the U.S. government grants a total of 85,000 H-1B visas to skilled foreign workers. Former U.S. President Donald Trump had strongly criticized this visa program, claiming that it was taking away job opportunities from American citizens. As part of his strict measures, he significantly increased the application fee for new H-1B visas to ₹89 lakh and announced that applicants’ social media accounts would be reviewed.Now, the U.S. government has announced a major change in the H-1B visa selection process. Until now, H-1B visas were issued through a lottery system. However, this method has been replaced with a new system that gives priority to highly skilled professionals who receive higher salaries.Matthew Tragesser, spokesperson for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), announced that the new rule will come into effect from February 27 next year. He stated that the lottery system allowed companies to hire low-paid foreign workers, which reduced job opportunities for Americans. Under the new process, visas will be issued mainly to high-earning professionals, which is expected to prevent misuse of the system.In the current year, Amazon received the highest number of H-1B visas, with more than 10,000 approvals. It was followed by major companies such as TCS, Microsoft, Apple, and Google.
