Retrogression Optimism

USCIS reports minimal new H1B filings. What does this mean? Obviously US employers are not in need of additional foreign workers. So, does this impact the Immigrant Visa Employment Based retrogression? Indirectly it does. Like H1 petitioners we can assume that Immigrant Perm petitioners who sponsored foreign workers under the perm/I-140 process no longer need those foreign workers. In some cases the petitioner has closed. More likely though as we go through recession petitioners will be unable to prove that they have the continued ability to pay the foreign worker. Namely, if the petitioner’s has no profitability or if the profit falls below the foreign workers offered wage the petition will be denied. I suspect this means that a substantial number of pending I-140/I-485 will ultimately be denied. As a consequence, visas which were allocated to pending filed cases will be made available. Once this happens the State Department will authorize the forward movement of Cut Off Dates. When? Who knows but the May 2009 visa bulletin indicates we will have no forward movement in the EB3 category until Oct 2009. Perhaps there is a silver lining in this recession for our foreign nationals stuck in a retrogression.