Where ever you live and what-ever you think of ‘Americans’, it cannot be denied that the chance to live and work in America is an exciting opportunity that would be difficult for anybody to turn down.

Such an opportunity was presented to my family nearly two years ago. Now, as we look back at the way our lives in the UK were too casually discarded, and stress again at the difficulties we had building new lives in North America, we feel a duty to pass on our experiences as a warning to anyone following in our path.

Although I had enjoyed many work related visits to Connecticut, the major influence of American people and culture had, for the rest of the family at least, come from the television. This is, of course, an extremely misleading and distorted channel for information. I am sure that there was a time when the box in the corner (or now more likely on the wall) was an informative and serious source of knowledge. Those days are long gone in our generation of dumbed-down quick-moving entertainment. It seems that no-one under the age of thirty wants to dwell on an idea for longer than ten seconds without the interlude of a joke or an explosion. America does not have jokes – it has slapstick; it does not have explosions – unless, some would have it, specifically arranged by the government.

So the first piece of advice is a scouting visit for all concerned to see what it is really like. This will, I assure you, both dispel wrong notions and delight in new experiences. You will find that Americans are not loud and arrogant, as you may have come to think from those sit-coms; but friendly individuals who work hard and play hard. If you can do the same then they will welcome you most heartily.

This initial adventure should be designed for two purposes: firstly to have a jolly good time but also more seriously as a reconnaissance of the area you expect to make your new home. It is important to see some of the sights and so make the visit a ‘holiday to remember’, but you should also travel; eat and stay in the local towns. Wherever you currently call home will have areas that you would not want to live in – and America is no different. You may want to have a second scouting visit, if possible, to find a home to rent so that it will be waiting for you when you arrive.

If it is at all possible you should arrange to have a relocation officer. This will not always be available to you, but we came across people who had a much easier transfer because of the assistance of a local representative.

As early as possible in the organization of the move, you must start the process of obtaining the American visas. Due to many reasons, our visas arrived just one week before we were due to travel and this caused us no end of problems. If you can get them sorted early then it will reduce the stress on arrival substantially.

Our lack of visas meant that we could not book flights or removals or even sell our cars in a controlled manner. These all, in particular, cost us significantly due to late fees and desperate sales. Being able to plan your last few months in sure knowledge of your move will vastly decrease the stress and anxiety from that we had to endure.

If you own your home then part of your plan includes the decision of what to do with it. Should you sell or rent it out? We are by no means financial experts, and so we can only tell of our own experience, but it has worked well for us in obtaining a long term tenant. This was the beginning of the recession and we had attempted to sell our house for a full year prior to our American opportunity being presented to us. The prices had dropped dramatically and so we would have been selling at a time of great loss of equity.

If you can obtain your visas early then you can carry out the task which will absolutely change your experience of the new country – you can obtain a Social Security Number.

These nine digits are your key to unlock a multitude of doors and without it you almost do not exist. If you arrive on American soil without this number then you will have to live an expensive and dreadfully frustrating life until the obligatory weeks of waiting for your allocation are over.

Without this number you cannot rent or buy a house. You cannot get paid for your work and certainly not obtain medical insurance. You cannot lease or buy a car and so you have the extensive car hire costs to contend with. You cannot have a phone (other than pay-as-you-go) or arrange for an internet connection. You cannot set up a television service either, but not such a bad thing perhaps as the family will be forced to actually talk to each other.

We had to basically pay upfront for everything by existing on the cash we had brought with us and the use of our English credit cards. The banks had great fun continually cancelling our cards due to ‘potential fraud’, however much we protested.

Whatever you do, do not bring your local currency as there are no facilities for currency exchange. We were astounded to find that there are no travel agencies or exchange bureaus and we had to laugh when we asked the bank to change money – they said they would have to send it away and it could take up to five weeks before we could receive the equivalent in dollars.

With the arrival of our Social Security Number we were finally able to lease a car and we then had the fun of arranging insurance. It is essential you take evidence of no claims with you and obtain insurance within thirty days of arrival in America. We were stung badly by our delay such that we are paying many hundreds of dollars per month which takes a significant chuck out of our income.

Another thing that you can arrange if you obtain your visas early is for the work permit for your spouse. Our visas included the ability for us to apply for a work permit but we did not appreciate that it would cost us so much or that it would still take so long.

The above can really be summarized quite simply in the advice to start your plans to move to America early and arrange as much as possible before you travel. When you obtain your visas then immediately apply for a social security number and a work permit for your spouse. Arrive with these documents and the proof of no-claims on your vehicle insurance. With these and hopefully a home waiting for you to move into, then you will be much more able to enjoy the adventure of new experiences in the land of ‘yes we can’.

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

However one point that we strongly believe that one of the top 2 or 3 causes of illegal immigration in the US is the legal immigration system. This is a widely held belief among well versed Americans that really understand the US Immigration system and its major inadequacies and inequities, as well of course a lot of foreigners that have to suffer through it.

The illegal immigration issue is far more widely covered in the media and talk radio due to its ability to garner passions which are too often irrational among the consumers of those providing the media. As ultimately that passion turns into greater numbers of viewers, listeners or readers and thus more advertising dollars for the publication and those engaging the audience.

The main focus of the illegal immigration debate tends to center around some core issues in the US today which includes;
- Terrorism & National Security
- Open Borders & Need for a fence on the US Southern border
- Illegal immigrants who commit felonies
- Paying taxes and receiving social benefits
- Unsafe and illegal workplace conditions for undocumented workers
- Lowering overall wage levels & taking US jobs
- Breaking up families where parties are of different nationalities

As you can see just by the nature of the headers, each of these points on their own has the ability to garner strong views from both side of the political spectrum producing less than cordial debate and thus no practical, long term, workable and overall beneficial solutions.

I would like to approach a couple of these issues from a different perspective that is rarely discussed in the mass media as a solution for all these problems. That being the US immigration system or the legal immigration system and its inequities that help cause many of the above problems.

As it relates to National Security types issues and Border Control, the current US immigration system and processing is not only more than sufficient, it goes way past what is practical. Every person who applies for a US visa has to supply all 10 fingerprints at their US Consulate interview. Additionally all these people as well as those traveling via the Visa Waiver Program and the new ESTA have to give fingerprints at the port of entry. This is in addition to all the background checks against all suspect databases and information.

Given that 99.999% of people are not National Security threats, nor have done anything that would make them even be considered a threat, this is certainly a huge intrusion into people’s privacy for a free society. It is also worth pointing out that almost all illegal immigrants are not national security risks and that many of the people that have committed atrocities within the US were legal immigrants or citizens. Everyone of the people who slipped through the system were as a result of government bureaucracy and federal agencies not talking to each other.

So really by implement ever more intrusive procedures the US is further alienating almost all the foreigners that are law abiding and follow the rules and yet still missing the ones they want to catch because of simple communication issues that a adolescent could see needed to be fixed.

The other issue I will cover relates to the workplace, taxes, social benefits and taking jobs from US citizens. In a healthy proportion, illegal immigrants are performing tasks that Americans would like not to do and at the same time are secretly happy is being performed by illegals at lower wages as it means lower prices at grocery stores, restaurants and retail stores.

Additionally illegal immigrants like their legal immigrant counterparts are also paying taxes like Social Security and Medicare on top of the relevant Federal and State taxes with no acess to any of these social services. So all immigrant types are helping to contribute to the welfare of their US citizens counterparts. Now if the US government even gave some basic access to social services to legal immigrants, then that would be a reason for people to both follow the rules as immigrants and to also pay their taxes.

As we have discussed in numerous other posts, citing studies like those by Duke Professor, Vivek Wadhwa of the huge net benefit job wise of the healthy immigration policy the US has always had. In that the overall benefit is of a mass job creation and innovation and thus more jobs and wealth for the US and its citizens. So making this process more streamlined and equitable in the end will only create more jobs for US citizens as opposed to arbitrary restrictions and protectionist policies.

In the end illegal immigration is a issue that deserves a lot more attention than this one post. However we just wanted to highlight the relationships between illegal and legal immigration and how fixes in one area can only help the other and the US as a whole.

CJ

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

We recently highlighted some of the more compelling US Immigration trends to help provide you all with a better idea of where the opportunities lie and how the US Immigration map is looking.

We are really grateful for all the comments and feedback to the site as it is this community that keeps the site active and full of new information for everyone to learn and benefit from. As best as we can, we have tried to write articles that are practically informative to answer firstly the most common questions and concerns of all foreigners as they seek to come to the US. Additionally we want to address areas that people may not be aware about the US visa system, life in the US as well as US Immigration issues as a whole.

So as 2009 draws to a close, we would like to again thank you all in participating in the e3visa.info experience and hope you come back again in 2010 and continue to spread the word far and wide to help ever more people.

We also want to highlight some of the major US Immigration talking points of 2009 in one spot so people can get an idea of both how far and how little we have traveled at the same time.

1. The biggest US Immigration story in the early part of the year was a reflection of the US and Global macro economy as many foreigners were laid off in all sectors and all sizes of companies. A good percentage of these people were forced to return to their home countries, unable like their US resident laid off counterparts to find work. However we continued to hear great stories from all people of immigrants overcoming the odds to continue their life in the US.
2. The annual H1B visa season opened as normal on April 1, 2009 for FY2010 and it was almost like nothing happened as the days went by. In recent years there was such a rush on this day it has become almost mandatory to pay for premium processing to ensure the best chance of being selected. Essentially if you hadn’t submitted your application on April 1-3 in recent years you had almost no chance of getting an h1b visa and even if you had that was certainly no guarantee. However even as we reached December, 2009 there were still h1b visas left.
3. The USCIS finally launched a long awaited new release of their website. This was a massive improvement on the previous version as now the ability to find information was actually practical and areas of the site were no longer out of date. However there is still a dearth of real practical information to help the average person navigate the US Immigration system when they reside thousands of miles away in far off lands.
4. In conjunction with the new site release, there were many modifications to the US visa process in 2009 that took effect. There were some modification to the forms required to be filled out and the way the US Consulate Interview is conducted. In general these modifications have been helpful in reducing the amount of paperwork required to be filled and further digitizing the process, including with photos which is helpful. However it is still important to be fully prepared for the US consulate interview for your US visa as we would say from the feedback of the people who were rejected for US visas, a vast majority were due to a lack of preparation. Finally for tourists previously able to come to the US on the Visa Waiver Program without any preparation, the new online ESTA was required to be filled out first.



5. As 2009 rolled along, and millions of Americans were left without work and the unemployment rate topped 10%, the need for scape-goats became great. This fueled a lot of Anti Immigrant sentiment that was inflamed mainly and ironically by politicians and the media given they along with much of corporate America were the main guilty parties for the economic and financial mess the US and the Globe found itself in. In the midst of all this gloom there were some voices of reason like Vivek Wadhwa and select others who demonstrated with fact, rather than hyperbole, that amount of companies that were founded by Immigrants (over 50% of Silicon Valley companies) and the huge net benefit to the US rather than net drain of a strong immigrant environment. Not to mention of course that all Americans, bar Native Americans, were immigrants at some stage, but how quickly people forget the struggles of their ancestors!
6. Despite the fact that we expect US Immigration Reform to be a more dominant story with actual legislation debated in 2010, due to 2009 being dominated by Healthcare Reform, there certainly has been some legislative movement in 2009. We mentioned above that Anti-Immigrant sentiment has been convenient scapegoat for many politicians that so much so Senator Dick Durbin (D) of Illinois and Senator Chuck Grassley (R) of Iowa introduced what can at best be described as an Anti Immigrant and Anti H1B visa legislation. Nothing like cheap political point scoring and with no regard to the future dynamic growth and overall economic costs to the US. The best example of this is the 50/50 clause which on the face of it seems beneficial to the US worker but if you dig deeper into the reality then would have companies like Google, Yahoo, Intel, eBay, etc. who were all founded by Immigrants even be able to have begun. Of course no one wants facts to get in the way of a sound bite on cable news.
7. The Green Card also had an eventful year in 2009. Green Card Processing delays has further frustrated Immigrants from all over the world again and particularly from India and China who are stuck in limbo for in many times 10 years of more, unable to move or change roles due to the crazy backward system. For the first time ever the DV-2010 lottery results for the Green Card Lottery run in 2009 were published online for both winners and non-winners to check. Possibly due to the delays and the economic issues of 2009, it seems ever more people turned to the Green Card Lottery (DV-2011 Lottery) in 2009 as there method to arrive in the US.
8. For those who deal with the F1 visa so they can study in the US, enrollments plummeted in 2009 with applicants from India and South Korea falling 12% and 9% respectively, as students turning their sights on schools in Asia and Europe instead. The Bay Area Council, the Campaign for College Opportunity and IHELP showed that the US needs a 90% upswing in people graduating with degrees in science, technology, math or engineering to keep up with all the new jobs being created in that discipline so it seems like unless policies are revered, a trend may be starting that will see the new Silicon Valley in Bangalore or China.

These of course are only some of the major immigration issues of 2009 and you can read our Immigration News section to read all of the details on these and other talking points of 2009.

We wish you all the best for the new year of 2010 and look forward again to your comments and feedback as hopefully move towards positive and meaningful Immigration reform in 2010.

CJ

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.