The Founders Visa Movement
feld.com
feld.com
I think that an employer should be able to offer a job, not US residency. I think an investor should be able to offer money (and advice, guidance, support). But not a green card, no way.
Think of the implications here. A young investor really doesn't need the money. He's ramen profitable. But he needs the investor's permission to be a startup in the us! Well, that's one way for VC's to get the upper hand in an era when their money doesn't matter as much.
Look, I know hacker news folks tend toward the libertarian side and are generally skeptical of government. But I want the people who decide to award green cards to report to the voting public, not to Larry Ellison. I admire PG, but he doesn't answer to me as a member of the voting public, and he shouldn't. Once VCs gain control over the immigration system, they assume a government role, but we can't exactly vote them out of office if we don't like their decisions. And even if you have faith that PG will be a good guy, do you feel that way about "credible VCs and lawyers?"
Winston Churchill said "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried." Personally, I'm not all that interested in trying out a regime of VCs, no matter how credible a panel has found them to be.
As for the "Green cards to all CS majors" idea, I think a very narrow rule targeting CS would discourage US students from this field, and encourage them instead to pursue more protected degree paths like law. I'm worried about any policy that would drive the already low interest in CS among US students even lower. I also think a University should be in the business of granting degrees, not US residency.
(a) a college degree
(b) a job offer with a salary above the average in their intended metro-area of residence
(c) a basic proficiency with English
(d) no record of criminality
Then there's no discrimination by field, and we'd get a bonanza of educated workers from around the world with minimal social/adjustment costs.
But good luck getting congress to force all private and public companies to publish their salary data ;).
On a political level, I agree, it's a longshot. However, a company that claims it can't find qualified workers at competitive salaries and is asking for a special visa program certainly should be willing to make its salary information public.
Doesn't help if you want to start a business in the US, though.
My only difference is that I can't get behind granting residency to "everyone" with these attributes ... lots of people, sure, but I think that for practical reasons, the US can't offer citizenship or residency to everyone who would like it, even good folks who meet your criteria.
But considering that we take about 1.2 million a year into the US, I'd much rather a good system based on the criteria you've proposed than the dysfunctional nightmare we have right now.
There is a more viable proposal of offering B1s to start a company and extending it beyond 6 months based on evaluation of startup. http://www.feld.com/wp/archives/2009/09/the-founders-visa-mo...
This is a power trip from the VC's it's also a method by which they can extract more equity from the founder of the company using "coming to america" as a carrot.
What does raising money have to do with founding a company? This is a stupid and ego-centric view of entrepreneurship.
90% of VC funded startups fail. 80% of restaurants fail and according to the SBA, as a general rule of thumb, new employer businesses have a 50/50 chance of surviving for five years or more http://www.businessknowhow.com/startup/business-failure.htm
Seems like it would be better for america if raising money was not a requirement of being a founder.
The first thing they often don't understand is how perverse incentives work. Consider, lots of folks with $250K in the bank would be happy to get a guaranteed $50K out of it. So they would "invest" (launder) the money into a fake start-up which would serve only for the "found" to give them back their $250K plus $50K in return for the "founder" getting a green card.
Just one bad effect of this would be the fake start-ups themselves, which would pollute the start-up space with starting with more fake craiglist ads on up.
Perhaps the most interesting comment over there is on relaxing the criteria for the O-1 visa instead. Perhaps instead of being "incredibly famous" you could just be "well known in your field" instead.. I better keep in the top 100 on Hacker News then ;-)
If there were programs I felt were sufficiently reputable I'd go for it. However, I'd want to quantify the risk. I'd rather not get into a situation where some ski resort gets partially built, goes under and funnily enough its all the immigrants money which disappears into dubious hands.. and the immigrants should just be happy they got their greencard.
Maybe more founders ought to look at the O-1.
Further, it should go without saying that other immigration conditions -- non-criminal, etc. -- will still be in effect.
I do think the proposal could be even more simple, though. We could just sell Visas to anyone who's law-abiding and self-sufficient. Then the only dimension for argument between pro- and anti-immigration advocates can be the price.
Start with a small pool and auction them off at a high price. Do a rolling study of taxes paid, jobs created, and services used by those who purchased those Visas. Each year, if prior experience suggests more people entering under this program would have been a net benefit, increase the pool. If the study ever indicates the entrants were a net drain, decrease the pool in following years.
You can even bias the whole process strongly against more immigration, to pander to the paranoid, and it would still address one of the biggest problems facing businesses: the uncertainty of getting a key employee in-country. There would be a relatively predictable price for doing so, which would allow rational planning.
Great, so all the rich sons of the Saudi Arabia royal family will buy their green card so they can travel freely, and all the entrepreneurs will stay home.
Plus, since such wealthy quasi-tourists create no net cost (and probably create value) with their visits, each year we'd increase the allotment until it reaches the intended audience: productive people we'd rather have here than competing against domestic employers from elsewhere.
In fact, Paul Graham's original essay leaves handing out the "founder's visa" entirely in the hands of the government. No mention is made to giving investors the power to grant immigration status. It would work in exactly the same way that the H1B visas work: Companies can vouch for a candidate to the government in an application, but ultimately it would be up to the government to decide. Don't like who they pick? Don't vote for your senator next time.
VCs and investor would "gain control over the immigration system" with the founders visa no more than universities and tech companies have control over immigrants with H or F visas
I completely disagree with this characterization of the H1B visa. Clearly, the visa is controlled by the employer, not the employee. And while the government does have to "ok" the visa, the employee does not apply directly to the government. The employer has tremendous, overwhelming authority over who does and does not get to come into the country and get in the queue for a green card.
A "points system" like the one used in Australia (discussed in other posts here) would preserve the immigrant's freedom, but I would like to point out that an Oracle lobbyist argued fiercely against it when a congressman proposed this, saying it would be "communistic" to have the government, rather than corporate HR, decide who Oracle gets to hire.
Personally, I'm outright cynical at this point. At first, I thought this was a design flaw, but now I'm pretty convinced that the industry likes the indentured nature of the visa and the extraordinary power it gives them over their employees. Those pesky US citizens and permanent residents can demand raises, leave for other offers, even gasp! start companies that compete with Oracle! Well, we can't have that! But H1Bs need green cards, and transfering jobs is risky, so by and large, they'll accept their lot in life and stick around for 5 years under the conditions we dictate.
"VCs and investor would "gain control over the immigration system" with the founders visa no more than universities and tech companies have control over immigrants with H or F visas".
We have profoundly different perspectives on the degree of control tech companies have over their employees on H1B visas.
Do you really think this will happen? This is a terrible idea, and if it were a good idea, the govt would never give up the right to decide who enters/stays the country, even partially.
As it stands, right now, I'm likely to start a company outside the US. I'll create jobs overseas instead of here just because of the hassles I've had with US immigration. I find the situation to be rather illogical.
I'm currently on a H1B and in the greencard queue. Anti-H1B people love to rave about my taking jobs from US citizens. I get to hear it in person from time to time because, since I'm white and speak English with an indeterminate American style accent, people presume I don't object to them bitching about the Indians and Chinese H1B holders while I wait at the coffee stand.
I'd rather start my own company. I've had a startup before in Europe so I know what I'm getting into. Then someone else could take my current job. I'm financially secure (close to $1m cash in the bank in addition to my long-term investments) but:
- I want to solve my immigration status and not resort to non-immigrant temporary visas like E-2
- I'm not happy to just hand $500k to $1m over to an investment of unknown risk to get an EB-5
- There is enough to do while starting up without getting bogged down in convincing some non-expert in the merits of a business plan and a schedule of hiring etc.
- My H1B NIW just got a request for evidence despite my letters of recommendation from "household names" in my particular industry (sorry to be deliberately vague).
- I have a government in another country willing to throw money at me to startup there
Now I could startup abroad and transfer back and jump thru various hoops that way. But, frankly, I have a young family and want to build a permanent base for myself. I rather like Northern California for that but there are many other nice places in the world as well.
shrug it leaves me confused as to why the US is so hostile to my intention to build a home here and create jobs.
I'm largely opposed to the H1B visa, but I definitely don't like to rave about your taking jobs from US citizens. I certainly don't think that you have.
This visa was truly a miserable piece of public policy, and I think the US should regard it as a failure and try to implement something that is in the better interest of the American public as well as the people who would like to work here and would make great contributions.
I read a bit about Australia's points system, and I think it's a good approach. You get points for having valuable skills, proficiency in english, and so forth. If you exceed a certain threshold, you get a "visa" (I'm not sure if that's the term they use, it's a residency and work permit). What's so cool about this system is that the visa is granted directly to the individual, so it preserves freedom. I also like it because it doesn't single out high tech - lots and lots of different professions and trades get full points, so engineers/programmers won't feel singled out and thrown under the bus, so to speak. While the needs of employers are a factor (a job offer adds points), it doesn't give employers control over the worker's right to reside in Australia.
I know you've had a bad time of the US immigration system, and anti-H1B ranters have given you plenty of opportunity to view critics of the program as anti-immigrant (and even potentially racist). But I'm hoping you can also agree that many US citizens who work in technical fields are legitimately outraged about abuses of this program.
I don't mind at all if you personally disagree that the H1B program has deterred Americans from entering the field at a time we badly need to ensure a steady supply from our own population, but I do think you should recognize that this is a reasonable point of view that can and should be debated.
Both the Australian and Canadian processes look far more sane to me. The Canadian one also runs roughly along the lines you mention.
I don't know whether Americans have been deterred from entering the field or not. However, I do know that in my particular subfield there is a distinct shortage of qualified people of any nationality.
What's wrong with E-2? 5 years is plenty of time to get your company far enough, and then apply for adjustment of status (green card).
I favor something realistic, that has a chance to pass: extend the E-2 regulations to setup some ground rules so that you know that you will be getting the visa if you are a bona fide founder.
There is no $500K requirement on E-2.
As they stand, there are essentially no regulations around E-2, so you don't know what your application should contain and how it will be judged. That can be fixed fairly easily without 5 years of debate.
It is also a non-immigrant visa. It's not a matter of a simple "adjustment of status" you have to do a greencard application under one of the usual categories which can be non-trivial and an extremely lengthy process depending on your country of origin.
there has been a strong increase of refusals to renew. Eg. at the London embassy
That's the key point for me: E-2 has no rules. Let's make some rules that make it easy for legitimate entrepreneurs to get it.
It is also a non-immigrant visa
Yes, but after two years, either your startup is going places, or it's dead. If it's doing well, you can (as the CEO) fairly easily adjust, which after one year (concurrent filing of I-485 and I-140), will put you in a position very similar to having a real greencard.
I agree it's not perfect, but it has the advantage of being doable by the current administration. We can also debate long-term, more ideal reforms, but they'll remain in the form of Internet bloggers pontificating for decades. So for once I choose practicality: get some actual change going.
You refer to "fairly easily adjust" and do concurrent filing of the 484 and 140 - this is the same as one does after labor certification in the H1B process. However, its not at all clear to me which category of greencard you are referring to with your "fairly easily adjust". I don't think EB-1 applies and the rest take just as long as the H1B to greencard route. Can you clarify which category you are talking about?
Yes, we lose some startups because of our immigration laws, but we lose far, far more to job lock-in because of healthcare.
But the more fundamental flaw here is privatizing decisions about citizenship. I can't think of anything that's more appropriately handled by government.
You need 75 points.
1) An advanced degree gets you 35. A PhD 50 and an MBA 75 (debatable, but good)
2) Gross salary over the last year gets you another 30 points (so if you made above $70k/yr)
3) Age gets you another 20 (below 28)
4) Work experience in the UK and English language qualifications get you another 10 points
Sure, this may not work for the people straight out of school (you do need 1 year of earnings and any decent dev with a Master's should be able to pull 75k) - but a couple of years of real world experience after school is probably a good thing, right?
Why does the US tie you to an employer? Probably because the H1-B program was a way to bring (relatively cheaper) labor into the US.
Not for nothing, but valuing an MBA higher than, say, a math Ph.D. is a bit insulting to some. MBAs are just taking jobs from other MBAs, really.
Edit: braino
Personally, I suspect this reflects cartel building and market coercion (lawyers), as well as the reality that finance people can earn large salaries without actually producing any wealth.
So personally, I do think that math/sci/engineering folks are often far more valuable than the MBA/JD folks, but I can't get behind any "shortage" argument until their pay reflects this.
I would any day opt to move to US and build a company over there given US is relatively a superior matured market segment for online businesses and more than that for the excellent startup ecosystem.
In the past have built products predominantly for US audience including a book readers community on facebook (which was my baby) that eventually got acquired by lulu publishing. But now when I am on my own startup I am devoid of deeper & closer understanding into the market/customers, the US presence to promote my products and access to funds, mentors and product launchpad.
Recently got a B1 visa to visit US but I was so uncertain of even that given I am self employed, single, with not much assets and in all ways seem to fit a potential immigrant in the view of the consulate. I couldn't have thought of any way to explain the consulate "a regular job" doesn't interest me and I am not going to take away jobs.
I am sure a lot of entrepreneurs in this part of the world would be blessed and move to silicon valley following their dreams of building a business and fortune.
Getting VCs to sit in a government committee and review thousands of visa applications seems rather unlikely, and their success prediction ratio is questionable.
The various legibility profiles I've seen (like those in Canada etc) all seem to filter out Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Larry Ellison..
Perhaps a solution is to allow investors like YC sponsor something like H1B granted to their companies' founders rather than their own employees.
But, is there really a need for all this? Why does anyone have to be in the US in order to start a company? If anything, shouldn't the web make geography less of an issue?
(1) set up a non-government board consisting of credible VCs, entrepreneurs, and lawyers to vet applicants.
It probably is a better solution than what PG proposed in his original essay. "let the market decide. Startup investors work hard to find the best startups. The government could not do better than to piggyback on their expertise, and use investment by recognized startup investors as the test of whether a company was a real startup."
PG's version would eliminate anyone who would bootstrap a startup without external funding. Brad's is a little inclusive.
I would rather prefer to leave it at "let the market decide."
Any interesting ideas as to how you could convert that statement into an actionable policy for immigration authorities to follow?
That said, I also don't like the idea of having a non-government board decide.
IMO, any co-founder of the company who owns more than a particular amount in the startup and the startup is at a stage where it can afford paying $100k+ salary to the co-founder should be able to obtain a visa. If the startup is VC funded, even better. But again there should be a complete background check and the startup business plan should be assessed by an independent committee before granting a VISA. Also, educational qualifications of the co-founder should be taken into account like PhDs should get the top most priority.
But still, there are a lot of things I really don't like about this proposal as well.
My experience as a grad student in engineering at Berkeley has left me convinced that these programs are utterly abusive of their students. If there's a shortage of Americans willing to sign up for PhD's in STEM fields, these institutions deserve it. Plus, starting salaries for PhD's in science/engineering lag badly behind MBA/JD/MD programs. This would only exacerbate the situation. And if a Ph.D granting institution is able to award citizenship along with a PhD, there's pretty much no limit to the abusiveness they'll get away with. Hey professors - Want to keep your highly trained poorly paid lab tech around for another year? No problem - you control his dream of citizenship, so trust me, he'll keep working 80 hour weeks for you for $22K a year.
When this sets the standard for treatment of grad students, Americans will all but abandon the field. Expect the already high percentage of foreign students in PhD programs to jump even higher if this becomes policy.
Of course there are neat ways for PhD holders to sidestep labor certification to hugely speedup up their greencard applications so I am somewhat being punished for making the saner professional/financial decision!