zzm9980 wrote:vishalgupta2 wrote:
In addition H1/L1/PR costs in US are insanely high.
What costs? The filing fees?
http://www.uscis.gov/forms
If you can't afford those, you shouldn't be trying to immigrate to the US. The most expensive single action on there is $2,070 USD, and that is only for those who arrived in the US on non-immigrant visas seeking to adjust their status to permanent (get a green card). If you're exploiting loopholes like this, you deserve to pay a bit more. (It's like showing up in SG on your SVP and applying for PR immediately - and most likely getting it.)
H1B to LPR is not a loophole. H1B is defined as a dual intent visa where you are allowed to have immigrant intent. Almost all other non-immigrant visas (Student/Tourist/Medical/Business) you are required to NOT have immigrant intent.
When people convert from F1 (student visa) to H1 (work), that's the loophole.
For cost, the ground reality is that Including attorney fees and everything, a H1B/L1B costs a company about 5000 USD. A green card costs about 10,000 USD to companies.
I moved out from US to Singapore NOT because of costs but for some other reasons. My employer was ready to go for Green card for me but I found it ethically incorrect to make my company spend so much when I had intentions to go to Singapore.
I am all in for expensive visas, in fact I remember that in one of my posts here I said that I would be happy if ICA/MOM made the EP/PR applications expensive (say 1k or so for EP and 5k or so for PR).