Top 10 US Metropolitan Areas where H1-Bs are in High Demand

New York metropolitan area (NY-NJ-PA) stands Number One, in demand for H1-Bs for the 2010 – 2011 year according to the research done by Brookings Institution. There was a request for 52,921 H1-Bs workers from New York. The Demand for H1-B workers has been increasing significantly among the major metropolitan cities in the U.S. during the last few years. USCIS received 250 or more H1-B requests from 106 metropolitan areas.

Here is the top 10 Metropolitan list which have high demand for H1-B Employees:

Geographic Distribution of H1-B requests for the year 2010-2011:

Courtesy:  Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program

Intensity: Number of LCA`s per 1000 employed workers in the same category.

Here are the Main Findings of the research:

• There is a high demand for H1-B workers and the demand changed with economic and political situations in the US. During the Dot-com bubble, the demand was so huge and the H1-B annual cap was temporarily raised from 65,000 to 195,000 during years 2001-2003.
• USCIS received 250 or more H1-B requests from 106 metropolitan areas during 2010-2011 periods.
• 92 Out of 106 high demand metropolitan areas, half of the requests came from STEM occupations.
• For the year 2011, India top the H1-B approved petitions by 58% followed by China (8.8%) and Canada (3.5%).
• 66% of the H1-B requests came from STEM occupations out of which Computer occupations share is 51.2% followed by engineers (8.6%) and financial specialists (5.6%) .
• Almost two-thirds of the H1-B worker requests are associated with the STEM (Science, technology, engineering and mathematics) category. Those apart from STEM category with high demand account to healthcare, finance and business firms.
• Over the last decade, the federal government of U.S. has distributed almost a billion dollars which came in the means of H1-B Visa fee, into a few fund programs to address skill shortages in the U.S. These funds have not been distributed proportionally to the metropolitan areas.
•  Of the highest requesting employers for H1-B visa in 2010-2011, around 80 percent of them are headquartered in the United States.
• Every year, approximately 10 percent of the H1-b visa requests come from educational and research institutions. We need to be well aware of the fact that these visas are not subject to the visa cap.
• Employees requesting for H1-B workers are mostly large companies, who needs workers specialized in Information Technology, Consulting and Electronics.
• Uncapped employers account to about 72 percent of the demand for the life scientists and 80 percent of the demand for the biological scientists.

You might think “Dude..Enough of your fancy stats and findings. Tell me what does it mean to me being a H1-B employee  .”

How does this research assist H1-B Workers?

• The top 10 cities where the demand for H1-Bs is high can be targeted to apply for jobs.
• The chances of being hired and getting your H1-B done is more if you are belong to the STEM (Science, technology, engineering and mathematics) category.
• In case of your OPT being expired and you H1-B not yet filed for this year, try looking for jobs in the H1-B visa exempt cap, which applies to educational, medical and research institutions.
• It is positive note that the H1-B workers are in high demand. This relays that the search for the highly skilled workers is still on. The demand for H1-B workers is still increasing, although so many H1-B employees are hired each year.
• The demand for the H1-B employees doesn’t necessarily infer the shortage of native employees, but it tends to show the preference of the employers to hire foreign high-skilled workers.
• Medicine and post-secondary teaching are the two major streams where the demand for uncapped employers is focused.