[A. Pole]

No new petitions for first-time employment in 2004 will be accepted starting Wednesday, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services said this week. The cutoff means that the annual cap of 65,000 new workers has been reached less than five months into the fiscal year, which began Oct. 1.

The news prompted a quick response from American Business for Legal Immigration, a coalition of 200 corporations, universities, research institutions and trade associations.

"Our goal is to keep the U.S. economy growing and keep U.S. jobs in America. Sometimes this requires hiring a limited number of highly educated foreign professionals to fill technical or specialized positions," Sandy Boyd, chair of the group, said in a statement on Wednesday. "Reaching the 2004 visa limit less than halfway through the fiscal year is clear evidence that the system needs to be fixed."

Free traders want system to be "fixed".

[oceanview]

what they really want is no cap at all, no limit. it should be completely eliminated.

[WayneM]

Right. Fixed so more foreign workers can be brought in - regardless of high unemployment in technical fields.

The software company where I work uses H-1B workers. Several rounds of layoffs in the last few years - but the H-1B workers are still there.

[Happy2BMe]

"Reaching the 2004 visa limit less than halfway through the fiscal year is clear evidence that system needs to be fixed the United States of American is under seige and payoff money has come to a trickle."

[neutrino]

Reaching the 2004 visa limit less than halfway through the fiscal year is clear evidence that the system needs to be fixed."

Fixed? Fixed as in spayed and neutered? Okay!!!!

[DustyMoment]

Yeah, I'm in favor of"fixing" the system. I'm about to change my name to Vijay Pradesh so that I can get one of those high paying jobs that "Americans don't want".

[looscnnn]

"Free traders want system to be "fixed"."

Fixed so they can bring more foriegners in. How about hiring Americans first? The reason the limit was met so soon is because they are using the visas first, instead of the last as intended.

[DannyTN]

"Reaching the 2004 visa limit less than halfway through the fiscal year is clear evidence that the system needs to be fixed."

Reaching a limit is bad? I thought that was the purpose of a limit in the first place.