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New rules ease ‘green card’ quest (GREEN CARDS)
Philipine News Online ^ | 01/05/2005 | Stephanie Grace Loleng

Posted on 01/05/2005 1:04:07 AM PST by nanak

FOREIGN workers seeking permanent residency will no longer have to wait several years under a new system implemented by the Department of Labor (DOL), streamlining the labor certification system, reducing the processing time to 45-60 days.

Last December 27, DOL issued its final rule on the new labor certification system, “Program Electronic Review Management” or “Perm,” The new regulations take effect on Mar. 28, 2005, with the same DOL unit, Employment and Training Administration (ETA) implementing it. Under Perm, employers must file a new ETA Form 9089, which can be filed electronically.

“The current process has been criticized as being complicated, time consuming and requiring the expenditure of considerable resources,” DOL acknowledged in issuing the new rules.

While lauding Perm as good news, Robert Reeves, principal of Southern California-based Reeves & Associates, maintained the need to fix the visa backlog.

The labor certification process is a necessary step for foreign workers seeking permanent residency in the United States.

Before the employers of these workers can file immigrant visa petitions with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (Uscis), the DOL must certify that the permanent job offer to the foreign worker will not pose any missed opportunity or displacement for U.S. workers.

The sheer number of U.S. employers seeking permanent hiring of foreign workers has resulted in massive backlogs in both labor certification applications with DOL and immigrant petitions with the Uscis.

“Perm is the second part of the [Bush] Administration efforts to bring labor that will accommodate employers in the U.S.,” said Reeves.

The immigration lawyer said he expects his office to be deluged with inquiries about the new rules. His advice: go to an established immigration law office.

Some requirements have changed that will affect a number of Filipino workers in the U.S.

For instance, the DOL document states a change for nurses in that, a nurse’s employer must present documentation that the prospective employee has passed the CGFNS (Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools) examination or has acquired permanent, full and unrestricted license in the state of intended employment.

Otherwise, nurses and physical therapists remain in the “Schedule A” category that lists occupations with known shortages of U.S. workers, and are thus open to foreign workers.

For live-in domestic workers, most of the requirements remain the same, according to Reuben Seguritan, a member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, except for changes in supporting documents for auditing purposes. Seguritan noted that, under the new rules, employers must maintain three key documents related to permanent residency applications for live-in domestic workers.

These include a statement describing the worker’s living conditions; the employment contract, indicating among others, the wage, hours worked, and freedom to leave the premises on off hours; and a document evidencing the foreign worker’s experience of at least one year of full-time employment. Pending cases may be withdrawn and re-filed under the Perm system, according to Seguritan.

Under the current process, it would take over five years for a foreign worker to gain permanent status, according to Evelyn Sineneng Smith, an immigration consultant.

“There is a provision in the new Perm regulations which affects so many Filipino household domestic workers and nannies and caregivers in private homes or residential care homes. Now there is absolutely no reason for Filipinos to remain as TNTs [tago ng tago or undocumented],” said Sineneng Smith.

The Department of Labor’s ETA spells out every aspect of this new system in “Labor Certification for the Permanent Employment of Aliens in the United States; Implementation of New System; Final Rule” that can be viewed at www.ows.doleta.gov/foreign/


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: aliens; bushplan; dhs; dol; greencard; immigrantlist; immigration; labor
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To: rolling_stone
Fortunately the people who make this economy go don't think like you. You are totally preoccupied with protecting your share of the pie instead of increasing the size of the pie. More doctors can generate more medical demand, build more hospitals, ....

Your theoretical supply/demand models don't work in practice. Look at the actual facts and you will see that immigrant labor is helping, not hurting our economy, including our standard of living.

You're wasting your time being concerned about people who will always be dead beat losers. Their problem isn't immigrants or imports or outsourcing or the weather or technology, or quotas, or scabs or mergers or anything else except their own attitude. You can't help them.

41 posted on 01/06/2005 11:04:02 PM PST by bayourod (The states and cities with large immigrant labor pools are the prosperous ones.)
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To: bayourod

Fortunately the people who make this economy go don't think like you. You are totally preoccupied with protecting your share of the pie instead of increasing the size of the pie.

I am not trying to protect my piece of the pie, I am concerned for our nation and the sad direction it is heading..all you have to do is look at Mexico and imagine what America could look like with unlimited immigration...Its kinda like looking at a prospective spouses parents to see what your spouse probably will look like in the future..it isn't a pretty picture...don't forget the Mayans flourished & prospered in cities with great monuments and technology, before they disappeared from the face of the earth...

More doctors can generate more medical demand, build more hospitals, ....

Yes they can but not in proportion to such a large increase in doctors...wages still would be depressed.


Your theoretical supply/demand models don't work in practice. Look at the actual facts and you will see that immigrant labor is helping, not hurting our economy, including our standard of living.

You seem to think having an abundant supply of cheap labor is good for the economy..well just take a look at third world countries and their abundant supply of cheap labor, that is the direction we are heading if we don't slow down our immigration...

I am looking at tht whole picture not just the economy..
Your standard of living may have increased and others that exploit illegals also, but mainstream America's standard of living is not increasing..

You're wasting your time being concerned about people who will always be dead beat losers. Their problem isn't immigrants or imports or outsourcing or the weather or technology, or quotas, or scabs or mergers or anything else except their own attitude. You can't help them.

I agree I can't help you. I can however present facts to show that your attitude/opinion is wrong and not based on fact.

http://newstandardnews.net/content/?action=show_item&itemid=978
http://www.carryingcapacity.org/DinAlt.htm
http://www.dieoff.com/page136.htm


42 posted on 01/06/2005 11:43:42 PM PST by rolling_stone
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To: bayourod
You're wasting your time being concerned about people who will always be dead beat losers. Their problem isn't immigrants or imports or outsourcing or the weather or technology, or quotas, or scabs or mergers or anything else except their own attitude. You can't help them.

More American bashing from bayourod.

43 posted on 01/07/2005 12:25:06 AM PST by usadave
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To: rolling_stone
"I am concerned for our nation and the sad direction it is heading.."

The sky is not falling, everything is getting better by any objective standard. Did you sleep through the presidential campaign?

"I am looking at tht whole picture not just the economy.. Your standard of living may have increased and others that exploit illegals also, but mainstream America's standard of living is not increasing.. "

Well the economy is what determines our standard of living and lots of people who don't employ illegals are buying bigger houses, exotic entertainment systems, new cars, designer clothes, expensive jewelry.....

44 posted on 01/07/2005 10:02:27 AM PST by bayourod (The states and cities with large immigrant labor pools are the prosperous ones.)
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To: seppel

This may interest you.


45 posted on 01/07/2005 10:03:47 AM PST by cyborg (http://mentalmumblings.blogspot.com/)
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To: bayourod

"I am concerned for our nation and the sad direction it is heading.."
The sky is not falling, everything is getting better by any objective standard. Did you sleep through the presidential campaign?

No I did not sleep through the campaign. Everything is not getting better by an objective standard.

"I am looking at tht whole picture not just the economy.. Your standard of living may have increased and others that exploit illegals also, but mainstream America's standard of living is not increasing.. "

Well the economy is what determines our standard of living and lots of people who don't employ illegals are buying bigger houses, exotic entertainment systems, new cars, designer clothes, expensive jewelry.....


Our standard of living includes other things than just bigger houses jewelry etc. Literacy rates, Health, Crime, Pollution, Traffic, Environment, all contribute to our standard of living. It's single minded money grabbers like you who think a new car or jewelry makes for a good standard of living while gangs of criminals are multiplying, literacy is going down, traffic is going up, affordability of housing is going down, etc. A high standard of living includes people following the law and paying their share of public burdens. If one person owned all the wealth in a country and the rest worked for subsistence wages, the average economy could show a high standard of living but in reality it would be in the sewer. That's where our country is headed, a third world sewer of uneducated, dependent, corrupt, lawbreaking people. Two chickens in every pot or two cars in every garage do not a high standard of living make. Ask the people of Iraq about their high standard of living under Saddam....those that lived through it...


46 posted on 01/07/2005 12:24:25 PM PST by rolling_stone
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To: rolling_stone
"That's where our country is headed, a third world sewer of uneducated, dependent, corrupt, lawbreaking people."

Well at least we all know where you're coming from now.

As for me, America never looked better. ... if i just had a big enouigh wall to hang my new tv on...

47 posted on 01/07/2005 5:06:27 PM PST by bayourod (The states and cities with large immigrant labor pools are the prosperous ones.)
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To: bayourod
Well the economy is what determines our standard of living and lots of people who don't employ illegals are buying bigger houses, exotic entertainment systems, new cars, designer clothes, expensive jewelry.....

And many of these people who are buying all these things are in debt up to their eyeballs.

48 posted on 01/07/2005 5:51:48 PM PST by judgeandjury
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