Maria Kallmeyer Gives Perspective on Immigration as Key Factor in Labor Shortage Issues in Area Development Magazine Article
Maria Kallmeyer, a Quarles & Brady Chicago-based Immigration partner, shared her perspective in an Area Development Magazine article about whether immigration policy could help address labor shortage issues in the United States. With labor gaps apparent and growing in recent years, the article explored how changes in immigration policy could be a solution.
An excerpt:
One more issue is that current immigration law only has mechanisms for welcoming foreign workers with at least a bachelor’s degree. “There is no real category for people with less than a bachelor’s degree,” Kallmeyer says, which can stand in the way of hiring immigrants for many different jobs, from welders to assemblers to nurses.
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“Immigration reform is the answer we certainly need, and it has been many years, since the 1990s, that we have had any real immigration reform,” Kallmeyer says. “I don’t think there is an appetite for it.” If policymakers were to develop that hunger for change, she offers a number of ways they could make a difference. One of the simplest would be to get rid of the 85,000 quota for H1-B visas and establish a market-based cap instead. “There is no reason for an artificial quota,” she says.