New Data and Facts on H-1B Workers across Firms
New Data and Facts on H-1B Workers across Firms
Using administrative USCIS data on approved I-129 petitions we summarize trends in H-1B employment between 1997 and 2012. We show that total annual petition counts in our micro data closely match USCIS-published records of aggregate issuances overall, by occupation, and by country of origin. We use string-matching techniques to build a longitudinal company-level dataset, of roughly 400,000 companies, for approved petitions, distinguishing between petitions for initial and continuing employment. These data show increased concentration of H-1B workers, with a 150% increase in the share of new initial-employment H-1Bs awarded to the top-20 petitioning firms between 2008 and 2012, and an increasing role played by global IT consulting companies. We match our dataset on approved H-1B petitions to Compustat data on all publicly traded companies. The data show that roughly 42% of Compustat companies had at least one approved petition during our sample period. We find firms using the H-1B program are larger on average and have higher growth rates than non-users. We show the expanding number of H-1Bs in the business services sector after 2008 is largely driven by greater use of H-1B workers (relative to overall employment in the industry), as opposed to growth in the industry’s size.
Keywords: H-1b, visas, skilled mirgration, I-129 petitions, firms, compustat, computer-related occupations, IT consulting firms, STEM, labor condistion applications
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