AI first Global Impact : H1B Visa

The most famous and influential passports might be those of Singapore or Japan, but the most famous and in-demand visa is the USA H1B visa.

By category and formal classification, it is required when a company needs to hire foreign workers in a speciality occupation. The visa is awarded through a lottery system, with a cap of 65,000, plus an additional 20,000 cap. This is done as demand always exceeds the supply.

Though it is not mentioned to be allocated to a certain industry or country, given the past trend, the majority are given to the Tech industry and Indian citizens.

The executive order signed by President Trump created a lot of confusion over the weekend, and companies issued advisories to their employees accordingly. Though clarification issued might have provided a breather, the structure of demand will surely change in the coming lottery cycles.

The reason for doing this from the administration's point of view is revenue generation and making sure that only highly skilled labour that is unavailable locally is provided with such a visa. The most curious and unexplored reason might be AI itself.

In the last quarter earnings, many tech companies and tech departments within corporates mentioned that they are now writing 25-40% of their code using AI. This does involve a human element for prompts, review and corrections, but the load is drastically lowered.

This would have given enough incentive to the administration to take such a step. Given that the staffing needs of these companies and departments can withstand such a change without impacting development over the period.

If this is the main reason, then within three years, AI commercialisation will have achieved what was impossible for a decade or two. The question now is how it impacts other industries as the development and deployment accelerate in the next three years.