Majority Statement

• Senator John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV

  Chairman

  U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
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  Majority Statement

  Senator John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV

  Prepared Opening Statement – Senator John D. (Jay) Rockefeller IV, Chairman

  “The Role of Immigrants in America’s Innovation Economy”

  Wednesday, May 8, 2013 2:30 p.m.

  The United States has always been – and still is – a place that attracts talented people from other parts of the world who are searching for new opportunities.  They view our country as a place that values and rewards hard work.  They are attracted to our vibrant, open economy.  And they admire our universities and research institutions that lead the world in technological and scientific innovation.  They are often top students in their home countries, and would have plenty of career opportunities if they stayed there.  But they want a bigger challenge and a bigger stage.  So they come here, to the United States.

  Tens of thousands of high-skilled immigrants come to this country every year to study, work, or start a business.  We should welcome these people, because they make our country and our economy stronger.  They create American jobs.  The role of immigrants in the phenomenal growth of the U.S. technology industry over the past two decades is well documented.  Many of our largest, most successful tech companies – like Intel, eBay, Yahoo, and Google – were founded or co-founded by foreign-born immigrants.  In fact, from 1995 to 2005, foreign-born entrepreneurs helped found 25% of all new high-tech companies.

  But the contributions of high-skilled immigrant workers to our economic success go way beyond Silicon Valley.  As our witnesses are going to tell us today, companies in every region of our country – large, mid-sized, and small – benefit from their talent and skills.  My home state of West Virginia has benefited from the high-quality foreign-trained doctors who practice in underserved rural areas.  We also benefit from the foreign professionals who do some of the specialized advanced manufacturing jobs in our state.  Our witnesses are also going to tell us that our immigration laws sometimes make our country a less welcoming place for high-skilled immigrants than it should be.   

  High demand for H-1B visas and long waiting times for green cards make it more difficult for talented foreign students to work or start a business here after they finish their degrees.  Unfortunately, some students give up and go home, or they move to countries like Canada or Australia, which are actively recruiting highly skilled immigrants.   

  As the Senate begins debating immigration reform, I have called this hearing to examine what changes are needed in our laws to maintain our ability to attract the best and the brightest to the United States.  This issue is part of a bigger challenge that we spend a lot of time discussing in this Committee – the challenge of maintaining our country’s position as the world leader in technological and scientific innovation.  To maintain our lead, we have to be producing enough workers with the skills and training to do the jobs that our 21^st century innovation economy is creating.  One of the reasons American companies hire foreign engineers and scientists is because our U.S. education system is not currently producing enough of them.  

  Leaders in government, academia and the private sector have all identified this issue as one of the keys to our long-term economic success – we have to do a better job encouraging our children to pursue the STEM subjects – science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.  A few years ago, President Obama commented that our economy would be in better shape if fewer young people aspired to be investment bankers, and more instead became engineers, scientists, doctors, or teachers.  He received some flak for this comment, but I think he had it exactly right.  The industries that are creating the high-paid, rewarding jobs of the 21^st century are the science and technology sectors.  We have to do a better job getting our students excited about these subjects, both at the K-12 and the college levels. 

  We have a long way to go in this country to reach the point where we celebrate the accomplishments of science fair winners in the same way we celebrate sports champions.  To keep our economy and our country strong in the coming decades, we are going to need a lot of well-educated, tech and science-savvy workers and entrepreneurs. They are the people who are going to create the good American jobs of the future.  Whether these people are American-born or come to this country as teenagers or adults, we need to give them all an opportunity to contribute to the success and prosperity of our country.         

Minority Statement

• Senator John R Thune

  Ranking Member

  U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
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  Minority Statement

  Senator John R Thune

  Chairman Rockefeller, thank you for holding today’s hearing on “The Role of Immigrants in America’s Innovation Economy.” I would also like to extend a warm welcome to our witnesses, some of whom I understand are testifying before Congress for the first time today.

  Immigrants have been an undeniably important part of our nation’s economic success story, especially in the technology industry. In fact, according to a study by the Kauffman Foundation, over 20 percent of high tech companies in the U.S. have been founded by immigrants. Immigrants created revolutionary companies like Google, Intel, and eBay. It would be hard to imagine modern American life without these innovative companies. 

  It is worrying, however, that for the first time in decades, the growth rate of immigrant-founded startups nationwide has stagnated, perhaps even declined. Our nation is currently engaged in a global battle for jobs and economic prosperity. Many of our foreign economic competitors are taking aggressive action to lure the brightest minds – including scores educated here in the U.S. – to their countries – not just for the talent they bring individually, but for the jobs they help to create and sustain. That is why it’s more important than ever before that we have in place policies that will keep the United States in first place as the world’s top economy.

  We can win this battle for jobs and talent by ensuring that the United States continues to be the innovation capital of the world. We should have a competitive tax policy that encourages rather than discourages investment and growth. We must continue to identify new export markets and fight to increase market access and reduce tariffs. And we need to examine our regulatory framework so that job creators have regulatory certainty and are not unnecessarily burdened.

  In addition to these key goals, our country needs an updated high skills immigration policy that allows the brightest minds to come to our country and become entrepreneurs. The fact that the Commerce Committee is holding this hearing reflects the fact that immigration policy is a multi-faceted issue, and that we must consider the issue from all perspectives if we are going to get the policy right. 

  Our panel today is composed of people from a variety of backgrounds and demonstrates the struggle of the private sector to obtain and keep talented people. I look forward to hearing about the experiences and the challenges high skills immigrants face as they seek to found companies, create jobs, and help grow our nation’s economy.

  Before I close, I wanted to take a moment to mention a proposal to expand high skills immigration known as the Immigration Innovation Act, otherwise known as the “I-Squared” Act, a bill introduced by Sen. Orrin Hatch. I, along with many other members of this Committee, are cosponsors of this important bill. This bipartisan legislation seeks to change the H-1B visa program by, among other things, increasing the annual allocation of H-1B visas from 65,000 to 115,000. The bill also includes a novel “market-based escalator” that allows the supply of H-1B visas to increase or decrease to adequately meet the market’s demand. I believe the I-Squared Act addresses the immediate need to provide American employers with greater access to high-skilled workers, and puts in place a sustainable, longer-term policy that should help us avoid repeated, short-term fixes. 

  Of course, today’s hearing occurs in the shadow of a much larger debate about reform of our immigration system and the comprehensive proposal put forward by eight of our colleagues, including Senator Rubio. As the Judiciary Committee prepares to markup that legislation, and as we all look ahead to likely floor consideration, I hope our Committee’s hearing will inform key aspects of the ongoing immigration debate.  

  Thank you to the witnesses for joining us today. I commend each of you for engaging with this Committee on a critical issue to our nation’s future, and I look forward to your testimony.

Testimony

• Ms. Ruchi Sanghvi

  San Francisco, CA
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• Mr. Jeffrey J. Bussgang

  General Partner, Flybridge Capital Partners

  Senior Lecturer of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
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• Ms. Gwenne Hendricks

  Chief Technology Officer and Vice President of Product Development and Global Technology

  Caterpillar
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• Mr. Stuart Anderson

  Executive Director

  National Foundation for American Policy
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• Mr. Luis Arbulu

  Managing Director

  Hattery
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