2021 Digest of NFAP Forbes Articles on Trade and Immigration Below are links to Forbes articles that have appeared in 2021 divided by topic. The articles are also pasted below in full and can be found by searching for the title. H-1B Visas and High-Skilled Immigration The Story Of How Trump Officials Tried To End H-1B Visas USCIS Taking Two Years To Process Many Applications For H-1B Spouses Trump’s H-1B Visa Wage Rule Is Dead: What’s Next? Over 1 Million Job Vacancy Postings In Computer Occupations In U.S. 2021 Might Be A Decisive Year For H-1B Visas U.S. Chamber Of Commerce Lawsuit Looks To Slay H-1B Visa Rules Again Trump DOL Wage Rule Remains Threat To H-1B Visas And Immigrants Plaintiffs Dispute USCIS Reasons For Long Delays For H- 1B Spouses DOL Delays Trump Wage Rule Poised Against Immigrants And H-1B Visas Immigration Bill Shows Need To End Employment-Based Immigrant Backlog New Bill Has Many Good But Two Bad Measures For Employment Immigrants H-1B Visa Ban Not Sustainable Amid Low Computer Unemployment Rate Ending Unlawful Trump H-1B Visa Policies Caused Denials To Plummet Trump Ignores Jobs Data To Extend H-1B Visa And Immigration Bans The Outlook On H-1B Visas And International Students In 2021 DOL H-1B Visa Wage Rule: Donald Trump’s Bad Parting Gift To Immigrants DHS And DOL Team Up On H-1B Visas Against IT Services Companies The Biden Administration And What Happens To Trump’s H-1B Visa Rules International Students Research: More International Students, More U.S. Student STEM Degrees Rule To End The H-1B Visa Lottery Would Harm International Students U.S. Businesses And Universities Defend STEM OPT In Court What International Students And U.S. Universities Need To Know AI Commission: Immigrants Key To America’s Tech Competitiveness Trump And Miller Left Biden With Unfinished Immigration Business Asylum, Refugees and the Border Asylum Expert: Respecting Human Rights Also Controls The Border Joe Biden’s New Policies For Asylum, DACA And Legal Immigration Illegal Immigration In America Has Continued To Decline Immigration – General Evidence Mounts That Reducing Immigration Harms America’s Economy The State Department Can Act To Reduce Visa Delays New Research Makes Case For Increasing Immigration Lawsuit Challenges Biden Administration Covid-19 Visa Policies Businesses Lend Support To The Case For Dreamers Attorneys Question Logic Of Policy Blocking Business Visas In Europe Pardons May Have Revealed Insincerity Of Trump Immigration Policies Unlike Trump, Bush Paints A Kind Picture Of Immigrants International Travel Nightmares Pause For Supersonic Dreams Thomas Sowell: Common For Poor Immigrants To Make New Country Richer America’s First Employment-Based Immigrant: Friedrich Von Steuben Trade Trump’s Tariffs Were Much More Damaging Than Thought IMF Tells Biden To Dump Trump’s Tariffs Forbes July 7, 2021 IMF Tells Biden To Dump Trump’s Tariffs By STUART ANDERSON For the good of the U.S. and world economy, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has advised the Biden administration to end the tariffs imposed by Donald Trump and his administration. The Biden administration has disappointed economists and trade analysts by continuing policies that objective measures show harm U.S. consumers and companies. The “Concluding Statement of the 2021 Article IV Mission,” which was issued on July 1, 2021, following the end of an official IMF staff visit, takes aim at U.S. trade policies. “The [Biden] administration has underscored the need for a ‘worker-centric’ trade agenda that ensures that global trade benefits Americans as workers and wage-earners, not just as consumers,” notes the IMF in a section titled Gaining from Trade. “In pursuing these objectives, a removal of the obstacles to free trade would help support U.S. workers and create more and better U.S. jobs (particularly in light of the domestic efforts that are being proposed to increase productivity, labor supply, and the competitiveness of U.S. producers). “It is of significant concern, therefore, that many of the trade distortions introduced over the past four years remain in place. In particular, tariffs have been kept on imported steel and aluminum, washing machines, solar panels, as well as a range of goods imported from China. The administration has also committed to prioritizing U.S. producers in public procurement, strengthening ‘Buy American’ requirements put in place by the previous administration. These policies should be reconsidered. Trade restrictions and tariff increases should be rolled back and ‘Buy American’ provisions should be tightly circumscribed and made consistent with the U.S. international obligations. Doing so would underscore the U.S. traditional commitment to an open, stable, and transparent international trade regime.” (Emphasis added.) The Biden administration has maintained Donald Trump trade policies even though economic research has shown Trump’s tariffs—the core of his trade policies—were even more damaging than initially believed. Research by Mary Amiti, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and Sang Hoon Kong and David Weinstein, both economists at Columbia University, used movements in stock prices to measure the response to policy announcements on tariffs and the escalation of the U.S.-China trade war initiated by the Trump administration. The economists found a long-term decline in U.S. consumer well-being (or “welfare”) of 7.8%: “Our results show that the trade-war announcements caused large declines in U.S. stock prices, expected TFP [Total Factor Productivity], and expected inflation largely by moving macro variables, but also by causing declines in the returns of firms trading with China. We find that markets expect the trade war to lower U.S. welfare by 7.8 percentage points.” Total Factor Productivity (TFP) “is the portion of output not explained by the amount of inputs used in production,” as defined by the Harvard Business School. “The results suggest that markets interpreted the impact of the tariffs as much more negative than what economists initially estimated,” said David Weinstein in an interview. “Part of the reason stems from the fact that the U.S. tariffs rose significantly in 2019, and the earlier studies didn’t include these higher rates. Moreover, the new analysis suggests that the tariffs’ impact on productivity is likely to be a factor holding down U.S. growth rates. The tariffs protect the least efficient firms and reduced their incentives to innovate while hurting the most successful U.S. firms, reducing their ability to innovate.” The decline in stock market value caused by trade war announcements “amounted to a $3.3 trillion loss of firm value (equivalent to 16% of U.S. GDP [Gross Domestic Product] in 2019).” The Congressional Budget Office has calculated the tariffs imposed by the Trump administration cost the average U.S. household more than $1,200 a year. A letter (June 30, 2021) from Republican senators urged President Biden to end the Trump tariffs. “For more than three years, we have highlighted the harm to U.S. businesses from tariffs and the trade war. While campaigning, you acknowledged this harm when you stated ‘American farmers, manufacturers and consumers’ were ‘losing and paying more,’” wrote Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE), Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA). The IMF also criticized what has become a common protectionist trade tactic—blaming other countries for currency manipulation (whether or not it exists). “Treating currency undervaluation as a subsidy to be countervailed raises concerns both in the finance and trade spheres and risks increased trade tensions and retaliation (with other countries replicating a similar approach, perhaps using their own standards and methodologies). Currency-related trade responses should be avoided,” according to the IMF. The IMF argues that U.S. trade agreements should not include “enforceable provisions on currency policy” and that “the U.S. should work constructively with its trading partners to better address the underlying macro-structural distortions that are affecting external positions.” “The IMF’s advice is excellent: To strengthen our recovery, the U.S. should untangle the trade barriers raised in recent years and avoid raising new ones, especially in the highly problematic area of currency,” said John Murphy, senior vice president for international policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in an interview. “Amid today’s materials shortages and port backups, we need to cut costs and red tape, not create more.” The IMF also criticized subsidies. “Finally, there is a clear need to address longstanding global trade and investment distortions in areas such as tariffs, farm subsidies, industrial subsidies, and services trade,” notes the IMF. It recommends that the United States work through the World Trade Organization “to strengthen the rules-based multilateral trading system and address these longstanding global trade and investment distortions.” After almost 6 months in office, many analysts believe the “Trump tariffs” have turned into the “Biden tariffs.” But there is still time for the Biden administration to act and remove the tariffs and change other trade policies. “The IMF says the United States should roll back tariffs and limit ‘Buy American’ overreach,” said Bryan Riley, director of the National Taxpayers Union’s Free Trade Initiative, in an interview. “If the Biden administration listens, U.S. economic growth coming out of the pandemic will be turbocharged.” Forbes July 1, 2021 Trump’s H-1B Visa Wage Rule Is Dead: What’s Next? By STUART ANDERSON A federal judge has ended the Trump administration’s controversial rule that would have significantly increased the required minimum salary for H-1B visa holders and employment- based immigrants.