H1b and Innovation

Here is an interesting paper on H1b and the contribution to innovation.

http://www.hbs.edu/research/pdf/09-005.pdf

It’s a pretty long paper and some parts of it are too technical. So, I have reorganized into two main themes and summarized the contents below.

Size of H1b	Innovation from H1b
immigrants represented 24% and 47% of the US SE workforce with bachelors and doctorate educations in the 2000 Census, respectively. This contribution was significantly higher than the 12% share of immigrants in the US working population.	Indian and Chinese inventors account for about 15% of Canada's patents during the 1995-2006 period, only slightly more than in the US
Approximately 40% and 10% of H-1B recipients over 2000-2005 came from India and China, respectively.	Higher H-1B admissions are associated with stronger increases in Indian invention in highly dependent computer-oriented firms (e.g., Microsoft, Oracle)
2.5% SE unemployment rate in 2006, the lowest unemployment rate measured for SE [Software Engineer] since the early 1990s	Bill Gates reported that Microsoft hires on average four additional employees to support each H-1B worker hired
The net increase in immigrant SEs during these twelve years [1994-2006] was 319k workers — 67% of the total. Looking even further, the number of non-citizen SE immigrants increased by 144k, or 30% of the total SE increase	Indian and Chinese patenting are consistently shown to be dependent upon the H-1B program, English invention is typically weakly correlated, and the results for other ethnicities fall in between. The majority of our estimates suggest that native invention is either not affected by the H-1B program in the aggregate or that a weak crowding-in effect exists.
SE and computer-related occupations account for approximately 60% of H-1B admissions	downturn in the Indian share of computer-related invention after 2000, which includes software patents. This shift from the strong growth in the 1990s is striking and may reflect more restrictive US immigration policies. Many factors contribute, however, such as the high-tech recession and the increasing attractiveness of foreign opportunities like Bangalore.
The share of H-1B visas granted to healthcare and therapy occupations declined dramatically from 54% in 1995 to 14% in 1998. SE and computer specialist occupations grew from 25% to 57% during this same period, and the SE sector has been dominant since this inversion.	H-1B admissions substantially increased rates of Indian and Chinese invention in dependent cities relative to their peers. In the base specifications, a 10% growth in the H-1B population increased Indian and Chinese invention by 6%-12% in the most dependent quintile of cities relative to the bottom two quintiles