The federal H-1B visa program allows skilled foreign workers to take jobs in the United States for three years if an employer can show that an American worker cannot be found for that job. In 2001, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service said that of 164,000 H-1B workers allowed into the country that year, 55 percent worked in the informational technology industry, 13 percent were engineers, 8 percent were administrators and 6 percent were college and university educators.

The L-1 visa program allows companies operating in the United States and abroad to transfer certain classes of employee from its foreign to its U.S. operations for up to seven years. From 1999 to 2004, 3.9 million foreign workers entered the United States under this program, according to federal immigration reports.

In New Jersey during that period, 99,810 workers were given jobs on H-1B visas, and 105,170 foreign workers were transferred to in-state operations, immigration reports said.
The current nationwide limit of annual H-1B visas is 65,000, set in 2003. Congress in 2001 set the limit at 195,000 for three years.