need to succeed. the american dream cannot survive if we keep telling the dreamers to go elsewhere. today, we may have turned away the next albert einstein. tomorrow, we might turn away the next levi strauss. and we certainly won't be turning away people like my ancestors who came to love my country with almost nothing except for one thing. a desire to work and work and work. to build a better life for themselves and their families. the debate here in washington will not be ending anytime soon. in all likelihood, the grid lock will not be broken unless the parties find a way to highlight their political interest. that is hard to do when egypt has entrenched positions.

but both parties can champion a cause that is vitally important to american companies. it offers both parties a chance to show business leaders that they understand the needs of the american economy. and it is a chance to show the american people that when it comes to immigration reform, they are in favor of policies that will help american workers and help our country get moving again. this is a chance we can't afford to mess, and it is up to all of us to convince congress to seize that chance. let's get together and to make this happen. your future and your children and grandchildren future depends on getting this done. i can't urge you enough to call your congressman or congresswoman. call your senator and said that we just have to have this. there is a time for a political campaign, but there is also a

time to save america. i have been working with my centers in new york, particularly chuck schumer, i think there are others like lindsay graham. you have to call your senator, your congressperson and say that this is something that cannot be consumed by partisan politics. it is not something that can wait for the next election. this is about keeping america the greatest country in the world, a place where our ancestors came and where our future has to come. thank you very much. [applause] >> i will take a couple of questions on topic. any questions? sir? seem to -- yes,

tell everybody who you are. >> [inaudible] >this is a great program have laid out. we have seen in other publications and it is an interesting platform. what do you do to encourage immigrants to come to the city and make it easier? what would you recommend to other levels of government for getting this particular change in outlook. >> let me enter a little differently and i will come back if it is not adequate. i was asked, what do you do about the big industrial cities that have a hollowed out? they have schools with and the seats. they have housing that nobody is living in, they have roads

without cars. what you have to do, given the political reality and economics the way it works, you offered visas to people to come to america, you assign them to a city. the deal is they have to live there for seven years. they have to agree to take no federal, state, or city subsidies whatsoever. but if they stay there for seven years, you give them and their family full citizenship. let me tell you what happens. we do an awful lot more things right in this country than we do wrong. america is the place where people want to come. a place where people want to practice their religion and say what they want to say, be in charge of their own destiny. and leave their kids in a place for the end of the will be able to prosper going forward.

you would fill each of those cities overnight. the people you attract would buy those houses and fix them up with their hands. they will demand a better schools because people that come to this country understand that education really is the key. they created businesses because they will have to do something to support themselves. if they have to drive halfway across the country at take to jobs, they will. that is the immigrant ethnic, no matter where they come from. that is the way i think is a politically viable because it doesn't cost us any money. no one can argue that they are coming here to be supported by others. you know that will create businesses or there will starve to death, and take the jobs that maybe nobody else wants. they said, we don't have enough jobs.

yes, he will never have enough jobs unless he gets somebody to come there and create those jobs. if americans are willing to do that, they would have done it. you see it the basic industries have been left and nobody is moving in. if we can't just sit back and say that god will provide. god will help those that help themselves, that as a way to do it. in new york, we have created an industry that replaces the manufacturing companies. have a 50 million tourists in new york city. they create jobs by entry-level people, people that have a great command of the english language. certainly not a high school diploma or more people that may have more problems in their background. to some extent, we have made up

for the oil line industries. we are creating small businesses which i think is really the solution to the country's unemployment problem. that is what supports the country, the pension system. when the companies that are labour intensive and hire people. those of the smaller businesses youe automation doesn't let do more with less. we have also tried to attract different industries. we have tried to diversify our economy. we have double the number of the fashion houses. he google just bought a building to fill with technology people. blumberg and all of these companies are expanding their

itn whole new york city. well worked very hard to bring in film and television to new york. today, if you want to make a feature-length movie, there are no sound stages available. studios are expanding, but we have 23 new pilots starting this year, a weekly shows. it employs something like 250 people. that is what you want. we'll try to attract businesses where new york has an advantage of intellectual capital and the diversity of our population. america is a country that is built on immigration, it is built on diversity. the more different people you have from different parts of the world, you will have more choices when you want to go out to dinner. you'll have more choices of where to go to pray.

you'll have more choices of people to talk to, and you will have much for the first business opportunities because people recognize opportunities from their homeland or get a brilliant idea. the strength has been the diversity of its population and the fact that we live as a mixture rather than as a mosaic, which is different from other big diversities. the answer to your question comes back to immigration. >> first, i want to say that baltimore has done with your design describing. they can't give a green card, but they have reversed a decline of the population. most of the talk has been about comprehensive immigration reform. some of us more recently have been talking in terms of

steppingstones, -- small pieces of legislation that can get half. how to know what you think about house judiciary committee chairman smith that he thinks a new era of them bill could pass this year. it would not do lots of other things. it would not include the hh1b. it would provide a green cards to roughly 50,000 trained workers in to make permanent residents out of them. >> anything you do to get more people to come and stay as a good idea. is the goal that it happens to be for me. some of the problem is being addressed. a number of undocumented in our country which is very hard to counter, it has got to be dramatically lower than it was a

few years ago. the number of people trying to cross the mexican american or canadian american border has gone down precipitously because the economy in canada and the economy in mexico is better than the economy here. a canadian company just announced that they will build their next jack in mexico. the people that came here for jobs, that is what the undocumented basically come for. it is not a country easy to come and put your feet up. you come because you want to work. i am sure somebody will show that they put their feet up, but that is not the real world. there are jobs back wherever they came from. to some extent, the issue of what you do with 11 million undocumented is fixing itself. it is also true that whatever

the number is, they are here. they broke the law, but because we, as a country, wanted them here and we wanted to have it both ways. so we said it was illegal and helped them, and did not enforce the laws. to sit here and jeopardize our economy because of what happened in the past is about as dumb thing as you can think of. we are sacrificing young people oppose the opportunity to get a job in the future because whatever you think happened in the past. it is nonsensical. we are looking back, for example, at the mortgage crisis. who caused the mortgage crisis? it wasn't just to the banks, it was fanny, freddie, and congress did more damage than anybody else. the problem we have is helping

people keep their homes and pay their mortgages in having people take new mortgages. you go around the world and they cannot conceive. explain to us why you're doing what you're doing. comprehensive immigration may form -- reform may be the desired thing, but the problem now is that americans don't have jobs and the tax base is not growing the way you would want it to, so you can reduce rates, have services, or any combination that you want. we're trying to blame somebody in the past, and we are wrong on who we are planning. >> one of the topics you mentioned was entrepreneurship.

having graduated from business school, i saw that most people going to business school and the beginning of lord away, even those with good ideas and they end up joining big companies for joining mostly financial services because the financial stability, they don't want to take the risk. they don't end up starting small businesses. what should the government will be for people interested in starting businesses? >> you can encourage small business growth with tax policy. one of the things we all talk about is the tax rate in and these tax breaks, gimmicks or whatever. keep in mind that some of those were there to encourage certain kinds of economic activity. and before you go and get rid of some of them, let's understand what they really do. if i want you to drill for oil over there, giving you an incentive to do so, you can

argue is a tax break for oil drillers, but we want the oil and we want somebody to build houses. their arguments about whether the mortgage reduction really encourages housing. canada, where the interest is not deductible has the same percentage of home ownership. the first thing is, you are wrong, they are not going to financial-services. because financial services are cutting back. every day, thousands of people are being laid off. the young people going directly out of business school today, but let me tell you, when i went to business school, there were small investment banking firms and consulting firms. for a young person to go start a business, and it is very hard.

they have that that they have to borrow to go through college and business school. some want to build a nest egg or get more experience, but some go and start businesses. i know people that never went to college in the started businesses. bill gates is the one that everybody holds up. a lot of people said that this isn't for me. you can go do that if you want and doesn't have to be a business that -- i was not smart enough to start a company. the reason the west and the company was a gun fired and nobody would hire me. do you want to end this? >> the unions continue to argue that the recruitment of immigrants generally is driven by the desire to undercut the wages of americans.

they argue that regarding and deprogram, and is this a disagreement over statistics or something else driving that position? it is sometimes very hard to decipher what is going on. >> to the top level science engineering, it is hard to argue that they create products that people manufacturing and service. that is where the union membership needs to be. not totally, but generally. what is clearly true in this country is that farmers are moving out of the country. there is the argument a union would make that if you raise the compensation.

the problem is that people would not by its most people in america just aren't going to work a backbreaking job, a low- paying job that is all the market will support. temporary workers come here for three of four months. if we can't get them, the farmer doesn't grow his crops. i think they would tell you that it would not be satisfactory. that is what farmers needed, and if they can't get it, they will move their jobs south of the border. but you can get produce from around the world today.

it flies. what you have to do is work with the unions, understand where they're coming from. there is nothing wrong with that. there are plenty of statistics to show, and plenty of places you could work with the unions just as the democrats have to work together for industries where immigrants will have to create jobs. this really is crucial to america. i hope that behind the scenes, there are plenty of people in congress working because they must be getting pressure from farmers that can't pick their crops, companies that they solicited for political donations that can't keep growing here and are expanding overseas. they have to be reading the newspapers just like everybody else. we live in a global competitive

technological world. it requires a kind of coming together and doing what is right for the country. i think that if they don't, the voters will hold them responsible. they say the voters will irresponsible, but there are an awful lot of unemployed and an awful lot of people that worry about becoming unemployed. maybe this really does have the legs and the power for the polling booth. there is enough blame in washington to go around. this is something where everybody can stand up and do something for america. yes, there'll be a couple of people that demagogue against them. but if you stand up and say that i created jobs in my city, by state, my district, maybe this will be the time that they do something.

thank you for having me on. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] >> lets go ahead and get started, we have a panel of true experts this morning. some have flown all the way across the country. i think these are great following general speakers, and his honor as a tough act to follow, but we will try to take

the big picture, move it down. our panelists are going to try to fill in the slices of the pie from their companies and their personal experiences about the beneficial effects of immigrants into the personal situations. i think it helps americans take the abstract and down and understand what they're talking about today. the mayor said the stage already, but a few comments did not want to go away. we are at 9% unemployment, but we are facing a shortage of workers for certain kinds of jobs. you don't have to take my word for it. a couple of studies have come out recently, the mckinsey global institute on june 11. the united states will not have enough workers with the right education to fill the profiles

of jobs likely to be created. ited states will not have enough workers with the right education and training for the jobs likely to be created. our analysis suggests that a shortage of 1.5 million workers with a bachelor's degrees had higher in 2020. 6 million americans without a high-school diploma are likely to be without a j. americans that attend colle and vocational schools choose a field of study that willive them scific skills that employers are seeking. this points to potential shortages in many occupations such as nutrition, welders, nurse's aide. in addition to the often predicted shortfall of computer specialists in engineering. a new one came out of georgetown. america was slow coming out of recession in 2007, only to find itself on a collision course

with the future. not enough americans are completing college. by 2018, we will need 22 million new college degrees but will fall short of that number by at least 3 million. whinnied 4.7 million new workers with certificates. you can't throw a stick without finding articles on this issue. a new york times, factory jobs return but employers find skills shortages. giving a lift to the fragile economy. because they laid off so many workers, manufacturers have a vast pool of people to choose from. employers complain that they can't fill their openings. the problem is a mismatch between the kind of skills needed and to the ranks of the unempled.

2 million open jobs, i can go on. the point is, in a world with 9% unemployment, it is hard to believe that this is the case. it is worth mentioning that we look at the 9% figure, but among those with college degrees, the unemployment rate is 4.3%. 0% unemployment is what we prefer, but as we're talking today about what the companies faced, we need to keep those statisticsn mind. -- ifkers can't find companies can't find the workers they need, it will not create jobs. you don't need an economics degree to say that if companies can't find workers, they are not going to grow and that will hurt everyone including americans looking for jobs.

it allows you to put things in perspective. right now, in this country, we have three separate worker programs. as we talk about trying to expand the program and the various ways, we're talking abt a small drop in an ocean and a drop that is very important to drive economic growth. those are basically the three programs that drive immigration in the temporary worker area. if you look at a charge of 165 million and you put the level of the numbers included in the temporary worker programs, it is flatter than a pancake. i am not going to go through the

various statistics that the mayor went through on graduates from universities, 50% with ph.d. and a master's coming from immigrants from overseas. we have a hard time keeping them even if they want to stay. a lot of them say i will go back to my home country and compete against -- it is sort of a ludicrous position we are in, one of those areas that over the years we keep struggling with. maybthe next year-and-a-half or less we have a shot at making some progress. certainly there are some economic studies that say that immigration has a slight adverse effect on americans with very low wage levels. there are more economic studies

anyone to shake a stick at. at the high end, ecomic studies are clear. it has a positive effect on the american economy, generally. it is t even a debate among that. that is where we are. the mayor touched on all of these subjes. we have an excellent panel here, and i will introduce them quickly. there bios are in your material. i will go down the list, then we will shake it up a little bit. senior counsel of global migration at microsoft, came in three days ago to get ready. as a senior management level of migration services, microsoft u.s.mmigration department consists of a team of 17 professionals responsible for the handling of all u.s. immigration matters for microsoft.

to her right, manager of a global immigration services. the company diversified with 57,000 employes worldwide and directs the company's emigration and international visa function to facilitate the transfer of personnel worldwide for regulatory compliance and associated travel issues. i have known elizabeth for over a decade. she chairs the subcommittee, and always comes to the table well prepared and whenever we needed somebody to testify, let's live up elizabeth. she will fly down and do what needs to be done. executive director of enterprise innovation, stephen has 10 years of private equity experience.

a graduate of georgia tech, he returned to his of water as chief commercialization officer. it was led to streamline the licensing of technology have to make the institut's resources more accessible to business and industry. i think he and our next speaker will have a different perspective on emigration, all agreement, but sort of a different take. he said i introduced him as a doctor q. even though iook four years of spanish. he is a neuroscience for cellular and molecular medicine. at john hopkins at the bayview medical center. that just about does it right there.

he is an internationally renowned neurosurgeon that leavesutting edge research to cure brain cancer, and as we have talked on the phone earlie he has quite a story to tell about his inexperience. i think most of you know her, a research officer for the federal reserve bank of dallas. she has done a lot of great writing on immigration. she wrote the book, u.s. immigration refor and a new era of globalization in 2010. do we have copies in the back of the room? she will provide a look back as we go through the specics. elizabeth, since you're the chair of the immigration subcommittee, let's start with you. >> while i chaired the

subcommittee on immigration, i hear from a lot of other companies that are having the same kind of problems, attracting and retaining high skilled talent. but so we can get a little snapshot of companies that use highly skilled workers, i will talk mostly about my company and what we do. it is a $14 billion diversified industrial company. we employ 58,000 worldwide. we have 83 manufacturing facilities, 47 of them in the united states. we operate in every global region. our strategic and branch, trained air-conditioning, transport refrigeration, locks and everybody knows our golf carts.

it does a lot to sustain productivity for industrial production. they are all the no. 1 or no. 2 brands in their market. a lot of that is because we have a very innovative product. we employ 3000 engineers globally. 700 are lead accredited engineers, who recognized gen building certification. we are committed to sustainable energy solutions, we have a center for energy efficiency and sustainability. it is a dedicated global team that is increasin the pace of environmentally sustainable innovation of the product that we manufacture and sell. while it really only uses less than 1% of h1b workers, their

highly specialized knowledge and skills driving innovation that supports a very complex global platform of products that are sold in every couny around the world. our engineering managers recruit at top universities in the united states. when ty go out to recruit, they're looking for candidates at have attained at least a master's degree, and they're looking for candidates with a very highly specialized in jerry specialties that relate to a product line. like integrated electronics. most universities now that are really at the top echelons throughout the country have a lot of cross-disciplinary degrees. which are really amazing

because you will take somebody that has maybe a business degree in engineering degree. they're very good at creating the business system because they understand the business aspect of it as well as having the capability of being able to create global platforms for itt business solutions. this year, we recruited the three ph.d. candidates that are working on product development. when we went out to look for engineers, one of them that w hired, in his doctoral thesis was on design optimization, a renewable energy system. a commitment to innovation and sustainable energy. as i said, he completed a ph.d. at a u.s. university and had opposed completion employment experimes -- experience, a

close connection to one of our product lines. with his employment experience, he was uniquely qualified to identify breakthroughs in energy from home air-conditioning, heating, and ventilation systems. not only is he doing a wonderful job for the company creating innovative products, but he is also doing research that is supporting our commitment to energy efficiency. that will help everybody. as i said, these people have a lot of opportunities now. because i do global imgration, i see oth couries were also interested in small talent pools and a lot of other countries make it much easier for these highly qualified individuals.

mayor bloomberg talked about canada. i have someone down who is concerned we will not be able to get a green card for him and he is applying for canadian citizenship. it is a pretty easy process. it is a skill-based thing. i'm afraid we will lose him. that is a simple fact. if we cannot come through the labor certification and get him a green card, because he is an indian national, he has to wait eight years to get a green card, he will go elsewhere. and now they're wonderful opportunities for them in their home countries. there are great opportunities in the european bloc for i.t. services.

this is our competition. we're not just competing against other u.s. companies. we are competing on a global platform with other countries looking to attract the same talent that we are trying to keep here. if we keep this talent here and redo the product innovation here and we do the manufacturing of these products here, this creates jobs for americans. for example, our centrifugal air tracked business has an almost 90% of the products exported, mostly to underdeveloped countries. these are products that sell from $500,000 to over $1 million. they harm manufactured here in north carolina. right now, we are going through a number projects to develop new cutting edge product

enhancements for this particular product line, which creates energy and is also energy efficient. it is an internional competition for this very small pool of highly skilled talent. i think we have to look at the immigration system in the united states that is in keeping our ability not allowed to hire these people initially as an h1b worker -- we do run out of them each year. by january, we will be out of h1b numbers for fiscal year 2012. so our recruitment people will not be able to hire a farmworker who requires an h1b visa.

how do we get green cards for them? why do they have to be stuffed in a job for eight years to 10 years because there is such an incredible backlog in immigrant visa numbers? again, a lot of the candidates that i am looking at, because we are and engineering engineering company, come from those classifications. that is something that mayor bloomberg brought up. if we had some mechanism to retain these people, it will drive business. it will keep manufacturing in the united states. in the end, it will support our economy and our gross national product. thank you. >> you mentioned high tech. in the past, you have also mentioned a shortage of skills. for example, welders and such. >> yes. there are manufacturing jobs as

well as high skilled jobs that are shortage occupations. precision machinists, that this kind of a skill that you do not see much in the united states anymore. again, it is essential for certain of our product lines that you are putting together. putting together to -- tool and die peoe, they are less skilled workers and there is no mechanism to bring them into the country. we spend a lot of kind -- a long time with that, looking for welders. the attrition -- the people who are retiring now who have those skil and the young people are not going into that at all. young people do not want to be welders in america. foreigners will come in and do welding. but that is not something that

attracts good and we do have our own welding school. we still cannot get the appropriate candidates. my engineering manager tells me that there is a skill to welding. it is not just being willing to do it. it is a highly skilled profession. as is precision machining and tool and die stuff. they do not require a college degree, but they are highly skilled jobs as well. >> first novel, i want to thank you for orgizing the event and inviting me to join. it is an honor to be part of the panel and the conversation and i am grateful for the opportunity to be here today. i am senior counsel for global migration at microsoft. microsoft global migration group is one of the largest in house

immigration programs in the country and is responsible for helping to enable microsoft to lead the industry in its ability to hire and tain talent by delivering timely, effective, and measurable immigration solutions. in simple terms, i like to say that we help microsoft hire the best and brightest talent. once on board, we helped insert them into the microsoft family by allowing them to focus on their jobs and their personal lives while we handled their immigration matters. having them focus on their jobs and their lives and not worrying about their immigration matters is a really big task. between tom, randy, the mayor, and elizabeth, we have covered a lot of ground here i want to spend a lot of -- in the the time covering what we see on the street level and giving you some specific examples of what we're facing in the competitive marketplace.

i would like to focus my remarks around three main issues. number one, why do we need to hire foreign nationals in the first place and what would be the detrimental effect if it could not bring them in the u.s.? no. 2, what is our experience when we are able to bring it in the foreign nationals that we need? is it right? that is often argued in for rick professional hired, there is an american professional who is not. or is there another more positive creation affected? number three, what are we doing because of the broken immigration system? do we have to operate at deficit until things change? why does microsoft need to hire foreign nationals and the first place? what would be the detrimental effect if we did not bring the four national mini into the u.s.? what lost opportunities which we face? for us, when we look at lost opportunities, it is really hard. we're focused on innovation.

we're focused on being the next great thing. we want to come out with the next best technology that you all want to use. so we cannot just identify the sites -- those opportunities. we have to create environments where we allow that innovation two floors. that will allow certain ideas to force and then see what opportunities present themselves. like most major companies, microsoft competes in the global economy. part of that intel's having operations around the world. that being said, we have been firmly -- part of that entails having operations around the world. while we have more than 90,000 employees worldwide, more than half of them live and work in the united states. our research and development efforts have always been led in primarily conducted at our headquarters in washington can and we fully expect this to continue. and fat, 83% of our nine points

$6 billion in research and development activities -- $9.6 billion in research and development activities occur in the u.s.. microsoft is a company whose entire basis is ideas and innovation. sure, we need to make sure that we stay on target with our development schedule. but we also want to make sure that we encourage -- that we trade increased opportunities for innovation. we want to be able to be a game changer. we want to create that hot tenology. this means having access to the best minds in the field. star talent acquition strategies are absolutely critical. finding the right talent is not as simple as substituting one person for another. for our business, it comes down to having the right technical skill set for our core technology jobs. we focused our recruiting for core technology jobs at u.s. universities, which continue to

be among the best in the world for computer science and engineering graduates. so there is a serious shortage of u.s. students with expertise in the fields we need. we have found through our expansive recruitment records that u.s. universities -- at u.s. universities, how of the small pool of graduates, the majorities are for national students. randy mentioned the georgetown university study that projects jobs and education reqrements in 2018. we will need 22 million new college degrees. but the country is on course to fall short of that number by at least 3 million. reover, we're falling short in many of the field we need the most feared computer-related bachelor's degrees awarded in the u.s. dropped from 60,000 in 2004 to cut 38,000 in 2008. nor are these shortfalls limited

to the bassos degree level. last year, only about 1600 computer science ph.d.'s graduated from u.s. universities. of these, some 60% were foreign nationals. as well, for instance turn 50% of the computer engineering degrees at the u.s. masters level. this is poor employment for recruitment. one of the stumbling blocks in this debate is that people often ask how you can talk about a shortfall of talent when the unemployment rate is hovering around 9%, and increasingly, however, the unemployment problem in the u.s. is also skills problem. we see this in a unemployment rate for the different groups of americans. we see a 9.6% unemployment rate for individuals with only a

high-school diploma. in contrast, unemployment for individuals with a college degree or more is only 4.3%. this education-based difference in the unemployment rate is mirrored in the i.t. environment. the unemployment rate for computer and mathematical operations hovered around 3.7%. it was under half the overall unployment rate. what is clear is that our country is operating with a dual the unemployment rate, one for those with strong post secondary education and another starkly different one for those without it. to promote the country's long- term competitiveness and from -- and create -- the u.s. must produce more university graduates in these fields. our first priority should be t elevate d enhance the skills of american citizens so they can compete for the higher skilled jobs in this economy.

we need to bring more ericans up to a secondary level. that makes such a major difference in employability. we also must make sure that students are focused in the fields that the economy needs pin it does not just start at the post secondary level. we need to do more to spark the interest of american students of all ages and to help build the educational environment for our own students to survive. f us, this is about addressing the issue at its record microsoft approaches its u.s. education strategy with the same level of thoroughness and creativity and resources that we bring to software development. microsoft contributes tens of millions of dollars annually to support organizations and programs designed to encourage students and workers in america to pursue stem field and to increase the skill level of the u.s. work force with a wide variety of free and reduced-cost

online digital literacy training. i can spend a lot of time going through the programs, the educational programs, but i will save time and just mention a few. we have elevate america and evate america veterans initiative. we looked at a community-based efforts to provide free jobs and -- to provide free job training opportunities and other transitional services for returning iraq and afghanistan veteran service people and their spouses. a new privately funded program to improve teaching and learning in sun's technology, engineering, and math. our $6 million commitment over three years will make this program focused on investments that will improve student learning and make -- in the crucial infield out in her home state. we have a washington opportunities scholarship for we

pledged $25 million over the next five years as well, microsoft education announced a new $15 million investment in research and development for merc of learning technologies, including game- based construction and the creation of a lifelong learning digital archive. i he to tell you, just as i have a child who just entered kindergarten, by e-mail came in yesterday. i saw that we just once a new program where we actually bring an elementary school student on tour campus and have them experience in the technology that we create and spend time with them really just trying to spark their interest in technology and the idea that they can be the next greatest thing, that they can be an innovator. if they just focus on the math and science and technology field, who knows what they may become. i think it is really exciting as look at my son. i hope you will go down that

road could i look to companies like my own and others to really sparked the interest of our young students. but skilling the population is not the solution near term coul. part of the solution means access to foreign professionals. i need to be clear that our need for high-skilled foreign talent is not just a shortage issue. we will always want and americans should always welcome those who a the very best at what they do no matter what country they come from. we should want this sort of impact talent on our team, not on someone else's. i can list the number of microsoft leaders who are foreign-born. but in the interest of time, i will just focus on one. -his name is alex to mentor and he came from brazil where he was thralled with software

developed when he started playing begins at the age of five. he strutted at the rochester institute of technology in the u.s. from the time he graduated and joined microsoft in 2001, he has been the primary inventor for 60 patent filings, 14 that have been granted this year alone. he is one of the fathers of connect and is responsible for incubating the project. he took the business and drove it through proof and execution good if you're not familiar with it now, it is the device that allows people to control through voice and gestures the fault -- the software and games for microsoft and xbox. it is very cool. other than being just a game, kinnect is a good example how often innovators from abroad help to promote jobs and groh and opportunity in the american economykinnect holds -- in the

american economy. kinnect holds the world record of sales after it launched in november. it has been a key revenue driver, generating more than $1.2 billion in revenue in its short life so far. it has been a huge job creator at microsoft. but there is an important downstream economic expectation good packaging, transportation, yers, stock clerks, persons in the stores who sell it and the list goes on. beyond that, there are also avenues of innovation not yet even imagined that this revolutionary technology will open for others. kinnect is a game, but we have read articles where is being used in operating rooms by surgeons. the list of innovation is on and on. we are very passionate about it

and we are passionate about the fact that it creates as a job creator in the u. economy. companies and developers can allies on the technology, whether through games or the technologies such as health care and robotics and more. as a country, we should be doing everything we can to make sure eas like this one bloom here in the united states. this means making sure that people like alex, who sits near the top of past company magazine as the creative people in business for 2011, are attracted to study in this country and bring their talents to the american workplace with a rdy pass to permanent residence in the u.s. so what is their expense -- what is our experience when we are able to bring in the foreign nationals that we need? there are no serious studies. microsoft's consistent growth

has letters to increase employment every year since the company's founding in 1975. this growth means more jobs for u.s. workers. over the last five years, our u.s. work force has increased by 22%. although microsoft has directly created u.s. jobs with a significant rate, this is not where the economic effects and been in 2010 from a study by the university of washington illustrates the powerful downstream economic effect of high technology jobs. the study found that the nine but 16 -- that the $9.16 billion in turn created job opportunities for other state businesses for a multiplier effect amounting to 267,611 jobs that year. through this multiplier, every job at microsoft supported 5.81

jobs elsewhere in the state economy. contributions have been possible by combining american brainpower with some of the talents of some of the brightest professionals from around the world gripped the u.s. work force is made up overwhelmingly of u.s. workers. but part of the recipe also relies on our ability to attract an essential complement of the best minds from other countries. microsoft is innovating and innovative department. because of shortages and intense competition, filling our talent needs remains a serious challenge. we currently have thousands of unfilled job openings with over half being computer science positions did our continued ability to help fuel the american economy depends highly on access to the best possible

talent. this can be achieved exclusively through educational improvement. we need to be able to attract and have adequate access through the immigratio system to skilled workers from abroad. so what are we doing because of a broken system? do we just have to operate at a deficit until things change? certainly, there are times when we have looked at work-arounds. when we could not bring in the talent that we needed, we look to canada and we moved jobs to canada. we openedp our development center did today, we are facing different challenges and our most pressing immigration problem is the profound shortage of green cards. as previously discussed, we have employees, indi and chinese

nationals mainly, who are looking at 10-year wait for more to obtain their green card. these are individuals who have master's degrees, ph.d. boss from u.s. universities, who have gone through the process. we have looked for an american worker through the american labor process. we have shown that there's not one available. we have been certified and they have gone through the petition process. they have been approved. immigrant visa available due to the restrictions of numbers to allow them to obtain permanent residence in the u.s.. that is really difficult to persuade the best and the brightest talent inthe world to come here if we cannot offer them permanent residence here. if they will have trouble obtaining a mortgage, even buying a car because they are seen as only being here temporarily, they cannot put down roots.

they are worried about their children going to school and then having to transition them back to a different country. it is really difficult. these are bright people. they could get high wages in other countries. we have talked about the wages in canada. we have seen wages in india and china and brazil skyrocket. the jobs will go to where the talent is. we need to make sure that the talent is here in the west. -- in the u.s. we look forward to legislative reform any meaningful way that will benefit the country, encourage invtment, retain and attract high skilled talent and create jobs. a lot of thinking clearly has already been done in defining clear policies that congress can take. i think mayor blubber went through -- mayor bloomberg went through changes that we shall look to.

which certainly recommend that congress ensures that the supply of employment-based green cards acknowledge the economy. after they graduate, rather than a tawnies abroad. again, we need to welcome these people in and we need to show them a path to permanent residency here in the united states. we need to welcome these people with open arms, not kind of let the men and then tell them, maybe, if you're a really long wait, maybe then we will allow you to reside here and planned your ribs. and while we await legislative reform, microsoft will continue to do what it has done for years, to be a positive participant in the process through collaboratives with the

u.s. government. -- wouldple would be st thee be the stem obpt. it would give graduates with more of an opportunity to remain in the u.s. and contributory economy. there are still plenty of good ideas out there. employers have already gone through the department deliver process and received certification, who have already gone through the sts process and received an improved emigrant visas position and would have their green cards today if not for there were not enough visas to go around. we cannot make mistakes with our economy. it is a mistake to not allow an innovative economy to hire the

best talent. we need to help keep our position as the global innovation leaders. to do that, we need a system that does not work as a detriment to our innovation. thank you. >> as you're talking, was making a list of senators for you and elizabeth to meet with. [laughter] a compelling case. let's go to the other side of the country, ga. -- i know you have a different angle on some of these issues. >> thank you for having me here. i was laughing in the brick tt i could probly replace my prepared remarks with what mike bloomberg said. he hit a lot of the right points. he did a great job. i thi my role is coming from academia. i am not personally and academic. but i would like to discuss what emigration means to us as a research university and what some of the policy's main toward where students can do after they graduate. for those of you who are not

familiar with it, we are the largest school in the nine states. there are some people who think we're pretty good. we are ranked as the force -- the fourth best engineering school in the u.s. that is not a plaid place to be. it ranks as the seventh best university of all types in the country. and we are broad. we're not just good at one thing. we have 12 different disciplines in engineering. we are actually top 10 in 11 of those categories. we do not offer the 12th one, which is agricultural. we do not have any cows. i think we're strong across the board. and we are in atlanta appeared as you might expect, ever since the civil rights era, we have a strong record of graduating minorities, initially african- americans, and now binaries' all types.

-- and now minorities of all types. we are usually numbered two or three in any of us and we're top 10 in all of them. we have a very diverse campus. part of that is that wehave a lot of foreign students. right now, 7% of our undergraduate body is. we get more applications than we .an take goo 40% -- the national average for stem students is 50%. in computer science, it is over 60%. we are at about 40%. those come from india, china, and korea. but we represent 115 countries, including iceland. i do not think that i can name

115 countries if you asked me to. but that is our latest list. and overall student body, 18% of our total eollment of 21,000 students. so 2000 foreign students on our campus. it is hard to get into georgia tech. w're pretty picky. we get nine applications for reese ft in our freshman class. the 3800 students have made it through the process are the best of the best. at that point, everybody is smart. they're hard-working, dedicated, and flexible. you cannot ask for better students, either at the undergraduate or the graduate level. companies could not ask for better workers per hospitals cannot ask for better physicians. as a country, we cannot ask better citizens than these kids. but as a country, we have put a bill of barriers and we're making it very difficult for these bright kids to build careers in this countryirst,

just getting their student visa approved, never mind residents say, has turned into a nightmare. we have created a whole department since 9/11 to help these students. we are not doing joint programs in other countries. so the chinese nationals and indian--- international's cannot get to georgia tech students to their countries. is a nightmare. it did not used to be that way. look back at history. 100 years ago, the united states had a mediocre set of colleges and universities in 1911. harvard was pretty good. but it fell off pretty fa after that. by 1950, unchallenged and unquestioned -- we have the finest higher educatio system on the planet. 60 years later, we still do. other people are working on it,

but we still have the best. what happed to change that higher education system between 1910 and 1950? immigration. the higher education system in this country was built on immigration. it was triggered, unfortunately, by adolf hitler. he took power in 1933. he basically destroyed the german university system, which was unchallend at that time, the best university system in the world. he ran off that talent. because talent family. it is tough to move factories real people get on airplanes. at that time, on boats. and most of the german professors and many of the students went to britain and increasingly to the united states. among other things, that won the war could imagine the manhattan project without jewish scientists could imagine even worse, manhattan project with those jewish scientists working on the bone. that would not have been a good

outcome all over europe, both sides, brainpower started moving, mostly at that point to the united states from all over the continent. then from latin america and asia. basically, we sought in the best brains from all over the world into our colleges and universities over 20 years. that led to more than half a century of really unchallenged economic dominance for the united states. we are now seeing challenges to that. it is interesting to reflect that, if we had had current immigration law back then, that migration of brain power would not have happened and we probably would not have had the dominant economy or the dominant military on this planet for the past 60 years. let me give you a current example. a couple of months ago, i was judging a georgia tech students event. it was about doing mostly master students with some undergrad,

mostly in couter science and electrical engineering. i was incredibly impressed by the quality of the student teams. it was a mobile app thing. it was really impressive. these were commercial-grade apps or you could see how they would get there from here. i spent about a decade as a working venture-capital is before getting to academia. i was pretty impressed. these were class projects that felt like a venture capital event where ople were coming to pitch ideas for investment. i started acting -- would you like to start a company? i have friends in the business. i think i can get some of these projects funded. usually, i cannot. i am kind of slow, but i figured out -- i started asking where

are you from? 28 competitors in this student project, 26 of them were from overseas. there is no way that a -- the 26 students can get their degrees at georgia tech and start companies. they want to, but they cannot. there's only one thing that i will say that you must remember we educate kids and they want to start companies here and they have to go home. they want to stay here. they can afford an h1b. they do not have $21,000. and the immigration service does not recognize self employment. there is no path for them to create company. so there trusses are to fight -- so their choices are to find a great company that will sponsor

them for h1b and a green card and they can have a very successful career that way, but they cannot create companies and create jobs. or they can go home. and they are doing very well in china and india and brazil and they can compete with ufrom there. i built the carrier building entrepreneurs. entrepreneurship is very hard. most people who try it fail. figuring out who will succeed is really one of the key skills sets in the venture capital business. i submit that being able to pack your bags and moved to another country where you may not speak the language for graduate school is a pretty good indicator if a young person has what it takes to start a successful company. over half the start-ups in silicon valley have a founder from either india or china. these are the people we want.

the kauffman foundation found young companies less than five years old have accounted for essentially all the job growth in new -- in the united states in the last five years. all of the job growth, from young companies. but our policy does not allow them to come here to particite in that job creation either get a job with the company or go home. at georgia tech, we have seen the impact of this every year. we are dealing with multiple students with these issues. last year, we had a spinoff company created by a graduate student from another country. master's in electrical engineering. a brilliant kid. he went through all the hoops and did his mpt, but then he ran out of options and could not stay and he gavep.

apple snapped him up instantly and he is now working. the kid is brilliant. but it delayed the formation of a company based on the technology until we could bring in new founders the did not have immigration issues and we wasted about a year. inhe wireless space, a year is a lot. there wasconomic growth that did not happen. and this is creating value as an apple employee, but he would treated more as the founder of a company that could hireeople in the next year or so. john door for is one of the most successful venture capitalists in the silicon valley. these students will create

value. they will create jobs. they will pay taxes. why would we not want them to stay here? they will get married. there will raise kids. they will buy a house. they will buy two 0.3 cars. ther is huge amounts of economic benefits to this. but as we heard this morning, the challenges that th're taking jobs away from real americans. the mayor already addressed this. that is just not true. entrepreneurs do not take jobs. they make jobs. and we need to give them a chance to make jobs. first for themselves and their co-founders and for hundreds and even thousands of employees. but this is not a zo-sum game. if these immigrants or one of the immigrants are not allowed to create jobs, those jobs and not magically go to american- born natives. those jobs simply do not exist. they exist somewhere else on the

planet, but not here. and the mayor touched on the agriculture issues. these are not jobs growing crops or flipping burgers pared their high-paying jobs that your kids would like to have some day. there are two million jobs, internet jobs in the united states. 20 years ago, none of them existed. much of the companies did not exist 20 years ago. subtract all of those compani that had foreign-born founders and take half of those two million jobs away. that is like the manhattan project without the jewish scientists. it is not pretty. silicon valley gets the press, but it is deeper and broader than that. it is not just who will d it is not just intel. pfizer, dupont, u.s. steel, proctor and gamble -- back when they were founded, there were founded by immigrants.

those are a lot of jobs coming from immigration. to start off with alejandra, i will start with to the cliche -- we are a country of immigrants. we encourage immigrants to come to the world's best graduate schools. other countries are trying to catch up, but it turns out that it is hard to create a network of post -- schools and we started out way ahead. we have a history of risk taking. we have a history of capital for would be. we have a culture that kaulitz failure more than anywhere else in the world. it made the u.s. -- culture that accepts failure more than anywhe else in the world. it made the u.s. the best in the world. our cultural history has given us an edge, even with the global the economic troubles. i think we're still the entrepreneurialism a cup of the world. we have to make sure -- the entrepreneurial mecca of the

world. we have to make sure that they have that opportunity, wther they were born here or not. this is like saying that my baseball team has enough talent to and i do not need any more talented players. but the other teams get talented players, too. that is not tell the yankees play the game and that is not with the united states should play the game either. i look forward to the rest of the panel. >> thank you. that was great. >> fst of all, i want to thank everybody for listening to what i have to say. i am not an expert in economics or immigration. as i said over the phone, i am a simple brain surgeon and scientists working at the number one hospital the united states, johns hopkins, the no. 1 department in the united states, neera surgery -- neurosurgery

for little kids. i was told that education was the best provision for old age. as i listen to the speakers, i have to think about the way to solve thisroblem. it is probably no different way than solving the problem of brain cancer. it will not be one solution. it will probably be multi- factorial. there are several issues. number one, there is the issue of education. we have millions people in our education system that are not being properly prepared so that they can face the challenges of higher education and the numbers have been going back and forth. if you look at johns hopkins, of but the numbers that reflect --

the numbers reflect those of georgia tech did the numbers are stunning in the sense that we have great people coming from all over the world to take advantage of the best education in the world. t in our own backyard and i can tell you myself, living in baltimore, in our own backyard, we're failing to educate our natives. i can tell you about my story. i will illustrate with my laboratory. i will sit with my operating room some the numbers you see here. i came to this country as an immigrant when those 19 years old in the late 1980's. i have to say that, if i ran out of work as a brain surgeon, i am probably the only bring surgeon who is also certified as a welder in california. [laughter] i could get a job as a welder. i am probably the only brain surgeon who can say that i was also a certified as an official

farmworker in the state of california when i was working there from 1986 to 1988. so i do not see a lot of people running their to get those jobs. so i have job security for right no i will not be able to compete with many of these other jobs that peoplhave mentioned. but at least those are two. i i was given an opportunity through the legislation to immigration reform of the late 1980's. by 1991, i was a permanent resident. that is when i started at uc berkeley, taking advantage of one of these places that was mentioned earlier. by 1994, i became a student at harvard medical school. before i graduated, i became a u.s. citizen. i went back to san francisco to take advantage of one of the best places to train as a brain surgeon, add uc san francisc

for anybody who understands language, you will understand that i was beginning to understand. my process was moving forward very fast. i came to hopkins six years ago. i mentioned the other day that, within six years, i was promoted to being nominated to full professor. in my department, it takes an average of 18 years. i took advantage of the inortunities that were put front of me. people say it was it a chance? was it good looks? i am reminded of what a very humble scientists said in 1906 who won the nobel prize in medicine. he told us how the brain was organized. thank you to his contributions, we can now do brain surgery. heaid that chance and good

luck do not come to those who wanted. it comes to those who look for it. many immigrants are looking for those opportunities coming to the united states. icho a lot of the comments that have been said before. let me tell you about my laboratory. i lead an effort in my lab to find a cure for brain cancer. i have a group of 23 scientists. i can count with both of my hands the number of brain surgeons that have federal funding, the most distinguished funding to do research on any type of brain-related work. i am one of them. i lead this multimillion-dollar effort. as i look to my scientists, 23 of them, only two of them are from the united states. the other ones are either immigrants, first generation, or people who are coming to my laboratory to try to help. an article was published a couple of weeks ago that give me

a lot of heat. the requested 10 scientists and nobody wants to look like the bad guy. after 10 scientists declined, they came to me. i said, sure, i would be delighted to tell you the truth. availability, affility, ability, and accountability -- i got a lot of heat when the article was published because my scientists work seven days a week, 24 hours a day. we are losing in our country the fundamental things that made this country the most beautiful country in the world. that is too simple words. hard work. no one wants to hear that. i am here to tell you -- i look like the bad guy. sure enough, a lot of heat has been going back and forth and i had to meet with the dean at one point. my operating room, all right? an s and -- an

anesthesiologist, 60% of foreign graduates. the others are first or second generation graduation-- from thd states. the people who help me monitor the brain as i am taking out complex brain tumors from the part of the brain where, if i may go an extra mm, that person will wake of mute or not able to move his arm or leg. half of them are foreign graduates. nurses, 50/50. my residence, 23 residents that are in the no. 1 program in neuro surgery, 60% are for an aunt 40% are u.s.-born. that tells you what w're going through. -- 60% are foreign and 40% are u.s.-born. that tells you what we're going through. those are my remarks.

thank you. [applause] >> thank you. do you want to wrap up the macro looked? >> who do not know what the is left for me to talkbout. as an economist, i thought i should go over a couple of things. let me talk generally about immigration and economic growth could then let me talk about the difference between low-skilled and high skilled immigration and competitiveness. then i will talk about policy and reform at the end pin in terms of economic growth, immigration is an extremely important component. they make up about half of the labor force over the last decade. the numbers for stem occupations are much higher in terms of the coributions of immigrants.

when you introduce emigrants into the labor force, you get specialization. it increases efficiency. it is efficiency that leads to higher productivity. hire a tip -- higher productivity is what makes us competitive. the other really important factor about the immigrant labor force is that it is more mobile geographically than the native labor force. that has an economic payout could immigrants tend to flow to growing areas more readily than native workers tur. we saw that, if you want to give a lower-skilled immigration example, in louisiana, in the wake of hurricane katrina, a tremendous influx of hispanic

workers to the gulf area to restore and rebuild. or to give high-skilled immigration examples, in dallas and other inter-city school districts, we have an influx of teachers teaching math and science. also, the doctors, for example, medical doctors who served in rural areas and inner cities as well, in fact, my mother who camerom sweden in the late 1970's, she is a surgeon could she went to work in gary, indiana. there were not many american educated doctors who were where it -- who were willing to work in gary, indiana in the le 1970's. the economy was collaing and it was a very poor and crime- ridden area. employer contributions, then and now, they are disproportionate

for foreign doctors. u.s.-bo doctors will not go there. different studies -- let me remarksriefly on immigration and econic growth. when it comes to high skilled immigration, there really is consensus among labor economists on the benefits of high skilled immigration could there probably is not with regard -- skilled immigration. there probably is not with regard to lower skilled immigration. in terms of fiscal effect coming

terms of high skills contributed . what they use in public services, theyctually pay off over their lifetime over $100,000 in net benefits to u.s. taxpayers in terms of what they contributeore vs. what they use up in services. on competitiveness, we first mentioned higher productivity. but there is another aspect, which is even more compelling. it is not just a one time change in productivity. but they contribute to productivity growth. if you can contribute to productivity growth, you can set the national economy on a higher growth path. that is not a one time change, but a continuous increase in output that is sustained over time. that is really because high skilled immigrants ctribute to

innovation, mostly being stem immigrants. when they patent, the patent at twice the rate of native one- time scientists. they are not substituting for native one-time native scientists innovation. that is another important result. i entrepreneurship is another area. it leads to higher innovation. another benefit that can spillover to higher producvity growth. there are other a fax. there is less research done so far, but it looks promising. there is research that suggests that more high school the immigration attracts physical capital as well, investments. it seems rsonable in this room. t documenting it as good research is harder. but there is a correlation between capital flow and investment and immigration.

and there is to research that suggests that more high school the immigration can flow out sourcing. in terms of policy, it is surprising. mayor bloomberg says it is crazy. it is crazy. the benefits of high skilled immigration is so well documented that it is surprising when you look at immigration policy and say that we have fallen short at taking advantage of something that looks like a free lunch. economists say that there is no such thing as free lunch, but this comes pretty close. i was talking about my book a while ago at an event at the urban institute. how do you set up quotas and high skill arrogance? what is the best way and how big should they be?

and a person from the australian embassy said why would you have any quotas on high skilled immigration at all? if all of these benefits are true, why would you limit them? i am so used to thinking in u.s. immigration picy and quotas that i had not considered the fact that you would not have a limit. i thought about that a little bit. the one where i draw the line is that there has to be demand. as it is, we know it is difficult to bring in foreign workers. it is expensive for companies to bring them in. there's preference for native- born workers. i think we have a built-in priority for native-born workers as it is paired and the second condition should be to maintain that -- as it is. and the second condition should be to maintain those conditions. like a stable poly that is even worth mentioning, having a

job being a basic requirement or even a plan, starting a business. i think there bloomberg and others have mentioned -- i think yor bloomberg and others have mentioned the 7% that i have been talking about. this compared to other o.c. the countries, no one else puts that kind of barrier to immigration. we fill the gap with temporary visas. we have been talking about them today. they have plug the gap. but at the end of the day, you end up with a dysfutional ring card program where lawmakers have passed legislation allowing more temporary visas than green cards to allow those people to stay.

the empler wants them to stay as well. queues.e a growing cue they can extend 10 years plus. people from china and india, even mexicans and latinos. there is 1.1 million approved and waiting in the employment- based queue. considering all of the contributions you can make to the economy and the competitiveness. in terms of reform, along the lines of american lumber, you have a policy that needs to put a priority on skill-based immigration instead of a permanent visas. grow with the economy rather than be fixed over time which does not make a lot of sense. they are allocated in a strange well -- way as well.

first,, first serve -- first come, first-served lea to long queues. the concludes my remarks. >> just a couple of -- i just want to get it on the table. i still hear a lot on the hill that -- sometimes company's port arthur and bridging immigrants from overseas. they are not working the domestic labor market. they are not searching it carefully enough to fight the people they need. -- find the people they need. i would like to askou what you do. why would you go overseas if you could find somebody here? sometimes i sit here that these

positions in these colleges are beg set asi for immigrants because they can pay full tuition. it is a cash cow for universities. elizabeth, d wants to -- >> first of all, we do well of our recruitment. every job is posted online. we go through a whole system that trickles in our system. all of our jobs are posted on time. there are tons of engineering jobs. when our talent acquisition team actually does the resonates -- gets the resumes, when they actually start searching for the candidates, it is unbelievable how many of them qualify for the

job and are foreign nationals. the first thing they do is call me. what to using about this? sometimes i'm telling them to turn down the top foreign talent because they have already used up four or five years in that status. we would immediately have to jump into sponsoring them for a green card. in some cases i am not telling the hiring managers, do not hire that person. all the jobs are posted up there. everybody has an equal opportunity to apply for a job. we are not going outnd recruiting. we would not recruit for a new job somebody who is living in china and would go to the expense of bringing them in.

most of the foreign nationals we are recruiting are being educated here in the united states. we have an active leadership development program that every year goes out and hires people, recent graduates from u.s. universities. most of the applicants -- some to come from canada. it is pretty easy for them. we do not necessarily offer international relocation. to lee -- relocate somebody from another country is anywhere from a $30,000 to bring somebody in. not to mention the cost of going through the petition. just to the application fee is $2,000. if you want premium processing, at another $1,200 to that.

both of us to do immigration in house. i'm not an attorney. i started out as a human- resources professional. when it comes to doing the lab certifation and an -- we use outside counsel. i can tell you my legal bills are tremendous. i get a lot of pressure -- why are we spending so much money? you try to explain that it is more and more difficult, particularly in an economy with high unemployment. when you're going to a labor certification and you a testing the u.s. labor market and against a specific skill sets, we do not find u.s. workers with the appropate skill set.

remember, when you are doing a petition, you were looking at the minimum requirements for the position. it is kind of a reverse of how everybody hires. when you were trying to hire the best person for the job when you're testing the labour market to sponsor somebody, the mandatory retirement is against the minimum qualifications to do the job. that is not the best and brightest. even in those situations we are usually successful in disqualifying candidates who do not meet the still set to spsor the foreign worker. the first person we are looking for, if we can get an american who can do the job, that is who we will hire. it is cheaper.

>> as i think i mentioned, microsoft looks to hire and retain the best and brightest talent from wherever they come in the world. refocus our recruitment efforts in individuals who aren the workforce and university hires. our primary for -- focus is at u.s. universities. they are the best in the world. we are looking for graduates from those universities. there is a shortage. there is a shortage of individuals coming out of those universities with a stem degrees. there is a shortage of u.s. citizens coming out of those universities with them. we cannot compromise. we are not going to not attempt

to hire the best and brightest. we are in a competitive market. we are competing with other u.s.-based companies. and we are competing with companies outside of the u.s. we want the innovation to take place here. we would like it to be at microsoft. if not, at least in the u.s. we do spend all lot of time and energy in terms of our recruitments looking for the best and the price -- brightest of -- regardless of nationality. we willontinue to put effort into building a pipeline of students coming out of u.s. universities with stan degrees. we have a robust in turn -- intern program. we of students who worked in the

summer with teams on our campus -- campus hoping to spur their interesting get them excited about working in the high-tech field so they will remain in the u.s. and go to universities and attain those degrees and come back to work with us later on once they have graduated. there are high school students, we have a robust university program. many of the u.s. students to come through our program that do come and work on our campus at microsoft. we focus on u.s. universities. we are looking to hire the best and brightest. it is not easy to bring in foreign talent or to go through the process. we hope they can focus on their jobs and their lives and we focus on bringing our talent in as quickly as possible and

getting them up to speed and helping them with their immigration process. we struggle with the cap. it is not as bad as it was a few years ago. thateing said, that a man to that of from january until october, we're not able to bring in any foreign national hires on the program. it does not mean we can stop hiring the best and brightest. we there have to delay their on boarding or higher than elsewhere. if we want to be competitive, into what that great technology to develop here and the economy the comes along with it, we need to work on the system.

>> an innovative product, as i say we are basically a manufacturing company. over the last several years unr our ceo, we have become a service business. a lot of the technical products that are manufactured and produced at our plants in the united states increases jobs for manufacturing. it also serves a whole industry. we do not just service our own products our industrial technologies group -- we have a whole service industry matter at a lower level but they have jobs as well. the company is growing. it is not limited just to our

products but also to other people, other competitors. >> i am sitting here doing that. that pulled up our website to attack current enrollments. the question was about we're just carving out seeds for overseas studes because they pay more. they do. we are a state school. we are less and less state supported as time goes by. we charge of georgia students one-third of the tuition that we charge students from elsewhere. we make no distinction between what we charge from the other states in the united states and the rest of the world. it is still the same rate whether you are from alabama or albania. we will chars the same amount. we are looking at nine applications for every slot we

have. i pulled up the numbers. overall, we get 54% of graduate. 54% of our students are from georgia. they have to prove a history. 27% from other states and 18% foreign. guaranteed if something stupid happens and you get no more student visas, we would manage the same ratios. 54% within the state of georgia, we would have the act same a dollar figure in tuition. we would get no economic benefit. we would wind up with lower quality student body. there's no financial incentive to us. >> let me throw it up and -- to

the audience. i have done this for a while. i thought this was a good panel. i was doing a little math on the country, yes ma'am. >> i am a reporter from reuters. i would like to ask elizabeth a question. i would like to know what you would like to see from congress. do you want to see a piecemeal legislation or would you like to see a much larger comprehensive legislation? >> i will go first. as chairman of the subcommittee our goal has always been a comprehensive immigration reform. that being said, we of seen a tough road. we have backed comprehensive immigration reform.

i was very involved in the kennedy-mccain bill in 1996. trust me, i have been fighting the fight for a long time. uic that happening in congress? i do not think so. judging from the type of highly skilled workers we need and the fact that these pple will be such a contribution to our economy, if we end up with some of piecemeal measures, we would support them. >> i would agree with that. we support comprehensive immigration reform. in the meantime we would support a peaceful legislation. we focus on and trying to work toward administrative reform. we want tlook at areas where

we can work with the government to make some slight changes that will have a larger impact on the folks who are waiting for their green cards. >> the chamber was a very involved in getting the ste that was done through regulations with the agency. in a couple years when we're hitting the cap on the very first day, the stem extension was critical. there may be other things like that we cannot act. if your suggestions, we are always looking for them. >> we do a lot of work on immigration. he noticed with the absence of comprehensive reform, aot of states have taken their own initiatives. have you seen or do you expect to see certain stakes to become

more economically competitive? do you think that could push a case for reform on the federal level? >> arizona hurt their economy when they did some of their draconian measures. the individual states acting in loops -- in liueu of the federal government is a troubling, pecially for companies like mind who have operations in every state. is a complex set of rules. these states are starting to do this. we are a federal contractor. we are enrolled in e-verify. i think utah has come up with a

strange plan to do their own immigration system. immigration is a federal issue. i do not think it belongs at a state level. whether each individual state i being hurt economically, and do not know. arizona was the biggest. i think it hurt them economically. >> i see a lot of states going that way even though we have this fuzzy law in the supreme court. >> i think we have time for one more. if not, that is fine. i think this has been a great panel. i have the commitment from our partners on this. this will not be an agent -- and we are going to follow up with

this on a report. we will take advantage from all of the information we have gathered today. i think that will help us in our challenges ahead in the senate and house. i want to thank our panelists. [applause] the panels tosk stay here for one minute. let me make some closing remarks. i am the executive vice president of the u.s. foreign for policy innovation. we'll receive the -- i wanted to thank the director for his great remarks this morning and for his tremendous flexibility. a special thanks to mayor bloomberg. i appreciate the comments about the yankees.

i want to thank the panel. we really got some great insight. we often talk about the fact that we talk theory and theory is easy and cheap. this is practice. this is where the rubber meets the road. we talked earlier that we are about engaging in dialogue on issues. he might not think of immigration as an emerging issue. we cannot seem to get there and figure it out. i am a cuban refugee myself. i have a lot of feelings and personal convictions about this. i appreciate it. my father would ten say the, as he can to this country, people would say, you have been fortunate. i said yes, the harder i work,

the luckier i get. hard work is something that immigrants bring to this country. and all other successl people in this country. i wanted to thank everyone. especially the partnership for the new american economy for the role they played in making this happen. in founding the partnership, which brought together -- prostie other mayors to make a case for atreamlining and modernizing and rationalizing the immigration system. what a novel idea. i also want to thank my colleague randy johnson. it is a team. in listening to the remarks, i wanted to make two points i think are important. we are in a global market. this is not about a closed circuit.

it is important. the second part, which is a question, we do not need to fix it all. it would be ideal to get comprehensive immigration. to do nothing is not acceptable. we are falling behind economically. it is affecting the business we do. as we look ahead, which planned to write some things. i thought i would end on a light and out. i have to thank for being reminded of a joke. a very famous brain surgeon heard me water running in the bathroom. the toilet was overflowing. he could not stop the water. so he called a plumber. he fixed the water and it's 15 minutes was out the door and handed him in $950 bill. the doctor said, i am one of

them a leading surgeons in baltimore. i do nats make $950 for 15 minutes of work. >> he said yes, i used to be a brain surgeon. but this job is better. >> there are all sort of jobs available. with that, we will end. thank you for your patience. thanks again to our panel. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute]

>> the ranking member of the house budget committee and a member of the joint deficit reduction committee talks about how the joint committee is doing with the task of identifying budget cuts and other political issues. that is at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. on c-span. >> the head of the american university professors says professors need to be protected. courts tenure creates an atmosphere on campus where people can speak freely in their teaching and in terms of university governance. if you do not like a proposal that the board or the president makes, you need to be will to

speak freely about it. that shared governance is part of what her academic freedom projects. without that, you do not have the expertise of the faculty available to you. >> that is on sunday night. the house meets on monday at 2:00 with the first roll-call votes expected after 6:30. this week, members will consider a federal spending plan through november. watch live coverage on c-span. at 3:30, the senate will begin debate on a bill that aims to crack down on china's currency manipulation. they will proceed to consider six nominations including one to the circuit judge for the fourth circuit. you can see the senate live on c-span2.

>> less than a year after the creation of dia, it faced its first great test when the cuban missile crisis brought the world to the edge of forwar. >> the defense intelligence agency was established in 1961. military on the intelligence issues. learn more online at the seized and video library. it is all archived and searchable. it is washington, your way. get regular updates of what is on the c-span network with twitter. it is easy to sign up. it is easy to sign up.