The H1 Visa or the H1B Visa is a work visa program was created by the US Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. This permitted the Attorney General of the United States of America to import non-immigrant temporary foreign workers. This could be done in consultation with other agencies responsible for the control of nonimmigrant labor. With this the Alien Contract Act of 1885 stood repealed.

The H1 visa was used initially to import temporary labor in times of labor shortages. The new act thus allowed woolgrowers in California to import sheepherders from the Basque region in Spain.  These sheep herders were allowed temporary working visas for three years. This we can see was the genesis of the present H1B visa. Earlier in 1944 with the help of temporary visas workers were brought in from the Caribbean to harvest the sugar cane crop. The workers were exploited by employers because of their non-immigrant and temporary status.

Years went by and many need based visas were created. The J1 visa in 1961 allowed the entry of non-immigrant artists and teachers on the basis of educational and cultural exchange.  The L visa was created for the benefit of big corporate houses in 1970 by Congress. This allowed the influx of non-immigrant professionals. The visa was further divided into L1A and L1B.

In 1976 amendments to the Immigration and Nationality Act increased the quota of non-immigrants with their families from 34000 to 58000. American Universities too got a special dispensation through the Eilberg Amendment. This allowed the influx of intellectuals from other countries without going through the strict Labor laws. An H-2 program was created followed by H2A in 1986. It was an attempt to allow Mexican labor to move to other sectors of commerce and industry besides the farming sector in which they had been stuck forever.

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1990 was signed by President George H.W. Bush. The visas suddenly jumped to a big number of 140,000. Non immigrant H1B visas were capped at 65,000 per year. The visa holders were allowed a stay of three years which could be extended to six years. The basic requirement was that the immigrant should hold a Bachelor’s degree.

This Act also made employers of the non-immigrant workers to give guarantees of wages equal to those being paid to existing employees. It also made employers to guarantee similar working conditions for them. It was a benign law for the newcomers. The H1B became a double purpose visa. It allowed the visa holder to apply for a green card which was one step away from citizenship. There was a big scramble for this visa the world over.

Also new categories of visas were created including the one for nurses called H1A. Special visas P and O were made for entertainers, artists, educators, athletes and scientists.

In 1997 the cap of 65,000 visas was reached and there was a demand for more visas. Under President Clinton’s administration the cap was raised to 115,000 in 1999 and 2000. It was then reduced in 2001 to 107,500 and by 2002 it was back to 65,000.

Today under President Obama the trend is towards giving jobs to Americans first instead of non-immigrants with skills that are not available in America. The downturn has also caused many H1 category visa holders to go back to their home countries.