How Trump’s Immigration Rules Will Hurt the US Tech Sector

When President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Jan 27 issuing a temporary ban on immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries, it went into effect immediately. The order had immediate consequences for thousands of people. But beyond harming long-term US residents, their families, their education, and their work, the executive order could cause long-lasting shockwaves in the business world—and especially in the technology sector.

Computer-related jobs are the top source of new wages in the US, according to analyses from Code.org, a nonprofit organization that advocates for more access to computer-science education. But there aren’t enough skilled American workers to fill open tech jobs in the US: There are more than 500,000 open computing jobs, but only about 43,000 Americans graduate from college with computer-science degrees every year. That’s a problem that H-1B visas—non-immigrant visas that allow high-skilled foreign workers to be employed, temporarily, by American companies—are designed to solve. A forthcoming executive order will likely change the rules to make it harder for companies to grant foreign workers H-1B visas.