The H1B visa lottery system is imperfect and insufficient, immigration lawyers agreed. For example, the limited number of H1Bs handed out every year has encouraged some firms to game the system by applying for more spots than they have open jobs. In 2010, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services caught wind of the trend and cracked down on IT firms. Today, a limited pool of visas, stricter monitored by CIS, and faster growth in Asia, are all pushing our smartest immigrants away.

An economy is only as good as its people and ideas. It doesn't make sense to try to grow the economy by making life difficult for the thousands of the world's smartest thinkers. If it's un-American to export a job, how un-American is it to export entrepreneurs -- job-creators -- just because they weren't in the U.S.?

That's why the White House should get behind the Startup Visa Act of 2011, a bipartisan bill that grants a temporary work visa to immigrants who secure angel or venture capital and create jobs after two years. Immigrants are 30% more likely to start a business in the U.S., and "one quarter of all engineering and technology firms launched in the U.S. since the mid-1990s had at least one immigrant founder," according to a Duke study. In 2005, immigrants not only accounted for 55 percent of Silicon Valley's science and engineering workers, but also founded 25 percent of its high-tech firms. This is the kind of talent we want to quota?

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed last week, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, advocated "decoupling" Startup Visa legislation from the comprehensive immigration reform package. He's on to something. Securing our borders and finding a solution for 11 million undocumented workers is an important cause, but it's too likely to become a political football for 2012. In the meantime, the United States is witnessing a historic reverse brain-drain -- thousands of people we've already spent billions of dollar educating at our best universities.

It's a cliche to say that we could be sending home the world's next Larry Page or Steve Jobs. But it's only a cliche because it's a truth that needs constant repeating. It's time to send a bipartisan message to the rest of the world: The U.S. is open for business.



