Hello U.S. Dopers. How are you? I would like very much to move in. Not into your house, because, well, that could be rather awkward, but into your country.
Anyone have any idea about how this works? The way I see it, I need a Green Card, so I can work and all that sort of thing, but Green Cards appear to be scarce. I am in this years Diversity Visa Lottery, but I don’t really think a random long shot is really anything to rely on.
So is there something I’m missing? It seems that people are moving to America all the time - starlets going to Hollywood and waiting tables, hoping for their big break, immgirants arriving in New York Harbor with just a suitcase, all that sort of thing. But, I don’t really see how people do it. Outside the lottery, it seems you can only really get in by marrying an American (not really an option), being related to an American (not at all an option) or being super talented like, I dunno… Stephen Hawking (well, maybe one day… but I don’t want to wait for the years it takes to become super talented).
The only other way seems to involve getting an American company to give you a job, but this seems a bit of a Catch-22 - can’t get a job without a visa, can’t get a visa without a job.
So, does anyone know if I’m missing something. It seems everyone gets to move to America except for me. What can I do to get myself to America in the not-too-distant future? Or is it just not very likely at all.
Well, I got here in two ways from Australia. First, I was offered a job here, and my employer and its lawyers got a temporary employment visa for me, based on my skill levels. Then, while I was working here on a temporary visa, I won the Green Card Lottery (the Diversity Lottery that you already know about), and “adjusted my status” from temporary visa to green card.
In addition to skilled employment visas and the lottery, there are other routes: refugee status, marrying an American, having American relatives who will sponsor you. You can also come to the US as a student, but that will cost you more money than you can make out of the part-time employment that is allowed for students.
Depends on a lot. Where are you? What is your nationality? Your gender? Your skills? Your age? Your languages?
All in all though, all my friends end up coming back to the Diversity Lottery. You might as well enter. They also consider the programs for Australia, New Zealand (a favorite) and Canada. The UK seems to be taking in a lot of nurses of late.
Giles: I’m also Australian (so unless the world changes a lot, refugee status is unlikely). Is there any more you can tell me about the skilled employment visa? If you don’t mind me asking, how did you get the job you were offered - is it more along the lines of finding an employer willing to import someone from overseas, or is it more like being good enough in your field that they’ll come looking for you?
Paul In Saudi: I’ve already entered the Diversity Lottery. I can hope I win that, but if there are other routes that I can use, that’s good, too. I’m hoping there’s something better than “wait for a computer to choose my name,” you know?
I am an Australian, in Australia, early 20s, male, my first and only language is English and as far as skills go - I’m just out of college, so I have a bachelor’s degree, but very little professional experience. I majored in Journalism.
I’d already had a close working relationship with my now boss, by serving for about 5 years on an international committee that worked in the area, so I knew all the people that I was going to be working with, and they knew me. So I got the job byt being at the right level in my profession, and by being well-known. Frankly, it’s so much work for the employer getting you an employment visa that you have to be pretty good at your job.
One path is to work for an international firm, and get an intra-company transfer. You still need some kind of visa to do that, but your employer organises it.
What the US does not really have is the WHV (working holiday visa) that you can get between Australia, Canada, New Zealand and many western European countries. In my opinion, that’s a great pity, but there’s not much you can do about it.
(Oh, and one of my sons is now in the UK on an ancestry visa, because one of his grandparents was born in the UK – there’s no equivalent to that in the US, either).
Have you spent much time in the US? If not, either study or volunteer work would give you a chance to see if it’s really for you, and further develop the skills and relationships that might help make one of the employment visa types realistic.
You seem to have ruled out marrying an American. You could also marry an Australian or other national who has strong credentials for a work visa. Perhaps a nurse?
smiling bandit, I’m a (sexy) foreign lad, so, unless we both consider a new home in Massachusetts, you’re out of luck.
Harriet The Spry, I lived in the U.S. on a student visa, so I’ve spent enough time in the States to be absolutely certain that it is for me. Indeed, that’s partly the problem - I’ve been back home quite a while, and I’m still missing America an awful lot. I’d made up my mind while I was there that I wanted to move permanently, and when I came back home it pretty much confirmed the decision. However, it appears from what Giles and others have said, all I can do is improve my experience and qualifications enough so that I am sufficiently attractive for an employer to want to go to the trouble of importing me or to convince an employer here to send me over. Only trouble is, I want that to happen sooner rather than later - America really is where I feel at home, even if it isn’t (yet) my home - and unfortunately the gradual building of experience takes time. Unfortunately, wanting things doesn’t make them true.
Oh, and I’m not anti-marrying Americans. It’s just that I’m not going to be marrying any of the Americans I do know, and I think it would be rather odd to place American Citizenship as the defining quality I look for in a future partner. So, marriage is a possibility, but not really something I can count on for my ticket in.
Sorry for the double post, but Giles: another question if you don’t mind - how many years did you have to enter the Green Card Lottery before you were selected? I know it doesn’t really tell me anything; it’s all random, but I still would rather hear it was 1 year rather than, say, 10 years.
I won the lottery the first time I entered. My wife entered too, because if she’s won I’d have been able to get a green card that way, but my name came up and not hers.
In addition (but maybe not an option) is joining the U.S. military. This will get you a green card and possibly citizenship when you come out after your tour of duty. Another way is to invest in the U.S. - starting a business. It takes a lot of capital though, last time I checked, it was about $1M.
You have to realize that many of those that move to the U.S. do so without having their papers in order beforehand. If you’re in one of the Visa Waiver program countries (Australia is one, I think), you basically go there without a visa and stay on indefinitely. Getting a U.S. driver’s license and social security card is perfectly legal, and while the SS card will state “Not Valid for Employment” there are a lot of people floating around that the INS never catches up with. I guess they hope to find some way to be able to stay legally.
Don’t we have a resident Doper who specializes in immigration law? Guin?
Just a thought, but as anxious as you may be, you’re still young. Why not try to get a job there in journalism (print or broadcast), and with a year or so of experience under your belt, you could then start applying to various media in the US for a job. If you have by then a good body of work you can refer to, you might have a better chance of landing a job.
Also, applying to some papers to be a stringer for them reporting Australian news or writing feature stories, might get their attention, and if it works out, you’d have a better chance of talking them into a job here.
I came on an H-1B visa. For this, you will need an employer to offer you a job that needs your skills. Having a college degree is a good start, but your lack of experience is not. There is also a limit on the number of H-1Bs given each year - 80,000 I believe.
An alternative would be to get a job in Oz with a company that has American offices. Then after one year you would qualify for an L-1 visa to transfer to your American office. This is easier to get than an H-1B and doesn’t have a quota.
Note that in both the above scenarios, you can only work for the US employer that sponsors your visa. If they fire you, you will have to find a new employer willing to sponsor you again, or leave the country.
