The New York Times' Kevin Sack positively reviews changes in the federal government's medicare pay system for hospitals. Medicare is no longer footing the bill for "reasonably preventable conditions" caused at hospitals. It's part of the new "performance-pay" model at the Center for ...

The Wall Street Journal’s Kelly Evans says that new restrictions on non-agricultural seasonal labor are hurting small businesses. Last year, in the midst of unsuccessfully trying to craft a comprehensive immigration bill, Congress let expire an exemption in its H2-B Visa program allowing for non-agricultural seasonal labor.

So ...

The New York Times’ Julia Preston reports that after five days the Department of Homeland Security’s immigration arm received 163,000 visas from highly-skilled potential immigrants. The visa application window is now closed and a lottery will be held next week to choose the 85,000 lucky winners.

These immigrants ...

If you are reading this, it may already be too late to apply for the government’s H-1B work visa program for highly-skilled immigrant labor. Julia Preston of the New York Times reports that today hundreds of thousands of foreigners are expected to apply for 65,000 available spots.

Last ...

How do you get a government agency to care enough to do things differently?  Let's hope Fernanda Santos's recent story in the New York Times will encourage people at Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS) to find a faster solution for immigrant soldiers and Marines who have served (and sometimes died) ...

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service, a division of the Dept. of Homeland Security, will accelerate green card processing for 47,000 applications delayed due to flaws in the FBI's security review system.  Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post reports that the change applies only to people who have applied for ...

Julia Preston of the New York Times reports that a new contract for passport processing issued by the State Department will cut wages for some 20% of workers at passport center in Vermont and California.  These cuts target long-term workers as well as recent hires.  The wage cuts come as ...

Arizona, with what may be the largest population of illegal immigrants in the U.S., is grappling with a state law that forces businesses to fire workers who are in the country illegally.  Arizona is on the front lines since Congress and the White House couldn't push through a new approach ...

The Department of Homeland Security did not anticipate the rapid rise in applications for citizenship and permanent resident status due to a July 30 deadline, after which the fees for naturalization rose by more than 50%.  Annual applications doubled to 1.4 million by the middle of 2007, Spencer Hsu of ...

The European Union will offer special immigration status to skilled workers, offering so-called "blue-cards" that would allow for free movement throughout EU and eventual citizenship. See the Wall Street Journal note on that issue here.