Washington: US President Donald Trump has recently announced the Gold Card, which the US will launch soon. According to Trump, the holder of the Gold Card will get the privileges of a Green Card, and it will also open the way to citizenship.
Its value will be five million US dollars. According to today’s Indian currency, this amount is more than Rs 43 crore 70 lakh. Trump said that the sale of Gold Card will start in about two weeks. US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said that the Gold Card will replace the government’s EB-5 immigrant investor visa.
Trump wants American companies to use this Gold Card visa to employ foreign students and professionals, including Indians, but the big question is whether American companies will actually hire foreign professionals through the $5 million visa?
Companies can use gold cards to recruit employees: Trump
“People come from India, China, Japan and other countries, study at Harvard or the Wharton School of Finance, get job offers, but the offers are immediately rescinded because you don’t know if the person can stay in the country,” Trump said while announcing the Gold Card visa on February 25.
He said American companies and the economy are suffering because talented students go back to India or their native countries and start successful ventures, creating thousands of jobs. “They go back to India or their country, start businesses and become billionaires, employ thousands of people,” Trump said. Trump said a company can now buy a gold card and use it to recruit employees.
Investment cost will increase for Gold Card Visa
The EB-5 visa requires investors to invest $1 million and employ at least 10 Americans. The EB-5 is a category of temporary visas that holders can use to earn a green card and eventually US citizenship. According to a CNBC report, about 3,800 Indians have used the EB-5 visa to move to the US in the last decade.
The investment cost for a Gold Card visa increases, as the Gold Card will require an investment of $5 million while the EB-5 costs $1 million. The question is, when other visa options such as H-1B are available, why would a company use an investment visa to hire employees?
The H-1B visa is the preferred route for both US companies looking for talent and professionals looking to work in the US. Although it is a temporary work visa that can be used to stay in the US for up to six years, the cost of applying for an H-1B visa can range from $2,010 to $7,380 depending on several factors including the size of the company. The number and cost of the visas make it a preferred choice for employers and prospective employees. The demand for H-1B visas is so high that there is a lottery system to select professionals.
Will Trump’s Gold Card Visa help Indians?
In comparison, an H-1B visa costs a US company up to $8,000, while a Gold Card visa would cost $5 million to hire just one person. While Trump has not revealed the specifics of his Gold Card visa, it is unlikely that one visa can be used to hire multiple people. This suggests that the Gold Card visa is much more expensive, which is bound to happen since it is an investor visa, while the H-1B visa is meant for hiring professionals.
What are people saying about the Gold Card?
Is it really a business-wise move for companies to invest $5 million in an emerging talent? Chris Hoffman writes on X, “If the goal is to attract the most successful entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial families: The cost of the ‘Gold Card’ should be variable depending on the applicant’s home country. Does the US want the top 0.1 percent of successful people from countries where the path to $5 million is more common… or the best 0.1 percent from every country in the world?”
‘Companies can use gold cards to reward employees’
According to a report by India Today, Indian-origin business development executive Ravinder Syal says that companies can use the $5 million Gold Card to reward their best performing employees. Syal, who lives in France, said, “I would link the Gold Card to re-industrialization, where companies can reward their best employees with US citizenship in exchange for investing in the US. For which America needs to promote certain industries.”
According to a report by India Today, the Gold Card can work as a reward but not as a regular route to hire employees including Indian professionals. It can also be used to induct rare talent but not for regular hiring. This is because companies always look at the return on investment and it is not an efficient investment at first glance. Why should a company use Visa to attract investors to hire employees?
Would any US company use the expensive visa route to recruit employees?
According to the report, US companies are using professionals from India, especially in the tech sector, because there is a shortage of local talent and it helps reduce operational costs. Would an American company really use the very expensive visa route to get employees, which it uses to reduce operational costs? The answer is ‘no’. So Indian professionals are not going to benefit from Trump’s Gold Card visa. Nor are US companies going to benefit.
