What is H-1B?

H-1B is a temporary immigration visa law enacted by congress and is the largest special-purpose employment program. H-1B allows a maximum 195,000 foreign professionals to enter the US each year. Each foreign professional is permitted to stay in the US for up to six years, ostensibly to meet short-term, high-skill employment needs in the domestic labor market. Robert Reich, Secretary of Labor, said  "In principle, this can be an appropriate purpose, consistent with the overall goals of our employment-based immigration policy. Our experience with the practical operation of the H-1B program has raised serious concerns, however, that what was conceived as a means to meet temporary business needs for unique, highly-skilled professionals from abroad is, in fact, being used by some employers to bring in relatively large numbers of foreign workers who may well be displacing U.S. workers and eroding employers' commitment to the domestic workforce." To get more information go to the H-1B Hall of Shame on this site.

When a company or placement agency wants to hire an H-1B alien, they must fill out an application called a Labor Condition Application (LCA) and file it with the Department of Labor. If the DOL approves, they officially have the permission to sponsor a foreign worker to temporarily come to the United States and work . The  Labor Condition Applications & Requirements for Employers Using is a huge government guide to the LCA.

Where did ZaZona get the data for the LCA Database?

The data was obtained after invoking the "Freedom of Information Act" to the Department of Labor.

What Information Is In an LCA?

The records available depend on whether the visa is an H-2B, H-1B, or Green Card.They are all slightly different. 

Web Data Format:
The data that is seen online is a subset of the LCA record that all visas have in common.

• Case Number - Number assigned by the DOL to identify the LCA record

• Employer Name - The Employer that submitted the LCA

• OCC - Occupational Code that is used to describe the job title

• Job Title - title of the job that the visa holder will have

• Number of Aliens - number of visa holders to be hired

• Salary - salary that the visa holder will receive

• Unit of Pay - pay period can be hourly, weekly, monthly, yearly etc.

• Start Date - date the visa holder will report to work

• End Date - date the visa expires

• Work City - city of employment

• Work State - state of employment

Additional information that is included on H-1B LCAs

• EIN - Employer Identification Number assigned by the INS

• Employer Phone - employer phone number

• Employer Address - address where LCA originated

• Employer City - city where LCA originated

• Employer State - state where LCA originated

• Employer Zip Code - zip code where LCA originated

• Part Time - flagged when the job is part time

• Prevailing Wage - previous wage to establish prevailing wage

• Prevailing Rate - pay period can be hourly, weekly, monthly, yearly etc.

• Source - source of prevailing wage figure

• Contact Name - name of person that submitted LCA

• Contact Title - job title of person that submitted LCA

• Det Date - date of last action by DOL

• Final Action - whether LCA was approved or  rejected

Additional information that is included with special Green Card LCAs

• EIN - Employer Identification Number assigned by the INS

• Contact Name - name of person that submitted LCA

• Employer Phone - employer phone number

• Employer Address - address where LCA originated

• Employer City - city where LCA originated

• Employer State - state where LCA originated

• Employer Zip Code - zip code where LCA originated

• Employer Fax - fax number where LCA originated

• Name of Alien - name of alien applying for green card

• Prevailing Wage - previous wage to establish prevailing wage

• Prevailing Rate - pay period can be hourly, weekly, monthly, yearly etc.

• Source - source of prevailing wage figure

• Received Local - date received in local office

• Reduction In Recruit - waiver or reduction of the full recruitment provisions of Federal regulations

• Limited Review - whether LCA was received in the region with minimal review

• SVP - Specific Vocational Preparation" or the time (or experience) needed to develop the skills needed for "average" performance of the job

H-2B Full Data Format:
Additional information that is included with special H-2B searches

• H-2B is approximately the same as H-1B Special Format

Go to the bottom of this webpage to see a graphic  illustration of the difference between the data in an LCA and the data that can be viewed online.

How Often is the Database Updated

Updating the database is an ongoing effort. Here is a history of the updates. Check back occasionally to see if an update has occurred. Records may be added or deleted from the previous dataset so the increase in record quantity does not necessarily mean that the data was taken from a new dataset - it could be old archived data. The online database is usually a subset of all data available.

Why Can't I See More than 500 Records?

The database used to return all the records and give a complete count regardless of the number of records - but that was in the days that the database was much smaller. Since then the database has grown to more than 1 million records. 

Unfortunately the database server that is being used is very limited and cannot handle the demands of multiple users obtaining large amounts of information at the same time. It also can't handle more than 1 million records so I have to publish a subset of all the data I possess. These are compromises I must make because I am providing this as a free service and I have a very low budget.

A better database requires a more robust server, and that costs money. I am trying to allow the best public access of the data that my budget will allow. Future enhancements will require me to charge users to access the data and I'm very reluctant to do that. It's more important to allow the public to view this information for free.

If this database continues to increase in popularity I may be forced to reduce the total number of records allowed to 250 and to find other ways of limiting bandwidth. Unfortunately I have not made more money to compensate for the increasing popularity of this database.

Why is the Database so Difficult to Copy or Print?

It's no accident that the data is tough to copy or print because it's designed that way. Some limitations include disabled right clicks, disabled menu bar, insertion of random characters into the background, and colors to make it difficult to print large amounts of data. This won't be a barrier for people copying small amounts of data because these things can be cleaned with minimal effort. For most purposes people don't need more than a page or two of data to prove their point. People who want to copy large datasets should contact the webmaster to see how to pay for large reports.

In the future ZaZona.com would like to allow complete and unrestricted use of this data. For this to happen an organization that would be willing to help with the costs of running this database needs to come forth. Recently several labor friendly organizations that oppose H-1B have been contacted about sponsoring the database or even hosting it on their site but they have not yet agreed to help. Users will just have to live with the limitations that have been imposed until these technical and financial problems are solved.

I encourage everyone to help this online database by clicking on the banner ads that are on the webpages and please read the Donations Page for more information about how you can help. Custom reports for a fee can be made for larger portions of formatted data. People that pay for these reports help to support this website.

What Types of Errors Exist in the Database?

There are many errors contained in this database. Most of them occur when employers enter something incorrectly or forget to fill out a field. Another major source of errors are caused when the Dept. of Labor scans the LCAs into digital format.

A major source of errors occurs when employers categorize the jobs. When employers fill out the Labor Condition Application they are required to categorize the job by using a three digit code defined in the Dictionary of Occupational Codes (DOT). These codes range from 000 to 999. The codes appear on the database results page as OCC followed by a three digit code. 

It is the employer's responsibility to assign the DOT codes and job titles. These are not reviewed by the Department of Labor (DOL) for errors or inconsistencies. Gross errors can occur because the employer assigns wrong codes and/or vague job titles. Here are some of the major reasons those errors could occur:

• Human resource people or clerical staff are not properly trained to assign codes. They might not understand the job title enough to categorize it.

• The employer want to be intentionally vague so that they have more flexibility in hiring a variety of different H-1Bs

• Intentional errors could be entered to change how prevailing salaries are calculated. If, for instance, a software engineer is considered for a position, he could be classified as a Programmer/Analyst since they typically are on a lower pay scale.

• Negligence or mistakes can never be ruled out as a source of error.

• The DOT system is outdated and doesn't define categories correctly in many cases

• Errors can happen at the DOL when LCAs are scanned into the digital format. They use an OCR that can misinterpret data items.

There are many types of errors observed in the database including:

• Missing fields

• shifted fields

• misspelled words

• numbers that are too large or too small

• numbers that have an extra digit

• numbers that are missing digits

• unknown or vague job classifications

• incorrect job codes

• Year 2000 date errors

Here is an example of some of the types of errors encountered in the database. Table A is an example of the raw data entries as received by the DOL. The job code, or DOT, column was all "030" but that isn't the correct code for the job titles given. Table B shows how the data would appear if the errors in the job code were corrected.

Are Database Errors Corrected?

The data in the database is an exact replication of the DOL data that was obtained using the Freedom of Information Act. This data is not modified or corrected for errors because a lot can be learned from the errors the data contains. It is not the mission of ZaZona.com to correct errors in our government databases.

Can Total Visas Issued be Calculated From LCA Data?

In theory it is possible to determine how many total H-1B visas are issued and where those H-1Bs are. In practice it's very difficult to know how many visas have actually been issued and how many people with H-1B visas are in the United States. 

The LCA database is often used for these statistics by our government but at best a rough estimate can be deduced. Remember an LCA is an application. There is no way to verify how many of these LCAs resulted in actual visas because the DOL doesn't track what the INS does with the LCA. The DOL and the INS don't use the same database so the right foot doesn't know where the left foot is going.  Further complicating an accurate count is that the INS doesn't track aliens once they are into the United States. There is nothing to stop a company or bodyshop from moving the H-1B to a different location once the visa is issued. Nobody knows where the H-1Bs go after they arrive into the US.

Reliable data on where H-1Bs are and how many of them are in the U.S. will be impossible to get until our government makes the commitment to make a database that tracks them.

Y2K Errors in the LCA Database

You may come across LCAs in the Visa Database that have dates like 1900, 1901, etc. Those dates are obviously wrong since H-1B didn't start until 1990. These erroneous dates are still in the DOL database because they didn't correct all of their Y2K problems.

What is a Public Access File?

Employers are required by 20 CFR 655.760 Public access; retention of records  to post all LCAs in a public place. If a company doesn't comply, a complaint can be sent to the DOL. The DOL will ask the company to post the LCA if somebody calls up and registers a complaint.  The DOL can impose sanctions if the company doesn't comply.

The posting should have the following information:

• Copy of the LCA (form 9035), signed by the employer

• Statement of the current rate of pay for each H-1b worker admitted under the LCA

• Copy of the prevailing wage determination for each area of employment

• Memo explaining how the employer calculated the actual wage (without identifying the H-1b worker or the other workers similarly employed to the H-1b worker for purposes of determining the actual wage.

• A copy of the documents) with which the employer has satisfied the union/employee notification requirements. 

How Can I Obtain More Detailed Data?

This website allows visitors to have limited viewing of the LCA database. The total number of records for one search will be limited to 500. Copying the data is discouraged until funding can be obtained to supply everyone with online reports. Once this occurs every effort will be made to give free data reports to anyone who needs them. 

This data is made public because people have a right to know which companies are hiring foreign workers and under what terms. I have spent untold hours of my time developing this database and can never recoup my losses. I will charge a fee for data retrieval to help defray the cost of my time. I will only do this for select individuals because this is not a business, it's a public service. 

What Does the Future Hold for This Database?

The Department of Labor has sent me their newest data for 2001-2002. I would like to obtain that and update the existing database. I am also attempting to obtain data from the INS that might be more interesting than the LCAs. That effort will require more web space and a large amount of my time. It won't get done without more donations.

I would like to work with larger web based organization that could fund this database. This database would be an asset to any organization that wants to be on the frontlines in the battle against the H-1B scam. It will add to their prestige and drive a huge number of surfers to their site. Please contact me if interested.

   07/04/03