Winning the Visa Lottery

A study published in the American Economic Association's website examines the effects of immigration restrictions on firms and workers. The study found that US companies are less likely to win the H-1B visa lottery when their employees are older than 35. The study also found that the odds of winning the lottery for companies with more H-1B visas approved in previous years decrease as the number of approved visas increases. The study's authors suggest that these findings could be due to the fact that older workers are more likely to be in higher-paying industries, such as tech, and that the lottery system favors companies that have previously been successful in obtaining H-1B visas.