Rocky Road

March 7, 2008, Bill Gates went before the House Committee on Science and Technology. He was not pondering the future of Microsoft or bargaining a tax break for his foundation. He was informing the committee that, “the U.S. faces a severe shortfall of scientists and engineers who can help maintain the country's position as the world's center for innovation.” In other words, we’re falling behind in the never-ending race toward the technological horizon.

There is a very simple reason for this, which Gates is well aware of: the United States cannot hold on to its foreign help. This sounds odd, considering the raging debates over how to keep immigrants out of America, not in. This applies only to illegal immigrants, however, and obviously is an important issue. In 2006, the estimated illegal immigrant population in the United States was 11.6 million. However, this crisis is distracting national attention away from an equally as troubling problem: our naturalization system is so faulty that we cannot keep foreign skilled, educated professionals for very long.

Trends have shown that immigrants are not naturalizing to America as fast as they used to because they encounter endless obstacles along their path to citizenship. The implications are catastrophic. This means that illegal immigrants can never become participatory, productive members of society. This means that often students who come here to study cannot stay because they cannot obtain a worker’s green card. This means that successful foreign businesspeople have trouble working for American-based firms because they are not promptly granted permission to live in America.

The current naturalization system requires many things, some of which are feasible and some of which are not. English-speaking abilities and favorable dispostion toward the U.S. are acceptable criteria. However, knowledge of U.S. history and good moral character are unreasonable, because they are both subjective and irrelevant. The government has little right to judge moral character, nor do they have the ability to. It is hindrances such as these that impair improvement in our economy.

The naturalization system in the United States today is seriously flawed. The process takes too much time, it is too detail-oriented, and is too vulnerable to mistakes in the catacombs of government offices. Politicians should stop bickering over illegal immigration and devote some time to a different venue, one that will directly benefit our economic standing and the perception of our country internationally. Maybe they can take a tip or two from Bill Gates while they’re at it.