Whatever the prevailing political rhetoric might suggest, talent is a global commodity; as such it moves around the world in search of opportunity. And every country, no matter how well developed their own domestic skills and education base may be, is in the market for talented people.
Donald Trump’s recent proposal to charge a $100k fee for those looking to secure a H-1B visa in the US might have got lost in the noise surrounding the bombastic president, but shrewd observers in both the US and Europe especially, will have noted the importance of Trump’s comments.
If the US is hell bent on erecting barriers to global talent – across numerous sectors, including tech, aerospace, healthcare and so on – then there will be no shortage of takers for these skilled workers.
Take the UK – PM Keir Starmer wasted no time in floating the idea of scrapping visa fees for people who have studied at the world’s top five universities or received prestigious international awards. One keen observer of the global talent market suggested that if the global talent visa were to become cheaper (or even free) here in the UK, it would make hiring from abroad easier and strengthen the “UK’s position as a destination of choice for the world’s best talent”.
That was echoed by the pressure group StartUp Coalition, which said the UK had a “once in a generation chance for Britain to attract genuinely top tier global tech talent. In an an open letter to the Home Secretary the group said, “The introduction of a $100,000 fee for H-1B visas has created uncertainty across Silicon Valley and left tens of thousands of the world’s most talented engineers, founders, and researchers reconsidering their futures.”
To capitalise on that, the Coalition suggested expanding the Global Talent Fund, which is designed to attract science, technology, and engineering talent to the UK. “This is not a moment for quiet diplomacy or understated British reserve. This is a moment for bold, decisive action,” they said.
At Paul Beare Ltd, we help overseas companies set up in the UK, often working on visa issues both for founders and new hires from overseas. I think the last few weeks should serve as a wake up call to UK leaders to look at the visa system and ensure it positions the UK at an advantage.
Because there’s no doubt the visa regime – the cost, complexity and transparency – can have a real impact on attracting talented people. We help growing businesses navigate the process of visa applications, so it’s vital that they can understand what’s going on, and not see the process as a barrier to investing, employing and growing in the UK.
Certainly, the UK has a lot to offer: one of its other compelling selling point is the relative level of salaries: The UK still has world-class skills, world-class universities and certainly American-level tech talent, but – crucially- they come at half the price of American salaries. British tech is cheap.
Meanwhile, Brexit, so often framed as a political gamble, is quietly becoming a strategic advantage, mainly thanks to what’s happening in the EU, which as a bloc is suspicious of AI and is following a route of tighter regulation. But the EU rules do not apply here.
And already, this is having results, with technology developed and sold in the US and UK by companies like Apple, which says it won’t be rolling certain products out in the EU. The UK has got the freedoms that the EU no longer offers. All of this is moving us towards the American tech slipstream, where all the growth in the next 25 years is going to come from.
The US may be misguided in going down the routing of charging huge fees for its H1-B visas, but we shouldn’t make the same mistake here.
If you have any visa or sponsorship licence questions, please get in touch.