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Annual H-1B Visa Cap Met In One Day
CNet is reporting that the door has closed on the H1-B visa application process for this year, one day after it began. The US Citizenship and Immigration Services said that it had received 150,000 applications as of yesterday afternoon. 65,000 H1-B visas can be issued for foreigners with bachelor's degrees. The USCIS will choose randomly from the applications to determine the winners.
As an H1B holding Indian working in the US, I can tell you for a fact that the assertion you make (really your lawyer) is completely and utterly false. The cap applies to the entire world. There are other visa types that you can come to the US under, but if its the H1B you are interested in, the cap applies.
If your lawyer doesn't know this or is feeding you misinformation for whatever reason, you should look into taking your business elsewhere.
Unfortunately, you remember wrong. The Economic Policy Institute has a great article on this that should probably be submitted to the main page. You can find the article here: http://www.sharedprosperity.org/bp187.html
To quote the linked article:
The most significant design flaw is the absence of a labor market test. The U.S. Department of Labor recently expressed the practical implications of this fact in a straightforward manner when it stated that "H-1B workers may be hired even when a qualified U.S. worker wants the job, and a U.S. worker can be displaced from the job in favor of the foreign worker." Simply put, an employer does not have to test the labor market before hiring a foreign worker on an H-1B.