And now, the U.S. defense industry is adapting to a national military strategy more reliant on technological superiority than on amassed hardware or troops. As defense professionals at the Pentagon and beyond revise their military plans, they are seeing an increasingly acute need for these talented STEM workers.
The importance of keeping foreign-born, graduating STEM students in this country cannot be overestimated.
Part of the need for foreign-born STEM workers is driven by a simple principle of supply-and-demand economics. The number of available H-1B visas is limited, and many of these STEM workers need the visas to immigrate to the United States. Currently, only 85,000 visas are granted each year. Many foreign-born, would-be STEM professionals come to the United States to study on student visas, but when they graduate, those who cannot obtain an H-1B visa must return to their respective home countries.
The recent budget-driven sequester cut spending in all federal departments, and those cuts have impacted the outlook for future defense strategy. The Obama administration has already reduced military outlays in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now, it seeks ways to cut back troop levels and jettison unnecessary, expensive weapons systems in order to maintain an efficiently lean, economical military.
As part of that strategy, the Defense Department has placed a premium on technological advances. But restrictive policies on immigration limit the number of H-1B visas to a total that does not meet the existing demand. The shortage of visas may crimp the Pentagon’s objectives.
Immigration policy troubles the Pentagon, but it is not their only quandary. Competition also affects requiting: many foreign-born STEM graduate students primarily seek a career in Silicon Valley or Austin, Texas. Employment with the defense establishment is often less tempting and, even more often, less lucrative.
A bill that would grant U.S. citizenship to immigrants with advanced STEM degrees passed the U.S. Senate last year, but it has sputtered in the House. Meanwhile, Defense Department officials have publicly emphasized the need for new technologies.
“We must maintain our technological edge over potential adversaries,” said Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel.
A. Banerjee is a Houston immigration attorney in Texas. Before selecting an lawyer, contact the Law Offices of Annie Banerjee by visiting their website at http://www.visatous.com.
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Almost one out of every five suicides in the U.S. is a veteran, though veterans only make up about 10 percent of the U.S. population.
The latest numbers indicate that there may be as many as 22 veterans committing suicide each day, or one suicide every 65 minutes. Former defense secretary Leon Panetta says the service member suicide rate is “an epidemic.”
A report by the Department of Veterans Affairs released in February 2013 looked at data reported from 21 states between 1999 and the end of 2011. But the numbers may be even higher, as many vets are missing from the official reports of vet suicides. There is no uniform reporting system of which veteran deaths were suicide-related in the U.S. A coroner or funeral director typically enters the veteran status of the deceased and that the manner of death was suicide on the death certificate. If a veteran dies in a manner that may nor may not be suicide, the incident may go under accidental death. Additionally, when a homeless person commits suicide, his or her veterans status might not be known in that community, and the stigma of suicide in some families and some communities may mean that the manner of death is not divulged or the coroner may be pressured to not list the cause of death as suicide. Veteran status is not verified or followed up by the VA or the Defense Department. Capturing accurate information is an ongoing issue.
A report released by a journalism student program, News21, states that the suicide rate for veterans annually is approximately 30 per 100,000, more than twice the rate of the civilian population (14 per 100,000), and it was also increasing at an accelerated rate compared to civilian suicides. From the 48 states they studied, they found that the suicide rate for vets was increasing an average of 2.6 percent each year, from 2005 to 2011, twice the rate of civilian suicide increase.
Though veteran suicides are happening among men and women, older vets and those who have just returned from Iraq and Afghanistan, almost 70 percent of vet suicides are being committed by those who were 50 and older. Vet mental health advocates currently think that the high levels for that cohort is a combination of Vietnam vets with ongoing combat stress who did not receive adequate support when they returned home, and men who have raised their children to adulthood.
Legal Help for Veterans, PLLC fights for veterans rights. We fight to make sure you get the benefits you deserve from the Department of Veterans Affairs. To learn more or contact an attorney about your Post Traumatic Stress, Traumatic Brain Injury, Mental Health, Sexual Assault, Hearing Loss and Tinnitus, Total Disability Based on Individual Unemployability, Medical Malpractice, or Aid and Attendance claim, visit http://www.legalhelpforveterans.com/ or call 800.693.4800
The post Veterans Committing Suicide At Accelerating Rate first appeared on SEONewsWire.net.]]>“Steps to protect our troops from any unwanted sexual advances and assaultive behaviors are to be commended,” stated James Fausone, a veterans disability attorney.
Steps include better enforcement of policies which prohibit inappropriate relationships, establishing an advocacy group within each service branch for victims which provides representation and legal advice for those with complaints of sexual assault, and disqualifying troop members who have backgrounds including sexual assault from roles as counselors, instructors or recruiters.
Meanwhile, an airman who was assigned to the Air Force Academy was convicted in August of aggravated sexual conduct at a general court martial against his fellow female airman.
The airman received a sentence of 15 months confinement. He was also reduced in grade to airman basic, and he was dishonorably discharged by a panel of officers. The conviction was just the latest in a series of high-profile military sexual assault cases as the Defense Department and Congress attempt to determine the best way to prosecute sexual assault cases and if a commanded should be included in proceedings.
The now-former chief of the Air Force Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Branch, Lt. Col. Jeffrey Krusinski, was arrested easier this year after allegedly committing sexual battery against a woman not far from the Pentagon after exiting a strip club. The ensuing fallout has thrown a harsh spotlight on sexual assault and misconduct against fellow officers in all branches of the service. Krusinski’s post is now helmed by a woman who had been hired to investigate the assault by trainers of female recruits inTexas, at Lackland Air Force Base.
The Defense Department is currently looking at how to expand an Air Force program which offers special counsel to service members who allege that they are the victims of unwanted sexual conduct or sexual assault or unwanted sexual contact.
There were an estimated 26,000 unwanted sexual contact incidents in 2012 experienced by active-duty troops.
Sources
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2013/08/15/military-sexual-assault-plans/2660005/
http://www.nbcnews.com/video/meet-the-press/52727533
Legal Help for Veterans, PLLC fights for veterans rights. We fight to make sure you get the benefits you deserve from the Department of Veterans Affairs. To learn more or contact a veterans lawyer, visit http://www.legalhelpforveterans.com/ or call 800.693.4800
The post Veterans Disability Attorney Fausone Notes Pentagon’s Proposal of New Steps In Light of Military Sexual Assaults first appeared on SEONewsWire.net.]]>