Classify this posting as yet another view of a 30 years plus phenomenon of the transnational Indian IT workforce.
Despite a formal cap of 85,000 on new H-1B workers, the entirely actively working H-1B workers today appears to be about 700,000. A new paper provides some insights into this workforce.
The size of the active workforce compared to annual entrants is due to these workers not only being able to extent their three year stay to six years, but also to extend beyond that
This is an overwhelmingly Indian workforce. India provides about 70% of H-1B workers; China, about 10%.
From a quarter to a half of these workers in a single sector, Computer Systems design. The size of this workforce engaged directly in computer and math (the core technical section) is about 1.3 million. Of these, about 1/10th are H-1B workers. But they are concentrated among the more highly educated ranks of the total 1.3 million workers, according to this study.
However, note this: Congressional Research Service data show that in about the past 10 years, 69% to 92% became green card holders. As most H-1B workers thus gain green card status, the presence of foreign born computer systems high end workers is very likely to be much more than 1/10th of this workforce.
The employment impact on U.S. born workers is selective. It appears that U.S. born workers in this core technical segment has not grown, which to me is a sign that H-1B workers are partially blocking the entry of Americans into this workforce. However, when H-1B workers are present, the non-STEM trained workers in the computer sector increase in size.
the article, focused on the United States, does no address how former H-1B workers populate American and India IT firms.