The bad news just keeps on coming.

Recently, the White House approved a policy recommendation by the Department of Homeland Security to modify the H-1B visa selection process from the current random lottery to a “weighted selection process” based on wage and/or experience levels.

As explained previously in this corner, an H-1B visa is a type of nonimmigrant visa reserved for foreign professionals who will work in “specialty occupations” in the US. To qualify, the job must require, at a minimum, a bachelor’s degree or its equivalent in a specific field of study. An advanced degree is a common requirement.

Included are teachers, accountants, engineers, physicians, lawyers, physical therapists, medical technologists, and the like. Although nursing is not typically considered an H-1B caliber occupation (due to the minimum associate degree requirement for many entry level nursing jobs in the US), there are certain highly specialized or managerial level nursing positions that will qualify, such as OR Nurse, Nurse Manager, Nurse Director, and Case Manager, among others.

Each year, over 300,000 foreign workers, through their prospective employers, apply to be included in a random draw to get a piece of the maximum 85,000 annual H-1B visa pie. Of this maximum annual quota, 20,000 visas are reserved for applicants with an advanced degree from a US university.

Under the current system, each applicant is assigned a single lottery point regardless of one’s salary or experience level. However, those possessing a US advanced degree are given preferential slots in the 20,000 specially reserved visas and those not selected are entered in the remaining 65,000 general lottery draw.

Notably, the current system, for all its flaws, offers every applicant a fair shot at being selected. In contrast, the proposed weighted selection process is skewed heavily in favor of experienced and senior level workers.

Here’s how it works: By law, every H-1B petition must include a salary rate not less than the prevailing wage based on the offered position’s minimum experience and/or educational requirement. For this purpose, the Department of Labor customarily assigns a wage level — Levels I through IV — for each offered position based on the employer’s specific requirements. Level I corresponds to entry-level jobs while Level IV has the highest wage rate for experts and senior-level professionals.

Under the proposed weighted selection process, priority will be given to applicants whose job offer contains a higher salary level. This means that positions requiring experienced and senior-level workers, usually sponsored by large and wealthy employers that can afford to pay higher salaries, will get the bulk of the limited H-1B visas.

Thus, assuming there are 60,000 H-1B visa applicants with a Level IV or Level III job offer in a given year, they will take almost 70 percent of the 85,000 annual quota. The remaining 25,000 slots will then be allocated to the Level I and Level II applicants, giving them a miniscule chance of being selected. In fact, it’s highly probable that there’ll be no more visas available for Level I workers.

Considering that most Filipino H-1B workers, including teachers, computer programmers and therapists, are usually sponsored for entry level positions, the revised selection process, if implemented, will result in fewer and possibly no H-1B visas for Filipinos.