No country is allowed to get more than 7% of the green cards each year (roughly speaking). This GC-H1B lock-in problem is very unique to Indians (~10 year wait), and to a lesser extent, Chinese (~4 year wait). The 7% quota would be illegal were it applied to US citizenship, according to civil rights legislations of the 1960s (prior to which non-whites were discriminated against in naturalized-citizenships via quotas).<p>However, unlike pre-civil rights citizenship quotas, the green card quota seems ok to everyone. This a moral discrepancy, IMO. Unfortunately, it won&#x27;t be addressed in the near future, because though the population affected may be in the hundreds of thousands, they are not important to any political players. Even on a generally enlightened forum like HN, you routinely encounter hateful comments about H1B workers. I think H1Bs deserve some level of representation in such matters simply because these workers pay the exact same taxes as all Americans. The situation for many people is utterly hopeless and it should be of humanitarian concern, here is a moving account from Seattle: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.seattletimes.com&#x2F;pacific-nw-magazine&#x2F;while-their-husbands-work-immigrant-wives-often-struggle-in-this-new-land&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.seattletimes.com&#x2F;pacific-nw-magazine&#x2F;while-their-...</a><p>I think the notion that after working (and paying taxes) in the US for 6 years, a person has to wait another 10 years to reap the benefits of permanent residency simply because they were born in a particular country is morally indefensible.