Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

For foreign nationals on temporary visas, marrying a U.S. citizen provides permanent access to the U.S. labor market, and drastically reduces the wait time for becoming a U.S. citizen. I use data on doctoral graduates in the U.S. to investigate the impact of changes in visa restrictions on the likelihood of marriage to a U.S. citizen. I exploit a severe and unexpected drop in the numerical limit of H-1B visas in 2004, followed by an expansion in 2006, and the fact that citizens from five countries had access to alternative work visas not subject to these caps. This natural experiment permits me to compare marriage rates of temporary resident Ph.D. graduates from countries with and without alternative visas, before and after the policy changes. I find that foreign-born graduates are highly sensitive to changes in visa availability. Those graduating after the drop were 18 percentage points more likely to marry a U.S. citizen if they did not have access to alternative work visas. The expansion in 2006 led to a corresponding 26.5 percentage point decrease in the rate of those married to a U.S. citizen. Furthermore, the distribution of married to a citizen shifted toward graduates from top programs, and away from lower ranked ones.