Relief for Indians in US: Spouses of H1B visa holders can continue to work

In a temporary relief to thousands of Indians living in America, a US court has refused to strike down, for the time being, an Obama-era rule that allowed spouses of H-1B visa holders to work in America.
The H-1B visa is a non-immigrant visa that allows the US companies to employ foreign workers in specialty occupations.

A 2015 rule issued by US President Donald Trump's predecessor Barack Obama allowed work permits for certain categories of H-4 visa holders, primarily spouses of those having H-1B work visas waiting for their Green Card, to work in the US.
Indians, in particular women, were the greatest beneficiary of this rule, which has been challenged by several US workers with the current Trump administration supporting their cause, saying that it wants to rescind the rule.
A three-judge bench of the US Courts of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Friday sent the case back to a lower court noting that it is "best to remand" to give the district court an opportunity to thoroughly assess and finally determine the merits in the first instance.
"Accordingly, we reverse the district court's grant of summary judgment and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion," the federal court said in its order on the lawsuit filed by Saves Jobs USA.
Saves Jobs USA comprises of American workers who claim that they have been laid off due to the policy of the Obama administration to provide work permits to H-4 visa holders.
By making H4 visa holders eligible for lawful employment, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees immigration, sought to "ameliorate certain disincentives that currently lead H1B non-immigrants to abandon efforts to remain in the US while seeking (lawful permanent resident) status, thereby, minimising disruptions to US businesses employing such workers", the court said.
It noted that the government has explained that H1B non-immigrants and their families often face long delays in the process of obtaining permanent residence, and H4 visa holders' inability to work during these delays leads to "personal and economic hardships" that worsen over time, "increasing the disincentives for H1B non-immigrants to pursue lawful permanent resident status and thus increasing the difficulties that US employers have in retaining highly educated and highly skilled non-immigrant workers".
The judges also observed that the rule will cause more H1B visa holders to remain in the US than otherwise would an effect that is distinct from that of the H1B visa holders' initial admission to the country.

India charges America over 100% tariff on a large number of products: Trump

India charges America over 100 per cent tariffs on a large number of products while the US imposes nothing on the similar or same items, President Donald Trump has said, urging his administration to work on the "stupid trade".
His statement came days after he criticised India, saying it is one of the world's "highest taxing nations".

The US President has repeatedly claimed that India is a "tariff king" and imposes "tremendously high" tariffs on American products.

Addressing the Republican Jewish Coalition in Las Vegas on Saturday, Trump said: "We have a case where a certain country, India, is charging us... what great country, great friend, Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi -- charging us over 100 per cent for many things".
The United States, he said, is charging India "nothing for similar or same" products.
In his speech, Trump indicated that he is receiving resistance from Senators for imposing reciprocal tariff on India.
He cited India as a country other than China which imposes high tariffs on American products.
India, he alleged, continues to wage "stupid trade" and unfair trade practices, and called out Prime Minister Modi for the trade imbalance with the US.
"I have Senators who say, you can't do that. It's not free trade. When did they come from? Where did they come from? It's not free trade," he said, ramping up his rhetoric against India's trade and tariff policies.
He asked his senior administration officials to work on this.
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"Will you please work on them? It's the craziest thing. It's stupid trade. We have so much stupid trade," Trump said.
He said that as a result of such trades, the US has lost for many years now -- $800 billion a year on trade.
"Who the hell makes these deals? Those are not good negotiators. Actually, Democrats made a lot of them though. But Republicans met a lot of up too, that's the amazing thing. They made $800 billion. But we're getting it back. We'll get to give back. We're going to be getting a lot of it.
ALSO READ: Trade error
"I have to be a little bit politically correct by saying it's ok if we lose $20 billion with a country because we want to be nice. We want to be nice with everyone," Trump said, asserting that his administration is cracking down on countries that cheat.
Early this year at a White House event to announce his support for reciprocal tax, Trump said he was satisfied with the Indian decision to reduce the import tariff on high-end Harley-Davidson motorcycles from 100 per cent to 50 per cent.
Trump has said that his administration is fixing broken trade deals to protect the American workers.

You've got to be kidding! US town elects goat as 'mayor'

In a divided America where politics seems increasingly to get people's goat, a small town in Vermont has taken the concept to heart -- this week electing one as mayor.
He may be a political novice but the goat's name, Lincoln, brings with it a storied pedigree.

And the leading human official in Fair Haven -- population about 2,500 -- hopes the long-eared, three-year-old animal's election can serve as a bit of a lesson in democracy.

In Tuesday's poll, Lincoln was victorious over 15 other candidates including Crystal the gerbil and many dogs and cats.
Fair Haven has no official mayor but the Town Manager, Joseph Gunter, holds similar functions.
When Gunter read in a newspaper that the village of Omena, Michigan, had made Sweet Tart the cat its "top" official, he got the idea to organize a similar election to raise funds for building a playground.
Lincoln's 13 votes were enough for him to squeak past Sammie the dog.
The goat, which belongs to a school math teacher, will get an education in the town's major festivals which it will represent during its one-year mandate: "Memorial Day parade, the Apple Fest and the events we organize every Friday in the summer," Gunter says.
Although the playground fundraising effort only generated about $100, at five dollars per candidate, Gunter isn't bleating because he says the animal election was also "a good way to get the kids involved in local government."
With 53 votes cast the turnout was low, Gunter admits, "but it was the first time, we expect it to be better next year." That happens to be the year that US voters will also elect a human president, in a contest expected to shake out like a barnyard brawl.

US becomes net oil exporter for 1st time in 75 yrs; Opec's power diminishes

America turned into a net oil exporter last week, breaking almost 75 years of continued dependence on foreign oil and marking a pivotal -- even if likely brief -- moment toward what US President Donald Trump has branded as "energy independence".
The shift to net exports is the dramatic result of an unprecedented boom in American oil production, with thousands of wells pumping from the Permian region of Texas and New Mexico to the Bakken in North Dakota to the Marcellus in Pennsylvania.
While the country has been heading in that direction for years, this week's dramatic shift came as data showed a sharp drop in imports and a jump in exports to a record high. Given the volatility in weekly data, the US will likely remain a small net importer most of the time.
"We are becoming the dominant energy power in the world," said Michael Lynch, president of Strategic Energy & Economic Research. "But, because the change is gradual over time, I don't think it's going to cause a huge revolution, but you do have to think that Opec is going to have to take that into account when they think about cutting."
The shale revolution has transformed oil wildcatters into billionaires and the US into the world's largest petroleum producer, surpassing Russia and Saudi Arabia. The power of Opec has been diminished, undercutting one of the major geopolitical forces of the last half century.
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The shift to net exports caps a tumultuous week for energy markets and politics. Opec and its allies are meeting in Vienna this week, trying to make a tough choice whether to cut output and support prices, risking the loss of more market share to the US.
"The week started with Qatar leaving Opec; then a mysterious US-Saudi bilateral meeting in Vienna; followed by a canceled Opec press conference, and now the latest news that the US turned last week into a net petroleum exporter," said Helima Croft, commodities strategist at RBC Capital Markets LLC and a former analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency.
The US sold overseas last week a net 211,000 barrels a day of crude and refined products such as gasoline and diesel, compared to net imports of about 3 million barrels a day on average so far in 2018, and an annual peak of more than 12 million barrels a day in 2005, according to the US Energy Information Administration.

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The EIA said the US has been a net oil importer in weekly data going back to 1991 and monthly data starting in 1973. Oil historians that have compiled even older annual data using statistics from the American Petroleum Institute said the country has been a net oil importer since the mid-1940s, when Harry Truman was in the White House.
On paper, the shift to net oil exports means that the US is today energy independent, achieving a rhetorical aspiration for generations of American politicians, from Jimmy Carter to George W Bush. Yet, it's a paper tiger achievement: In reality, the US remains exposed to global energy prices, still affected by the old geopolitics of the Middle East.
US crude exports are poised to rise even further, with new pipelines from the Permian in the works and at least nine terminals planned that will be capable of loading supertankers. The only facility currently able to load the largest ships, the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, is on pace to load more oil in December than it has in any other month.
ALSO READ: OPEC waiting for Russia before deciding how much oil production to cut
The massive Permian may be even bigger than previously thought. The Delaware Basin, the less drilled part of the field, holds more than twice the amount of crude as its sister, the Midland Basin, the US Geological Service said Thursday.
While the net balance shows the US is selling more petroleum than buying, American refiners continue to buy millions of barrels each day of overseas crude and fuel. The US imports more than 7 million barrels a day of crude from all over the globe to help feed its refineries, which consume more than 17 million barrels each day. In turn, the US has become the world's top fuel supplier.
"The US is now a major player in the export market," said Brian Kessens, who helps manage $16 billion at Tortoise in Leawood, Kansas. "We continue to re-tool our export infrastructure along the Gulf Coast to expand capacity, and you continue to see strong demand globally for crude oil."

Dwindling forex pile may limit India's rupee defence, says BofAML

India’s foreign-exchange reserves are shrinking fast and may soon reach a level that could hamper the central bank’s ability to defend the rupee, according to Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The solution lies in luring dollar flows by tapping overseas Indians, the bank said.
From a record $426 billion in mid-April, reserves have fallen by nearly $33 billion as the Reserve Bank of India sold dollars to stem losses in Asia’s worst-performing currency. A further $15-$20 billion erosion will leave the nation with an import cover of eight months, according to Indranil Sen Gupta, India economist at BofAML.

“You have sold so much that your ability to sell is becoming more and more constricted,” he said. “The amount of reserves, whether it is $400 billion or $800 billion, doesn’t matter. What matters is if you have enough to cover imports, short-term debt and flows.”
Reserves plunged $5.14 billion in the week ended Oct. 12, the biggest drop in seven years, suggesting the Reserve Bank of India intervened to curb the rupee’s decline. The support helped the currency recover 1.4 percent from a record low of 74.4825 per dollar on Oct. 11. The rupee lost 0.3 percent Friday to 73.4675 in Mumbai.
India’s FX reserves further declined by nearly a billion dollars to $393.5 billion as of Oct. 19, the central bank said in a statement Friday.
The reserves adequacy is “not much better off” compared with 2013, the year of the taper tantrum that saw the rupee tumbling along with its emerging-market peers, Gupta said.
Import cover stands at nine months versus seven months five years ago, the ratio of reserves to short-term debt plus current-account deficit is 1.4 times higher, and foreign inflows are 130 percent of reserves versus 100 percent back then, he said.
Bring It Home
The metrics show “you are not on a strong wicket,” Gupta said, making the case for turning to non-resident Indians for raising as much as $35 billion via bonds or deposits. The option was used in 2013, when a discounted swap window lured inflows of about $34 billion. Overseas Indians were also tapped in 1998 and 2000 to ease pressure on the rupee.
While the RBI in 2016 used about three months of import cover as a measure of reserves adequacy, India’s increasing links with global markets has led it to also consider two other metrics -- short-term debt and volatile capital flows -- to gauge if it has enough arsenal for a rainy day.
READ: India Is Said to Plan Tapping Its Citizens Abroad to Prop Rupee
“You have to demonstrate to the market that you can raise foreign reserves rather than just sell reserves,” Gupta said. “In all previous crises, you showed that you can raise reserves, and NRI bonds is the best way to demonstrate that again.”