H-1B for $103,265: the fee is back, this time by regulation

$103,265. Per petition. On top of everything else.

For an entry-level job paying $90,000 a year, the first year now costs more than twice the salary. For a senior role paying $250,000, it is a noticeable but manageable surcharge.

That is exactly the point. Combined with the wage-level weighted selection in place since February, the result is a system that effectively shuts out small employers and entry-level roles and favors large employers paying high salaries.

The difference is crucial, and for planning it matters more than the amount.

The September 2025 proclamation was a unilateral executive act, based on the power to restrict entry. That is exactly why it failed: a payment obligation is not an entry restriction.

A draft rule follows the prescribed process. It is published, the public can comment, and the agency must review those comments and justify its decision. It must also show that the fee rests on statutory authority.

A rule made this way is much harder to challenge in court. So if you hoped the June ruling had ended this burden for good, read this draft very carefully.

For Europeans, the route through US employment is now largely closed, at least for anything below top salaries.

What remains are the routes this dispute doesn't touch at all, because they rest on statutes and treaties.

The E-2 for investors from treaty countries. Most European countries qualify. No quota, no lottery, no special fee. The requirement is a substantial investment in an active business that you run.

The L-1 for intracompany transfers. If you have worked for a European company for at least one year as a manager or with specialized knowledge, you can be transferred to its US subsidiary. Also with no quota.

The O-1 for extraordinary ability and the EB-1 for executives and top talent, which opens the door directly to permanent residence.

All four take months of preparation. All four are predictable. And all four stayed unchanged this year, while almost everything else was in flux.

This post wraps up a series that began in the fall with a nineteen-dollar fee increase. What has happened since then fits into five sentences.

Travel has become more expensive and more transparent. ESTA for forty dollars, five years of social media details, biometric capture on entry and exit.

Working has become harder. A special fee, a salary-weighted selection, no more automatic extensions.

Staying has become more formal. Fixed periods of stay instead of open-ended status, more discretion in the public charge test, higher naturalization fees.

Living has become more expensive. Health insurance, as the enhanced subsidies expired, and energy, because of the conflict in the Gulf.

And the courts drew the line twice. On tariffs in February, on birthright citizenship in June.

If this year taught one lesson, it is this: in the United States, going through your own company is not only the most sensible route economically, it is now also the most stable legally.

If you build a company, invest and transfer people, you stand on foundations that have held for decades and that no proclamation touches. If you want to come as an employee, you depend on procedures that changed several times this year.

That was always an argument. This year it became the decisive one.

If you want to plan your path to the United States or have an existing structure reviewed, talk to Mount Bonnell Advisors in Austin, Texas. Start with our core areas: US company formation, US taxes and US visas and green cards.

If you have a decision to make, three numbers matter more in the end than any regulation.

Health insurance. For a family without employer coverage, a five-figure annual cost. This is the number that decides whether a move is feasible, and it went up this year.

Your home state. On the same income, the difference between Texas and California is bigger than the difference between Germany, for example, and the United States as a whole. If you don't run those numbers, you aren't really calculating.

And the running costs of your company. State fees, Registered Agent, filings. In the low four figures per year for a properly run small structure, considerably more once cross-border issues come in.

Everything else we wrote about here over eleven months is context. These three numbers are the decision.

The comment period on this draft will run in the fall, and a final rule is not expected before next year at the earliest. Until then, the next cap year will be governed by whatever the pending court cases produce, and that is unclear.

If you plan to take part in the spring registration, plan on two tracks: prepare the registration, and at the same time check whether one of the cap-exempt routes works for the person concerned.

And if you are following the midterm elections in November, know that the conditions for new legislation may change afterward, in whichever direction. Regulations are not affected by that for now.

Four things that will keep us busy in the coming months and that are worth watching now.

The H-1B cases in the courts of appeals. Two conflicting rulings, a likely path to the Supreme Court, and this draft rule running in parallel.

Tariff refunds. Since the February ruling, billions are at stake, and the procedural questions are still not fully settled.

Energy prices. If the Strait of Hormuz stays open, things will ease over the winter. If not, we are no longer talking about a crisis but about a new price level.

And the November midterms. They won't decide regulations, but they will decide whether any laws get passed at all in the next two years.

Forty-eight posts, one year, a country on the move. If I had to boil it down to three sentences, these would be them.

First: America has become more expensive, not more closed. Almost every change this year was a price change or a procedural change, not a border closure. If you can pay and prepare, you still get through.

Second: the gray areas are disappearing. Biometrics on exit, social media in applications, fixed periods of stay, no automatic extensions. If you have been living between two countries without committing to either, you won't be able to for much longer.

And third: structure beats improvisation. Every story this year that ended well ended well because someone was prepared. Every one that went wrong went wrong because someone hoped for leniency.

This country is extraordinarily generous to those who have their paperwork in order, and extraordinarily unforgiving to those who take their chances. That was true eleven months ago and it is true today, only more so.

For eleven months, every Tuesday, this space carried a post about what had changed in America. If you read them all, you might get the impression that this country is closing itself off.

That would be a misunderstanding, and it is worth clearing up before we close.

In those same eleven months, the United States admitted hundreds of thousands of people as permanent residents. Millions entered the country. More companies were founded here than in any other country in the world. Twice the courts set limits on the President, and both times the ruling was obeyed.

What has changed are prices, procedures and priorities. What has not changed is the core: a country that welcomes people who bring something with them and have plans, and then puts remarkably little in their way.

If you come from Europe and bring a business with you, you belong to exactly the group this country wants. Access has become more expensive and more formal. But it has stayed open.

And to be honest: anyone unwilling to take on this year's forms would not have taken on those of the past decade either. America was never the land of easy paths. It has always been the land where effort pays off.

This series has closed the gap between last September and today. From here on, we return to our usual rhythm, covering what actually happens each week.

What will keep us busy this fall is already on the calendar: the public charge rule takes effect on September 18, the fixed period of stay for students on September 15, and the fee rule for H-1B and L-1 on September 9. And in November, Congress is up for election.

If any of these deadlines affects you, act now, not in September. After a year of watching, that is the one rule that always holds in this area of law.

If you have read this far, you have worked your way through eleven months of American administrative law. That is not light reading, and it is not what anyone dreams of when they think of America.

But these are exactly the things that decide whether a dream works. Not longing, but status. Not the idea, but the structure. Not courage, but the deadline calendar.

If you have both, the courage and the calendar, this country is still what people have been coming here for over two hundred and fifty years.

Update: What happened next is covered in One more year: the President extends the H-1B ban while a court blocks the $100,000 fee.

Consultation & implementation

If you'd like to find out what this means for your own situation, the best step is to book a consultation.