[dustintownsend]

The Startup Visa Act and Dream Act are crap. Why do we insist on building on our broken immigration policy?

We need to make immigration simple for all immigrants. We don't need to create more laws that require an immigrant to spent $100K in legal fees to some lawyer to fill out paperwork.

I think YCombinator has proven that a startup doesn't need tons of funding to get an idea going.

The biggest problem with government is they over complicate EVERYTHING! We need simple solutions to the problems, not another stack of laws to add to the (literal) truck load that already exists.

We need one (1) page form that someone can fill out to get a visa. If someone comes from Mexico (for example), they should be able to fill out this form and get a Visa the same day. If someone flies in from Germany they too should be able to fill out this one page form and get a visa right at the airport. There is no reason why someone should have to have $100K in funding for a business, another $100K for legal fees just to get in.

I think the approach should be applied to everything government does. Simplify, Reduce, Eliminate.

Another good example is paperwork to start a business. I should be able to fill out a simple form and be able to have a business up and running (Legally) in any city/state in the US - the same day I fill out the form. I don't understand why places like New York City make these kinds of things so difficult. It takes MONTHS to get a business LEGALLY up and running in a major city like New York, but that same business can be LEGALLY up and running in 1 day in Hong Kong.

[yardie]

I can't agree more. There are already visas that cover every letter of the alphabet and several subclasses. We don't need more visas we need competent immigration reform.

Also, no one has been able to explain to me how someone in another country needs a visa for an idea they're working on. If the country they are from is hostile to startups isn't that something that should be taken up in there. I don't take issue with those that wan't a startup visa to be created. I take issue with the reasons given of why it should exist at all.

[techsupporter]

While you're right that Y Combinator (or, rather, companies it has sponsored) has demonstrated that minimal funding is required, there is no harm in a government trying to secure the best for its citizens. Nothing says the United States, Canada, Germany, France, Australia, Japan, China, India, or any other nation on the planet must make it easy for an immigrant to enter and establish a business. Least of which, establish a business that requires minimal presence and that can direct its expenditures to any other country. Put another way, if you were the Minister of Immigration, would you prefer to have the cloud-based start-up with 4 employees, two of whom want to live in your country, or do you want the datacenter that has millions of $currency_units worth of equipment that can't easily be forklifted out of the country?

To address your second point, without making any pass at politics: Someone once said that states are laboratories of democracies; therefore, each state conducts its internal affairs differently. Michigan allows the formation of a Limited Liability Company with nothing more than the payment of $175 to the state and an online form (ironically, the link to that form appears broken at the moment). Texas is more expensive--$325 for a LLC or a corporation--but offers the same thing. Both states have minimal requirements for non-residents forming and operating corporations under those states' laws, so if NY doesn't suit your needs, there is "something for everyone," even when creating a business entity.

[jaredhansen]

I too would love to have a dramatically simplified immigration policy, but political reality makes any kind of vast, sweeping reform really unlikely for at least the next several years (probably longer, but I'm not willing to predict that far).

Sure, neither the Startup Visa Act nor the Dream Act go far enough, but they're steps in the right direction, and if we oppose such measures on the grounds that they aren't big enough, it's going to be much harder to get anywhere. It's always easier to convince people to make 20 small changes than it is to convince them to make 1 big one that's 20x the size.