Flexible immigration provisions key to U.S. markets

Now that the free trade agreement is a certainty, its new immigration provisions should result in at least a 50% increase in Canadians doing business in the United States.

According to Joseph Grasmick, a Niagara Falls, N.Y., immigration attorney who specializes in obtaining visas and work permits for Canadians to work in the U.S., the agreement’s new immigration rules will make a more dramatic impact than the agreement’s elimination of trade barriers.

“High level Canadian sales executives, for example, will have the opportunity to generate millions in sales revenues annually in the U.S. market,” Grasmick says.

Beyond lifting trade and tariff restrictions, the agreement includes sweeping provisions for modifying and loosening U.S. immigration rules for Canadians, Grasmick says. Currently, the U.S. does not have a visa treaty with Canada, although the two countries have the largest two-way trade relationship in the world.

“Without work permission, as the immigration rules currently stand Canadian executives cannot manage a U.S. branch, manufacturers cannot send technicians to U.S. customer sites, many professionals cannot visit their U.S. clients and investors cannot actively manage their U.S. investments,” Grasmick says.

The agreement, however, includes a list of favored professionals who will be able to work in the U.S. without advance approval, and a list of other professionals who will not experience a waiting period for work permits.

On January 1 the agreement will allow Canadian investors to manage large investments in the U.S. Professionals who are now unable to obtain work permission and those who experience long waiting periods for permits will benefit. More than 50 professions will be affected, from management consultants, technicians and scientists to architects, engineers and computer systems analysts.

“This agreement includes provisions for exchange of services as well as goods: a definition that is unprecedented in U.S. immigration history,” says Grasmick.

“While tariff reductions will be phased in over a 10-year period, the qualitative impact of the immigration rules will be immediate.”