I call bullshit on the United States Department of State. I call absolute and total bullshit because every year they give out fifty five thousand (read: 55,000) green cards to foreigners (and those foreigners' spouses and unmarried children under the age of twenty one) through a sort of lottery. That's above and beyond the foreigners the State Department already gives green cards to through the regular, old fashioned way, by the by. Enter the lottery and, through totally random chance a computer in Kentucky could select you, too, for permanent residency in the United States.
So, what are the details? What do you need to apply? What do you need to get selected? Here we go: you have to be from certain countries (more on this later) and you have to have at least a high school education OR "two years of work experience within the past five years in an occupation requiring at least two years of training or experience to perform." Not particularly stringent, huh? To apply, you fill out a simple electronic application with a few scanned or digital photos. Whoopie.
Now, obviously, I'm not opposed to foreigners coming to the United States. You could, in a round about way, say that getting them here is my job. I'm also not opposed to foreigners moving to the United States on a permanent basis. Several of my best friends were, in fact, born in a foreign country to foreign parents. There are people in particular that I'd like to move here on a permanent basis right now. It's the specific process here that I'm opposed to. See, after you're selected at random, you still have to meet all other requirements for getting a green card, which includes an application and interview and may include you having a job in the States waiting for you. In other words, winning the lottery doesn't guarantee you a damn thing except someone's brief attention.
So what, then, is the point? Well, remember those certain countries I mentioned above? The list of countries is quite specifically "countries with low rates of immigration to the United States," defined as countries which sent no "more than 50,000 immigrants to the U.S. in the past five years." This does not, by the way, mean strictly underpriveledged countries; it also includes countries the citizens of which have no real interest in moving over. So, Tajikistan is on the list, but so too is Switzerland. The idea here is not to help the underpriveledged make it to the States but rather to encourage diversity in the United States' immigrant population.
Now, again, I'm all for diversity, but I can't see this program as anything more than a smoke screen or empty suit. Think: whatever the normal requirements for getting a green card are, you still have to meet them if you win the lottery. Anyone is entitled to apply for a green card. So, if you're qualified, you should be able to get a green card without the lottery. If you're not qualified you won't be able to get one even with the lottery. All I see the lottery doing is adding a cruel sense of chance and false hope and a way for the Department of State to pat itself on the back (and defend itself to the United Nations) for encouraging diversity.
So, read the link at top, check out the sources that page links to. Come back and tell me: am I missing something?