Articles   Attorney Johansson writes a legal column for the newspaper "NORDSTJERNAN" or Swedish Press. The publication is the oldest Swedish-American publication, established in 1872 in New York and serves the Swedish-American community on a nation-wide basis, and "FINLANDIA WEEKLY", an east-coast based Finnish-American weekly newspaper published in Florida and distributed all over the United States.   New Cap on H-1B visas   The number of available H-1B visa per year will drop from 195,000 to 65,000 from October 1, 2003.   The H-1B visa is the visa of choice for most corporations when bringing in foreign employees/specialists to work in the United States.   The visa quotas have been under attack ever since September 11, and this combined with a weak American economy has resulted in an anti-immigration sentiment in the U.S. and in Congress. Based on these facts it is hard to see when a change will occur towards a more immigration friendly environment among the decision makers.   The consequences of the reduction of H-1B's can prove to be devastating for great many companies here in the U.S. and abroad. Even though the number of applications have dropped to 26.659 in 2002 this drop was due to the recession and the decline of the dot-com sector and is only temporary.   As the economy turns around the 65,000 available H-1B visas may be gone in a couple of months leaving everybody stranded in their need for foreign expertise.   To add insult to injury the only alternative to the H-1B, the L-1 classification is also under attack and may suffer restrictions in the future.   It has been said that this is basically a problem for the software industry and countries like India which supplies all these software specialists. Not so, this affects every country including Finland where Finnish companies need to take on foreign workers in their U.S. based entities and where L-1 is not an available option. It also affects U.S. companies who in order to stay compatible need foreign specialists to assist them.   The prudent thing to do at this point is for companies to really plan ahead. Do not delay to employ that specialist that you will need in four months - four months from now there may not be any visas available! The same goes for (foreign) individuals who are thinking of starting to work for a U.S. company. The time is now! Do not delay your visa petition!