Proposed $100,000 OPT fee could cut international STEM talent in the United States
Under a new federal proposal, US universities would have to pay up to $100,000 for each graduate to find a job in the United States after completing their education.
Credit: Getty
International students in the United States could face a $100,000 price tag to work in science-related jobs after graduation under a proposal unveiled yesterday by President Donald Trump’s administration.
The proposed rule would require universities to pay for Optional Practical Training (OPT), a programme that allows international students to work in the United States for up to three years after earning an undergraduate or graduate degree.
Approximately 420,000 students — about one-third of all international students — are expected to participate in OPT during the 2025–26 academic year. The programme is the largest pipeline of global talent into the US workforce.
Foreign doctoral students face strict restrictions on the amount of time they can spend in the United States
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which released the proposed rule, said it is intended to “combat fraud, strengthen the integrity of the immigration system, and protect American workers.” DHS predicted that, if finalized, the rule could reduce OPT enrollment by as much as 44% and cost universities between $8.4 billion and $16.5 billion annually.
An unpublished analysis by Michael Clemens, an economist at the Johns Hopkins School of Policy Studies in Washington, D.C., predicts that the number of students enrolling with bachelor’s degrees would be cut in half, while enrollment among master’s degree holders would essentially disappear.
Clemens also pointed out that OPT is particularly important for overseas doctoral graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields. Around 70% of these graduates were admitted in 2022.
The proposed rule is the latest in a series of attempts by the Trump administration to restrict immigration. Those measures have already limited the country’s ability to recruit scientific talent. In 2025, for example, President Trump announced a $100,000 tax on visas for researchers and other highly skilled foreign workers. New applications for those visas subsequently fell by 90%, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services.
If the new proposals and associated restrictions are implemented, the combined measures will “wipe out the pipeline” of talent, Clemens said. In a separate analysis commissioned by the National Academy of Sciences, he and his colleagues found that implementing all of the administration’s proposals would reduce the overall size of the US STEM workforce by 6% to 11% over 10 years.
A DHS spokesperson said the $100,000 charge “strengthens oversight of the programme while addressing concerns of fraud and abuse”, but did not respond to questions about its impact on the international STEM talent pipeline.
A high cost for international graduates
The OPT programme has expanded dramatically over the past decade, with international students using it to work at major technology companies such as Google and Amazon.
Violet Buxton Walsh, an immigration policy researcher at the Institute for Progress, a nonprofit think tank in Washington, D.C., said that although the number of new international students has declined, the number of new graduates enrolled in OPT increased by 14% last year.
“Few people have a better option than remaining in the United States,” she says.
Canada hires dozens of American academics, including several stars of science
The plan, reported by The Wall Street Journal, would charge graduates a $70,000 fee for the first year of OPT. STEM graduates would pay an additional $30,000 for the two-year extension.
Without OPT’s appeal, the number of international students in the United States would likely decline precipitously, multiple academics said. US universities could consequently lose between $2.5 billion and $4.2 billion each year in tuition and other revenue, Clemens estimates.
Ina Ganguly, a science and innovation economist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, said the impact would extend beyond student numbers and university finances.
“This is going to change the type of students coming to the United States,” she says, because strong candidates have the freedom to look elsewhere.
Source: www.nature.com