Neither interpretation's fair to either of you, though.
(I have no horse in this race; living in Europe, the idea of a visa seems a bit anachronistic, really.)
That's what I mean; living in Europe you think about visas so rarely, despite crossing borders and looking at jobs overseas, that the whole idea begins to look archaic and paranoid.
I can understand why visas might seem obsolete from a European perspective, but from an American perspective regulation is a necessity. Per year we already accept the highest number of permanent residents in the world. In 2008 we naturalized a record number of people. And most importantly, per year we grant the highest number of people political asylum. These numbers, combined with the fact that unemployment in the US is the highest it's been since the early 1940s, makes accepting large number of immigrants impossible.
I'm not defending this bill or the current system; I know there are areas that need improvement. But fundamentally the US needs some sort of visa system.
This claim is specious: the high-end immigrants who are likely to start tech companies and earn PhDs are enormously employable and likely to employ others. If you want more employment, bring in people who are likely to make jobs; notice the high number of tech startups with founders who are immigrants or the children of immigrants.
Still, I doubt that these visas are going to have any noticeable impact on unemployment because the rate at which they'll be granted isn't going to be high enough.
As for immigration more generally, see James Fallows' comments here: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/201001/american-decline . Allowing immigration is one of the relatively few things that America does right.
Here's the different kinds for Sweden: http://www.migrationsverket.se/info/1074_en.html
In Germany the first permit that you get (an H1B equivalent) is tied to one job, and hence, tied to the place where you have that job. After 5 years of working full-time (and a long string of other checklist items), you're eligible to begin the application process for permanent residence (which I now have).
However you can still (with the permit to stay) move between UE countries, just get back to Italy and declare revenue (as entrepreneur).
Heh, there are still people in EU countries (Romania, Bulgaria the least) that need visas to work in another EU country. So it's not all rosy within EU borders either.