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Coaxing Foreigners to Bet on U.S. Entrepreneurs (Again)

Much of the money for the expansion at Jay Peak, like this water park, has come from the EB-5 program, in which foreign investors are given green cards in exchange for investment capital.
Much of the money for the expansion at Jay Peak, like this water park, has come from the EB-5 program, in which foreign investors are given green cards in exchange for investment capital.Photograph courtesy of Jay Peak Resort
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Should wealthy foreigners be able to buy permanent resident status in the U.S.? That’s a question that surfaces whenever Congress considers renewal of EB-5, the decades-old federal program that makes green cards available to people who invest a minimum of $500,000 in U.S. companies that create or preserve at least 10 jobs in the country.

Fair or not, the program is going to be around for a while. The Senate approved the program’s three-year reauthorization in August. The House, which on Tuesday was considering the same extension, is expected to sign off before the program expires at the end of September.