It derailed efforts to deal with an equally vexing business concern: a backlog in applications for so-called green cards, the coveted cards that are actually pink or white and that offer proof of lawful permanent residency.

Many people now wait six years or longer for the card. There are 526,000 applications pending, according to Immigration Voice, an advocacy group that tracks government data.

Lately, this has prompted an exodus of foreign workers who tired of waiting, to return home or go further afield. With the economies in Asia and elsewhere on the rise, they can easily find work in the native countries or in third nations that are more generous with their visas.

"You have China, Russia, India -- a lot of countries where you can go and make a lot of money. That's the biggest thing that has changed," said Murali Bashyam, a Raleigh immigration lawyer who helps companies sponsor immigrants. "Before, people were willing to wait it out. Now they can do just as well going back home, and they do."

Mike Plueddeman said he lost three employees (one a senior programmer with a doctorate) at Durham-based DynPro in the past two years because they tired of waiting for their green cards.

All three found good jobs in their home countries within a few weeks of leaving Durham, said Plueddeman, the software consultancy's human resource director.

"We are talking about very well-educated and highly skilled people who have been in the labor force a long time," he said. "You hate losing them."

This budding brain drain comes as the first American baby boomers retire and projections show a huge need for such professionals in the years ahead. U.S. universities graduate about 70,000 information technology students annually. Many people say that number won't meet the need for a projected 600,000 additional openings for information systems professionals between 2002 and 2012, and the openings made by retirements.

"We just don't have the pipeline right now," said Joe Freddoso, director of Cisco Systems' Research Triangle Park operations. "We are concerned there's going to be a shortage, and we're already seeing that in some areas."

Cisco has advertised an opening for a data-security specialist in Atlanta for several months, unable to find the right candidate. Freddoso believes the problem will spread unless the government allows more foreign workers to enter the country, and expedites their residency process.

However, not everybody believes in the labor shortage that corporations fret about.

Critics say that proposals to allow more skilled workers into the country would only depress wages and displace American-born workers who have yet to fully recover from the dot-com bust.

"We should only issue work-related visas if we really need them," said Caroline Espinosa, a spokeswoman with NumbersUSA, a Washington, D.C., group pushing for immigration reduction. "There are 2.5 million native born American workers in the math and computer field who are currently out of work. It begs the question whether we truly need foreign workers."

She added that the immigration backlog would be aggravated by raising the cap for temporary and permanent visas, which would make it harder for those who deserve to immigrate to do so.

Waiting since 2003

Sarath Chandrand, 44, a software consultant from India, moved with his wife and two young daughters from Raleigh to Toronto in December because he couldn't live with more uncertainty. He applied for his green card in early 2003 and expects it will take at least two more years to get it.

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