Is percentage arrangement acceptable as salary (H-1 and PERM)

Question details

The physician group I'm talking with are looking to hire me on to work alongside them, and they would not actually pay me a direct salary. I would bill insurance for each patient seen, and the practice would take a certain percentage and give me the rest. Would this be allowed? Or do I have to actually receive a salary from the future employer? My understanding is that as long as the potential employer can show the ability to pay the prevailing wage via a business income tax return, that is all that is needed. Whether or not I actually get paid and how much I get paid once the green card is approved, is irrelevant, correct?

ANSWER

First of all generally speaking, for H-1 and for green card your salary cannot include terms that are variable. So for instance if you get a yearly bonus, but the bonus changes from year to year you cannot include that as a part of your salary. Salary cannot include per diem. A lot of companies and a lot of employees get stuck with a lot of problems because per diem is set up as part of the salary. Per diem is not salary. Benefits are not salary. So all three of these items are big problems when you talk about H-1 and green card salaries. You cannot include benefits, You cannot include per diem and you cannot include variable amounts such as bonuses. if the bonus is guaranteed, in terms of the amount then you can include it otherwise but this is not salary.   

But how about a percentage?... In PERM for sure you cannot have this arrangement because this is not a fixed amount. Green card is a job in the future and what if you have a different set up now and another set up when you actually get the green card, I think that's ok but the  problem is if you are in H-1 this actually offends H-1 as well.  


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Nonimmigrant Visas