How does it work with the VISA system?

I want to go to the USA - I have a British passport - I have interest from a few companies out there but they've all said to me, "without an existing
Visa we would not be able to consider you for the position"

What's the process? Is it really long winded?

You need to apply to a company whom is willing to provide a H1B for you, or try the Green Card Lottery, which does work. Getting into the US these days is difficult, just going there to find work will not happen, however plenty of Mexicans succeed .You could marry an American also, which a lot of people do, that basically provides you with a solid sponsor.
Anyway, applying to a company is the best way, and legal.
This IS a long winded process.

Check out these websites:

http://www.h1base.com/content/h1bvisa/

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/fo...loyment-visas/

and a google search on h1b

I do not know your speciality, but e.g. an IT job website,
http://www.dice.com/ if you do a search for "h1b", there are plenty
of job listings that offer h1b sponsorship.

h1b visas take about 3-6 month to be processed, but for an additional
$1,000, it can be expedited, and you get an answer within 15 days.

useful links from Saulius, I found this thread....though I don't believe it somehow.

http://www.visajourney.com/forums/to...a-us-employer/

green card lottery website.
http://mygreencard.com/immigrate.php...de_mygreencard

The green card lottery is not open to UK citizens at he moment:

Cool thanks Saulius,

Well I currently hold the position of Interactive Art Director here so it is the IT industry, I'll take a look at that site

Dude, wtf does this have to do with Daily Life in Switzerland? Get on to a specialist website. Rant over.

Stop living on an internet forum dude - who cares where you post shit...it's the internet ... it's a forum ... prick

The bigger question is why would somebody living in Switzerland would
want to move to the USA to work?

The worst part is that you get only 10 days holiday a year, and most of
the US, you cannot get around without a car.

And in the NYC metro, you are sharing the ride with rats:

It's expensive, time consuming and hard... and getting to be more of all three of those each year, more so in some states than others.


Secondly, these days, many many Americans will not be likely to thank you for coming to work there as unemployment is in the double digits in many areas. The jobs that will be "easiest" to get also will be the least likely to pay well or offer any sort of benefits, let alone good ones.

Well, that is unless you are well trained in some high paid white collar job, in which case you are already working in a (really really) nice job here and going there puts you at risk of being "let go" due to downsizing and then your employment choices would again be low paid no-benefit jobs - even if you were transferred there by your company in the first place.