An L-2 spouse is employment-authorized incident to status and may work without a separate permission. Children hold derivative status, may attend school, and may not work. Derivative eligibility ends at twenty-one, and a common-law partner is not a spouse for these purposes.
Plan the household around the shortest clock in it
For a defined assignment the household questions are usually practical rather than legal. A spouse who intends to work should confirm in advance what an American employer will want to see as proof of authorization, because status-based authorization is less familiar to payroll departments than a card. Children can enrol in school, and a school district's own registration requirements are a separate matter from immigration status.
Two items deserve a note in the calendar. If a child turns twenty-one during the assignment, derivative status ends on that birthday whatever the parent's remaining period, and a student route with its own admission and financial requirements takes time to arrange. If the couple is not married, the partner has no derivative eligibility at all and needs an independent basis to be there, which for an eighteen-month posting may be the fact that decides whether the family moves together.
Where the household keeps a home in Ontario, the practical questions about schooling, insurance and tax residence deserve settling alongside the immigration ones.
- USCIS: L-1B Intracompany Transferee Specialized Knowledge
- USCIS Policy Manual, Volume 2 Part L, Intracompany Transferees
- eCFR: 8 CFR 214.2(l), Intracompany transferees
- Department of State: 9 FAM 402.12, Intracompany transferees
- USCIS: employment authorization for certain spouses, Policy Manual Volume 10 Part B Chapter 2