Letter to the Editor of the Week

Amy Traub

Letter to the Editor of the Week

One of our aims at the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy is to "challenge the tired orthodoxies of both the right and the left." Nowhere is that more apparent than in our focus on immigration policy: over the past year we've found ourselves criticizing both the guest-worker program promoted by Senator Ted Kennedy and the immigration plan proposed by President Bush. We've diverged from allies like the union UNITE-HERE on how to achieve the best immigration policy to better the lives of immigrant workers and U.S. citizens alike. And with this week's featured Letter to the Editor, we're in agreement with the chairman of the New Hampshire College Republicans. His letter appears today in Newsday.

'Guest workers' won't solve problem
I am tired of hearing that because Americans will not take certain jobs, we need to allow currently illegal immigrants to do them in a guest-worker program. I am a 21-year-old college student who would gladly take a job washing dishes or mowing lawns for a summer's worth of work. Plenty of other college and high school students would do the same.

The only reason Americans cannot get these jobs is because employers are able to pay someone who is in this country illegally well below the minimum wage. Why would you pay a 16-year-old student $5.15 an hour when you can have someone else do the same day's work for $2 and a lunch? There is no job beneath an American. The day we begin to believe that will be a sad day for this country.

Thomas DeRosa
Lindenhurst
Editor's note: The writer is chairman of the New Hampshire College Republicans.

Thomas DeRosa, we salute you! You're right that you will never get a job mowing lawns for minimum wage as long as employers can easily find someone to do the work for less. And the argument that there are some jobs U.S. citizens simply won't do -- given adequate wages and working conditions -- is fundamentally flawed.

We need to take the next step, however, and recognize that undocumented immigrants would also prefer to be working for better wages. They're toiling for substandard pay only because they lack the ability to demand a fair deal in the workplace. And as long as undocumented workers are vulnerable to that kind of exploitation, Thomas can't get a job washing dishes unless he too is willing to accept the degraded (and illegal) going rate. Until we make sure everyone participating in our labor market has full workplace rights, U.S. workers -- not just college kids looking for a summer job but full-time workers trying to support a family -- risk being undermined. That argument is at the crux of DMI's immigration analysis. Thanks to Thomas DeRosa for illustrating it so clearly.

Comments

Must a guest worker program create a two-tiered labor system?

Foreign nationals recruited to work in US firms get the same pay and conditions as US citizens get. The issue, as I see it, is to make making sure undocumented and guest workers all good jobs at fair pay. That is: to try to stem the race to the bottom.

Your college young Republican letter writer will continue to have a hard time finding work mowing lawns so long as the underground economy in the US provides better pay than displaced workers find at home.

I do think guest worker programs tend inevitably toward creating a two-tiered labor market. This tendency can be mitigated -- I think the requirement in the current Senate bill that guest workers be paid at least the prevailing wage for their occupation is a great step -- but I don't think you can get away from it entirely.

The inherently temporary nature of guest workers means that they have less incentive to take risks in the hope of long-term gain. Doing something like complaining about an unsafe work environment or participating in a union organizing drive invites employer retaliation. If you're in it for the long haul, the risk might be worth it, but guest workers need to stay employed to remain in the country. If you're only in the country, and in your present job, for a maximum of six years, it makes more sense to keep your head down and not risk trouble. In practice, most of the guest worker plans proposed have other situations built into them for employers to exercise disproportionate power over guest workers. The threat of being able to revoke legal status and have people deported is a powerful bargaining tool in the labor market and the more employers have this power the more pressure for a race to the bottom.

Why not remove the source of this vulnerability entirely? If our economy needs immigrant workers (and I believe it does) we should give them full, permanent legal status in this country -- green cards.

The following responses emanate from the analysis: Principles for an Immigration Policy to Strengthen & Expand the Middle Class.

1. No, immigrants (I trust you meant illegal immigrants) DO NOT "pay more in
taxes than they use in govt. services". The shortfall is enormous- see letter to Andrea.

2. No, illegal immigrants DON'T increase consumer demand (AKA "disposable income"). Their wages being less (much less) than the Americans they replace, their
disposable income is much less, and so there is economic shrinkage (less $ being
spent, less $ going to businesses).

3. "Stimulate the economy" ? Why ? They have no greater propensity to
start businesses than the Americans they replace (and less money to do it with).
"Capital from countries of origin" ? Give us a break. Let's take the # 1 C of O as an
example. That'll be the day when Mexico funnels capital to illegal immigrants that they just expelled. They have only 2 relationships to the migrants they sent:
A. to add $40 Billion/yr to their economy from the migrants' remittances
(how come I don't see that word in DMI website?) (that's $40 B LOST from our economy).
and: B. to dump the migrants (their poverty bill - $62 Billion/yr) right square
into our laps. (they'll continue this as long as we're stupid enough to accept it).

4. "Contributions of immigrants" ? (illegal ie.) The "contribution" is a
$102 Billion/yr LOSS for us, and a $102 Billion/yr gain for Mexico, and the copycat
countries.

5. Employers are only "willing to take advantage of the situation" when they're
not being penalized (as it's been up to now with Bush in cahoots with these traitorous
domestic outsourcers). BUT with new legislation, (perhaps with your help) like HR
4313, HR 4437 and HR 98, employers could NOT do that as they'd be facing jail time
and huge fines. Note: what is Andrea talking about ? Lou Dobbs talks about employer sanctions all the time.

6. Deportation isn't necessary. Tough action against Corporate Mexico and their
"running dogs" the Mexican Congress and Obrador? IS what's necessary. That
coupled with tough action against the American employers (domestic outsourcers)
will have the migrants migrating back under better conditions. If it takes 1847 all over
again, so be it. Mexico has been waging war against us (economically) for 30 years
now. $102 Billion/yr ? Attila and his Huns would be envious. Time to stop the
pillaging and maybe even bill Mexico for what they've been ripping us off for.
You know even in WWII, the Japanese didn't occupy our land with 12-20 million
of their (cheap labor) "troops" and plunder us for $102 Billion bucks a year.
Truly,
Miguel Berreradad
we're on the same side but if we cry wolf, we're
in trouble.
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