Suman Raghunathan

No-Match is a No-Go

In another page from the enforcement-only book du jour, last Friday the feds rolled out a whole new package of measures designed to target undocumented workers without acknowledging their crucial economic contributions and how our immigrations system’s current configuration just isn’t working.

The plan is all stick and no carrot, with no effort to integrate immigrants into economies, let alone communities. In fact, the President’s new immigration enforcement package will actually provide employers with more sticks to hold above their undocumented workers’ heads to force them to accept unfair wages, working conditions, and harassment - segregating immigrant workers in an underground economy. The result will be lower wages and poor (if not hazardous) working conditions for all workers, including the American middle class.

Newsflash to Washington and those behind the other nasty local anti-immigrant ordinances:attempting to enforce immigrants’ work authorization without first giving them legal status or enforcing labor laws for all workers will do nothing to improve the lot of American workers. It will simply reinforce a two-tier labor market that will depress the wages and work conditions of all workers (both immigrant and native born).

This is why, contrary to the anti-immigrant spin doctors(which can be found on both sides of the party aisle), the American middle needs to stand up and support legal status for undocumented workers. Believe me, the ripple effect will be a positive one for not just immigrants, but for workers in the country in general.

Many of the government’s sticks will take the form of enforcing so-called ‘No-Match’ letters (no reference intended to matchmaking or internet dating) sent out by the Social Security Administration (SSA) to employers when they think something fishy is going on between their inaccurate database (it has at least a 4% error rate, probably more) and payroll tax information sent to the Social Security Administration by way of the IRS from employers. As I’ve said before and contrary to popular belief, undocumented workers are not the lyin’, cheatin’, freeloaders often depicted by the anti-immigrant right - even though the SSA itself admits three quarters of undocumented immigrants fork over payroll taxes annually.

Click here for more information on the 26 other enforcement-heavy pieces of the Department of Homeland Security’s plan, which range from upping the number of Border Patrol agents to 20,000 in the next 2 years, to denying immigrants from immigration court hearings, to increasing the number of detention spaces to over 30,000.

To be clear, the SSA has been sending out ‘No-Match’ letters for a few years now, but has not assiduously enforced fines or pressed charges against employers for hiring workers without work authorization. All that will change with the new regulations,which according to President Bush’s spokeswoman are ‘going as far as we possibly can without Congress acting.” Great. We’ve forgotten about checks and balances – the whole point of giving Congress the power to craft legislation – and are continuing the White House’s beeline for Executive Privilege. The beeline is headed straight for25% higher fees imposed on employers–as high as $10,000- and more criminal felony charges against both employers and undocumented workers.

Here’s how the new ‘No-Match’ enforcement process will work: When it appears there is a discrepancy between an employee’s work records and payroll taxes the SSA is receiving (let’s not forget undocumented workers and their Social Security benefits are actually a windfall for the SSA and literally keep the Social Security program in business, since the lion’s share of the $6-$7 million undocumented workers pump into the nation’s Social Security program will never be claimed) SSA will send out letters to employers notifying them they may have a ‘No-Match’ situation. Employers will then have 90 days to rectify the No-Match situation, or to fire the employee. If neither happens in the Department of Homeland Security’s time frame, then DHS and its Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) unit will assume the employer has knowingly hired undocumented workers, and impose fees or attempt to press charges.

In a rare consensus (shocking! the mainstream media gets it for once!), the Washington Post, New York Times, and business groups like the Essential Worker Immigration Coalition all admit a beefed-up enforcement-only approach without addressing the nation’s crippled immigration system will only drive undocumented workers further into an unregulated economy where employers will be able to get away with paying their workers even lower wages under the table. American workers and the middle class in particular will continue to have a hard time competing with the shamefully low wages forced upon undocumented workers by employers.

In practice, SSA says it will only pursue businesses that employ at least 10 people, and will send out 140,000 letters. You do the math: that means at least 1.4 million workers who run the risk of being targeted, fired, or both for engaging in our economy. Now tell me how that’s going to help America’s workers or its economy.

No match is a no go, folks.

Suman Raghunathan: Author Bio | Other Posts
Posted at 8:00 AM, Aug 15, 2007 in Immigration
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