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The Trouble With 'Guest Workers'
Nathan Newman links to a new report by the Drum Major Institute noting that the easiest way to deal with the economic problems from illegal immigration is simply to give immigrants more rights, rather than trying—unsuccessfully—to immigrants from entering the country:
As long as a cheaper and more compliant pool of immigrant labor is available, employers are all too willing to take advantage of the situation to keep their labor costs down and are less willing to hire U.S.-born workers if they demand better wages and working conditions. So, U.S.-born workers are left to either accept the same diminished wages and degraded working conditions as immigrants living under threat of deportation or be shut out of whole industries where employers hire predominantly undocumented immigrants.In theory, that's right. Immigrants end up "dragging down" wages and working conditions for other workers precisely when, as is the case now, businesses are given free rein to abuse "guest workers" who can't speak out for fear of being deported. Now in practice, it's debatable whether immigrants actually take jobs from native workers or pull down wages in predominantly native industries—there's certainly decent evidence that immigrants do the jobs no native worker will accept, as the saying goes.The solution is to eliminate the second-class labor market in this two-tiered system and allow immigrants and U.S.-born workers to compete on an even playing field by guaranteeing immigrants—including undocumented workers—equal labor rights and making sure that employers cannot use deportation as a coercive tool in the labor market.
But the larger point here is a good one, and it's exactly why any humane immigration policy, ideally, should allow immigration but discontinue "guest worker" policies. At best, guest worker programs don't work—immigrants who want to stay in the country after their allotted time expires simply slip away and become "illegal" residents—and at worst they create a large underclass of indentured servants who can't change jobs or protest their often-dismal working conditions for fear of being kicked out of the country.
Posted by Bradford Plumer on 01/17/06 at 12:45 PM | E-mail | Print
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Comments
Thank you, Mother Jones! It's good to know that someone finally gets it. We need a policy that allows anyone to quickly and easily immigrate here and have all the rights of citizens once they get here.
We also need to allow the Mexican government to double the number of consulates they have in our country, in order to facilitate even more remittances for them.
Instead of building a wall at the border, we need to build a bridge! In fact, we need to build bus stations for all the millions of new immigrants who will want to come here for our new, official self-service immigration policy.
I'm not worried about the resulting loss of sovereignty, or the resulting decimation of the middle class, or supporting what is in effect an invasion of this country. After all, if the Mexican oligarchs want to send their poor people our way, what right do we as liberals have to refuse their wishes?
The only thing I'm worried about is the comment from TangoMan at washingtonmonthly.com/mt/mt-comments.cgi?entry_id=8026 where he says, "I'd say [the Drum Major Institute] report ranks up there with the Pharmacare study in outright dishonesty."
Now, that should be worrisome to anyone with any slight interest in their own credibility.
Posted by: TLB on 01/18/06 at 11:07 AM
When watching the frantic rescue attempts to save those American coal miners trapped in West Virgina I wondered, "Tell me again, exactly, what jobs Americans won't do?"
I thought back to when I worked my husband's way through grad school as a university janitor and the students working out their Fruedian hangups by smearing shit all over the four walls of the bathroom stall and I wonder, "tell me again, exactly, what are the jobs Americans won't do?
I am from Owensboro, Kentucky which was recently featured in Salon.com as the "new ARizona" because of all the immigrant workers in the tobacco fields there. When I was in high school it was the high school boys who worked the tobacco fields, earning money for a truck, or a nice prom, or saving for college. I wonder what they do now? Deal meth? What are, exactly, jobs Americans won't do?
Posted by: lmwilker on 01/18/06 at 1:28 PM
Coal miners are actually paid a very nice salary with good benefits compared to the others that live in those areas.
The solution: employers should pay more and therefore we wouldn't need illegal immigrants. While this sounds simple, it's not. Many industries would get their clocks cleaned by international competition, and many jobs simply wouldn't exist
Posted by: Ralph on 01/20/06 at 2:48 PM
Those coal miners were being paid about $20 per hour, hardly a princely salary. Even an Affirmative Action eligible idiot like Ralph probably makes something close to that- assuming he's employed.
Posted by: perroazul del norte on 01/20/06 at 8:28 PM
Just to drive home the point: there are hundreds of thousands of Hispanics just a short drive away from WVA in Virginia and North Carolina. Based on the logic of the open borders liars those should have been Mexicans trapped in that mine. What is more, because they were white, the leftist hatemongers didn't give a shit about their fate.The leftie dimwits simply adhere to the "logic" of the reigning Multicultist ideology:"four legs good, two legs bad." But to most of you Orwell is, no doubt, a dangerous rightist.
Posted by: perroazul del norte on 01/20/06 at 8:50 PM
Sad that most of these posted messages are by people who don't seem to have an idea of the entire dynamics surrounding undocumented people. If they took the time to study economy and international affairs, travel and read newspapers like New York Times they could undestand and be a little bit more respectful and understanding of human and civil rights of individuals. Acutally, immigrants generate a lot of money and all of us benefit from it. Also, nobody can assure that a natural or nuclear disaster would not occur in the U.S. and that we all would have to immigrate to other countries. No countrie has been invincible through history. But of course, history might not be something these guys read.
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Finally, somebody with common sense. So very few people can see this, even the ones that defend human rights in other areas. So called illegal immigrants seem to be the lowest of the lowest of the human scale at this time. Those concerned with human rights don't even care for them. What the U.S. government is doing with this people is criminal and history will hopefully record this.
Posted by: constanza baez on 01/18/06 at 9:35 AM