Andrea Batista Schlesinger

President’s Melting Pot is more like Worker Stew

"Why are all of these people marching for those crappy jobs?" I was asked at Sunday brunch with family last weekend. Spoken by a progressive immigrant, it gave me pause. I quickly came to realize that the focus on pathways to citizenship and border security has distracted attention from the third vitally important component of the immigration debate: what happens in the workplace, and how this piece of immigration reform will impact American workers.

It's not a surprise that the President didn't tackle this last night in his immigration address. If he were to address the repercussions of his immigration proposals to the American worker, it would be revealed that his agenda is that of big business, not of the current and aspiring middle class. President Bush's guest worker program creates an unintended effect that will result in a race to the bottom for the unskilled American worker. It will be a melting pot, alright, but one in which everyone is eaten for dinner.

Unfortunately, the immigrant rights community won't call him on it. They too have placed the emphasis on pathways to citizenship and family reunification - and for good reason. But in doing so they are missing an important opportunity to build alliances with the American worker by making the case that there is a shared economic interest in progressive immigration policy, and a shared danger in the creation of a permanent underclass of exploited immigrant workers.

Anyone who thinks that rounding up all the illegal immigrants and sending them back to where they came from is good for the pocketbook of Americans is wrong. The truth is that immigrants - legal and illegal alike - play a critical role in our economy. They prepare and serve the food that the middle class eats. They start new businesses. They pay taxes - in fact one of the main reasons that the Social Security system isn't in worse shape today is the contribution of the young immigrant population. Studies have even shown that over time immigrants and their descendents pay more in taxes than they receive in services. They purchase homes. They stimulate the creation of new markets. If every immigrant - even every illegal immigrant - left the country tomorrow, the results would be bad for the economic interests of middle-class Americans.

Critics say that illegal immigrants are lowering the wages of low-income workers. Sure. That's why we need to fix the system! When conservatives say, "even the liberal Paul Krugman agrees," pointing to the columnist's piece saying that immigrants lower wages, they forget that nobody thinks the status quo is acceptable. The presence of an exploited class of workers is assuredly going to bring down wages. If you own a factory and have a choice between hiring a worker whom you can pay whatever you wish, because if he complains he will be deported, versus someone who will demand a basic level of compensation and compliance with workplace safety requirements on top of that, who are you going to pick? The issue is not so much that illegal immigrants take jobs (by stimulating the economy, they also create them) but that they drive down the cost of labor for all unskilled workers, forcing their U.S.-born counterparts to accept diminished wages and working conditions that predominate in industries where illegal immigrants make up a large section of the workforce. This is the same reason that guest worker programs will hurt Americans (for more on "The Guest Worker Gamble," read this).

And so comprehensive immigration reform must do two things: recognize the critical role that immigrants play in the economy, and at the same time strengthen workplace rights for all so we don't have an institutionalized underclass pushing everyone's wages down. When immigrants can assert their rights in the workplace and the labor market, from the right to the minimum wage to the right to join a union, the downward pressure on wages will be eased.

Unfortunately, those talking about immigration on the airwaves are not stressing the shared economic interest in sound immigrant policy. This is having the unintended effect of causing a fracture between African-Americans and the immigrant advocacy communities. Talking points are circulating urging organizers not to say that our nation is one of immigrants, lest African-Americans brought here as slaves take offense. But the question here goes beyond spin. African-Americans, like anyone else, want to understand how these questions impact their bottom line. An institutionalized underclass without rights in the workplace will lower the wages of working Americans, especially low-wage African-American workers. More on this later.

The middle class and those trying to work their way up have a direct stake in the outcome of this immigration policy debate. It's unfortunate that the only people speaking directly to their perspective are those more interested in an agenda that protects big business' bottom line and not that of American workers (surely not a surprise that these agendas differ). Immigrant advocates would do well to express the shared economic interest in progressive immigration reform, so that it's clear that no one is in the streets fighting for crappy jobs, but against crappy legislation that will harm every American's economic interest.

cross posted with Huffington Post

Technorati Tags: | Drum Major | Drum Major Institute | immigration reform

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Posted at 12:37 PM, May 16, 2006 in Immigration | Labor | Middle-class squeeze
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