Thread: Immigrants' Jobless Rate Falls Below U.S. Natives'

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 00498.html

Immigrants' Jobless Rate Falls Below U.S. Natives'

By Neil Irwin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 7, 2006; D01

The jobless rate among immigrants fell below that of U.S.-born workers last year for the first time in at least a decade, according to new government data, during a hiring boom by construction, hospitality, and other companies that rely heavily on immigrant labor.

Unemployment among immigrants was 4.6 percent in 2005, down from 5.5 percent in 2004. The jobless rate among native-born Americans was 5.2 percent, down from 5.5 percent a year before.

Joblessness among immigrants has been as high or higher than that of native-born Americans in every previous year the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics has compiled such data, which it started doing in 1996. The survey includes immigrants who arrived in the United States legally and illegally and does not distinguish between the two.

The new figures come as Senate leaders have reached agreement on legislation that would allow many illegal immigrants to pursue legal status and as an intense debate over immigration roils the political world.

"There aren't a lot of immigrants working in manufacturing, which has been hard hit; they don't work as much in professional services, which is still sluggish," said Charles W. McMillion, chief economist of District-based research firm MBG Information Services. "They do work in health care, which is booming. They work in bars and restaurants, which have been booming, and in construction, which continues to be strong."

The number of jobs in the construction sector rose 4.3 percent in 2005, compared with 1.5 percent overall job growth. In 2004, 15.8 percent of foreign-born men worked in construction and related industries, compared with 10.2 percent of native-born men.

Put all those numbers together, and it amounts to jobs being created most rapidly in sectors where immigrants have the strongest footholds. When companies that already employ significant numbers of people born outside the United States are expanding, they tend to recruit workers through the friends and families of existing workers, a phenomenon economists call the network effect.

To some economists, the Labor Department data suggest that immigrants, more so than in the past, are pursuing jobs more aggressively than their native-born counterparts.

"The pressure on immigrants to work, especially immigrant men, is very strong," said Harry Holzer, a public policy professor at Georgetown University and senior fellow at the Urban Institute. "They have to bring home the bacon and just don't have the luxury of doing otherwise."

He notes that some government welfare programs are closed off to immigrants, especially those who entered the country illegally. And people whose families have been in the United States for two or more generations may have the savings and support networks to just keep looking for work rather than accept a job with unpleasant working conditions.

That divide is particularly visible among Hispanics. Native-born Hispanics had a 7.2 percent unemployment rate in 2005, according to the new data. Foreign-born Hispanics who are not U.S. citizens had a 5.5 percent unemployment rate. Foreign-born Hispanics who are naturalized citizens had only a 3.6 percent jobless rate.

One factor in the low jobless rates among naturalized immigrants is that to be in the country legally, many needed to be sponsored by an employer. "This is a group composed almost exclusively of people who came here through a labor certification," said Rakesh Kochhar, associate director for research at the Pew Hispanic Center.

He notes another possible reason for lower joblessness among immigrants: If they have trouble finding a job, they may be inclined to return to their home country temporarily, whereas native-born workers have no comparable option.

The trend of lower joblessness among immigrants held true in each local jurisdiction, though state numbers are based on small samples subject to significant statistical error. In the District, 3.9 percent of immigrants were jobless, compared with 6.7 percent of native-born workers. In Maryland, 3.4 percent of workers were jobless, compared with 4.3 percent of native-born workers. And in Virginia, 2 percent of immigrants were unemployed, compared with 3.7 percent of native-born workers.

The data are based on the same survey of about 60,000 households that provides the raw material for the unemployment rate and other labor force indicators released each month. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has not yet issued its formal report publishing the survey results, but it made preliminary data available on request. CNN/Money first reported on the data yesterday afternoon.

If they have trouble finding a job, they may be inclined to return to their home country temporarily

So, that means "Employer Sanctions" WILL work!

What this proves is that new jobs in the United States are in fields of low skill, low pay and temporary.

This is the result of a population-service-based economy rather than a production based economy.

It means to grow your business, you have to grow the population.

When you grow the population to feed American Business, you have more people than jobs; a declining economy and a race to the bottom instead of working to stay on Top.

As we've learned recently, the US Labor Department no longer counts unemployed Americans. They do a survey or poll calling 60,000 "households" every month and then use mathetmatics formulas to create a national unemployment rate statistic for 150,000,000 working Americans from this 60,000 "person" Survey.

This is not a valid means to count the unemployed in the United States. This is a means to conceal the number of unemployed in the United States to make things look better than they are to fabricate false labor shortages to justify illegal immigration and more legal immigration.

If they have trouble finding a job, they may be inclined to return to their home country temporarily

I'd say they're more inclined to pack up and invade NC.

Judy,

Originally Posted by judy

What this proves is that new jobs in the United States are in fields of low skill, low pay and temporary.

Judy, not so fast. Technical high skilled American jobs now belong to:

1. H-1B visa card holders[/*:m:1smxa04d]
2. H-1B visa card holders who overstayed their 6 year visa (guess what? They're illegals).[/*:m:1smxa04d]
3. L-1 Visa card holders[/*:m:1smxa04d]
4. Body shop* employees residing in Bangalore, India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
5. Body shop* employees residing in Chennai, India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
6. Body shop* employees residing in Hyderabad, India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
7. Body shop* employees residing in Mumbai (Bombay), India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
8. Body shop* employees residing in Dehli, India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
9. Body shop* employees residing in Kolkata (Calcutta), India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
10. Body shop* employees residing in Pune, India[/*:m:1smxa04d]
11. Body shop* employees residing in Guragon, India[/*:m:1smxa04d]

*Employees of Tata, HCL, Infosys, Wiprospectramind, Accenture, IBM of India, Satyam, to name a few.


Predictions, based on trends, are: 10.5 to 20 million US jobs will belong to India by the end of 2010. The entire US Info tech industry will be wiped out twice over.

65,000 new H-1B arrivals, Congress is aggressively pushing to double this figure, 110,000 H-1B arrivals per year. The president's Nukes for Mangos trade agreement is what doubles the H-1Bs and doubles offshoring to Bangalore and Hyderabad.

Presently,
355,605 Legal H-1B (mostly from India) w/ jobs Americans were fired from.
2,604,029 Illegal H-1Bs who overstayed their visas.
They forgot to go home.
Need proof? http://www.zazona.com/ShameH1B/Library/ ... saGlut.PDF
Oh it's worse than you think. Hold onto your hat when you look at the L-1 visa count. The L-1s don't have to go home and there is no cap.

Just like the H-1Bs, Americans are forced to train them right before being fired.

These are not "Jobs that Americans' Don't Want**,"
These ARE Jobs that Americans were FIRED from!

**Jobs that Congress expects us to believe that Americans don' t want.

Right Coto and most of those jobs are existing jobs, not new jobs, where Americans are being fired and replaced with foreign nationals.

What I was addressing was the 'new job growth' which is pathetically inadequate for our nation because it is limited to primarily construction trade for housing and retail trade growth that relates to population growth.

Not only are these the only new jobs being created by our economy, they are being filled with illegal aliens. Not only are new jobs begin filled by illegal aliens, employers are also firing American Workers and replacing them with illegal aliens or legal visa holders.

With respect to other fields, there is little to no growth which means there are no new jobs being created. In these, they are filling vacancies created by attrition with illegal and legal foreign nationals and shutting out Americans from these professional fields as well.

Our economy is declining because there are no new jobs that provide long-term economic security for Americans. These derive from our industrial base and related support industries and both the industries and jobs are being shipped out of the country because of Free Trade Agreements.

I agree with you 100%, I was just addressing the type of new jobs our country is creating and who has been CHOSEN to fill them.

Americans need all the jobs, low skill and high skill and professional jobs.

We have 39,000,000 people in the United States on some type of welfare assistance because they lack the job opportunities to sustain themselves independently. Many of these would be thrilled to work for a retailer at a livable wage with benefits and a full 40 hour work schedule. But they are being shut out of the job market in favor of illegal aliens.

Any American, low skill or high skill that thinks they are safe and protected from the ravages of illegal immigration needs to wake up and join our fight, including those employed in the public and government sectors.

And all Americans need to demand that stop pursuing a population-service based economy and begin re-building our production-based economy immediately.

Originally Posted by Judy

Right Coto and most of those jobs are existing jobs, not new jobs, where Americans are being fired and replaced with foreign nationals.

What I was addressing was the 'new job growth' which is pathetically inadequate for our nation because it is limited to primarily construction trade for housing and retail trade growth that relates to population growth.

Not only are these the only new jobs being created by our economy, they are being filled with illegal aliens. Not only are new jobs begin filled by illegal aliens, employers are also firing American Workers and replacing them with illegal aliens or legal visa holders.

Hi Judy, you jumped back in on this message thread real quick.

Americans being fired were told to find replacement jobs in nano-technology, and that they would be taken care of. They were told that by economists and the press.

Bad news followed when Tata of India announced (either in India Times or Hindu Times) that all nano-technology jobs would be oursourced to Bangalore.

Lots of fired IT workers made heroic efforts to try to find the so-called "replacement jobs." Some even chartered a bus from CA to DC to try to inform the Congress; upon arrival, elected officials refused to see them. Of course, we all know, low end "replacement jobs" belong to the illegals.

The IT and other technical engineers are being treated like crap. Other professionals are too. The "key" characteristics making them and us and everyone in the category undesirable is: LEGAL AMERICAN CITIZEN

GRRRRRRR!!!

Good Stuff, Coto, keep it coming, especially your statistics and stories about the experiences of high-skilled technical workers. Maybe this will help others to see...if they've still got a job, they won't tomorrow, they are on the list of being "replaced".