Thread: Why America’s Elites Want Amnesty

Why America’s Elites Want Amnesty


October 9, 2014 | Laura Dern - Progressives for Immigration Reform

Mark Zuckerberg’s political group FWD.us has raised over $50 million to lobby in favor of amnesty for illegal immigrants. [1] The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which represents big business interests, spent millions on ad campaigns advocating for more immigration. [2] And union bosses donated over $40 million to pro-amnesty politicians in 2013 alone. [3]

America’s elites seem bound and determined to push through amnesty at all costs. They claim that more immigration will help the nation. But regular Americans aren’t falling for these empty promises — they know that amnesty will benefit the elite few at the expense of working-class families.

The economy is only slowly recovering from the recession. Wage growth is outpacing inflation by just 0.5 percent — the weakest rate since World War II. [4]

The nation’s immigration policies deserve part of the blame. In fact, a report by the National Bureau of Economic Research confirms that immigrants partly caused the growth in U.S. wage inequality in recent decades. [5]

Immigrants keep wages low by underbidding American workers. Low-skilled, low-wage workers are especially vulnerable, as they tend to face the most competition from immigrants for jobs.

Therefore, it’s no surprise that 47 percent of Americans with a high school degree or less want decreased levels of immigration. [6]

The CEO of Marriott hotels, like many amnesty advocates, argues that America needs more immigrants because “Americans are unwilling” to fill certain jobs. [7]

That’s hard to believe, given that 9.3 million Americans are currently unemployed. [8] A further 7.1 million Americans want a good-paying, full-time job but are stuck working part-time. [9]

Clearly, the problem isn’t that Americans don’t want to work. It’s that businesses don’t want to pay fair wages.

An overwhelming majority — 71 percent — of citizens believe that companies should pay better wages to attract American workers instead of importing new immigrant laborers. [10] But corporate fat cats balk at the prospect of paying a fair wage. That’s why they’re spending so much to open the immigration floodgates.

Business leaders aren’t the only ones out of touch with popular opinion — union bosses are also selling out American workers. In fact, unions are integral to the amnesty campaign. That’s why President Obama invited labor leaders to a closed door strategy session dedicated to immigration “reform.” [11]

Yet a poll of over 7,000 union members shows that 63 percent think immigration levels are already too high. [12]
To understand why union bosses are ignoring the opinions of the workers they’re supposed to represent, just look at the Service Employees International Union. [13] SEIU boasts that it “helped pave the way for organized labor to support legalization” for illegal aliens. Tellingly, SEIU also claims to represent “more immigrants than any other union”. [14]
With union rolls generally declining, labor leaders see immigrants as a new source of dues — even though more immigrants mean fewer jobs and lower wages for their American members.

Business and labor elites support higher immigration levels for their own selfish reasons. That’s why they’re spending millions to force amnesty on the American people. Politicians in Washington must stand with regular, working-class Americans and say, “No!” to amnesty.

[1] http://www.politico.com/story/2014/0...rm-108633.html
[2] http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefi...-gop-lawmakers
[3] https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/blio.php (based on total donations to Democrat representatives/senators, none of whom voted against an amnesty scheme earlier this summerhttp://dailycaller.com/2014/09/19/se...-obama-amnesty/)
[4] http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-0...s-workers.html
[5] http://www.nber.org/papers/w14683.pdf
[6] http://www.gallup.com/poll/171962/de...-increase.aspx
[7] http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinio...751_story.html
[8] http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf
[9] http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf
[10] http://cis.org/Minority-Views-Immigration
[11] http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/05/politi...reform-unions/
[12] http://cis.org/Business-Union-Poll
[13] http://online.wsj.com/article/<acronym title="Google Page Ranking"><acronym title="Google Page Ranking">PR</acronym></acronym>-CO-20130501-909806.html
[14] http://www.seiu.org/a/ourunion/a-closer-look-inside.php


http://www.progressivesforimmigratio...-want-amnesty/

The Establishment Almost Had Me

We now have 1 million per year legal folks coming in that in itself in my opinion is too many for our current system to absorb. The far left wants votes business people want cheap labor and consumers of junk products from China but at some point under this plan the system will crack as more jobs exit the country and more under educated people come in the rich can not nor will they support the welfare system.
What we end up with is a third world country, rich/working poor, no middle class to support government, military or contribute anything to the system after that an internal war or other total break down of our society, we're on that road but yet no one in a leadership position seems to care.

Originally Posted by Newmexican

With union rolls generally declining, labor leaders see immigrants as a new source of dues — even though more immigrants mean fewer jobs and lower wages for their American members.

Business and labor elites support higher immigration levels for their own selfish reasons.

IMO more dues payers probably also translates into higher salaries for the union elites. In any case, some union leaders are just as likely to sell out ordinary Americans as are the Republicans big money donors.
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