Thread: Immigration debate ignores dirty little secret

Author makes some good points in this article but she's in favor of amnesty:

Immigration debate ignores dirty little secret
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 10/14/07
CYNTHIA TUCKER

During the fractious, months-long immigration debate, Big Business hid in the corridors of Congress or ducked behind closed doors, afraid to say in public what it whispered in private: We need illegal workers. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and its allies didn't want to be blasted by conservatives seeking harsh measures against undocumented immigrants.

The dirty little secret is this: Several important sectors of the economy depend heavily on low-wage workers, many of whom are in the United States illegally. And employers in those sectors, which include agriculture, hospitality and construction, don't really check carefully to learn whether their workers have proper documents. They know that if they insist on hiring only legal workers, they won't be able to get crops harvested or houses built or motel rooms cleaned.

Now, a White House crackdown on illegal immigrants has forced Big Business out into the open. Joined by the AFL-CIO and the American Civil Liberties Union, a coalition of business groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and small-business associations, went to court to stop the Bush administration from implementing an initiative designed to ferret out undocumented laborers and punish employers who use them. Last week, a federal judge issued an injunction against the crackdown, warning that it could also harm law-abiding workers and employers.

So we're right back where we started: Employers can continue to hire and exploit illegal workers, paying them poverty-level wages while ignoring health and safety regulations. And those workers still have little hope of becoming citizens.

Earlier this year, a pragmatic congressional compromise on illegal immigration dissolved in a miasma of political cowardice, jingoism and lackluster presidential leadership. A bipartisan group of senators worked for months on a plan that would increase spending on border protection; penalize employers who hire illegally; and provide a winding route to citizenship for illegal immigrants who worked hard, learned English and paid fines. But after a backlash from the right-wing fringe, some of those same senators, men such as Georgians Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson, backed away from the deal.

Perhaps the compromise legislation could have been salvaged if Big Business had been willing to mount a highly visible public campaign in support of it. If poultry processing giants and titans of agriculture had appeared in TV ads supporting immigration and gone on talk shows to confront the likes of Lou Dobbs — who has made a new career of xenophobia — the bill might have passed. It was in their interests to do so, since it would have allowed many undocumented laborers to keep their jobs.

But Big Business, playing the percentages, declined to step up. When you're making billions off of illegal immigration, what's to reform?

After the immigration bill failed, President Bush promised stronger measures to patrol the borders and punish employers who hire illegally. In August, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff announced a new initiative to send letters warning employers about any worker whose Social Security number didn't match the agency's records. The employer would have 90 days to either verify the worker's Social Security number or fire him. Employers flouting the law could face stiff fines.

But U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer of San Francisco noted that Social Security's records are full of errors and could unfairly target legal workers. He also blasted the administration for failing to conduct a survey of the costs of the new rule to small businesses.

If the records of the Social Security Administration are that badly flawed, they need to be fixed — in a hurry. Not only has poor record-keeping hampered efforts to curb illegal workers, but it will also lead, inevitably, to false accounting. Those records remain the best way to spot undocumented laborers.

And penalizing illegal employers remains the best way to curb illegal immigration. Mexicans, Guatemalans and Koreans come to this country for jobs. If they learn those jobs are no longer available, they'll stop coming.

The worst thing to do is retain the status quo: Exploiting illegal workers for wretched pay while refusing to give them a path to citizenship. That's un-American.

http://www.ajc.com:80/opinion/content/o ... _1014.html

You know, I've been wondering about this:

If all of proponents of illegals are in agreement that their employers treat them like dirt, then why continue to block attempts to punish these employers for hiring illegals in the first place?

Seriously.....if you are honestly convinced of this, and realize that, for now, there is no amnesty in sight, wouldn't you at least want to extract some kind of justice from these ruthless, abusive, opportunistic, greed driven animals and put an end to their ability hire more illegals to "abuse" while making damned sure they are punished for all of their "crimes" against the previous batch?

No. Any job in this country, as opposed to where they came from, is better than no job. If the job pays little and has no or few benefits, they can always hope to improve that by striking or other means. Of course they don't intend to work for low wages forever. That would be beneath them. Even the guys hanging out on the corner looking for day work want $20 per hour.

Originally Posted by USA_born

Even the guys hanging out on the corner looking for day work want $20 per hour.

Really? $20 an hour? But they will work for $8 an hour if they can't get more, right?

I would hate to think any self-respecting illegal alien day laborer should have to work for $6 an hour (part time). That would be demeaning and discriminatory against illegal aliens, on the basis of race or national origin. Only American citizens workers like me have to do that.