More Immigration

I continue to be skeptical about this deal. One issue is Daniel Davies' dictum that "Good ideas do not need lots of lies told about them in order to gain public acceptance". This is applicable to, say, this RNC press release lauding the bill:

No Amnesty For Illegal Immigrants: Illegal immigrants who come out of the shadows will be given probationary status. Once the border security and enforcement benchmarks are met, they must pass a background check, remain employed, maintain a clean criminal record, pay a $1,000 fine, and receive a counterfeit-proof biometric card to apply for a work visa or "Z visa." Some years later, these Z visa holders will be eligible to apply for a green card, but only after paying an additional $4,000 fine; completing accelerated English requirements; getting in line while the current backlog clears; returning to their home country to file their green card application; and demonstrating merit under the merit-based system.

Now, look, this is an amnesty. But instead of being a well-designed amnesty, it's one where, as Atrios says, we're adding useless epicycles in order to enhance the plausibility of the "don't call it an amnesty" line. Much better to do the thing properly, even if that runs the risk of being forced to call a spade a spade.

Dana Goldstein says the bill is "better than nothing" which it may well be, but that's not really a reason to support it. Insofar as the political dynamic produces a polarized choice between pro- and anti-immigration positions, the business community -- i.e. the constituency for guest worker programs -- is going to need to side with the pro-immigration view. There's no reason to accept a giant guest worker program as part of a political compromise. Things should move in the other direction. A skill-based immigration regime, which the bill apparently moves toward, is a good idea and should persuade us to get rid of the H-1B high-tech version of indentured sevitude and instead embrace the idea of letting high-skill workers immigrate legally through normal channels.

Comments

So this seems to be one of those rare initiatives that pleases no one in the real world, but will garner 80something votes in the Senate.

Odd.

Posted by Ben | May 18, 2007 12:25 PM

Much better to do the thing properly, even if that runs the risk of being forced to call a spade a spade.

I couldn't agree more. But sometimes calling a spade a spade insures the damn bill will never reach the president's desk. I've got no problem with the word "amnesty" -- but a lot of folks do. Let's not allow the perfect to become the enemy of the good.

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 12:27 PM

Ben, it's only odd because you think we live in a Democracy. It's been quite clear for a while now that Elite Theory is correct, and that something will have to be done about it if we are going to progress as a nation and as a people.

Posted by soullite | May 18, 2007 12:36 PM

There's no reason to accept a giant guest worker program as part of a political compromise.

Sure there is, Matt. That reason is the fact that we already have a "guest worker program". We just call it "illegal immigration." Some regularization of this, er, program, is likely to result in a net improvement for all concerned.

Given the choice between an illegal inflow of, say, 400,000 Latin Americans annually and a legal, regulated inflow of the same, I'd prefer that we opt for the latter. I know a lot of people will respond "but we don't have to have an inflow of any unskilled immigrants if we just enforce the laws." Sure we don't. And we also don't have to have death or taxes.

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 12:38 PM

What is the strategic benefit of doing this now?

This just hands the president a win on one of his agenda items, energizes the republican base and results in a poor solution anyway.

Why not wait and keep this off the table until after the next election?

Posted by David Helms | May 18, 2007 1:05 PM

Good to see Matt admit that it's amnesty. And, since millions and millions of people in foreign countries will see it as such, expect many of them to try to come here to take part in either *this* plan or future amnesties. (They can take part in this plan even if they aren't here now by coming here and getting fake documents showing they were here last year).

Here are a few other things Matt might consider discussing:

- How much more PoliticalPower will this give to the MexicanGovernment inside the U.S.? (tinyurl.com/8u2jm, tinyurl.com/23xg52, tinyurl.com/yo2j95, tinyurl.com/yns9zd, tinyurl.com/ysnpd2; dozens more could be provided). How will that government use that power? Was Hiker Matt even aware of this issue?

- How much more PoliticalPower will this give to far-left racial power groups like LaRaza ("The Race")? How will they use that power? What will they push for, and will it serve the national interest?

- Just how sloppy will the "background checks" be, and how many terrorists will be amnestied?

Posted by Why it will fail | May 18, 2007 1:05 PM

Matt:

"A skill-based immigration regime, which the bill apparently moves toward, is a good idea..."

Sen. Kennedy has already explicitly said that under this bill the majority of future immigrants will be from family reunification, not skill-based.

Jasper:

"I know a lot of people will respond "but we don't have to have an inflow of any unskilled immigrants if we just enforce the laws." Sure we don't. And we also don't have to have death or taxes."

That's a straw man argument. The question isn't whether we can reduce illegal immigration to zero by enforcing laws; we can certainly dramatically reduce it by requiring a biometric ID card for legal employment, and building a fence on the border with Mexico. The cost of doing that would be a lot cheaper than the social costs of importing millions more poor, uneducated people into this country.

The other problem that you miss is that a compromise bill with a guest worker program doesn't mean there would be no illegal immigrants in the future -- it's likely that there will still be illegals in addition to this, if the border isn't secured.

Posted by Fred | May 18, 2007 1:08 PM

Right off the top, it's going to cost the illegals a thousand dollars. That's really going to encourage them to come forward.

This program is a sop. The Democrats, typically, just want to do a deal, and any deal will do, even one that cannot perform as advertised.

There are no incentives for illegal immigrants already in the US to participate, and nothing to discourage new arrivals. I hope no one here really thinks employer sanctions are really going to happen. And in any case, a high percentage of the men here illegally are clearly willing to accept working as day labor. They can't afford a thousand dollars and I doubt that they'll see any point to the program anyway. Ain't like we're going to kick them out. As for tech workers, or others in the job catagories that we used to consider good jobs that Americans wanted, you are in the process of being outsourced. You will regret your support for this program as you watch wage arbitrage destroy your standard of living.

This program will fail, like the one before it. Too many people think we're picking on the illegals. And forget that they are, well, illegal aliens.

This is from a yellowdog democrat in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Posted by zak822 | May 18, 2007 1:09 PM

I am a liberal and I'm opposed to any guest-worker program or path to citizenship for illegals.

Stiff employer sanctions, a fence, and attrition are the only solutions. This plan is a repeat of 1986, which was a huge mistake.

Both legal and illegal immigration are being used by big business to drive down the wages of Americans.

See this video:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4094926727128068265

The worst thing ever to happen to the American worker is the marriage of big business and multiculturalism.

Last year, Wal-Mart gave more money to La Raza than to any other organization. I think this says it all.

As any historian knows, a tight labor market is good for wages and innovation. Both legal and illegal immigration are nothing but tools to drive down American wages.

Posted by DavidP | May 18, 2007 1:10 PM

Ben, it's only odd because you think we live in a Democracy. It's been quite clear for a while now that Elite Theory is correct, and that something will have to be done about it if we are going to progress as a nation and as a people.

Gimme a break. This is the cop-out that's always dusted off whenever one's own policy preferences fail to get enacted by the government.

My own personal wish list includes much stronger gun control and universal healthcare. But I harbor no illusions it's "the elite" who keep my policy preferences from becoming law. It's because they're not popular that my ideas remain on the drawing board.

Anyway, if the "elite" really got their way with respect to immigration, surely we'd go back to our circa 1899 practice of open borders -- literally any non TB-infected person who could afford the plane fare could immigrate to Peoria. But we all know such a policy change is not even remotely politically possible, despite the prefernces of elites like the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal and the folks at Cato.

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 1:10 PM

My current thinking is something like this:

* You almost have to do this under Bush; a Democratic President+Congress will be flayed. A Republican President probably won't do it. Perhaps McCain or Giuliani, but still unlikely. So it's now, or probably not until 2017 at the earliest.
* There's a short-term political hit to passing something like the McCain/Specter/Reid-Kennedy that gets most of the Democratic votes and a few Republicans. It's Pete Wilson on a national scale. There's value in getting 25-30 GOP Senate votes.
* In twenty years, if this bill doesn't work, you're just going to have a third round of amnesty (indeed, about a third of the Senate has now been there for both go-rounds).

I'm still thinking about it. So far, not a big fan. It could turn into something swallowable.

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | May 18, 2007 1:14 PM

I'm trying to figure out exactly who is supporting this bill now. It seems to be getting pounded everywhere I look.

Though it's kind of fun to see a bill that manages to get Hugh Hewitt, Mickey Kaus, and Matt Yglesias all against it at once.

Posted by AlanC9 | May 18, 2007 1:15 PM

"This just hands the president a win on one of his agenda items, energizes the republican base and results in a poor solution anyway."

In what way would this bill 'energize the republican base' except negatively against Bush? To me that is the main advantage, if Bush signs this his support among the Tancredo folks might crater, and I suspect there is substantial overlap between the nativists/racists/totalitarians because there always is. This bill is poorly designed and whatever the fantasies of the RNC will be seen as amnesty.

Bush may think he can just piss in the faces of his remaining base support, me I am watching for meltdown.

Posted by Bruce Webb | May 18, 2007 1:23 PM

If I'm a resident illegal, I'm sorry--I'm not buying (or paying $5,000-plus for some hope down the line of attaining legality) unless I see something very nearly like a police state instituted in the temporary/seasonal/under-the-table labor market.

If ever there were a policy issue that admits of no legal solution, immigration seems to be it.

Maybe we should think of it as osmosis: Unless and until we can improve the lives and economic fates of those populations most able to reach our shores, illegals will always be with us. Why, once this grandiose scheme is instituted, should there not arise a still more desperate new-and-improved super-latecomer illegal class within our borders? It's like an Escher optical illusion of infinite regression....

Posted by elle loco | May 18, 2007 1:25 PM

The question isn't whether we can reduce illegal immigration to zero by enforcing laws; we can certainly dramatically reduce it by requiring a biometric ID card for legal employment, and building a fence on the border with Mexico.

Fred: I'm not saying that anybody is arguing we can reduce illegal immigration to zero by enforcement measures. I'm arguing we cannot reduce it substantively by enforcement measures, especially if political realities are taken into consideration. My approach, and the (admitedly far from perfect) approach being taken by the poobahs in D.C. -- has the supreme advantage of being politically feasible. We wouldn't be debating the proposal were this not the case.

What you advocate --Buck Rogers ID cards coupled with an Iron Curtain -- is laughably unlikely to ever materialialize into law, and were it do so, would hardly guarantee a sharp reduction in illegal immigration. For that you need big increases in troops. It is men with guns -- not fences -- that are ultimately necessary to stop migrants from reaching the US if no legal means is provided. So I would furthermore argue that obtaining a sharp reduction in illegal immigration via an enforcement only approach wouldn't withstand cost-benefit analysis. What would such an approach cost us? Many billions. What would we gain? Maybe a 2% increase in the median wages of the bottom quintile. Hardly seems worth it to me.

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 1:32 PM

I don't get why people think there's any chance this bill will get better as things get moving. In my lifetime, I have never seen a bill get better as it becomes more removed from the sunlight.

Sure, I could strike oil, gold, and uranium all in the same day by digging in my back yard with a sandcastle making kit. However, the odds of such a thing happening are so abysmal that it may as well be impossible.

Posted by soullite | May 18, 2007 1:53 PM

I tepidly support the bill as an improvement over the current mess, but something that will have to be tweaked over the years. But for humanitarian and pratical reasons it is as start.

I have read three articles in the last three days of business sectors complaining of tight labor markets and the difficulty of filling jobs at the (low) wages these sectors now want to pay their workers: Airlines, hotel/restaurant (hospitality), and utility linesman. As Dean Baker points out, if these firms would respond as dictated in classic econmics they would raise wages and restore benefits. But this they don't want to do. So instead they are desperate to increase the labor supply. But a tight no immigrant policy is not in the cards. A National ID card remains an anathema on the left and the right, businesses will not get slapped with civil fines based on strict liability for hiring illegals, and we all enjoy the lower bids our general contractors give us on our home improvement projects because of all the Spainish speaking guys they hire.

There are efforts to obfuscate this obvious fact that increasing the the supply of unskill and semi-skill labor depresses wages, both directly and indirectly, but if works with all other commodities, it works for labor.

Nevertheless, putting more of this labor in the legal market will make it easier for unions to organize these workers and (when a real Government exists again) to enforce minimum wage, health, safety standards.

Also based on my experience, medium and long-term, immigrants add to the commonwealth of the country (not just material gains, but psychic and cultural gains).

Adding more high skilled immigrants, but not as indentured to particular company may, as Dean Baker points out, lower the costs for health care, law, and other for the moment protected professions.

Finally, everyone wants a panacea to this issue, but there is not one as long as the U.S. is relatively 10 times more prosperous then our southern neighbors with expanding populations.

Finally, please give me a break on the "Mexican terrorist" threat.

Posted by Rick Kane | May 18, 2007 1:58 PM

As I say above, I'm a liberal but I'm against any path to citizenship for illegals. I also think we should reduce all legal immigration to less than 10,000 per year.

Legal and illegal immigration are nothing but tools of big business to drive down American wages. Last year, WalMart gave more money to La Raza than to any other organization.

The vast majority of my friends in high tech have been fired, replaced by cheap H1B imports from India. My friends in the traditional labors (construction, electric, etc.) are now making about $12 less an hour than they were 15 years ago - and that's even if they can find jobs.

It's insane. You don't need to do an economic analysis to see that the lower and middle classes are being completely screwed over by immigration. You only have to know average Americans.

This is nothing but a cheap labor invasion brought to you by big business. Sickening.

Posted by DavidP | May 18, 2007 2:04 PM

And, since millions and millions of people in foreign countries will see it as such, expect many of them to try to come here to take part in either *this* plan or future amnesties.

Who are the people who won't come here illegally now, but will come here illegally "in hope of future amnesty" if we pass this bill? I find it difficult to believe that such people exist, even at the margins.

When people come here, they're looking for jobs, they're looking for American health care and education, they're looking for a shot at a better life for their kids. These, and not the thought that 10 years down the road Congress might decide to grant another amnesty, are the motivating factors.

Posted by Steve | May 18, 2007 2:12 PM

Re elle loco's comment "Finally, everyone wants a panacea to this issue, but there is not one as long as the U.S. is relatively 10 times more prosperous then our southern neighbors with expanding populations "
-------
Sure there is. Put up a fence at the border, another fence half a mile inland and then add a microwave alarm system (like the one around the National Security Agency at Fort Meade.) Next, station 10 or so Apache helicopters with orders to strafe anything that moves.

A $600 BILLION /year defense budget should at least give us that much.

This "we can't keep them out" line from the Democratic leadership is a deliberate lie.

Posted by Don Williams | May 18, 2007 2:16 PM

"This just hands the president a win on one of his agenda items, energizes the republican base and results in a poor solution anyway."

You know, I agree with this. Why rush to judgement on something that people are still divided on and haven't had an opportunity to really consider fully. I'm willing to bet this includes people in Congress not just a lot of ordinary citizens.

Clearly this whole issue is part and parcel of a lot of current labor issues. I think the rush is to prevent us from connecting them.

Really, any immigrants from south of the border, illegal or "guest workers" or through some legalized process, are working here alongside "native" workers and they share some common condition. Businesses want to just run over all of them and evade whatever wage and labor protections exist for everyone.

The Republican Party, meanwhile, whips up native workers who are at risk by the policies promoted by their own business supporters. If labor conditions are going to make any progress at all, at some point this double dealing needs to be exposed to the light of day.

Let the two halves of this labor issue go at it against each other, and then we'll decide where the illegal workers belong in this picture.

This is a labor bill. From a labor perspective, it's lose-lose. And people who just don't like Latinos in their neighborhood and school system, etc aren't going to see any kind of resolution come out of this, either.

Posted by JT Faraday | May 18, 2007 2:19 PM

Nicholas-
Your comment didn't end up going where I though it would, and I'm curious why. In particular, why would we have to wait twenty years to make changes, instead of passing this now, and then working towards a Democratic President with a Democratic Congress making a few minor revisions: make the number of people admitted for the guest-worker program gradually decline to zero (and if necessary have the actual quota gradually rising to compensate); get rid of the bizarre "you must jump over this imaginary line before we let you come back" rule; and perhaps change the amount of the fine paid if it's found to be too difficult to meet (or I guess too easy, though that seems unlikely).

Bruce-
If you think the bill is bad for Americans and insufficiently good for immigrants to make up for that, it's morally callous to support it because it will hurt Republicans. If you think the hurting Republicans is just a plus, go right ahead.

Posted by washerdreyer | May 18, 2007 2:24 PM

Why, once this grandiose scheme is instituted, should there not arise a still more desperate new-and-improved super-latecomer illegal class within our borders?

elle loco: Presumably because these "still more desparate" would-be illegals would rather have the advantages of legal status -- via the guest worker program -- than the not-so-wonderful life of an illegal immigrant (especially when stepped up enforcement is making this choice more difficult). I mean, wouldn't you prefer to have the ability to visit family in your home country regularly, and not constantly live in fear of arrest? Indeed, if you had the option, wouldn't you prefer to eschew the sometimes lethal services of a coyote in favor of American Airlines?

My worry is that the guest worker proposal is insufficiently attractive to would-be illegals to get them to forgo trying to make it illegally. Rather than two year permits renewable after a year out of country (with no right to apply for a green card) I'd prefer something along the lines of, say, four year permits renewable with ninety day waits out of country and the ability to apply for a green card (after, say, three successful renewals with no criminal record and a strong employment and tax-paying record).

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 2:30 PM

Jasper;

You could put armed and armored border patrol shoulder-to-shoulder the entire length of the border and it will do no good as long as employers are allowed to hire illegals without significant penalty.

That's where any meaningful immigration reform legislation must put the pressure. Fine heavily and imprison employers (including the officers of corporations) who hire illegal aliens. Impose the corporate death penalty on repeat offenders.

Does this compromise bill do anything like this? If so, I haven't found it.

Until legislation attacks that end of the problem, everything else is, at best, a waste of time and effort; more likely, like Reagan's amnesty, it will just make things worse for the American worker.

Posted by Tom Betz | May 18, 2007 2:30 PM

Steve inquires: "Who are the people who won't come here illegally now, but will come here illegally "in hope of future amnesty" if we pass this bill?"

86% of Mexico's workforce still lives *in Mexico* (not here), so there are plenty more people their government could send us. Plus, there are half a billion people in Latin America, so there's a large pool to choose from.

Plus, Mexico might switch from simply profiting from sending us their citizens, to acting as a TransshipmentPoint for citizens from other countries, such as the ones in Asia with the hundreds of millions of likely crossers.

Right after Bush promoted an amnesty in 2004 (IIRC), the BP started surveying illegal aliens why they crossed, and a majority referenced Bush's plan. The survey was soon stopped by DC.

Posted by Why it will fail | May 18, 2007 2:42 PM

Its good to see that MY is finally coming around on his position on H-1B business visas, at least.

Posted by mpowell | May 18, 2007 2:46 PM

Heh, It always comes down to who to side with. One one hand, a bunch of racist people favor the same thing I do, but they do so because they don't want to have to live with brown people.

On the other hand, there are people who pretend to be noble, looking out for the interests of another countries impoverished. But in reality, they just know that they can benefit from cheap labor and services without ever facing competition

In the end, coalitions are always made by people who can't stand each other, except on that one issue they both agree with. So I'll prefer to go with what I know to be right, rather than not doing so because I don't like some of the company I'll have to keep. Classism is no better than racism. It's still using your birth to designate yourself as better than other people.

Posted by soullite | May 18, 2007 3:11 PM

David P -- As any historian knows, a tight labor market is good for wages and innovation. Both legal and illegal immigration are nothing but tools to drive down American wages.

This is a fairly silly statement. I'll give you "good for wages." But innovation? Can you think of any innovations that occurred during the great wave of immigration from 1880-1920? Are you aware of how many legal immigrants work in biomedical research labs?

Immigration is good for overall economic growth. It's bad for wages. It shouldn't be a surprise that we've seen those exact trends over the past quarter century. Finding a balance between these objectives is a little more difficult than Lou Dobbs-style sloganeering would indicate.

I still believe the only way to truly cut down on illegal immigration would be ruthlessly enforced laws that inflict major penalties on businesses that hire illegals. Like any issue of smuggling, where there's a demand, someone will find a way to supply it. If you make it less expensive for businesses to hire Americans at higher wages than to break the rules, their behavior will improve. The fact that we seem to take enforcement less seriously than underage alcohol sales speaks volumes.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | May 18, 2007 3:29 PM

I have an acquaintance who's a refugee from one of the former Soviet republics in Central Asia, so I've paid particular attention to the "path to citizenship" bit. It stinks. It really stinks. I can see imposing a fee/fine for dodging the CIS (formerly knows as INS). But the "Z" visa requirement that heads of households need to return to their country of origin for some kind of "security" song and dance is pure bureaucratic chickenshit. My guess is that this alone will keep many immigrants -- all those from further than Central America -- out in the cold.

The "guest worker" thing conjures up images of the plight of the Turks in Germany -- exactly the kind of dead-end situation that America, to her great credit, has managed to avoid.

I don't see why Dems need to sign off on such a shit bill, just to give the Boy King a transient feeling of accomplishment.

Posted by sglover | May 18, 2007 4:25 PM

LaFollette Progressive: with less cheap labor available, employers will be forced to do one of several things, with one option being to invent machinery. That what I assume he meant by innovation. As it is now, employers don't have to innovate, they can just import more cheap labor. And, the government helps them, by neglecting things like programs to develop new farm machinery.

Posted by John Edwards is going to help oppose amnesty | May 18, 2007 4:39 PM

You can't be both pro-immigration and pro-labor. It's that simple. For American workers to have a decent standard of living, they need to be able to control the labor supply and ensure a tight labor market. That isn't happening, so American median wages have gone down.

My sympathies are primarily with my countrymen. Immigrants are scab labor, tools used by big business to deprive us of our earning power.

Posted by Josh G. | May 18, 2007 5:01 PM

You can't be both pro-immigration and pro-labor.

Which one is the SEIU?

Posted by washerdreyer | May 18, 2007 5:04 PM

Having been taken over by the Mexicans, they are pro-immigration at the expense of legal workers.

Posted by Josh G. | May 18, 2007 5:24 PM

Incidentally, this has come up before. In order to keep labor supply tight and increase wages for his legal agricultural workers, Cesar Chavez had to organize campaigns to kick illegal workers out. He made the same point before a congressional committee, that illegals are used by companies as scab labor to hold American wages down.

Posted by Josh G. | May 18, 2007 5:26 PM

You can't be both pro-immigration and pro-labor. It's that simple. For American workers to have a decent standard of living, they need to be able to control the labor supply and ensure a tight labor market. That isn't happening, so American median wages have gone down.

My sympathies are primarily with my countrymen. Immigrants are scab labor, tools used by big business to deprive us of our earning power.

How "progressive". And you guys wonder why us free marketers think that organized labor is just another self-interested entity rather than the savior of the poor...

Posted by MattXIV | May 18, 2007 5:33 PM

Why not wait and keep this off the table until after the next election?

Because you can't do immigration reform in an election year, and if the Dems take the White House, the GOP will go all out with the xenophobia. Like it or not, there's a tiny window to do something before electoral politics renders everything moot.

(Why? Because too many candidates run on stupid, ignorant anti-immigrant platforms to appeal to stupid, ignorant people.)

Anyway, I see that Wackjob the blogwhore is here. Hey, Kelly: was your great-grandpappy called a bogtrotter back in the day? And why is it that fourth-gen Irish and Italians are the biggest ladder-pulling xenophobes?

I still believe the only way to truly cut down on illegal immigration would be ruthlessly enforced laws that inflict major penalties on businesses that hire illegals.

Sure. Now get people to sign up for more expensive food. Show your commitment to paying the appropriate retail price for something that begins with minimum-wage labor with decent benefits in a field or a slaughterhouse somewhere in the US. 'Punish the employers' also means 'stop supporting them from the retail side'. It's a two -way street.

On skill-based visas: it all comes down to appropriate certification. There's always the problem of evaluating excellence in rapidly-developing industries: headhunting a self-taught web development expert from Europe with ten years of experience but no CS degree is different from hiring a vanilla DBA from Bangalore, and the skill metric has to be able to discriminate. And of course, there's always the issue of the state and national cartels of board-certified professions.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | May 18, 2007 6:05 PM

All you restrictionists are going to lose, I really hope that causes you pain in your turbulent, stinking guts. This bill will pass, and then in a few years, pro-immigration advocates will improve it again. You can't fence in America, assholes. And the Dems will prevail for decades, people will remember which party fought grandma's deportation, if the Dems don't listen to xenophobe demagogues (including those posing as labor advocates).

Immigration is bad for the economy, unions and workers, eh? So explain the fact that New York City has (and has always had) the best economy, the highest wages, the strongest unions and the highest rate of immigration?

Immigration is good for America, we need many more immigrants, don't be fooled by cryptoracists.

Posted by WelcometotheFuture | May 18, 2007 6:07 PM

welcometothe future said "Immigration is bad for the economy, unions and workers, eh?"

Setting up straw men like this is cheap. Please stop conflating legal and illegal immigration. They are different issues.

No one is saying stop bringing in legal immigrants. A lot of people are saying do something about illegal immigration. You're just trying to confuse the issue.

signed, a lifelong democrat

Posted by zak822 | May 18, 2007 6:24 PM

In my lifetime, I have never seen a bill get better as it becomes more removed from the sunlight.

Didn't the Tax Reform Act of 1986 get better as time went on?

Posted by Nicholas Beaudrot | May 18, 2007 6:27 PM

You can't be both pro-immigration and pro-labor. It's that simple.

Again, this is just simply a stupid statement. Highly educated legal immigrants do not hurt labor. A great many people work for businesses started by immigrants. Blanket opposition to all immigration is not useful to labor or anyone else in America.

A large influx of unskilled illegal immigrants depresses wages, which hurts labor. A permanent guest worker program will hurt labor. These are real problems that need to be solved. But a knee-jerk anti-immigration stance is not in the best interests of labor.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | May 18, 2007 6:36 PM

1) With pro-immigration advocates like WelcometotheFuture, I wonder why we condemm spies like Alrich Ames, Robert Hansen, and the Rosenbergs.

After all, they are just following the examples of traitors in our political class. If you are going to allow free flow of labor, why object if soldiers, intelligence agents,etc go to work for foreign countries if they get a better deal. How is that different from what Hillary's rich supporters do?

2) Hillary and other Democratic Senators voted to take tens of thousands of our National Guardmen out of their civilian careers and send them to Irag for no good reason.

Many of those Guardmens have been killed and many more crippled --some for life. Now Hillary and the Democrats are saying that when those Guardmen and Reservists return home, they can compete for low wages and poverty-level jobs with 12 million illegal foreigners -- on top of the millions more foreigners here legally.

3) Why do we worry so much about Al Qaeda terrorists ? The people who really destroying America are our own politicans.

Posted by Don Williams | May 18, 2007 6:38 PM

"No one is saying stop bringing in legal immigrants. A lot of people are saying do something about illegal immigration. You're just trying to confuse the issue."

No, Zak. Quite a lot of people are saying stop bringing in legal immigrants, some are even talking about flouting the plain language of the 14th Amendment and denaturalizing natural born US citizens if their parents weren't in lawful immigration status. And you are part of the lots that want to "do something" about illegal immigration. What exactly? Attrition? We've been doing that for 10 years and it has been about as effective as the drug war. Roundups? You nativists have always been around in this country. Freedom always wins, and nativists always lose.

Posted by WelcometotheFuture | May 18, 2007 6:55 PM

Matthew was evidently wrong about the H1B visa aspect of this law:
-------------
"The deal will also raise the number of H-1B visas, used by American universities and companies to find skilled workers like scientists, medical experts and computer programmers, from 65,000 a year to 115,000 a year.

In years of especially high demand, that figure will rise to 180,000 a year. "

Posted by Don Williams | May 18, 2007 7:24 PM

This is doubly funny, because I worked on a CDROM called WelcometotheFuture, and also because I'm trying to figure out whether he's really to a certain extent part of the "Klan with a Tan", or whether he's just acting like it.

As for the "plain language of the 14th Amendment", that's a common misconception: tinyurl.com/ssqxm The original author of that clause didn't intend it to apply to "foreigners", and the only reason there's birthright citizenship is because of the way it's been interpreted.

As for attrition, we haven't been doing it for ten years. In fact, enforcement under Bush is even worse than it was under Clinton.

Posted by John Edwards is going to help oppose amnesty | May 18, 2007 7:48 PM

Don Williams, 2/3 of illegals here now are estimated to have come on temporary visas of one sort or another. You could spend a zillion bucks to create a Martian Death Cloud from Brownsville to San Diego and it wouldn't solve your problem.

And I still say we'll cap the illegal migrant well about the time we dry up our marijuana arrests (currently running around 600,000-700,000 per year). This is all just another variant of our proliferating political and cultural psychoses. People yearn to be free, and they yearn to give their families a better life. And so many would equate that with, say, manslaughter or grand theft auto. F**kin idiots.

Posted by elle loco | May 18, 2007 8:11 PM

And while the nativists may lose in the long term, tehy often win in the short terms. We've slammed the door from time to time.

It's a good thing the Republicans are so confused on the issue. They could put together a pretty motivated bloc of anti-immigration voters if the business lobby would let them.

Posted by AlanC9 | May 18, 2007 8:12 PM

Now Hillary and the Democrats are saying that when those Guardmen and Reservists return home, they can compete for low wages and poverty-level jobs with 12 million illegal foreigners -- on top of the millions more foreigners here legally.

I seriously doubt very many "Guardsmen and Reservists" are competing for "poverty level jobs" as the majority of them have at least a high school diploma, many of them have at least some college, and nearly all of them are fluent in English. Such credentials are hardly automatic tickets to the good life, but in an economy with full employment, they should at least enable someone with a bit of ambition and a good work ethic to earn an income well above the poverty level. Even if such people really were doomed to compete for "poverty level jobs," I don't see how this proposal exacerbates the situation, because those "12 million illegal foreigners" are in the work force now, under the status quo. At least with an amnesty process in place, the accursed illegals would be able to do things like access educational opportunities and join unions -- actions, in other words, that should tend to pressure wages upwards.

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 8:35 PM

I am a liberal and I'm opposed to any guest-worker program or path to citizenship for illegals.

Stiff employer sanctions, a fence, and attrition are the only solutions. This plan is a repeat of 1986, which was a huge mistake.

Both legal and illegal immigration are being used by big business to drive down the wages of Americans.
See this video:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4094926727128068265

The worst thing ever to happen to the American worker is the marriage of big business and multiculturalism.

Last year, Wal-Mart gave more money to La Raza than to any other organization. I think this says it all.

As any historian knows, a tight labor market is good for wages and innovation. Both legal and illegal immigration are nothing but tools to drive down American wages.

Posted by David | May 18, 2007 8:51 PM

I normally agree with Matt, but I think we have a differing definition of "Amnesty". For me, "Amnesty" means that a law-breaker is spared punishment. Clearly that's not the case here - the illegals will be paying very hefty fines.

When I pay a speeding fine I don't consider it "Amnesty". What's up Matt?

Posted by LaurenceB | May 18, 2007 9:45 PM

Jasper makes at least tiny little errors.

First, some employers prefer illegal aliens for a reason. If those newly-legalized workers cause problems, they will work to bring in workers more to their liking, legal or illegal.

Another tiny little error: the price tag for this whole thing could be as much as $2.5 trillion dollars. (tinyurl.com/2zx88o)

$2.5 trillion dollars.

Posted by We're going to use John Edwards to oppose amnesty | May 18, 2007 9:47 PM

First, some employers prefer illegal aliens for a reason. If those newly-legalized workers cause problems, they will work to bring in workers more to their liking, legal or illegal.

So? Who is arguing otherwise? I'm not aware of any plan that promises to eliminate illegal immigration. I'd be content merely to substantially reduce it.

Another tiny little error: the price tag for this whole thing could be as much as $2.5 trillion dollars. (tinyurl.com/2zx88o)

Right. Just like Rector's estimates last year that the country was about to receive 193 million immigrants. His numbers were promptly and soundly demolished by the demographics experts. He's a hack. Or he's just inept. I'm not sure which.

Posted by Jasper | May 18, 2007 11:11 PM

Jasper: Such credentials are hardly automatic tickets to the good life, but in an economy with full employment, they should at least enable someone with a bit of ambition and a good work ethic to earn an income well above the poverty level.

First of all, we do not have full employment, regardless of what the cooked BLS numbers say. If we had full employment, wages wouldn't have stagnated and even fallen over the last six years. This is the usual Bushite spin - "the numbers say the economy is doing well, so you have nothing to complain about." Well, it doesn't matter what the numbers say. You can say anything with numbers. What matters is how people feel.

Posted by Josh G. | May 19, 2007 12:11 AM

As for the "plain language of the 14th Amendment", that's a common misconception:

Yeah, right: Wong Kim Ark in your motherfucking face. The ruling is really that not difficult to read, unless you're squinting hard to avoid what's on the page. Amend the fucking constitution if you're that desperate. Because no court's shown any sign of going near Wong Kim Ark with a ten-foot pole.

If those newly-legalized workers cause problems, they will work to bring in workers more to their liking, legal or illegal.

Ah, the 'imminent Mexican insurgency' theory, yet again. You just can't wait for the opportunity to start shooting brown folks, like the Know-Nothings of old against the Kellys of their day.

Which reminds me again: why are you so loathe to acknowledge your immigrant forefathers, Wackjob? Or so eager to hide your blogwhoring links?

Stiff employer sanctions, a fence, and attrition are the only solutions.

Your knowledge of geography on the southern border appears to be lacking.

And I'll say it again: are American consumers prepared to enforce legal, fair employment with their wallets? Because employers don't work in a vacuum.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | May 19, 2007 12:25 AM

I think a main stumbling block in this debate is that we hopelessly confuse what to do about the illegals who have been here in the U.S. for some time now, working, raising families, etc., and a more general immigration policy beyond this specific and important issue. I agree with LaFollette Progressive that our general immigration policy has to be nuanced. We need to find a way to go about restricting illegal immigration, seriously and severely punish employers who hire illegal immigrants, etc., without engaging in the totalistic Tancredo style anti-immigrant rhetoric that you hear so much of on the right.

Yet, I am in favor of "Amnesty" for those illegals who are well-established here, for the simple reason that it would be intrinsically inhumane to kick them out. Do we really want to break up families, punish children, etc? That just goes against basic Western, democratic values. But once we've integrated those that are here, we should then be willing to crack down hard on employers who hire *new* illegal immigrants. As Thom Hartmann often says, we have an illegal employer problem, not an illegal immigrant problem.

The guest worker 'solution' is a bad idea all around. The problem with guest workers is that it's too much of a floating status. Paul Krugman did the best deconstruction of the problems inherent in the guest worker idea in one of his columns. This just works to the benefit of the big corporations, and it also leaves the workers themselves in an extra-legal limbo as it punishes citizens and residents of this country by driving down wages, etc., etc., you know the argument... (triple-negative-whammy)

Posted by Warren | May 19, 2007 12:48 AM

pseudonymous in nc said: "Are American consumers prepared to enforce legal, fair employment with their wallets? Because employers don't work in a vacuum."

I find that this argument--repeated often by both Republican and Democratic corporatists--has a simultaneously petulant and arrogant hue to it. To answer the question: Yes, I actually think a lot of Americans would be willing to pay more if it were American citizens picking the fruit and harvesting the spinach. I would.

Posted by Warren | May 19, 2007 1:03 AM

Re: The vast majority of my friends in high tech have been fired, replaced by cheap H1B imports from India.

Does this really happen (assuming your friends were not fired for screwing up or otherwise deserving it)? It's been my observation that the process is much more subtle and gradual: core staff is never "fired". But: when there's need for extra workers in the IT department, H1B visa-holders are hired on a contract basis (they are employees of contacting firms, hence validating their status) and then, when permanent positions open up due to core staff retirement, promotion or moving on to other jobs, these immigrant contractors are then hired on permanently.

Re: they're looking for American health care

The US does not have universal healthcare and most low-wage jobs do not have health insurance, Why would anyone in his right mind come here for that?

Re: Plus, Mexico might switch from simply profiting from sending us their citizens, to acting as a TransshipmentPoint for citizens from other countries

How would Mexico benefit from doing that? And in fact Mexico is quite xenophobic, treating even other Latin (illegal) immigrants harshly. I don't see Mexico throwing open its birders any time soon.

Re: But innovation? Can you think of any innovations that occurred during the great wave of immigration from 1880-1920?

You are confusing invention with innovation. In point of fact in the era of which you speak the benefits of the great inventions of the era tended to be limited to the upper classes. It took FDR's depression era programs to finally get electricity to rural America. And as late as 1945 a majority of Americans did not have telephones, and a non-trivial percentage of the population did not have indoor plumbing. Inventions happen randomly (relative to economic factors). Whether those inventions are widely utilized depends very crucially on economic and demograpohic factors. The ancient Greeks invented the steam engine-- did they do anything major with it? Why does Japan (with virtally no immigration) lead the world in robotics? Why did our South lag so long in mechanization (hint: slavery?)

Re: Quite a lot of people are saying stop bringing in legal immigrants, some are even talking about flouting the plain language of the 14th Amendment and denaturalizing natural born US citizens if their parents weren't in lawful immigration status.

The 14th Amendment contains a large loophole. See: "Subject to the laws thereof". This language allowed Native American children and diplomats' children (both technically subject to the jurisdiction of their own tribes/nations) to be excluded from birth citizenship. Native Americans were given citizenship by act of Congress in 1924. Diplomats' children are still excluded. (On the other hand extending this to illegal aliens would also mean we could not try these people in our courts when they committed crimes here; the most we could do is expel them, as we do with diplomats. I doubt the xenophobic, law-n-order right would buy into that consequence!)

Re: If we had full employment, wages wouldn't have stagnated and even fallen over the last six years.

Wages have been rising since 2004/05. But they will almost certainly stall as the economy as a whole stalls.

Posted by JonF | May 19, 2007 2:38 AM

The one glaring thing of this debate is how many in the blogosphere truly have no clue how the badly off the poor and middle class are in this country.

Jasper pretends an high school diploma DOESN'T mean competing with low-skilled labor. Most people in the low skill labor pool ARE highschool graduates. So yes, unless those gaurdsmen have an extremely useful MOS, they will be working for 6.50 an hour when they get back. To think otherwise is to be willfully blind to economic reality. You're also a fool if you think we have full employment. We reach the number usually associated with full employment by ignoring structural unemployment, and counting military personal which are not usually counted in such numbers. I'm sure you think we really have low inflation too, because our numbers don't count service, education, or food costs.

The problem here isn't one of too few workers. We have plenty of workers who will work. Our problem is that our wages are too low to attract those workers. So rather than obey real economic rules, and raising wages, employers are attempting to artificially increase the labor poor. These companies are making record profits, they just don't want to do what they always promise to do with profits, and that's raise wages.

Posted by Soullite | May 19, 2007 8:39 AM

Re the comment "The US does not have universal healthcare and most low-wage jobs do not have health insurance, Why would anyone in his right mind come here for that?"
----------
Because Hospital emergency rooms are required by law to treat anyone who shows up, regardless of whether they can pay.

Posted by Don Williams | May 19, 2007 9:20 AM

Re the employment problems of returning Iraqi veterans, just look at the Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh. McVeigh was a COMBAT veteran of the first Gulf War and earned the Bronze Star -- which is rarely awarded.

Yet when he came home, he ended up working as a low paid security guard.

Secretary of Defense aka "compassionate conservative" Dick Cheney threw 80,000 Army veterans out on the streets in 1991 and the discharges continued throughout the decade. Including the DC sniper who slaughtered
so many victims in Washington DC a few years ago.

The news media, of course, averted its eyes and covered up the vicious betrayal that created McVeigh and John Mohammand. After all, why should our urban news media elite care?? --they have about as much military service as Dick Cheney.

The odd thing is not that McVeigh and John Mohammand went amok. The odd thing is that we did not have thousands more like them.

Army or Marine service as an enlisted man, by and large, has little value in the US commerical marketplace. It essentially is the same as taking a few years off to loaf on a beach somewhere. And if enlisted men were that well set up for civilian careers, they probably wouldn't be in the military in the first place.

Posted by Don Williams | May 19, 2007 9:32 AM

Re: The one glaring thing of this debate is how many in the blogosphere truly have no clue how the badly off the poor and middle class are in this country.

Um, most of us who are posting here, or on similar websites, are middle class ourselves. I do agree however that few of us understand what it's like to be poor in America.

Re: You're also a fool if you think we have full employment.

That's pretty harsh, and I'm going to call bullshit on it, even though it was not adressed to me. But this tendency (here and on other liberal/left websites) has been bothering me for a long time. Matt Yglesias used to bill his blog as The Reality Based Community. That means we should not be denying facts that are inconvenient to our politics and desires (there seems to be a grotesque and rather sick desire to wnat a bad economy to punish George Bush-- as if he would personally suffer from anything short of the collapse of civilization). The right is notorious for this sort of behavior-- invisible WMDs, phantom pacts between Saddam and bin Laden, dinosaurs and humans partying together in a 6000 year old Earth. Please, let's avoid that sort of thing!
That said, there are some observations about employment and unemployment that I will make.
1. The official stats do indeed miss some things: underemployment, discouraged workers (but note: NOT people who have run our of benefits!) and, on the other side of the coin, people working under the table in the underground economy. However this systemic error has always been present and I see no reason it would be any worse today than in years past. Today's 4.5% unemployment means what a similar number would have meant ten or twenty years ago. The uncertainity cancels out in comparisons over time.
2. Re: military personnel: why in the world should they be counted as unemployed?!? They are doing a job and getting paid (Yes I know there's more to it than that). If you donl' want to count them, then honest recokoning should also compel us to exclude them from the total population figures as well so as not to bias the count in the opposite direction either.
3. The most unusual thing about today's economy is its non-uniform nature aross the country. My county (Broward, FL) had an unemployment rate of 2.9% last year (it just ticked up to 3.1% due to the loss of construction jobs in the real estate bust). But go up to Michigan and you will find unemployment at %7 or above in some areas. In some ways the Rust Belt states are worse now than they were in 2001. An unlike, say, Appalachia or other longtime poverty-mired parts of the country, there is no obvious reason for this-- Michigan and Ohio are not physically or economically ioslated from the rest of us. We seem to be having a severe but very localized recession coupled with a moderate but also localized boom. Thus left and right can both find grist for their propaganda mills, but no one is asking the really necessary question of What Do We Do About This.
4. The economy is weakening. Whether this leads to a full-scale recession or not remains to be seen. Anyone who cares about the poor and middle class should NOT be wishing for this, for obvious (I hope) reasons. For what it's worth. My own prediction is for an ecobomy that sputters but does not tank for the coupel of years, kept alive mainly by backdoor efforts by the administration to avoid a recession before the 2008 election.

Re: Dick Cheney threw 80,000 Army veterans out on the streets in 1991 and the discharges continued throughout the decade.

Yes, downsizing the military. Something most of us progressives usually think is a good thing.

Re: The news media, of course, averted its eyes and covered up the vicious betrayal that created McVeigh and John Mohammand.

Sorry, but I don't buy this logic. McVeigh and Mohammed made their choices freely and certainly had other opportunities available to them. I also dislike the implication that ex-military people are all a bunch a seething psychos ready to explode. This flirts with slander.

Re: Army or Marine service as an enlisted man, by and large, has little value in the US commerical marketplace.

I disagree. Military personnel are often seen as good workers given their discipline experience. In most cases they will be hired preferrentioally to high school grads without a military background. (And some may utilize vets benefits to go on to college or vocational school). The deeper problem of course is that too many of the jobs available to high school grads basically suck out the gate and offer no chance for advancement.

Posted by Jonf | May 19, 2007 11:09 AM

"Yes, I actually think a lot of Americans would be willing to pay more if it were American citizens picking the fruit and harvesting the spinach. I would."

That's not happening. Some labor-intensive businesses have such thin margins that it's impossible for them to raise wages substantially.

A better, and more realistic, solution would be to either convert the labor-intensive businesses to automated, capital-intensive ones (what Japan has done in many fields) or let the whole business relocate to a country with cheaper labor. It would be cheaper for us to import fruit and spinach from Mexico, and let Mexico provide social services to its low-skilled workers.

Posted by Fred | May 19, 2007 11:52 AM

The 14th Amendment contains a large loophole. See: "Subject to the laws thereof".

It's really not a 'large' loophole, as Wong Kim Ark makes clear. It's a recognition of long-standing exceptions towards the children of occupying troops or foreign diplomats, along with 'Indians not taxed':

By the civil rights act of 1866, 'all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed,' were declared to be citizens of the United States. In the light of the law as previously established, and of the history of the times, it can hardly be doubted that the words of that act, 'not subject to any foreign power,' were not intended to exclude any children born in this country from the citizenship which would theretofore have been their birthright; or, for instance, for the first time in our history, to deny the right of citizenship to native-born children or foreign white parents not in the diplomatic service of their own country, nor in hostile occupation of part of our territory. But any possible doubt in this regard was removed when the negative words of the civil rights act, 'not subject to any foreign power,' gave way, in the fourteenth amendment of the constitution, to the affirmative words, 'subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.'

(my emph)

Extending the exclusion through the courts would be judicial activism. Extending it through legislation would be unconstitutional. If Wack O' and company think they can get a constitutional amendment passed, then that's their prerogative. But their blatant lack of honesty on the subject suggests otherwise.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | May 19, 2007 12:08 PM

Jasper: Robert Rector revised his figures down as the details about the bill were made available and as the bill changed. IIRC, his latest estimate of the numbers under the previous Senate bill were 60+ million over 20 years.

His report is here:

judiciary.house.gov/media/pdfs/rector070517.pdf

Posted by John Edwards: get ready to help us oppose amnesty | May 19, 2007 1:34 PM

Still here, Wack O'? Still coy about your immigrant heritage? Still pissing yourself over the 'Mexican insurgency' you've predicted?

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | May 19, 2007 2:24 PM