Weekly Immigration Update: Foreign Workers and the Debate Over Comprehensive Immigration Reform

Last week we posited that Immigration Reform is a vital component of economic recovery.  This week, we’ve seen hopeful signs in the seriousness of the immigration debate while we have also seen Republican and Democratic law makers attempt to use this pivotal policy issue as a publicity tool.  As stated by Simon in The Politico today:

The small visa programs have little to do with the central issues of the broader immigration debate, such as how to handle the 11 million illegal immigrants now in the U.S., said Simon Rosenberg, president of NDN, a progressive group seeking a broad immigration package.  But they have become the stray dogs in this political fight. “It’s irresponsible the way some members of Congress are going after this,” Rosenberg said.

This week, after the Obama administration again delayed implementing a rule requiring federal contractors to use the E-Verify system (an Internet tool that checks the validity of employees’ Social Security numbers) Rep. Lamar Smith argued this constituted "an insult" to "legal immigrants and Americans."  The rule originally was to go into effect in February, but the Obama administration delayed it until May 21, and now until June 30.  What Rep. Smith fails to highlight is the significant error rate in this system, which is designed to check a social security number against a name for determining benefits, not as an immigration database. 

The same tone was taken in discussions over legal foreign workers.  Even though labor organizers themselves recognize the need to deal with the issue of future flow, we’ve seen debate over comprehensive immigration reform stop at “how many?” instead of answering the essential question: “how” do we fix our broken immigration system?

There is something very wrong when our immigration “system” is comprised of 70,000 legal immigrant workers and an estimated 400,000 undocumented workers each year.  How do we create a fair, safe, effective, and productive immigration law?  An immigration system should ideally:  1) serve as a record-keeping mechanism that allows a government to know who is within its borders, 2) achieve this by putting incentives on the side of legal flow, not by attempting to stop flow, 3) help reflect a country’s values, and 4) generate revenue through an effective and speedy application process. 

Is the purpose of reform solely to legalize those currently here? Or is the goal to develop a comprehensive, forward-looking plan to effectively end undocumented immigration?  In a 21st century globalized world, with a globalized economy, it is naïve – at best – to argue that people won’t come to the U.S. because the economy is not doing so well, because they’re not welcome, or because we don’t want them to. 

They will come; the bottom line is: do we want them here legally, or illegally? Do we repeat the mistake of 1986 and pass reform arguing that we look after all those currently in the shadows, many of them in abusive conditions, but leave the rest in ambiguity?  Turning a blind eye towards the plight of legal immigrants currently in the country and to the undocumented that are on their way as they cross over illegally and in inhumane conditions? Only those who have had to undergo the increasingly expensive and irresponsibly drawn out process of legal migration can understand how the existing policy has of its own design dictated how much easier it is for individuals to fall out of legal status or come to this country illegally. We do not advocate “open borders,” we argue for justice and the rule of law – the rule of a just law that responds to reality, that encourages legality instead of exacerbating illegality. 

A piece in today’s Wall Street Journal by Jason Riley contends that President Obama will “be pressured by advocacy groups” to focus on a legalization program as part of a proposal for comprehensive immigration reform – I disagree with this contention as it is presented because it implies that this is not already the President’s position.  President Obama has been a longtime supporter of the essential components of comprehensive reform (CIR):

1.   Enhanced border security,
2.   Bring people out of the shadows
3.   Work with immigrant-sending nations
4.   Improve the legal immigration system
5.   Remove incentives to enter illegally

Despite this week's news articles, the legalization of the estimated 12 million undocumented individuals in the U.S. will prove equally or more controversial than fixing our legal immigration system. A true immigration reform proposal must include all the above elements, supported by the President.

Foreign H-1B workers are the most recent subject of much of the anti-immigrant sentiment.  The argument that H-1B workers bring down wages and “displace” U.S. high skilled workers could be equated with positing that women are unfair competition to their male counterparts because all the studies and statistics demonstrate that we make less than our male counterparts in the same position.  Instead of doggedly insisting on making foreigners “the boogieman” of this economic recession, let’s focus on fixing the inequities and flaws that do exist in the broken legal immigration system. We can't ignore the fact that many of these "foreign workers" are educated in the U.S., have been long-time residents of the U.S. and as such have strong ties here.

Additionally, we can’t forget that just as we receive foreign workers, other countries receive U.S. workers, too.  As highlighted in Gebe Martinez’s piece today:

Goldman Sachs has about 200 H-1B employees, Blankfein said at a recent meeting of the Council of Institutional Investors. “But we have 2,000 employees who are working overseas and pay U.S. taxes. Do we want to invite other countries to take punitive measures against us?”

Particularly conservatives advocate a merit-based society, yet these are the same individuals that – like Sen. Grassley – have been suggesting to companies like Microsoft that H-1B workers be laid off before qualified Americans.  How about we let companies let go employees based on their individual contributions, regardless of nationality? [Microsoft General Counsel Bradford Smith responded that the company complies with civil rights law and does not base its compensation decisions in the U.S. on an employee’s citizenship.]

If President Obama is to be more successful than the previous administration when it tried to reform immigration, he must remain cognizant of the reasons behind the failure of the last major immigration reform legislation enacted in 1986 (IRCA).

IRCA focused on the legalization piece and border enforcement enhancements, and did not address the issue of future flow of immigrants.  It merely designed a system of what was desired future flow, not a system based on reality and actual demand.  It’s no news that the border enhancements over the past two decades haven't hampered the illegal flow whatsoever, they have merely made it more profitable to smuggle human beings across the border.  But that hasn't stopped immigration restrictionists from calling for still more security measures.

As contended by Mr. Riley in the WSJ today:

The 1986 amnesty was never going to solve the problem, because it didn't address the root cause….Illegal immigration to the U.S. is primarily a function of too many foreigners chasing too few visas.  Some 400,000 people enter the country illegally each year -- a direct consequence of the fact that our current policy is to make available only 5,000 visas annually for low-skilled workers.  If policy makers want to reduce the number of illegal entries, the most sensible and humane course is to provide more legal ways for people to come.

It's unfortunate that the "no amnesty" crowd has been able to suck up so much oxygen in this debate. Immigration hysterics on talk radio and cable news have used the term effectively to end conversations. And restrictionists in Congress have used it as a political slogan to block reform. But from a public-policy perspective, the fate of the 12 million illegals already here...will solve itself over time if we get the other reforms right.

As in 1986, our economy and society have already absorbed most of these illegal workers. Many have married Americans, started families, bought homes, laid down roots. If their presence here is a problem, it is a self-correcting one. In time, they will grow old and pass on with the rest of us.....

Past experience shows that economic migrants have no desire to be here illegally. They will use the front door if it's available to them, which reduces pressure on the border and frees up homeland security resources to target drug dealers, gang members, potential terrorists, and other real threats.

We need to improve existing legal channels and provide more pathways.  This could be done by creating new – more inclusive – visa programs or increasing green-card quotas or both.  The end should be to create more legal channels for workers and family members. The 1986 legislation did not create realistic legal pathways, which is why we now have the problem of 12 million undocumented immigrants (who have incidentally already been absorbed by the U.S. labor market).  If we don’t think and act globally, then we will all suffer the penance of our own short-sightedness.

The WSJ goes on to highlight points NDN has discussed before:

Granted, this will be a hard sell at a time when growing numbers of Americans are out of work. Even in good times, zero-sum thinking -- the notion that what is gained by some must be lost by others -- dominates discussions about immigrants and jobs. But the schooling and skills that the typical Mexican immigrant brings to the U.S. labor market differ markedly from the typical American's, which is why the two don't tend to compete with each other for employment. Labor economists like Richard Vedder have documented that, historically, higher levels of immigration to the U.S. are associated with lower levels of unemployment. Immigrants are catalysts for economic growth, not job-stealers.  There are plenty of ways and plenty of time to deal with the country's undocumented millions in a fair and humane manner. But we'd do better to focus first on not adding to their numbers.  If the fate of this group instead drives the policy discussion, we're more likely to end up with the status quo or faux reforms like amnesty that dodge the real problem.