The Argument for Immigration Reform During Tough Economic Times
It's been a great couple of weeks for the immigration reform effort. First, last week President Obama announces that he's determined to live up to the promises he made on the campaign trail and begin facilitating a national dialogue in support of immigration reform. But the administration knows that immigration reform is one of the most challenging issues around, especially during an economic downturn, so it got out ahead of the predictable uproar by offering a helpful and clear-headed frame around the issue. Basically, the administration said this: immigration reform isn't an effort to add millions of new workers to the workforce, it's simply an effort to recognize those who are already in the workforce. An argument of this nature has the benefit of being both reasonable and true. How about that?
And then earlier this week we learned that the A.F.L.-C.I.O and Change to Win, two vital segments of the American labor movement, had forged a compromise to support the reform effort, including a disciplined path to citizenship for the undocumented.
Why would two previously warring factions of the labor movement, two groups who represent many 'laborers' in the truest sense of the word, come around to be on the same side of this issue? The legal American workforce doesn't gain anything by allowing the underground economy to exist in its current state, especially on the 'lower', less educated end of the skill spectrum. If a scrupleless employer is faced with the prospect of hiring a likely undocumented worker for $6.50/hr., or a fully documented worker for $8.00/hr., who do you think he's going to hire? Nine times out of ten he'll choose the guy willing to work for less, the guy with no legal protections. To say that immigration reform and the legalization of millions of undocumented workers is somehow going to hurt the legal American workforce is exactly wrong. The tough part, however, is helping people see beyond their learned biases and come to terms with this basic economic reality.
