[The MoJo Wire]
Hiring From Within
High rates of legal immigration provide cheap, nonunion
labor for big business, a steady stream of domestic
servants for the overclass, and lower wages for American
workers. So why do so many liberals support them? Michael
Lind makes a provocative case for immigration reform.
MEMO TO: Democratic Party Members and Progressives
RE: Immigration Reform and Progressive Populism
FROM: Michael Lind
"I know why [immigrants] are here. There are a lot of
jobs people in Texas won't do, [such as] laying tar in
August."
ÑTexas Gov. George W. Bush, 1997
The late GOP political strategist Lee Atwater once said
that the populist vote is the key to building a political
majority, and he was right. Republicans controlled the
White House in the 1980s, and won the House and Senate in
the 1990s, by following Atwater's advice and appealing to
populists with culture-war demagoguery and tax-cut
rhetoric. But the GOP's grip is loosening, and the
political contests brewing over free trade and tax reform
could be the start of a prolonged, pitched battle between
Republicans and Democrats for the populist vote.
The left's best hope for capturing it is to hammer away
at economic issues. But conservative propaganda has
poisoned the well when it comes to that old progressive
standby, increased entitlement spending. Many working-
and middle-class voters would rather lose government
benefits than pay higher taxes that go to the poor. And
the fight against free trade, which has sparked a strong
center-left coalition, isn't likely to set the saloons on
fire either. In the 21st century, most low- and
middle-income jobs will be found in nontraded service
sectors like health care, construction, janitorial
services, and retailÑin other words, jobs that don't risk
being lost to workers overseas.
But there is one pocketbook issue capable of bringing
populists over to the progressive camp, and it is ripe
for the picking. Without raising taxes or spending, a
progressive government can increase the wages of low- and
middle-income Americans by reducing immigration.
In a classic example of bait-and-switch politics, the
Republican Party has cleverly bought off right-wing
populists with calls to fortify the border and penalize
undocumented immigrant workers. But while Republican
leadersÑsuch as California Gov. Pete WilsonÑviciously
lash out at illegal immigrants, they are usually silent
about legal immigration. New York City's Republican Mayor
Rudy Giuliani has actually refused to cooperate with
federal laws governing immigration control. Indeed,
supported by Bill Gates and other industrialists seeking
cheap labor, some Republican politicians claim that the
current rate of legal immigration is too low. What's
going on here? The crypto-racist histrionics of some of
his colleagues aside, Gov. Bush's remark about needing
cheap labor to lay tar accurately sums up the rationale
behind his party's approach to immigration.
Republicans may be able to get away with speaking out of
both sides of their mouths, appealing to the nativist
impulses of the working class while satisfying big
business' need for cheap labor. But progressives must
stand, first and foremost, for the economic interests of
the struggling middle class, the working poor, and the
unemployed. The unpleasant truth is that the present
rate of legal immigration has been a boon to
employersÑand a disaster for low-income workers. It is
time for progressives to take the issue back from
Republicans and advocate an immigration policy that keeps
the interests of the working class, not the business
class, in mind. By demanding equal rights for legal
immigrants, humane treatment for undocumented ones, and
continued legal immigration at reduced levels,
progressives can oppose mass immigration without being
perceived as anti-immigrantÑor even anti-immigration.
Lower rates of immigration would reduce middle-class
taxes and raise working-class wages. And the costs of
immigration reduction would fall chiefly on the
professionals, corporate executives, and investors who
have benefited for a generation from an ever growing pool
of cheap immigrant labor. Consider the following:
* According to the Immigration and Naturalization
Service, 915,900 immigrants entered the U.S. legally in
1996. In the same year, only an estimated 275,000 entered
illegally. Of the legal entrants, only 143,163 were
humanitarian refugees or people seeking political asylum.
All told, an estimated half a million immigrantsÑlegal
and illegalÑenter the U.S. job market each year.
* According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics,
immigration was responsible for 15 to 25 percent of the
increase in the wage gap between low- and high-skill
workers in the 1980sÑand for one-third of the decline in
real wages for American high school dropouts.
* A high rate of immigration provides employers with a
constant influx of nonunion workers, and language
barriers can make labor organizing difficult. It is no
coincidence that the greatest growth in U.S. union
membership took place during a period of restricted
immigration between the 1920s and the 1940s.
* Using Census Bureau data, the writer Roy Beck has
predicted that if present immigration and fertility rates
continue, there will be 400 million Americans in the year
2050Ñ125 million of whom will be immigrants who arrived
after 2000 and their descendants. These nearly half a
billion Americans will be crammed into a few major
metropolitan areas and will have an enormous impact on
our already depleted resources.
* Harvard economist George Borjas has calculated that
immigration in the 1980s redistributed more than $100
billion a year away from working Americans and to the
economic elite. The cost of high immigration is paid not
only by low-income Americans who must compete with
immigrants for jobs, but also less directly by
middle-class taxpayers who pay higher taxes to build the
infrastructure for all those new AmericansÑhighways,
schools, police and fire departments, etc. The wealthy,
of course, pay those higher taxes as well, but they get a
huge rebate in the form of immigration-lowered wages for
their domestic servants and employees. Middle-class
taxpayers end up paying for the infrastructure and social
services needed by the low-wage employees and menial
servants of the rich, while receiving few if any economic
benefits from immigration. Perhaps that's why the Wall
Street Journal has proposed this five-word amendment to
the Constitution: "There shall be open borders."
If current immigration levels persist, working people can
look forward to overcrowded cities, depleted watersheds,
paved farmland, low wages, decimated unions, happy
agribusiness CEOs, and rich people enjoying a buyer's
market in maids, gardeners, and nannies. Yet the
Democratic Party elite either has been silent about the
issue or has opposed immigration reform. Why?
Many progressives have a romantic attachment to the
notion that the United States is a "nation of
immigrants." But where is it written on the Statue of
Liberty that legal immigration must be maintained at 1
million each year, instead of 500,000 or 250,000? As long
as we don't have open borders, the number of immigrants
we let in annually will be somewhat arbitrary; shouldn't
we fight to make that number more compatible with the
interests of labor than those of business?
Another significant reason that progressives remain
silent on immigration reform is that the issue is almost
inextricably bound up with race. Many recoil at the
notion of reducing immigration levels, equating attempts
to do so with attacks on the rights of Latino or Asian
immigrants.
But it is a mistake to think that minorities uniformly
support high rates of immigration. In the 1990 Latino
National Political Survey, approximately 75 percent of
Mexican Americans, 66 percent of Cuban Americans, and
almost 80 percent of Puerto Ricans agreed with the
following statement: "There are too many immigrants
coming to this country." In 1994, before the anti-Latino
overtones of California's Proposition 187 campaign to
deny certain state benefits to illegal immigrants were
widely publicized, 52 percent of California's Latino
voters favored the measure, according to a Los Angeles
Times poll. A 1996 survey showed that 59 percent of
Latino citizens in Texas supported cuts in immigration,
while only 30 percent opposed them. The same survey
showed similar preferences among Latino citizens in
California, Florida, and New York.
Many African American leaders have been AWOL on the
subject of immigration reform as well, even though high
immigration has hit black workers the hardest. In Los
Angeles, for example, the abundance of nonunion
immigrants permitted unscrupulous firms to wipe out
unionized janitorsÑhalf of whom were blackÑby the 1990s.
What would a progressive-populist campaign for
immigration reform look like? For starters, progressives
can borrow a line from Bill Clinton: Immigration should
not be endedÑbut it must be mended. And the best way to
do that is to implement the recommendations of the
Commission on Immigration Reform, chaired by the late
Barbara Jordan, a humanitarian and progressive of
impeccable pedigree. Appointed by President Clinton in
1993, the Jordan Commission called for reducing legal
immigration to 550,000 a year (in addition to
humanitarian refugees); limiting those admitted into the
country for purposes of family reunification to nuclear
family members (spouses and young children), rather than
siblings and adult children; and using Social Security
numbers to verify the citizen status of employees.
Progressives who campaign on immigration reform should
stress that they do not object to the particular culture
of immigrants, only to the volume of immigration. If most
low-wage immigrants came from the poor nations of
post-communist Eastern Europe, rather than from Latin
America and Asia, the damage done to the American labor
market would be the same.
As long as the issue is framed in economic terms, a
progressive-populist coalition for immigration reform can
hope to gain the support of many Latino and Asian
American wage earners, immigrant as well as native born.
A tighter labor market would even help recent immigrants;
we shouldn't assume that people who migrate to the U.S.
want to be followed by others who might undercut their
own precarious position. In fact, Cesar Chavez horrified
sentimental liberals by endorsing government crackdowns
on Southwestern agribusinesses that employed illegal
immigrants.
Progressives should define the problem as too much legal
immigration for the good of America's workforce and
environment. The number of legal immigrants should be
reducedÑbut the rights of both legal and undocumented
immigrants should be protected (and in some cases
restored). We should oppose right-wing schemes to create
a Berlin Wall along the Southwestern border, and support
an immigration policy that shifts the focus from hounding
the illegals to punishing the employers who pay them
miserable wages.
While working to reduce the overall rate of immigration,
progressives should campaign for workfare programs that
move the poor of all races and ethnicities into the
private-sector jobs opened up by the dwindling supply of
foreign-born workers. Participants in welfare-to-work
programs would be natural recruits for a reinvigorated
union movement. And vigorous unions could ensure that the
minimal-wage jobs with no benefits that are currently
done, usually off-the-books, by nonunion immigrantsÑmaid
service, laundry service, construction, and restaurant
workÑwill be performed tomorrow by union members working
under decent conditions.
Immigration reform is the best hope for a swift
improvement in the wages and bargaining power of working
Americans. It doesn't make sense to oppose trade
agreements, which harm relatively few U.S. workers, while
ignoring the mass immigration that threatens the economic
security of a far greater number of Americans. The energy
that goes into fighting fast-track legislation and the
World Trade Organization would be better spent on a push
to implement the recommendations of the Jordan
Commission. Instead of wasting their energy on quixotic
campaigns against sweatshops in remote countries,
progressives should focus on the pro-business immigration
system that permits the proliferation of sweatshops down
the street. [Image]
Michael Lind is the Washington, D.C., correspondent for
Harper's Magazine. This is the last in a series of four
articles on democratic political reform in the United
States.
Table of Contents
--------------------------------------
E-mail the Editors | Other Articles by Michael Lind |
Mother Jones Archive
The MoJo Wire and Mother Jones are projects of the Foundation for National
Progress, a nonprofit 501(c)3 organization, founded in 1975 to educate and
empower people to work toward progressive change. Al
