[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Sign-in]  [Mail]  [Setup]  [Help] 

Status: Not Logged In; Sign In

Nicotine and Fish

Genocide Summer Camp, And Other Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

This Can Create Endless Green Energy WITHOUT Electricity

Geoengineering: Who’s Behind It and How We Stop It

Pam Bondi Ordered Prosecution of Dr. Kirk Moore After Refusing to Dismiss Case

California woman bombarded with Amazon packages for over a year

CVS ordered to pay $949 MILLION in Medicaid fraud case.

Starmer has signed up to the UNs agreement to raise taxes in the UK

Magic mushrooms may hold the secret to longevity: Psilocybin extends lifespan by 57% in groundbreaking study

Cops favorite AI tool automatically deletes evidence of when AI was used

Leftist Anti ICE Extremist OPENS FIRE On Cops, $50,000 REWARD For Shooter

With great power comes no accountability.

Auto loan debt hits $1.63T. 20% of buyers now pay $1,000+ monthly. Texas delinquency hits 7.92%.

Quotable Quotes from the Chosenites

Tokara Islands NOW crashing into the Ocean ! Mysterious Swarm continues with OVER 1700 Quakes !

Why Austria Is Suddenly Declaring War on Immigration

Rep. Greene Wants To Remove $500 Million in Military Aid for Nuclear-Armed Israel From NDAA

Netanyahu Lays Groundwork for Additional Strikes on Iran: 'We Didn't Deal With The Enriched Uranium'

Sweden Cracks Down On OnlyFans - Will U.S. Follow Suit?

Joe Rogan CALLS OUT Israel's Media CONTROL

Communist Billionaire Accused Of Funding Anti-ICE Riots Mysteriously Vanishes

6 Factors That Describe China's Current State

Trump Thteatens to Bomb Moscow and Beijing

Little Bitty

Vertiv Drops After Amazon Unveils In-House Liquid Cooling System, Marking Pivot To Liquid

17 Out-Of-Place Artifacts That Suggest High-Tech Civilizations Existed Thousands (Or Millions) Of Years Ago

Hamas Still Killing IDF Soldiers After 642 Days

Copper underpins every part of the economy. If you want to destroy the U.S. economy this is how you would do it.

Egyptian Pres. Gamal Abdel Nassers Chilling Decades-Old Prediction About Israel-Palstine Conflict.

Debt jumps $366B in one day.


Immigration
See other Immigration Articles

Title: American Workers May Be Rejecting Low-End Jobs as Immigrants Depress Wage
Source: Bloomberg
URL Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/regions/us.html
Published: Jun 26, 2006
Author: Bloomberg
Post Date: 2006-06-26 12:59:02 by Brian S
Keywords: None
Views: 662
Comments: 40

June 26 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush, addressing the nation on his immigration-overhaul plan last month, declared that granting temporary visas to immigrants would merely give them a chance at ``jobs Americans are not doing.''

A growing number of economists challenge the contention that Americans aren't willing to take on those low-end jobs; it's kitchen-table economics, not the sweat factor, that keeps them away.

These economists' studies indicate many Americans want those jobs -- they just can't afford to take them because of declining pay and benefits. And they say the influx of immigrants has helped drive down compensation in occupations such as the needle trades, landscaping and restaurant help.

``The idea that somehow you have a need for people to do jobs that Americans won't do is just insane,'' says George Borjas, an economist at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who has written extensively about immigration and wages. He says that as immigrants flow into an occupation, ``the wage goes down, and you go do something else.''

The issue has become central to the debate over immigration, a controversy that has divided the Republican Party and the nation.

Philip Harvey, a professor of law and economics at the Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, says that salaries for the lowest-wage workers in all occupations increased by 7.4 percent from 2001 to 2005, while pay for all jobs rose by 11.4 percent during the same period. Harvey's study used data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Recent Decades

The disparity is greater over recent decades. The bottom 10 percent of wage-earners is the only group that has seen a decline in real wages -- 2.4 percent -- since 1979, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington think-tank with ties to organized labor. The group's study was also based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Administration officials, who are advancing a plan to establish a guest-worker program for immigrants and a path to citizenship for undocumented aliens, say newcomers aren't elbowing aside American job-seekers. ``We have got jobs that are available, that need to get done, that American citizens are not willing to do,'' Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez said in a June 14 interview.

The precise effect of immigration on the U.S. economy is a source of debate among economists. Some say it isn't fair to blame immigration flows for wage shifts. The transition to a post-industrial information economy and the growing impact of globalization may be more critical factors, they say.

``Immigration has relatively little to do with the state of the American job market,'' says Bradford DeLong, professor of economics at the University of California at Berkeley. ``Globalization has a bunch.''

Exaggerated Threat

Pro-immigration business groups say that those on the other side of the debate exaggerate the threat posed by undocumented workers. Martin Regalia, chief economist at the Washington-based U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation's largest business lobby, says many of the nation's unemployed are seeking higher-end jobs than those that immigrants typically take.

In Regalia's view, heeding calls to send undocumented workers packing would create labor shortages. ``The hyperbole that comes into this debate doesn't mesh well with the numbers,'' he says.

Immigrants form a larger segment of the work force in the U.S. than in some European countries. Foreign-born workers made up 14.7 percent of the U.S. civilian labor force in 2005, according to Census data. In the U.K. and Germany, the figures were 9.6 percent and 12.2 percent respectively in 2004, the last year for which they were available, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Continued Interest

There is evidence that Americans continue to be interested in low-skill jobs ranging from tailoring to hotel service to food preparation, some of the industries where immigrants are making their biggest inroads.

Steven Camarota, research director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington-based group that backs immigration controls, says Census data show U.S. natives still make up the majority of workers in most of these occupations.

For example, he said, indigenous workers account for 62 percent of all maids and housekeepers and 60 percent of dry-wall installers, based on 2003-2004 Census figures. ``There's a high degree of native interest in being a maid or housekeeper,'' Camarota says. ``If the wages were better, you certainly could attract more.''

Loading Freight

James Lynch, a 45-year-old unemployed electrician from Fayetteville, North Carolina, says he's unloaded freight and held two other temporary jobs since he lost a well-paying position at an electrical-contracting firm in Durham in 2004. None of those stints led to permanent work, a situation he blames on immigrants willing to toil for sub-par wages.

Lynch says he passed up the chance to apply for full-time status at his subsequent jobs because employers ``wanted me to work for a lot less pay than I'm used to getting. They can go and get cheaper labor'' from immigrant ranks.

Immigrant wages are lower on average than those for the native-born, according to a study by the Urban Institute, a Washington research group. It found nearly half of immigrants earn less than 200 percent of the minimum wage as opposed to about one-third of native-born workers.

Still, some economists say, if immigrants are grabbing off so many jobs, why has the U.S. entered a period of sustained low unemployment? The national unemployment rate in May was only 4.6 percent.

Other experts say the rosy unemployment numbers mask the growing number of Americans who are not participating in the labor force. That number rose to 35.5 million in 2005 from 30.8 million in 2000, says Camarota, citing Census data.

Beyond the Fringe

Aside from low wages, the lack of fringe benefits for jobs in low-wage industries may be discouraging native-born applicants. The percentage of workers earning between $10,000 and $20,000 a year who were eligible for a company-sponsored health plan in 2002 was 56 percent, compared to 92.4 percent for those earning $50,000 or more, according to an analysis by the non- partisan Employee Benefit Research Institute.

In construction, one of the U.S. occupations where immigrants make up an increasing share of the workforce, 46 percent of workers have no employer-provided health plan, statistics compiled by the Laborers' International Union show.

For his part, Bush continues to assert that immigrant labor is vital to economic prosperity. ``It makes sense to say, if someone is willing to do a job Americans aren't doing, here's a temporary way to come and work,'' he said in May 18 remarks in Yuma, Arizona.

Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 19.

#1. To: Brian S (#0)

``We have got jobs that are available, that need to get done, that American citizens are not willing to do,'' Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez

Like....Commerce Secretary? hmmmmmmmm....I can't help but wonder if Mr. Gutierrez might be somewhat....biased.

mehitable  posted on  2006-06-26   14:52:03 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#2. To: mehitable (#1)

I have QUIT doing business with ANYONE who even remotely reeks of having illegal aliens on staff. Zero tolerance. 45,000 DEAD AMERICANS at the hands of illegals is too steep a price to pay for cheap produce. Unfortunately; no one else cares about this country.

who knows what evil  posted on  2006-06-26   15:07:05 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#3. To: who knows what evil (#2)

What makes me sad sometimes is that I'll meet a foreign person, and they're very nice, but I have to keep wondering - is this person here legally. It's happened to me frequently with restaurants and service workers, and it makes me feel very uncomfortable with them. If I knew they had to be here legally, I might feel more friendly towards them, but this suspicion I always have that they're illegal, really dampens having any kind of relationship with them for me. There's an emotional cost to this illegal invasion as well as the financial and political cost.

mehitable  posted on  2006-06-26   15:13:44 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#4. To: mehitable (#3)

We had a local bust 2 weeks ago at a construction site that had 22 illegals working there.

Here's the kicker; they left the illegals go, but arrested 2 kids and the contractor for violating child labor laws.

Grumble Jones  posted on  2006-06-26   15:31:49 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#11. To: Grumble Jones, Brian S, mehitable, All (#4)

I just overheard on the boob tube that somewhere in HAARP-ravaged Katrina territory, the rulers are fixing to get visas for 3,000 CHINESE to build new homes down there, although there are Americans willing and able to do the work!

AllTheKings'HorsesWontDoIt  posted on  2006-06-29   8:51:43 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#12. To: AllTheKings'HorsesWontDoIt (#11)

I just overheard on the boob tube that somewhere in HAARP-ravaged Katrina territory

I live in the N.E., we've just been HARRPed too.

I posted a question on one of the local TV station's message board. I asked if we ever experiened such a weather pattern before. The front was stalled for a week. I haven't gotten an answer yet.

The meterologist who answers weather questions has refused to answer my question for 3 days. Oddly, he's answering everyone elses. I don't think he has an answer.

Grumble Jones  posted on  2006-06-29   9:07:41 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#16. To: Grumble Jones, All (#12)

I live near DC. I've been fighting the water all week. So far we've been more fortunate than a lot of people who are going to be ruined by this. Meanwhile, I had to listen to my dad go on about global warming and how he believed this "weather pattern" was going to continue. He's in his eighties, and he has NEVER seen anything like this, which I find interesting in light of the fact that I keep hearing that we are in the midst of a "twenty-year weather pattern". Such BS. I have to bite my tongue, because my family all think I'm crazy, and refuse to listen. My father hung up on me for the first time close to 7 or eight years ago, when I tried to tell him about the Satanic pedeophile crimes at the Presidio. HIS army wouldn't do that!!! He also hung up on me earlier this year when I tried to tell him the government was doing the weather.

Of course the media refuses to talk about this conspiracy against the people. We know they are part of the conspiracy. And now Cheney and the other neocons are going to use the trumped-up "terrorist financial spying" to shut up any reporters who might want to buck their owners.

More and more people have wised up to the HAARP-caused hurricanes. We now know that you can destroy people with water alone, forget the high winds, although, we are in "hurricane season", and I fully expect them to send a few our way to finish us off.

Jer 51:25 Behold, I [am] against thee, O destroying mountain, saith the LORD, which destroyest all the earth: and I will stretch out mine hand upon thee, and roll thee down from the rocks, and will make thee a burnt mountain.

http://www.blueletter bible.org/tsk_b/Jer/51/25.html

For another view of this, you might be interested in the discussion of HAARP at WHAT ABOUT THIS OLD TESTAMENT KILLER GOD?

What about this Old Testament "Killer God? "The December 15, 1991 Alaska Daily News carried a big article on HAARP: ... God is NOT a killer God, neither in the Old Testament nor in the New Testament. ... http://www.goodne wsaboutgod.com/studies/otkillergod.htm

AllTheKings'HorsesWontDoIt  posted on  2006-06-29   10:42:58 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#19. To: AllTheKings'HorsesWontDoIt (#16)

More and more people have wised up to the HAARP-caused hurricanes. We now know that you can destroy people with water alone, forget the high winds, although, we are in "hurricane season", and I fully expect them to send a few our way to finish us off.

I have a feeling NYC is going to get it this year.

Grumble Jones  posted on  2006-06-29   10:59:48 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


Replies to Comment # 19.

#23. To: Grumble Jones (#19)

I have a feeling NYC is going to get it this year.

WEATHER... we like it or NOT! | It Could Happen Tomorrow: Weather ...And the next one that targets the East Coast could hit New York city. ... You're not talking about pumping out the subways; you're talking about rebuilding ... http://www .sweetliberty.org/issues/weather/weatherchannel.html

Expose them!!! Offense is the best defense. CAREFULLY place fliers [remember the White Rose Society].

...and thank you for the link. I am pushing it right now, and I have a feeling if I tried to look at it now, I would lose everything I'm working on, but I will look at it later. Thanks!

AllTheKings'HorsesWontDoIt  posted on  2006-06-29 11:15:16 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


End Trace Mode for Comment # 19.

TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest


[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Sign-in]  [Mail]  [Setup]  [Help]