Factcheck: Does Immigration Cost Jobs?

May 13, 2010

Summary

Do immigrants take American jobs? It’s a common refrain among those who want to tighten limits on legal immigration and deny a "path to citizenship" — which they call "amnesty" — to the millions of immigrants living in the U.S. illegally. There’s even a new Reclaim American Jobs Caucus in the House, with at least 41 members.

But most economists and other experts say there’s little to support the claim. Study after study has shown that immigrants grow the economy, expanding demand for goods and services that the foreign-born workers and their families consume, and thereby creating jobs. There is even broad agreement among economists that while immigrants may push down wages for some, the overall effect is to increase average wages for American-born workers.

To read the full analysis click HERE.

Flippy Floppy McCain

A president says, "Take down this wall." In a campaign ad a few decades later, Sen. John McCain and a sheriff from another county stroll along beside The Great Wall of the Southwest. "Put up the dang wall," says Cowpoke John.


Sen. John McCain, (R-AZ) who has been beating the tom-tom in support of the new anti-immigration bill in Arizona is not "in favor of enforcing laws prohibiting employers from hiring undocumented workers."

Let me see if I have this straight. Undocumented workers should be deported but employers who hire them should not be prosecuted. The guy is not only pandering to his business constituents, he's wondering how he's going to pay Anglos the wages they expect to maintain his nine mansions. It's also slave labor.

The American worker expects minimum wage. Immigrants are happy to get $10 a day, if that much.

McCain went on to praise Arizona Governor Jan Brewer who signed the law "giving state police broad power to identify, detain, and deport undocumented immigrants." McCain said on Fox News that he is "proud of the work" she is doing on immigration, and justified the law “because the federal government would not enforce its responsibilities.”

But letting business get away with skirting immigration laws hurts Arizona’s workers. As the Wonk Room’s Andrea Nill has noted:

Unscrupulous employers who hire and abuse undocumented labor drive down wages and working conditions for all the Americans who work alongside them. They also put honest businesses who want to abide by immigration and labor laws in a position in which they are forced to compete on an uneven playing field.

Too bad Arizona doesn't have at least one sane Republican candidate for Senator. One who is half-way intelligent and who doesn't flip-flop.

Arizona Under "Terrorist Attack" Says Governor

I wonder why it is that GOP politicos always run to Fox News after passing controversial legislation which generates a public backlash. "Why is everyone picking on me?" It just rips my heart apart.

Megyn Kelly, in an interview with AZ Gov. Jan Brewer, asked her what she thought of the three states, with two pending, that have banned official trips to Arizona  on account of the new "Show Me Your Papers" law.
Brewer whined, "It is thoughtless and harmful to innocent people. It is wrong."

Maybe I didn't hear this right. Listen to this load of hypocrisy and tell me if I'm wrong. I really wouldn't mind being wrong in this case.



Are you thinking what I'm thinking? What about the innocent people who just happened to be born with brown skin? Aren't they receiving "thoughtless and harmful" treatment?" I don't see them running to Fox with big ole crocodile tears.

Brewer further said:

You know Arizona has been under terrorist attacks, if you will, with all of this illegal immigration that has been taking place on our very porous border. . . .

CrooksandLiars looks at the death of an Arizona rancher by an alleged scout for the drug cartel and Fox's contribution to the hysteria by falsely and consistently claiming his death was due to an illegal immigrant.
With statistics from Media Matters, the drop in crime from 2006 2007 and 2008 -- the most recent year from which data are available -- is the greatest since 1983.

I am not diminishing the need for immigration reform but this prohibitively costly and unconstitutional law is not the way to go about it. Worse, but not surprisingly, for the right to blame President Obama for the the lack of reform is factually wrong but typical of  people who do not let facts stand in their way.

Particularly egregious has been Sen. John McCain who ducked the issue until 2005 when he and the late Senator Edward Kennedy co-sponsored an immigration reform bill but failed to get out of committee..

The bill, which combined amnesty, guest worker, and border security programs, served as a template for similar bipartisan legislation attempts in 2006 and 2007, none of which succeeded after coming under pressure from all sides of the immigration debate.

McCain fell silent again, but it is Obama's fault we don't have an immigration bill.