"A Day Without Immigrants"

Pabulum Redux:
A Day Without Immigrants

The LA Times and most liberal leaning establishments have unilaterally supported immigration, whether legal or illegal and particularly from south of the border because these people “do jobs that Americans won’t.” The assumption that illegal immigrants are the only people who would perform jobs that most middle class Americans wouldn’t perform is an assumption that has weakened fair labor practices for all working people across the board.
Lou Dobbs of CNN fame in an interview on “Good Morning America” today stated the heretofore unstated in the media when the issue of undocumented aliens comes up: “The issue is we have a middle class. Meatpackers made $19.00 and hour twenty years ago and today they make $9.00” a direct reflection of the impact of immigration on Americans who want to work and invest their incomes into our American economy. The mantra that rises over the issue of illegal immigration, like far too many other issues of gravity in our society today, is an unexamined argument that flies in the face of reason because of the assumption that all undocumented workers are simply “hardworking and good people.” The other side of the coin is the never examined “all the good, underemployed or unemployed Americans” who would truly love to have a secure job to support themselves and their families.
My father worked a job in construction in the early 1960’s; a job that paid a generous income with benefits, a job that was largely held by African American and white Americans during that time. Today, almost all construction sites are filled with the faces of immigrant workers, many of whom are probably illegal …sorry undocumented, and yet there are many unemployed African American and white Americans who would dearly love the opportunity to work in that profession.
The point in, there used to be a time in America where young high school/college students who either had to get a part time job to help their families to pay expenses or had to support themselves were able to get jobs as busboys, servers and other entry level positions that are largely filled by immigrants today. Maids who worked in hotels across the nation were almost exclusively African American yet those very same jobs are now filled by immigrant labor.
Like many other issues in our society today, the immigrant labor issue is fraught with lies. Corporations know that the federal government takes forever to process Employment I9 forms to validate an employee’s “right to work” and the federal government like the corporations are no more interested in getting a handle on the illegal immigrants than are the corporations who continue to make record profits while not increasing the salaries and benefits to the workers that fill their factories.
To return to Lou Dobbs’ statement about the meatpackers: $9.00 and hour twenty years ago was a decent salary but prices for meat, gasoline, maintenance and upkeep for businesses was also much cheaper than today yet businesses expect employees to get by on less while the guys at the top take home greater pensions and record salaries.
There is a definite economic imbalance that has been growing in American society for well over twenty years, an imbalance that has been largely ignored by a certain segment of American society, the segment that has the economic clout not to have to worry about losing their economic viability. On the other hand, it is time to dispense with the lie that immigrants do jobs that Americans don’t want to do. If you consider the fact that on the corner drug dealers also work for less than minimum wage and if the jobs that undereducated and poor Americans could work are given to “undocumented aliens” and they are forced to turn to crime to fill the economic void in their lives, then our society will continue to slide towards the ‘haves’ vs. the ‘have nots.’