Robert Samuelson wrote this over a year ago. It's still valid.
Excerpts:
"Guest workers would mainly legalize today's vast inflows of illegal immigrants, with the same consequence: We'd be importing poverty."
"What we have now -- and would with guest workers -- is a conscious policy of creating poverty in the United States while relieving it in Mexico. By and large, this is a bad bargain for the United States."
"Among immigrant Mexican and Central American workers in 2004, only 7 percent had a college degree and nearly 60 percent lacked a high school diploma, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Among native-born U.S. workers, 32 percent had a college degree and only 6 percent did not have a high school diploma. Far from softening the social problems of an aging society, more poor immigrants might aggravate them by pitting older retirees against younger Hispanics for limited government benefits."
"What's more perplexing is why liberals, staunch opponents of poverty and inequality, support a program that worsens poverty and inequality. Poor immigrant workers hurt the wages of unskilled Americans. The only question is how much. Studies suggest a range "from negligible to an earnings reduction of almost 10 percent," according to the CBO."
Why do some insist on creating a perpetual underclass in America? Isn't that what we have sought to eliminate for many, many years?
No comments:
Post a Comment