"Wop." "Hunkie." "Polack." "Kike."
When I was a kid growing up in Nemacolin, Pa., those are some of the slurs people used for us.
Why? Because our parents or grandparents came to this country from somewhere else, fleeing poverty and war, seeking opportunity and hope. As a kid, every person I knew who was older than 50 spoke broken English.
Those names hurt. But they also determined almost everything about us -- where we would live, where we would worship, where we would go to school, where we could work.
It wasn't easy. We were the last hired and first fired, the people who did the hardest and most dangerous work, the people accused of taking jobs away from others who had been here longer, the people whose pay got shorted because we didn't know the language and were afraid to complain.
But from the mines and the mills, the immigrants of my parents' and grandparents' generation built America.
Today, we have a new generation of immigrants. And the names and accusations are just as ugly. I hear it all the time. I even hear it from people close to me. "Those immigrants are taking our jobs. They can't speak English. They're taking over the country."
I couldn't disagree more, but I know where they're coming from -- an American economy in tatters, rampant unemployment, foreclosures, disappearance of health and retirement benefits.
They're anxious and angry. I'm angry, too.
There's justifiable anger at seeing our economy, our way of life, our security trashed. And it's being used by people who have a real stake in maintaining our economic disaster to turn working people against one another.
Many working men and women -- including union members -- were pretty confused that I would be speaking out on behalf of today's immigrant workers, as I did last week at the Cleveland City Club. But I can honestly say to them: An immigrant worker did not move your plant overseas. An immigrant did not take away your pension. A Mexican or Salvadoran or Guatemalan worker did not cut off your health care. His wife didn't foreclose your home. Her children did not crash our financial system.
Blaming immigrant workers for our economic catastrophe is like blaming shrimpers for the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
BP was too greedy to drill that well safely. And many U.S. employers are too greedy to pay workers a living wage, or comply with health, safety and labor laws. They've got exactly the immigration system they want -- plenty of workers living and toiling in the shadows, borders that are closed enough to turn immigrants into second-class citizens and criminals but open enough to ensure an endless supply of socially and legally powerless cheap labor.
Gripped by our own economic insecurity, it's often hard to see immigrants as mothers and fathers who are just trying to make a living and take care of their families -- people pursuing the same goals and dreams the rest of us have. Maybe it's easier to identify with or side with the rich and powerful.
I'm afraid too many working people are forgetting the painful legacy of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). It destroyed jobs and industries in this country. It destroyed jobs and industries in Mexico. It increased inequality and eroded workers' rights on both sides of the Rio Grande. Except for the people who are still profiting from cheap plants with low-wage labor and weak environmental and labor protections, it hurt us all. But Mexican workers are being blamed for the results.
We're not going to fix the U.S. jobs and economic crisis as long as we permit a two-tiered workforce and a two-tiered society, with recent immigrants who are easy to abuse, easy to underpay and too intimidated by our broken immigration system to demand better.
Border fences, military patrols and un-American laws like Arizona's aren't going to fix that.
We need a new national economic strategy for a global economy that focuses on creating good jobs and making trade fair, not just "free." But part of that strategy must be comprehensive immigration reform that brings workers out of the shadow economy, provides a path to legalization for hard-working, tax-paying immigrants, determines society's genuine need for more immigrants so corporations who just want cheap labor aren't calling all the shots and extends legal protections -- including the freedom to form unions and to be paid fair wages -- to every person employed in this country.
That will get us much closer to a healthy economy than calling names ever will.
Paul Loeb: Worker's Rights: Your Best Ally Is Probably Sitting Next To You ('Soul Of A Citizen')
Whatever our situation, we need allies to work successfully for change. We need people to talk with, brainstorm ideas, lift us up when we're down, and build power by acting together. Many of us involve ourselves in local and national political issues, but what about our workplaces?
Its the fact that their not paying taxes for our schools, hospitals, roads, etc - and that their sending their earnings back to their country. Yet their overfilling the schools and hospitals, driving on the roads (most of the time illegally) - and most importantly STEALING other IDENTITIES and Social Security numbers to fake their legality. This needs to stop.
You cannot compare the times of our ancestors with today, it makes no sense. No one has a problem with LEGAL immigrants, we're all immigrants - It's the ILLEGAL ones.
Arizona is doing the right thing! They're doing something about it - a lot of people are saying it's against their rights, but THEY HAVE NO RIGHTS, THEIR NOT LEGAL!
I'd like to see you go into another country and try to do the same thing - They'll ask you for your papers or permit to work. America needs to stop allowing this to happen. They need to tighten ship.
Illegals are not the cause of this country's problems, but they are emblematic of America's limp resolve to attack any problem for fear of appearing racist, as with Mexicans, or anti-Islamic, as with terrorists. America has a right to border security and defense against its enemies.
I see that most pro-illegals think it is WRONG for illegals to be arrested for driving without a license, insurance, or car registration and having no ID on them. They don't even go to the trouble of getting a passport before illegally entering the US. There is a GOOD reason for that, so that if they are caught, they can use false names and ID to avoid prosecution. So they are mostly typical crooks. They are only law abiding when the laws don't conflict with their desires. If they don't like the law, they feel no need to obey it. THAT is NOT a law abiding citizen of any kind.
Under existing legislation it is the well established right of states to concurrenly enforce federal immigration statutes, and thia has been tested to the highest level of the country's courts . SB1070 merely reiterates this right and makes it a law at state level to do so.
As for NAFTA it is only one of many trade agreements that hurt our manufacturing and agribusiness sectors. Before that was granting most favored nation status to China.
I understand why people from Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean come here. Their countries do not offer the same economic opportunities. What's troubling is our porous borders and lax enforcement provide them a safety valve but also keep them from reforming what's wrong.
I'm for reform and amnesty and mandating wages and benefits are the same regardless of citizenship. Unfortunately I don't think Democrats are any different than Republicans; they both support policies that offshore jobs or drive down wages.
The reason for the depressed wages, is more due to the following factors: CEO and executives taking a larger piece of the pie, supply and demand that increased supply of labor through outsourcing to other countries, technological advances which made many jobs obsolete, competition for jobs with 3rd world nations with lower standards of living, the power of unions and collective bargaining being lessened, the "supply side" economic theory's long term consequences, and many more, immigration is but one small factor. It's the combination of ALL these factors, which led to our current situation.
Where is all the mention of the "rich elite" in our country who have become citizens that now have brought their families here, bought, because they can, their "citizenship." Guess what - they have no income, they've never paid into our system, and they are collecting medicaid and social security.
#2 - most of the "illegal aliens" are here on expired visas. Those people come here with work or student visas and never go home. And they never become "legal" citizens - who knows why - maybe the cost, maybe the fear of not passing the tests, etc....
Where's all the hoopla about them. Oh yeah, that's right, they are some form of "white", not brown and uneducated.
There's a reason you see these laborers gathering in most every town - they will do what others won't - and for less.
There's also a reason you don't see local young and not-so-young people standing there with them - even knowing that folks would hire them first because they are legal, local, and speak the language.
It's because they can't compete with folks who truly burn to make better lives for themselves through hard work...
you need to finish the sentence with "at the price employers are willing to pay"
Offer $30 bucks an hour and watch people line up.
As long as there are day labors willing to work for less and off the books, there will be downward pressure on wages for the legitimately employed worker
If you say you wouldn't - either you are a liar, a coward, or you don't love your family nearly as much as you let folks believe.
There is much about immigration that needs to be addressed - but demonizing those but for the grace of God could be you isn't one of them...
Good post.
I have very mixed feelings on this issue, on one hand I have sympathy for a poor person trying to make a better life for himself and his family. Found in the desperate straits many of these folks find themselves in, I most likely would do the same.
However, we are a nation of laws, and to enter the country illegally when there are legal methods of doing so, shows a basic disrespect for the laws of our country, laws that are far less draconian than Mexico's. Plus it does represent a security risk as well
I doubt you would find anyone but the most bigotted that is against legal immigration, however it is the illegal part most people have a problem with, and I fear Mr Trumka, with whom I most always agree with, has fallen into the MSM trap of blurring the distinction between legal and illegal immigration.
However reforming immigration laws treats the symptom, it does little to cure the disease - which is as stated is bad economic and trade policy on both sides of the border.
Mexico needs to use its tremendous wealth of resources, arable land, tourism, mfg to make right for their own people, and we need to stop our reckless offshoring of inudstry
In the other side, the american companies look for lowing operatinal costs, so they hire services in foreign countries, that before were services performed by american people.
We cannot forget the issue that some economic interest have driven entire countries form a good position to the worst caos in the name of "freedom", as we have so many examples all aroun the world. And in my humble oppinion, is the main couse of inmigration.