Immigration by the Numbers

NumbersUSA has a really good video called Immigration by the Numbers that gives a very good sizing perspective of the impact of our current immigration rates in this country. I highly recommend it.

Foreign workers take jobs away from skilled Americans

Gene Nelson has an interesting article on jobs and foreign workers.

The Best Thing Since The Invention of Vitamins

Rob Sanchez over at Job Destruction just mailed out this newsletter. Not only is cheap labor good for companies, its absolutely fabulous for workers. Therefore we really should be bringing in billions of workers and let the riches flow!


"There is no job that is America's God-given right anymore."
Carly Fiorina, CEO of Hewlett-Packard (HP). January 7, 2004


In March of this year the National Foundation for American Policy (NFAP) concluded that every H-1B that comes into the USA creates seven jobs for Americans. Not long after that Bill Gates testified before Congress with a slightly more modest estimate that every H-1B creates four jobs for Americans.

McCain just topped both them -- he said that every H-1B creates ten jobs for Americans!

Even assuming McCain, Bill Gates, and the NFAP were right, why can't the same number of jobs be created by hiring an American instead? Hiring a U.S.
worker should create at least as many jobs as an H-1B -- plus one more.

McCain said that the Department of Labor should determine how many H-1Bs are to be issued instead of having a yearly cap. Bad idea! McCain would probably appoint his campaign chairwoman Carly Fiorina to replace Secretary of Labor Elain Chao. BLECH!

The Five Percent

This blog is dedicated to fighting the offshoring of jobs to other countries and the outsourcing of jobs to non-immigrant visa holders (those non-citizen, non-resident workers who come here primarily to get a job).

You would think that workers here, who pay a heavy price in lost jobs and depressed wages, would be very interested in this topic. Some might monitor email lists or groups, occasionally adding their 2-cents. Others might become full blown activists, say starting blogs, websites, or even joining groups.

The sad truth is that there is only about a 5% response rate to solicitations. That is, if I send out an email or flyer or whatever, talking about this issue, less than 5% will respond. That pitiful amount is further fractured among the spectrum of participation.

Why isn't this 50%? Does anyone care about their future (or their childrens')?

Cornyn Sells Out Workers Again

Senator John Cornyn aka Cornhead is selling out workers again by sponsoring three different bills to increase the number of H1-B visas in the US. I'm going to have to go research Rick Noriega to see if he has any sane position on this.

Mexico Shaping US Immigration Policy

Mexico's President Calderon . . .
Is Still Trying to Shape U.S Immigration Policy

Having just completed a 7-city tour of the U.S. in late February to promote amnesty plans by pressuring elected officials in the U.S., he’s back again, meeting with leaders of immigrant groups and more U.S. officials trying to influence U.S. laws and immigration policy in favor of illegal aliens.

This is of course a follow-on from Vicente Fox's efforts. See the article on FAIR (fairus.org)

We must be dumb as rocks

Microsoft has apparently begun arguing that having American citizens and legal residents lose their jobs due to displacement by labor imported via visas is good for us - so good that it creates more jobs that it takes!

This is an incredible statement. Bill must think that we are dumb as rocks to believe that one. There isn't a shred of evidence that this is true and there is a lot of evidence that there is nothing but a net job loss for Americans. Following this logic, we only need to import maybe another 200,000 foreigners to take jobs, then the resulting jobs explosion will employ everyone (trading engineering jobs for MacDonalds at best).

See an article on this at the Job Destruction Newsletter.

Way to go, Bill. Way to show thankfulness to the economy and workers that made you the richest person in the world. I bet your Democratic parents are proud of you.

Reasons why the H-1B visa cap will increase

1. H-1B opponents have no clout
2. The Gates effect
3. There is grass root support for the H-1B visa
4. The H-1B lottery is a big problem for tech firms
5. Congressional support for visa

The above five reasons come from Patrick Thibodou here.

1. Congress won't see through Bill Gates' misleading testimony.
2. Congress doesn't want to know these truths anyway, as they don't want to jeopardize the lavish campaign contributions Congress receives from the tech industry.
3. The Programmers Guild and many other critics of the H-1B program are diluting whatever influence they have (which Thibodeau correctly points out is limited compared to the huge clout wielded by the tech industry) by focusing on the second-sourcing issue (in which a firm hires H-1Bs and then rents them out to other firms).

The remainder come from Professor Norm Matloff here.

The Welch Way

Re: The Welch Way – Immigration: A Reality Check of Feb 14, 2008

Mr. Welch, also known as the ¾ billion-dollar-man, has a lot of nerve trying to dictate what reality is and how we workers should accept illegal immigration. He lives behind gated community; his children attend only the best schools; he lives in the top of the upper crust of society. He makes no personal sacrifice on the issue of illegal immigration. It costs him no job, it does not adversely affect his wages, it has no impact on whether he can afford health insurance.

Mr. Welch is so far from the reality that we all face daily, he really is on another planet. The thought of this tycoon of industry lecturing to workers is absurd. Go back to your country club, Mr. Welch, and discuss leveraged buyouts and PE ratios with your buddies.

(name withheld)
Austin, TX

The McCain Hoodwink

The Washington Post/ABC News poll this weekend asked likely Republican voters which candidate, "regardless of who you may support," do you "trust most to handle immigration issues." The answer will shock you:

47% McCain
22% Romney
10% Huckabee
5% Paul

This is incredible. Mr. McCain has pushed hard for legalizing all illegal immigrants in the US. He was the primary sponsor of the McCain-Kennedy Act to achieve this. If voters do not wise up, he will have pulled off the biggest hoodwink in recent memory.

They Lied!

During the comprehensive immigration reform battle, the pro-immigration side said that there were only 12 million illegals in the country, trying to keep from alarming those in the center.

Now the truth comes out that there are more like 37.5M.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070912/ap_on_go_ot/census_demographics

The number of immigrants nationwide reached an all-time high of 37.5 million in 2006, affecting incomes and education levels in many cities across the country. But the effects have not been uniform.

We feel your pain -- but not too much

As Norm Matloff says, the depression of salaries shows there is no shortage of technical workers as the industry shills claim there is -- it is all just a sham. Here the collaborators in the sham admit so much for all to see. Does their arrogance mean that they don't fear any repercussion? Have things gone that far? Or is confession good for the soul even for these shameless destroyers?


http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=56744

excerpt:

"The cover article in the current issue of the Council on Foreign Relations magazine Foreign Affairs asserts globalism has harmed even well-educated workers in the U.S., creating a gap between the "haves" and "have-nots" greater than any time since the 1920s.

......

Scheve and Slaughter argue that under the globalization policies pursued by the Bush administration from 2000 to 2005, "Even college graduates and workers with nonprofessional master's degrees saw their mean real money earnings decline."

They conclude average earnings for 96.6 percent of all U.S. workers fell between 2000 and 2005, due largely to globalism."

Let Them Be Bathed

This is a press release from Elaine Chao, our illustrious Secretary of Labor. Its a public showing of contempt for resident workers. Long ago, this would have gotten someone run out of office. Of course, long ago, this would not have been merely passed off to the public - a real reporter would have been all over this. See what you think...

New York, June 28 – Foreign workers may be taking over jobs in the U.S. — not because they’re willing to work for less, but because they have better workplace skills and discipline. According to this Sunday’s Intelligence Report column in PARADE magazine, that’s the message Labor Secretary Elaine Chao hears from U.S. executives who are worried about America’s competitive edge. While job losses have been relatively low thus far — one study estimates that only 280,000 jobs out of 115 million in the service industry are outsourced each year – that could change. U.S. employers say that many workers abroad simply have a better attitude toward work. “ American employees must be punctual, dress appropriately and have good personal hygiene,” says Chao. “They need anger-management and conflict-resolution skills, and they have to be able to accept direction. Too many young people bristle when a supervisor asks them to do something.”

As for our economic future, Chao notes that most of the fastest growing fields today require advanced skills and are “very high or high wage.” To learn what jobs are hot and how you can get retrained in the changing economy, go to Parade.com.

Jobs Americans Won't Do

Well the tidal wave of criticism against Bush and his pro-immigration, anti-american worker policies has hit. The Cohen & Grigsby video got pulled by an embarrased set of attourneys, but not before two Congressman got ahold of it and started the questions.

In the spirit of piling on, I'd like to list the "jobs that Americans won't do", you know, the ones that are outsourced and heavily insourced...

Financial Advisor
Legal analyst
Programmer
Engineer
Research lawyer
Radiologist
Architect
...

Construction worker
Nurse
Teacher
Waiter
Soldier
...

Of course, reality is that there are no jobs Americans won't do. There are just a lot of jobs that employers refuse to pay enough money to attract resident workers.

Its About Cheap Labor, Stupid

The cheap labor lobby and immigration lawyers are usually very, very careful to not actually say that "its about cheap labor." Every once-in-a-while, they slip up. Here is a quote from a video at a recent conference that reveals all:

And our goal is clearly not to find a qualified and interested U.S. worker. And you know in a sense that sounds funny, but it's what we're # trying to do here. We are complying with the law fully, but ah, our objective is to get this person a green card, and get through the labor certification process. So certainly we are not going to try to find a place [at which to advertise the job] where the applicants are the most numerous. We're going to try to find a place where we can comply with the law, and hoping, and likely, not to find qualified and interested worker applicants.

Thanks to Rob Sanchez for finding this and Norm Matloff for notifying us.

A Very Rare Moment of Honesty

Vivek Wadhwa of Duke University was interviewed on Morning Edition today (4/30/07).

He says that the "US is far ahead by any milestone" when asked about the quality of U.S. engineering graduates versus those from India and China.

In a not-so-indirect way, he thus acknowledges that behind the scenes company executives admit that Americans are the more capable workers (just too expensive), that H-1B visa is all about cheap labor, that companies like Microsoft are definitely gaming the system with their claims of worker shortages.

He says that "outsourcing R&D jobs is not good for the USA".

In closing, when asked "if you were a tech entrepreneur (starting up a new company), what would you do differently?" , he indicated he would act in his company's best interest and get the cheapest labor at the best quality (i.e., he would offshore jobs).

Quote:
"That's capitalism - the system rewards you for doing what's in your own interest. Bill Gates
interests as chairman of M$ are different than Bill Gates' interests as a philanthropist. He doesn't get paid to worry about US competitiveness and to worry about social issues as the chairman of M$".

(posted for AmericanProgrammer)

Strange Bedfellows

As I have stated in a previous posting, not too long ago, I considered myself a liberal Democrat. My times have changed. Below is a citation of an article by Phyllis Schlafly. Now in my previous life, I considered her to the right of Atilla The Hun and would be embarassed to share anything in common with her. Now all I can say is that her article hits the issue dead on - I couldn't agree with her more. The political landscape is changing. Neither the Republicans or Democrats have a clue...

Tech Industry Has Ulterior Motive Regarding H-1B Visas
by Phyllis Schlafly
Posted Dec 18, 2006

The technology industry has dispatched its fat-wallet lobbyists to demand that the new Congress vastly increase the number of foreign computer software techies and engineers who can be imported on H-1B visas. This demand is based on the claim that we suffer a labor shortage in those fields, but that's a bare-faced lie to erect a smoke screen around the real reasons.

(follow link above for complete article)

Shame On You, NPR

Date : 5/24/2007 10:03:49 AM

Dear NPR,

A few minutes ago, I heard a piece on the "immigration reform" going on in Congress. You gave the ITAA, which represents most of the large corporations, a lot of airtime, giving their usual spin about "industry shortages". Anyone who spends at least a little time researching this subject is well aware of the "shortage shouting" that has occurred over the decade (yes, I said decade).

I am forced to conclude that you have either not done your homework, that you consider the corporate point-of-view as the be-all of the issue, or that you cant be bothered interviewing anyone on the other side of the issue, like Professor Norm Matloff, who might give your listeners something closer to the truth on the issue.

When the Republicans had control of Congress, the threatened to cut the funding to NPR. I was very vocal in defending you. Next time I think Ill just tell them to "go ahead and cut because itd make things better for everyone."

Very Disappointed,

Disgusted in Austin

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

NPR Services responds:

Thank you for contacting NPR's Morning Edition.We regret that our programming has not met your expectations. We strive to offer the highest quality of news and information available. Listener feedback helps us to accomplish this goal. We welcome praise, as well as criticism, and your thoughts will be taken into consideration. Thank you for listening to Morning Edition, and for your continued support of public broadcasting.

Hillary's Great Sellout

Until about three years ago, I was a Liberal Democrat. But that was before the Great Awakening. Now I consider myself an independent progressive. I cannot stand what the Republican party has become. I am repulsed by much of the Democratic party's stance on issues.

To wit: look at Hillary Clinton's stance on visas and offshoring. She recently announced her "innovation agenda," which is an industry buzzword for strongly supporting the industry's stance of "the more visas the better." Her adament support of companies like Tata Consulting is established, but thanks to an indiffernt press, not publicized much. Norm Matloff has written extensively about this.

I used to cheer for Hillary, when Bill was in the Whitehouse. Now she turns my stomach. If she is the Democratic candidate, then I'm staying home on election day.

The Big Green Light

So, lets say that this illegal immigration reform passes in some version like what is proposed. What will be the net effect on those currently outside our country? If you believe Bush, it will increase security. If you use common sense, you'll see that the spigot will get turned on just that much more, as it will be a huge encouragement for those people to come here. After all, the worst that could happen is they could get a visa and the best is they could get citizenship.