If, as they say, politics makes for strange bedfellows, then immigration politics in today's America makes for absolutely bizarre bedfellows.
Business and agriculture rarely have anything useful to say about unionization and the labor movement. Conversely, labor leaders routinely disparage employers, whether in business or agriculture, for their views on wages, benefits, and employee working conditions. And religious leaders frequently shun involvement in such earthly matters, preferring instead to focus on the moral health of their flock and the nation as a whole.
And yet despite these profound differences, a loose coalition of representatives from business, agriculture, labor, and religious organizations have come together to press for "comprehensive immigration reform" with the administration and with leaders in both houses of Congress.
As these representatives envision it, such reform would take at least three prongs: first, they endorse a broad-based amnesty of the plus-or-minus 11 million aliens illegally in the country; second, they endorse a guestworker program of substantial size for unskilled workers; and third, they endorse a variety of programs that would open the doors to admit large numbers of foreign workers in information technology and certain other skilled professions. Consider:
- In September 2012, a "Who's Who" of business and industry sent a letter, sponsored by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, urging members of Congress to pass the "STEM Jobs Act of 2012", which failed as a separate piece of legislation, but is likely to get wrapped back into a larger immigration bill, if/when one is introduced.
- In January of this year, a group of agricultural associations formed the Agriculture Workforce Coalition (AWC) to lobby for including in any immigration reform bill generous provisions to bring in thousands of migrants to work in America's fields, farms, and orchards.
- The AFL-CIO and other major labor unions such as the SEIU (Service Employees International Union) have endorsed amnesty, and are prime movers in crafting the outlines of a guestworker program that would swell the ranks of unskilled laborers admitted to work in a number of service and other industries, for instance, as housekeepers, janitors, etc.
- The Catholic Church, the Church of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons), and the Southern Baptist Convention have all endorsed pro-amnesty proposals.
Cumulatively, if all of the needs/wants/desires of these groups were met — both by amnesty and a variety of guestworker and other employment visa programs — this would amount to granting green cards to millions of illegal aliens, on top of which tens, possibly hundreds, of thousands more aliens would be admitted per year than current levels, which are already extraordinarily high.
So what's going on here? How could organizations with such disparate and often conflicting aims and philosophies come to spend the night together (so to speak, if I might irreverently stretch the "bedfellows" analogy a bit further) on this issue of big immigration numbers? Has some kind of divine enlightenment descended, or have we finally achieved here in America a Rousseau-like earthly paradise where the lions rest with the lambs and everyone strives in favor of the common good?
Call me jaded, but, well, probably not. No, instead, using the principle of Occam's Razor, I conclude that for each of these groups, it's just the same old case of looking out for one's own vested interests.
Organized agriculture and farm associations make much about their incapacity to find workers to bring in the crops, asserting that Americans won't do the jobs that migrant (usually illegal) workers do, but let's face it: Big agriculture is as addicted to cheap migrant labor as tweakers are to crystal meth. Agricultural associations don't want to change their practices in any fundamental way, ergo their keen interest in migrant worker programs that keep the flow going — provided, of course, that the wages stay low and working condition requirements attached to guestworker programs aren't onerous, because investing in the health and safety of these workers would cost money.
A similar situation exists with many big businesses, particularly those involved in the construction and service industries. (Just one example: A recent report co-sponsored by a pro-migrant group and the University of Texas found that fully half of construction laborers in Texas are illegal aliens.) They too are interested in ensuring a continuing flow of workers willing to work long hours in substandard or risky conditions and who are also willing to be paid either under the table or at minimum wage levels, without collateral investment in costly health and other employee benefits.
The high-tech industries, too, want a piece of the action — although they fancy themselves much too sophisticated to speak in terms of "guestworkers". Instead, they look for cheap substitutes willing to work on temporary visas who, though paid much more than minimum wage, are still a bargain, compared to the alternative: industry having to invest in the cultivation, development, and recruitment of talented and well-educated Americans competent to seek jobs in information technology.
Labor unions also have their own selfish interests in mind. Union participation in this country is at an all-time low. With low membership, dues slow to a trickle, and without funds to liberally distribute to pliable politicians at all levels of government, the unions lose their power. What better way to change their fate than with an influx of new, vulnerable workers who want and, truthfully, sometimes desperately need someone to look out for their interests when they know their employers aren't and won't?
And then there is organized religion. Like labor unions, church membership in America has significantly dwindled; we are fast becoming a secular nation. A massive amnesty gives churches a vast new population among whom they can proselytize and convert — without the costly and messy inconvenience (not to mention risk and hardship) of having to send out missionaries to far-flung countries. And, like with unions, more members mean more money by means of donations and tithing, not to mention power and influence. It neatly brings the mountain to Mohammed.
The problem in every one of these scenarios, though, is that because they are calculated solely to the interests of the associations and organizations, they cater to the lowest common denominator, not the common good. The programs each group pushes are for workers of a vulnerable underclass. But this signals a stunning misunderstanding by business, agricultural, labor, church, and yes, even political leaders about how immigration works. Inevitably, the individuals who constitute the population such programs target will find ways into the system on a permanent basis. When they do, they are no longer vulnerable. Their willingness to put up with substandard pay and working conditions evaporates, they leave for better jobs, and their interest in union membership wanes and even if they remain religious, their upwardly mobile and more-assimilated children are likely to be as secular as their native-born youthful counterparts.
What happens then? The cycle starts all over, and the hue and cry for "meaningful" immigration reform begins again — at least, until such time as the American people stand up and say, "enough".
Why not now? ¡Ya basta!
Legitimate immigration reform will only take place after there is a recognition that legislation cannot be crafted to cater to special interests of any kind, and that it must be done with the national interest in mind. Cyclical charades of the kind we are seeing now simply kick the can down the road, leaving our children to grapple with the intractable problems we bequeath them. Will one of them be continued uncontrolled immigration?
