Illegal Immigration and Low Wage Labor

In recent years, ripening crops regularly are accompanied by stories suggesting we need illegal immigrant labor to bring in the harvest. [snip] Visions of crops rotting in the fields make for vivid journalism. But in September, 2007 a Congressional Research Service (CRS) Report for Congress entitled "Farm Labor Shortages and Immigration Policy," found little cause to worry about crops ripening and spoiling, stating that,

"Trends in the agricultural labor market do not suggest the existence of a nationwide shortage of domestically available farm workers..."

A 2007 study written by Philip Martin, a professor of agricultural and resource economics at the University of California, Davis, for the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) entitled "Farm Labor shortages: How Real? What Response" further substantiated the conclusions of the CRS Report.

A March 2006 CIS study of the top 22 occupations in 2005 indicated that in no occupational category did immigrant employees outnumber native employees. In other words, native-born U.S. workers are already doing all jobs - and in majority numbers - where high concentrations of illegal immigrant are also employed.

Here's one example of that wage-leveraging impact from the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR):

"In Los Angeles, unionized black janitors had been earning $12 an hour, with benefits. But with the advent of subcontractors who compose roaming crews of Mexican and El Salvadoran laborers, the pay dropped to $3.35 per hour. "

The myth only approaches truth if amended to read: Illegal immigrants accept jobs that American workers won't do for poverty level wages and no benefits (including healthcare).

[remember: whenever we're told about jobs Americans won't do it's a lie; Americans hold the majority of all jobs - and that despite the above referenced wage-suppression. What say we exclude illegals {as you'd think the name would require} with prohibitive consequences employers who knowingly hire them, and let market forces re-level to natural levels?]

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