Dirty And Dangerous Jobs That No One Else Will Take
Whenever Wonks Anonymous gets into a discussion of illegal immigration he is sure to hear this phrase and whenever he hears this phrase he is called back to his days as a graduate student in Labor Economics. He hopes that this trip down memory lane will provide some illumination to the discussion of the impact of immigration on labor in the US. Everybody "knows" that immigrants take jobs that US citizens are too proud or finicky to take, like jobs in meatpacking or seasonal jobs harvesting crops. Wonks Anonymous remembers a time when this was not true.
In our labor classes we had some discussion of worker buyouts. This is a situation where the workers in a company that was about to close would try to pool their savings, reform their work rules, make investments and make a go at running the company on their own behalf. One of these attempted buyouts happened in the upper midwest, maybe Iowa, in, of all places, a pork packing plant.
Now why would US citizens risk their nest eggs to save jobs that they were too proud and finicky to take? Well, back then, in the late 1970's, these jobs weren't all that bad. They were highly paid union jobs with benefits, safety rules and some security. Of course that did not last. The plant closure was a part of a larger industrial restructuring which moved the industry south to "right to work" states and discovered the utility of immigrant labor in keeping wages down.
In our classes we also talked about the situation of the farm workers in the Salinas Valley. At the time these folks were represented by the United Farm Workers. One of the major worries of some families was that their kids would be attracted to lettuce harvesting by the high union pay and neglect their educations. Some families got their kids jobs picking strawberries just to sour them on farm work.
Things change and here the main thing that was changing was the introduction of new immigrant labor, mainly through a complex system of labor contracting that left the farmers clear of any adverse consequences. As above we now have no union and no desire by citizens to take up the dirtier, more dangerous and lower paid work.
Wonks Anonymous would like to propose that no legal and morally acceptable occupation is too dirty or dangerous or whatever for most people. All that is needed to get people to take a job is to offer the right package of wages, benefits and respect. The problem with most of the jobs we are talking about is that wages are too low and workers are not treated with respect.
One of the major reasons that employers can get away with this is that they can always find immigrants to whom the wages that they offer seem like a fortune and for whom the working conditions that they impose seem like paradise. This is a simple truth that liberals would do well to acknowledge. Management has used immigration as a tool to worsen the situation of labor in the US. This has inevitably lead to serious resentments among citizens who have lost income and status as a result.
The solution to this problem is another matter and Wonks Anonymous does not believe that closing the borders and deporting them all is either feasible or particularly humane. Depriving illegal immigrants of rights and public services is even worse. This is matter for another post. In the meantime I would like those on the left to consider what if would feel like to publicly acknowledge that immigration was causing serious problems for US workers and ask themselves what they might do to mitigate these problems. It might even win over a few Republicans.
Re: "Dirty And Dangerous Jobs That No One Else Will Take." I completely agree with your analysis, but I think you've left out an important component. I'd like to hear your thoughts on how NAFTA, CAFTA, and just general exploitation by the US of smaller economies - and here I'm thinking primarily of Mexico and the Central American countries, has impacted immigration.
After working 20 years with the Latino (primarily Mexican) community, I can say with some authority that the vast majority of immigrants come here not because they're anxious to leave home, family, and country but because life in their home country has become untenable. They come here to survive.
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Wonks Anonymous supported NAFTA when it was originally passed because it seemed to be a good idea at the time. I, and most other practicing conventional economists thought that it would at least improve life and working conditions in Mexico. I was quite wrong and I remain puzzled. The theory seemed unassailable and I have yet to come up with a precise explanation of how this happened. That is an explanation other than "corporations always win" which is not entirely satisfactory to the wonk in me.
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Just a couple of thoughts to add:
Where, in all the laws, rules, and regulations is it written we have a God-given right to cheap food...food so cheap that almost anyone can overeat to the point of morbid obesity and the point that nearly everyone participates in immoral waste? Why should food be so cheap that almost no one bothers to produce even the simplest natural foods on their own?
Cheap food may be a valuable trading tool for us as a nation, but food's cheapness, if you will, should not be at the expense of those who labor at the most difficult tasks involved in our food chain.
In our latter-day rush to de-unionize we have opted to remunerate those from the pea-pickers to the shelf stockers at rates even high schoolers turn their collective noses up at. As a percentage of our earnings, we pay the least and get the most for our food dollars. We can afford to pay more if the increase goes to those deserving it the most.
Those who have left their home countries and entered ours illegally should be either strongly encouraged or forced to return to their respective countries to deal with the problems that cause their countries to be unlivable. Running away from that responsibility only allows those who wreck their home countries to do so even more. Their future revolution should not be our problem.
In their quest for even greater profits, many industries have artificially held down prices to their customers causing downward pressure on the wages of that industry. There has been pressure to allow foreigners of all stripes into this country to fill jobs in the trucking industry, jobs that were once well paid positions.
For a decade or more trucking companies have struggled to fill the seats of their trucks with qualified drivers. Many companies experienced 100%, 200%, even 300% turnover each year, as demands on the drivers increased and rates of pay stagnated or decreased. With fewer companies to choose from, larger companies were emboldened to keep pay rates low. To feed the dragon they had produced, freight rates were kept artificially low. "Backhaul" rates, a device to get a truck to an area where better paying loads are plentiful, often covered fuel costs. These rates became the norm forcing thousands of independent drivers off the road and company drivers in search of an employer paying a better rate.
Due to all this turmoil, companies found that drivers were not willing to spend weeks away from home for substandard pay. A contrived "shortage" of drivers arose causing the bigger companies, those large enough to get the ear of our labor department, pushed for programs to bring drivers from eastern Europe and later to allow drivers from south of the border to drive in this country.
A few years ago I happened to have direct contact with an foreign driver lost in my area. He understood little and spoke even less.
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contintued:
The whole situation was not due to a shortage of qualified people, but a shortage of people willing to live like a gypsy at $600 a week.
We should welcome outsiders with open arms…but only when we need them and only when they apply legally…and at no other time.
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