06/06/2006
On Saturday The New York Times carried an Op-ed piece on the impact of flooding the country with low-skilled immigrant labor [The Worker Next Door, By Barry R. Chiswick,June 3, 2006]The essay essentially says that this labor supply is not necessary, that without it other ways of handing the work would be found, and that the effect of having the supply is to redistribute income from low-skilled to high-income families.
Put simply, there are no low-skilled jobs that American workers would not and do not do…Over the past two decades the number of low-skilled workers in the United States has increased because of immigration…This increase in low-skilled workers has contributed to the stagnation of wages for all such workers. The proposed "earned legalization" (amnesty) and guest worker programs would allow still more low-skilled workers into the country, further lowering their collective wages…In short, the continued increase in the flow of unskilled workers into the United States is the economic and moral equivalent of a regressive tax.
The news here, of course is not the content of the column. As VDARE.com readers well know, it has been said before, notably in April in a fine column in the Fort Collins, Co. newspaper and again in a piece by Portland’s KATU station, featuring a local economist:
“You have to recognize the flexibility of the economy based on relative wages. Producers change the way they produce things. If there’s a large amount of low skilled labor available, then they tend to change the production process to make use of that.”
The news is that the national newspaper of record finally feels this is a concept it cannot keep from its readers any longer. Even if they have to use an academic from a University none of the editorial page would want their own children to attend (notwithstanding the fact the education there would probably be better than at the fashionable East Coast destinations).
Steve Sailer wrote yesterday of the determination shown by the elite MSM to manage the immigration discussion to the conclusion they want. Given the craven PC character of the colleges these people favor, it is not surprising they had to look elsewhere for a writer.
But they had better beware. The boondocks are ahead of them — and they are angry.
This is a content archive of VDARE.com, which Letitia James forced off of the Internet using lawfare.