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Talking Points on Immigration Policy
Principles for an Immigration Policy to Strengthen and Expand the American Middle Class: 2009 Edition
DMI’s new paper reveals that the American middle class relies on the economic contributions of immigrants, both authorized and undocumented, but also that the exploitation of undocumented immigrant workers threatens to drive down labor standards for current and aspiring middle-class workers.
These findings have clear implications for the major immigration policy decisions Congress will be weighing in the coming months:
• Immigration reform is necessary. Current immigration policy fails the middle class because it is disconnected from our nation’s economic reliance on undocumented immigrants, and threatens to undermine the middle class because undocumented workers cannot exercise workplace rights.
• Earned legalization for current undocumented immigrants is an effective way to both maximize immigrants’ economic contributions and prevent the workplace exploitation that makes it harder for American workers to earn a middle-class standard of living. It must enable hard-working immigrants to gain legal status relatively swiftly and without excessive barriers, or it will not succeed in absorbing the nation’s existing underground labor force.
• Establishing new guest worker programs would undermine the nation’s current and aspiring middle class by institutionalizing a permanent two-tiered labor market. The more jobs that can be transformed into “guest worker jobs,” the fewer domestic jobs will provide the wages and benefits capable of supporting a middle-class standard of living. As the economy begins to grow again and demand for immigrant labor resumes, these workers and their families should be granted legal permanent residency, not contingent, temporary status.
• Increased enforcement of the nation’s current, flawed immigration laws endangers the middle class by both reducing immigrants’ economic contributions and driving undocumented immigrants further underground, where they become still more vulnerable to exploitation. Current enforcement-only proposals are ineffective and costly to middle-class taxpayers. Better enforcement must wait until better immigration law can actually be enforced.
Read Talking Points on Immigration Policy in its entirety
Principles for an Immigration Policy to Strengthen and Expand the American Middle Class: 2009 Edition
DMI’s new paper reveals that the American middle class relies on the economic contributions of immigrants, both authorized and undocumented, but also that the exploitation of undocumented immigrant workers threatens to drive down labor standards for current and aspiring middle-class workers.
These findings have clear implications for the major immigration policy decisions Congress will be weighing in the coming months:
• Immigration reform is necessary. Current immigration policy fails the middle class because it is disconnected from our nation’s economic reliance on undocumented immigrants, and threatens to undermine the middle class because undocumented workers cannot exercise workplace rights.
• Earned legalization for current undocumented immigrants is an effective way to both maximize immigrants’ economic contributions and prevent the workplace exploitation that makes it harder for American workers to earn a middle-class standard of living. It must enable hard-working immigrants to gain legal status relatively swiftly and without excessive barriers, or it will not succeed in absorbing the nation’s existing underground labor force.
• Establishing new guest worker programs would undermine the nation’s current and aspiring middle class by institutionalizing a permanent two-tiered labor market. The more jobs that can be transformed into “guest worker jobs,” the fewer domestic jobs will provide the wages and benefits capable of supporting a middle-class standard of living. As the economy begins to grow again and demand for immigrant labor resumes, these workers and their families should be granted legal permanent residency, not contingent, temporary status.
• Increased enforcement of the nation’s current, flawed immigration laws endangers the middle class by both reducing immigrants’ economic contributions and driving undocumented immigrants further underground, where they become still more vulnerable to exploitation. Current enforcement-only proposals are ineffective and costly to middle-class taxpayers. Better enforcement must wait until better immigration law can actually be enforced.
Read Talking Points on Immigration Policy in its entirety